Is work working?

Call me old fashioned - and you would perhaps be right in many ways. But then nostalgia is not what it used to be. And it never was really.

You see I always thought that work was work - an ability to earn money, stand on your own two feet; pay for what you and your family needs and out of that income a small amount is taken in the form of tax by the government in order to pay for services that require a bigger scale of funding, like the machinery of government, defence of the realm or the NHS; as well as to provide a safety net for those who are unfortunate enough not to have any work (ideally for a short period) or who cannot work for other reasons such as disability.

I also thought that welfare or 'benefits' were provided as I have described, as a safety net for people who are unemployed or disabled and therefore need a helping hand from their fellow citizens in our civilised society. And to declare my interests in this subject, I am currently unemployed but not claiming benefits and have a (registered) disabled daughter.

To 'old fashioned' me, the above seems to be a fair and equitable approach to creating a system that rewards work - so that those who do work are better off than those who don't, but ensures that those who can't find work are looked after and can live relatively comfortably in terms of food and shelter and dignity, albeit - and importantly - without being able to enjoy some of the 'luxuries' that going out to work allows. In this way people who are out of work are encouraged to find work and better themselves in a way which is good for their families, the wider community, the country at large, and perhaps most importantly, for the unemployed individuals themselves.

Having a purpose in life, a reason to get up, get out, earn money and 'get on' is a difficult thing to measure accurately, but in terms of mental well-being, self esteem, motivation, purpose and simply, as a positive role model, encouraging your kids to have a positive work ethic, it must be a better thing than encouraging people 'not to bother', to retreat from society and the world.

If you fundamentally disagree with any of the above, thanks for getting this far. And goodbye and good luck.

Because, once, as a society, you get to the stage where most people who go out to work (but on on low incomes) are also receiving 'benefits' because they don't have a 'living wage', you have fundamentally lost the plot. And once you get to the stage where many (if not 'most' and I think it is getting very close to 'most') people on benefits who don't work would be worse off if they got a job, then you're in a downward spiral of absolute disaster if you want to be a successful, thriving, achieving, successful economy.

And that is where we are right now.

Subsidising private sector companies' wage bills because they don't pay a living wage is a socialist approach but it is just lining the pockets of the stingy employer by reducing his costs and increasing his profits. Are you sure that's a good socialist thing to be doing?

And making benefits an 'entitlement' something that people have a 'right' to get, as opposed to being grateful for the safety net afforded to them by people who do work and pay their taxes, is certain to create resentment, particularly if those who don't work seem to be as well off as those who do. That simply cannot be right in a fair society.

Current benefit levels are trapping people and families into years, decades, generations of worklessness. Where there is simply no incentive for them to go out and find work (I'm not saying finding work is easy by the way), because they would lose out financially if they got a job. That is just madness.

I know of some young people (teenage girls mainly) in my part of the world who view 'starting a family' as a career move. As a genuine alternative to staying at school, going on to college (university is a different world to them), or getting a job. Because it allows them to leave home at 15 or 16, get their own place and have a livable level of benefits income. And while you might view this as me being critical of them, I'm not. I'm on their side and I am horrified that this short-term trap, which looks very attractive to someone living in a difficult home environment and who wants to be 'grown up', but which effectively wastes them and their talents and efforts, probably forever.

We are, as a society, doing this to people in order to be as kind to them as we can. We're killing these young people with kindness. And we feel smug about it. We think we're doing the right thing. We're so not.

These kids have kids of their own and get a lifestyle, a home, an 'income', from which they will never emerge to achieve their potential, to better themselves or to make a contribution to society. And we seem to think that this is a good thing? In order to be better off, they would have to be earning more than £300 a week (net), just to have a couple of quid more in their pockets. And they don't need that extra couple of quid so why bother? And how many 15 year olds with no qualifications and a kid (at least one) in tow, do you know who are earning £20 grand a year?

So that's a massive issue in my opinion for our society to try to address and whilst IDS is tinkering and moving somewhat in the right direction, it's nowhere near enough to address the fundamental problem.

But even more important it seems to me, is the current madness of 'topping up' the wages of people who are working full-time, in the private sector. What is the point of having a minimum wage if it is not enough to live on? And what is enough to live on? Who decides? Does it include fags? Nights out? Holidays? Are these fundamentals of life or 'pleasures' that make working worth doing? People were outraged earlier this year when the figure of £53 a week to live on became a public issue. But that figure was after housing and energy and other living costs had been accounted for. It was effectively £53 a week for food. I don't want to detract from my overall point here, but I can, and often do, feed three people, healthily and well for £53 a week. More here.

And how does this play with people who go out to work? When they know that what they're doing is not enough for them to earn a living wage? Of course they will take the extra money thank you very much, but it must diminish their sense of worth, of value, of purpose. If you go out to work for 40-odd hours a week and need to be subsidised by the state, that's not really standing on your own two feet is it? And whilst this situation is probably not front and centre of their thinking on a day-to-day basis, these people who are working but being subsidised, are not making any net contribution to society. So what's the point? They're just surviving.

And what does this state subsidy really achieve? Does it redistribute wealth or just leave many (most?) people trapped in relative poverty? Does it incentivise endeavour, achievement, effort? Or undermine those values upon which our nation has been founded? Does 'topping up' wages really help the employee or the inefficient, perhaps insolvent employer in the long-term?

Is it a likely plan for making Britain 'Great' again on the world stage or more likely to see us meandering slowly but inexorably downhill towards a meaningless, desperate, state-funded, uncompetitive realm?

If working doesn't pay you enough to live on, it's not really work. It's 'benefits but with a little extra something to do along the way'. If someone employs you to do a job and that job does not give you enough to live on, it's not really a job. If an employer can get away with paying you so little that you need state benefits to make ends meet, his business is not viable. Or, perhaps more likely, he's taking the piss out of you, the tax-payer, the government and this crazy system.

This subsidy is just propping up crap businesses, propping up ridiculously high rents and house-prices. And the people who suffer - or perhaps 'pay' is a better term - are those who make enough from their jobs (lucky bastards you might suggest) to pay 40% of their incomes to subsidise these greedy, inefficient, otherwise bankrupt employers.

Figures are largely meaningless in terms of the amounts of money involved but we paid almost £42billion in 'in-work' benefits to people in 2011-12. That's eight times what we paid in unemployment benefits. Source here.

To prop up crap employers and perpetuate this 'client' or 'nanny' state. Are we completely mad?

I'm beginning to think that we are.

Thanks for reading.



   


 

Football really is about more than life and death

I don't tend to blog much about football, it's too important. I tend to stick with the mere life and death issues of politics and energy, climate change and the EU. It's much easier. Besides there are loads of really fantastic Arsenal blogs which I won't name here for fear of missing someone out. Suffice it to tell you that I am unworthy to touch the hem of the garment of the writers of these blogs. And that is not said sarcastically or facetiously but genuinely. There really is some great stuff out there.

Funny, tactically brilliant, often challenging; capturing the mood of most Arsenal fans on a daily basis.

But I did just want to make a very small contribution if I may?

The thing is, we're nearly back. It's been a while and we have been meandering, doing OK but not really contenders. But we're now quite close to being genuine contenders and that makes a massive difference to me. I am optimistic by nature (thank goodness) but Arsenal doing well - and more importantly to me, playing well - is a real boost, a breath of fresh air.

When I worked in the North East you could tell whether Newcastle United had won at the weekend by the attitude and productivity of the workforce in the shipyards. Genuinely and measurably. It had an effect that was worth more than wages - a strange phenomenon, but I promise you it was true.

When Coventry won the FA cup years ago, sq.ft office prices in the city went up significantly. Weird but true.

It's strange, but football is probably unique in being able to deliver this optimism on a weekly basis - and of course the reverse is also true if the local team loses. A successful football team puts places on the map.

Nottingham Forest, by winning the European Cup, did more for that city's world standing and reputation than any amount of work that the local inward investment company could dream of doing.

Manchester is not the UK's second city - obviously Birmingham is - but on a world scale? Manchester is world-renowned because of its fantastic football teams and their heritage and achievements. And Liverpool, perhaps more than any other city, has a reputational benefit that far outstrips (sadly) the reality of the place because of the football team.

Barcelona was a crap port, a declining city, before they got the Olympics and the values of their football team has sustained their uplift. Not just winning but winning with style. It has a clear effect on the reputation and attraction of the place.

London is not quite like that. It doesn't really need that level of uplift (where other places clearly do or would like to have it) but nonetheless the success of Chelsea and Spurs and Arsenal has a contribution to make. Rome clearly doesn't either, but the success or otherwise of Roma or Lazio make a contribution to their standing in the modern world.

Anyway I meandered, sorry. My local team is 'Northampton Town Nil'. Go figure.

But this is a personal blog. Will Arsenal win the league? It's possible but I doubt it. The mega-bucks of Chel$ki and Citeh probably put that out of reach realistically, but we're not far off. And we're a real 'club' I think, in the true sense of the term. It makes one wonder whether it's possible in these days of unlimited oil money for real clubs to compete.

And whether we have (or will) abandon the traditional club mentality for sponsorship and major backers like Usmanov  Whether we will end up with 22 multi-millionaires kicking a pigs bladder around a field watched by a couple of billionaires?

All I know right now is that what we're doing is good, feels good and above all is entertaining. Most Arsenal fans would sell their souls for a trophy: a succession of boring 1-0 wins and a title. That is very tempting. But not for me. I need it to happen with style, with verve, with gut-wrenching tension. That way comes real value. In my opinion. Up the Arse.

Thanks for reading.

Are you planning to be a NIMBY?

It's time, I think, and if I may, to point out a few things about planning and development - as a slightly more serious follow-up to my tongue-in-cheek blog about that great ally of the NIMBY, the Great Crested Newt - here. I am both anti NIMBY and a fully fledged NIMBY too as are we all. It's really about exactly where you live. To the yard. And it's awkward for us all, but you should have some facts to hand in my opinion.

This is neither a party political blog nor pro or anti any specific developments. In general terms I am in favour of building more homes in the UK - we haven't been building enough for decades and the result is a current situation in which many young people - especially if they come out of University with a £40,000 debt around their necks - have little hope of getting onto the housing ladder anytime soon.

I read somewhere that the average age of a first-time buyer is now 34. And when one considers that the first time buyer is the foundation stone upon which the whole market rests, this is a scary prospect. Help to buy seems to me to be pretty close to a scheme to re-inflate the housing bubble that got the whole world into its current financial mess: It's not a solution to the overall problem, but another way of getting some movement into the market for the benefit (it seems to me) of people selling financial services, rather than people who are financially capable of buying and sustaining a home, without being saddled with crippling debt and essentially trapped into lifelong struggle.

And the pressure on the market - demand for new homes - is not just about immigration (although one would have thought that immigration doesn't exactly help); it's about people living independently into older age, rising divorce rates, people choosing to live alone and a growing population generally. It leads to ever rising house prices which are portrayed by the government and the media as a good thing, but unless you downsize or move northwards, they simply are not. They just encourage you to think you have more 'assets' so you'll spend more on 'stuff', but you still have to live somewhere. It's not generally 'accessible' money in your lifetime.

Anyway without going too far down that particular track, I think tackling the supply-side of the housing issue is massively important: Where else are our kids going to live? And how else can we try to breathe new life into some tired old towns and places particularly outside the south east, if not through the development of new communities and the provision of jobs and infrastructure that must be planned and delivered alongside the houses?

Planning is a massively divisive issue but, generally speaking, being in favour or against a particular proposal, almost invariably comes down to where you live. And I don't mean town or region, but street or indeed the very house that you live in. The Not In My Back Yard (NIMBY) is really an extremely apposite and accurate description of the issue. People living in one area of town which will be largely unaffected by a proposed development tend not to have much of a view and can quite easily be persuaded of its merits and its value to the place. Whereas other people who are otherwise entirely rational, understand the need for new homes and the other benefits associated with the proposal, will never be persuaded that it should go ahead if it will impact negatively on their view (out of the window) and their 'space' even if only for a short period of time (building work etc).

And in this scenario, these people will do anything, use any argument, to oppose the plan.

I often see reported in the media, arguments like 'we don't have enough schools', 'what about the extra traffic?', 'our health service is already creaking' 'what about energy and waste and water?' 'What about the wildlife?' 'We can't afford all this'.

People who don't have kids, have private health insurance, know nothing about energy or waste or water supply and don't give a toss about wildlife suddenly become experts overnight. People who use the town as a dormitory, have never spoken to a neighbour, and would not themselves have anywhere to live if development hadn't been approved to build their own home 5, 10, 50 years ago, will make banners and placards, go on marches, threaten to vote out the local council; anything to stop the proposed development.

And that's not really a criticism of individuals (well it is a bit but bear with me); it's what happens, every time and everywhere. And ultimately, it's about their view, their 'space', rather than logic or generosity or recognition that more homes are needed. Suggest that the development be sited on the other side of town and they almost immediately agree and start to come up with reasons why that would be a much better place to build. It's not about principle but their 'view'.

Everyone is a NIMBY to one degree or another. I was involved in opposing the opening of a local sand quarry near to where I live some years ago. I am by no means exempt from the criticism outlined above. I have also worked on the side of the developer on plans for 50,000 new homes across a number of sites in North Northamptonshire. This is not a 'holier than thou' bog in any way, just an attempt to point out some realities and some facts that might make you think a bit more about this perplexing and difficult issue.

But there are some (planning) facts you should know about in my opinion.

You don't own your view. Unless you own the land as far as the eye can see (in which case you're probably the Duke of Buccleuch and live in Kettering - and were a partner in the proposed developments that I was, in a small way, involved in). And (and this blew me away) even if you do own the land, the local planning authority can grant planning permission on it if it falls within the 'local plan'. The uplift in land values from £2,000 or £3,000 an acre (agricultural) to over £1 million an acre (with planning permission) usually overcomes any principled problems with this.

New developments have to provide schools and healthcare facilities in line with the numbers of houses. Something like 800 houses equals a new primary school and 5,100 houses means a secondary school. The primaries are built by and paid for by the builder/developer via their Section 106 (S106, or 'planning gain') contributions and then taken over by the local authority, academy group or free school initiative. Secondary schools, a bigger ticket item, are also 'sponsored' by the developer but will also involve the local authority the DfE and others (school groups, Church schools etc) for whom this is a commercial opportunity.

S106 contributions will also part-fund local healthcare facilities (policy is now to provide healthcare more locally rather than at the creaking local general hospital, in a way which will also free-up capacity at the hospital - in theory).

There are also legally binding requirements for energy, waste and water provision. If requirements cannot be met then no homes can be built. Obviously the energy companies will do their bit so they can make their profits (no comment in this blog but much more here) and waste and water companies also benefit commercially from making provision, although they only review their capacity every 7-11 years so this can cause problems. (We threatened to build our own waste treatment plant in competition with Anglain Water and amazingly they found they could do something to help after all).

Then there's traffic - another 'show stopper'. The developer pays for the roads on site and the connections into the existing road network through S106. But the Highways Agency also needs to consider and address any traffic issues both locally and regionally and must provide additional capacity (new main road junctions, main roads, by-passes, even new motorway junctions but they're very expensive indeed) if the new development is to get the 'go ahead'.

So none of the 'we can't afford it' or specific schools, energy, waste, health, traffic etc.,  concerns are really issues for the NIMBY. They're taken care of by planning law.

And also you should bear in mind that the developer has to actually sell these houses once they're built, so he or she has to make the site attractive and ought to (and generally will) provide incentives and benefits to the wider location in terms of facilities, leisure and sports amenities, connectivity with other local communities etc. This will extend to the use of sympathetic building materials, energy efficient homes and homes that meet current and future demographic needs - single person homes (I find that sad but it's real) and homes in which a growing elderly population can live independently for longer - wider doors, wheelchair access, redesigned bathrooms etc.

So what's left? Bugs and bunnies. Wildlife. Our friend the Great Crested Newt - and badgers funnily enough, although we seem to be trying to kill about 70% of them, they're still protected in terms of development land and have to be found, negotiated with and re-housed somewhere else - presumably where the men with guns can get a clearer shot?

But whilst a major pain, the wildlife issue can also be reasonably addressed by the developer, it just takes more time, costs a bit more money, but in the end it's not a real obstacle, just a delaying tactic. And I have to say that delaying tactics quite often work when governments change, local politics change and policies are reviewed. All that money wasted for nothing. But you've saved your view, deprived people of a place to live, for a couple of years perhaps? Whereas if you'd embraced the plan, you could almost certainly have got more out of the developer in terms of benefits for the existing community. Go figure.

Finally, I would argue that bigger developments are best. I'm sure most people (depending upon where they live of course) would not agree, but what happens with a big development (more than 1,000 homes) is that these uplifts in infrastructure (compulsory and in terms of marketing the site) bring bigger benefits, bigger contributions on site and to the wider community and clearer compliance with the planning requirements described above. The alternative is a small, say 50-home site that doesn't require an uplift of infrastructure - schools, healthcare etc - but which does put additional pressure on local facilities. So, over time, 20 years or so, you have 800 extra homes but no new primary school or new healthcare facilities. Over a longer period (with smaller developments) you have extra pressure on healthcare, roads schools etc, but no significant S106 contributions to mitigate the population growth.

Finally finally, as part of its S106 obligations the developer will be required to build a certain percentage of homes on the site as 'affordable' or 'social rented' to you and me. 'Affordable' is such a misnomer it makes me laugh: all of the homes on a site must be 'affordable' to the target market or they won't sell, simples. But this percentage must be for the local authority to take into its own stock of council houses (let's call them what they are) as part of the planning agreement. The current figure is around 35% of homes should be 'affordable', but this is subject to negotiation and will - or should - reflect the make-up of the existing housing stock in the town. If the exisiting stock is 50% 'affordable' then the new development will probably have a lower percentage and vise versa, but this isn't always the case. I have argued (unpopularly) that recreating a town in its own image (same proportion of 'affordable' as currently exists) does not deliver 'uplift' but a continuation of the balance that has left it in its current tired, failing state.

I'm right about that, but it doesn't always win the argument.

So now you know. If you want to be a NIMBY either live somewhere else (i.e. not where anyone's going to build anything close by) or cultivate newts.

 But if you want progress and somewhere where your kids - our kids - can afford to live, try to be less in love with the view out of your window and a bit more generous to others. I know it's not easy.

Thanks for reading.

The Great Crested Newt

A charming fellow, I'm sure you'll agree.

They grow to about 15-18cm; average life as around ten years but they can live as long as 27 years in captivity (but would you want to?). I bet you're glad I'm here aren't you?

They're widespread across Europe, live in wetlands, are nocturnal and chill out for the days under leaves, rocks etc in wet areas, all over the country. In Spring the males develop an impressive crest along their backs and tails, don't we all?

They're also designated as a protected species under Schedule 5 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. They're not daft. Touch, harm or damage one of these and you could receive a £5,000 fine.

If you're planning to build something - a railway line perhaps, or let's say 5,000 much-needed new homes, a couple of (five) primary schools and a secondary school, healthcare facilities, roads etc, on an urban extension perhaps (green field but on the edge of a tired town as part of a regeneration scheme to bring new homes, jobs, infrastructure, prosperity to the place), and you find one of these little chaps in say June, things can get a tad awkward.

Because under the act you cannot build anything at all within 500 metres of where you found him. Not without 'mitigation' at any rate. I now have the undivided attention of all prospective NIMBYs out there. But hell they all know this stuff. If you're a NIMBY and not cultivating these chaps ready to drop them quietly all over the place you're not worthy of the name!

And 'mitigation' doesn't mean building a pond somewhere else, oh no, you have to wait until next April and May, and employ grown adults to put on wellies and get on their hands and knees to find your newt and all his family, cousins, distant relatives (they have up to 300 offspring in a year, each), collect them up, gently, and move them to another suitable habitat. And to ensure that they don't return home (they're 'homing newts' presumably) you have to erect newt fences (this is no word of a lie) - here's proof -

to make sure they don't get back onto your site. Now if you could give them hard hats and high-viz vests... oh no they're quite shy.

The above image is genuinely of newt fences - you have probably seen them at the side of roads and wondered what they were? If not you will notice them now, and know what they are. You're welcome.

These surveys and collections and the rehousing process can only take place in April and May, by law, so you may have planning permission, have sold 'off plan' to Mr & Mrs Helptobuy, and have hundreds of builders, plumbers, sparkys, plasterers and decorators ready and willing to crack on, but you have to wait until next April and May for the survey, the collection, the re-visit, the follow-up survey etc. So August then when you found the little chap the June before last. And this is not just to appease Natural England (who administer the Act); oh no, the local planning authority cannot grant you permission to go ahead if there is an issue with Great Crested Newts. They come to all the planning meetings, but usually in disguise.  

Meanwhile Mr & Mrs Helptobuy are living in a lovely council B&B (not) with their new addition Marcie Helptokeepawakeatnight. But that's OK because the Great Crested Newt is protected by European law.

Because it's an endangered species. In Europe.

The thing is, it's not an endangered species in the UK. Far from it. Current estimates are that there are around 400,000 of the little chaps on 18,000 breeding sites in the UK all alive and well, and living in beautifully manicured new homes. Yes the bloody fences are a pain in the crest when you want to go to the shops for a bag of insects and some larvae and hummus perhaps, but they're doing really rather well. The population was in decline in the 70s but has now recovered and is thriving in the UK.

I wonder how many Great Crested Newts they're going to find along the route of the proposed HS2?

Still, that's conservation for you, EU style.

That's all from Newts at Ten.

Thanks for reading. 
 

If only I had the Energy

If you think switching to a different energy supplier is going to solve the problem of piss-taking profiteering by our crooked energy companies, you're quite wrong. All it's doing is creating a 'commission' opportunity for organisations like 'uswitch' and 'gocompare' against a back-drop of all of the energy suppliers raising prices, maximising their profits and essentially ripping us all off for the heating and power that we cannot comfortably live without.

What switching also does is lock you in to a tariff, like a fixed rate mortgage, so that if, as a guy at uswitch said to me earlier today; 'The Government pulls its finger out and does something about these high prices', might mean you're paying more than the 'going rate'. Yes you can get out of the contract but inevitably there will be a fee which will negate any immediate savings.  

I have been saying that Mr Davey & before him that nice upstanding Mr Huhne should do something about this ridiculously one-sided situation for three years now, so I'm not jumping on the Miliband wagon nor identifying a problem for the first time now that it is in the public domain. Energy prices are a massive problem for the UK and whilst Miliband does not, in my viw, have the right answer, he does, unlike Messrs Davey and Dave C (be honest?) he does at least have the right question: 

Anyway, maybe I should start from the beginning?

You've got to feel for these poor energy company Chief Executives. With wholesale energy prices going up and up all over the world and absolutely nothing that their parent companies, sorry the wholesale energy suppliers, can do about it, these poor guys are striving manfully to hold back price rises for us consumers.  It's getting to the point for some, like the top five senior executives at Centrica, that they're working so hard to keep prices down for us, that they hardly have time to spend the £16.4 million they received in pay & benefits for the last year. Indeed some of the poor bastards hadn't even yet had the time to spend their share of the £15 million they received the year before.  

They're doing everything they can. Almost single-handedly they're trying to hold back the tide so that our energy bills don't go up any more than they absolutely have to. They're also holding off on introducing price rises for as long as possible. These people are heroes. Clearly. We should be recognising their efforts in some way.

Time after time you hear them say how much they understand about high prices affecting household budgets. If you listen carefully you can almost hear a catch in their voices as they get overly emotional about it. These are truly people who understand. Who are on our side. Can't we arrange for them to get paid more than the frankly paltry £4.9 million received by Centrica CEO Sam Laidlaw last year?

Without these heroes we would be at the mercy of disreputable villains who would be using all kinds of subterfuge and deceit in order to trick us into paying more for a commodity that is extremely ineleastic in terms of demand (the price goes up, consumption doesn't fall very much because we cannot do without it). And that situation would be terrible. Imagine being at the mercy of crooks who could essentially charge us what they want for our gas and electricity? It would be madness.

Thank goodness we have an energy regulator in the form of ofgem to make sure consumers' interests come first and foremost and also, in the the Department for Energy and Climate Change, we have a government department that is also there to ensure we are not ripped off.

I have just the one small, almost inconsequential gripe about all this legislative protection we receive and all this striving for lower prices that is being done on our behalf by these unsung heroes. Minor to the point of insignificance. You'd probably not even notice it unless you looked quite closely.


My problem is, to be frank, that none of the above is either true or effective.

Are these executives at the big six suppliers of energy to the consumer really trying to keep prices down and for as long as possible? Are they fuck.

Is ofgem, which issues the operating licenses under which all gas and electricity companies must operate in the UK, really doing all it can, under its first principle of operation which is to put the consumer first, to keep prices down? Is it fuck.

Is the DECC doing all it can to help consumers and stop them being royally ripped off by these suppliers? Is it bollocks.

These companies claim that green tax subsidies (many of which apply to them so they receive these subsidies) are reasons for them to increase their prices. Erm so we have to pay more to subsidise their green operations (in order to make this fuckwit green windpower bollocks profitable even though it simply doesn't work by any realistic measure of efficiency or reliability) and for that privilege, they are also allowed to charge us more for our day-to-day power, erm so they can afford their investment in green operations? So we pay twice for this green bullshit?

The government claim that green taxes 'only' add about 11% to the average bill. Really? When these taxes are paying for the decommissioning of swathes of coal-fired power stations, subsidies to land-owners that would make a Rothschild wince, and operating subsidies including paying the wind-turbine operators to turn them off when the grid can't accept their power or when it's too windy? 11%? Are we sure about that? Does that include the benefits we have to pay for the 60-odd 'old energy' jobs that are lost for every single new green energy job created? We're also paying for the UK's biggest Drax power station to be converted to burn wood ('bio mass') instead of coal; wood that we're importing from Canadian forests. How green is that? Not very. Unless the massive freight ships being used are essentially giant pedaloes?

And the energy suppliers are saying that they're making a loss on energy transmission. That their profits in the consumer end of their businesses are only around 5% and that, poor things, they have to invest in new infrastructure in order to maintain supply. And they tell us, seemingly every year, that the price increases have to be (well) above inflation because they have to fund the investment in infrastructure. Shouldn't they be funding their investment in infrastructure out of the massive profits they make? Given that that infrastructure enables them to get their product to the consumer and thereby charge them handsomely and make those profits in the first place? Or are they just so used to it that they just assume we'll pay twice for it as we do for everything else they do these days?

Speaking of which, take a look at this (above) table. Yes it seems that the retail arms of these companies are making profits of (typically) less than 5% but you'll notice that their wholesale arms are making profits of over 20%. Now I'm not a bean-counter, but even I can tell you that you could, if your very highly paid CFO wanted to, put these profits into any area of the company you wanted, just a by a little - and perfectly legal - sleight of hand. So some of these companies are generating profits of over 20% on the energy they supply on a wholesale basis and then making profits of an additional 5% on that figure. So, again, we're paying twice. We're paying to give them an additional margin on the profit they're already charging us for.

These companies talk about 'world prices' going up, forcing them to put their prices up. Two things to note on this. First is that the media and the politicians seem just to accept this without any kind of investigation. 'World prices eh? Well nothing we can do about that, on you go guys.' These aren't world prices but the price fixing that's now possible because there are only 6 players and they are all both wholesale suppliers and retailers of energy. It's virtually a cartel that the government seems unable to stand up to.

The real 'world energy price' has only risen by 1.7% in the last 18 months as global demand weakens because of the global economic situation. So how can these companies justify 11% rises? They are taking the piss but sadly Ed Davey has been unable to act in the public's interest until the issue has become a crisis. And, sadly, until Mr Miliband raised the level of importance of energy prices at the Labour Party conference earlier this year.

Davey's job is to look out for the consumer when it comes to energy, all the time. Not just when he's forced to do so. The sooner he goes from office and we get a grown-up in place, the better. 

And ofgem knows all this - it must do surely? - and does the square route of fuck all about it. Consumers interests first? My arse.

 Here's a couple of recommendations put forward by a consultant to ofgem in 2011: Original house of commons report on energy company profits here.

And ofgem's response was to reject three out of five recommendations. Why? What possible damage could the provision and reporting of clearer information have done to the price being paid by the consumer? Or was there some kind of lobbying going on? Re item 4 above, how on earth could the supply of clear details about which elements of the organisations involved make the profits, compared with the risks involved, have done anything other than to clarify the fact that we're being ripped off by this financial subterfuge?

The fact is that these companies are there to make money for their shareholders. That is their primary concern - indeed until this morning when it changed its website, the SSE front page disclosed that the company has 'one strategic policy: to deliver sustained real dividend growth.'  The same could be said for them all, they're abut making money for their shareholders at the expense of a captive business and domestic audience whose protection is being provided (try not to laugh) by ofgem and DECC. More here - factcheck)

Let's look at these companies to get a quick measure of the cut of their jibs:

I've mentioned Centrica, UK-based and market leader, 14.8% profit margin on turnover of £12.3 billion (British Gas Trading Limited, year 2011) profits of almost £2 billion. And it's wholesale arm, Centrica averaged 7.3% profit between 2007 - 2011 on turnover of £22 billion. Dividend is up 5% year on year for 2012 and the company paid 75.5% of its profits before tax, to shareholders rather than investing in infrastructure.

French owned, UK turnover of around £15 billion; makes a loss on it's customer supply business but a very healthy profit on its generation business (it's just a matter of where you allocate the profit not necessarily an indication of who's paying for what, the consumer pays for everything these people do in the end). EDF paid 55% of its net income back to shareholders in 2012. Money it said it needed to invest in infrastructure? Leading the consortium which includes investment from China, in new UK nuclear power station at Hinkley Point in Somerset - DECC has given guarantees of future electricity prices (twice the current level and for 35 years - I wonder if Mr Davey ever fancies a game of poker?) in order to secure this investment. Not exactly going to help consumers then, what a surprise.

German shareholder-owned energy company, £16 billion UK turnover, profits of 7.2% (2011). Recently withdrew its 'Stay Warm' tariff for over 60s. Customers have automatically beeen moved to a more expensive tariff. Recently fined £1.7 million for overcharging customers for exit fees.

Spanish Iberdrola-owned energy company, £8 billion UK turnover, profits of 9% across the two elements of its business. Recently fined £8.5 million for misleading selling practices. Profits doubled between 2011 and 2012 (from £350m to £712m. The company also paid Iberdrola £890 million this year, again, when it should surely be spending this money on the infrastructure it so badly needs to invest in? Iberdrola, not surprisingly is struggling in many of its continental European markets and especially in Spain. Guess who's paying to bail them out, as usual?

npower, subsidiary of German RWE. £6.5 billion UK turnover, just increased prices by 11% (gas) and 9.3% electricity. Profit margin figures are opaque to say the least, I'm guessing that with 'renewables' you can offset just about every cent against losses or subsidies. However John Robertson MP (Lab Glasgow) who sits on the Energy Select Committee said, commenting on the npower prices rises and the Chief Exec's 'we feel your pain' bullshit (“I know that any increases to household bills are always unwelcome, and this is not a decision that we have taken lightly,”) said: “The CEO has come out all guns blazing, saying they only make 5 per cent profit. But he is trying to pull the wool over our eyes and make us forget about the shady shuffling of money around the company. Profits went up by 25 percent last year and it is clear Npower is simply taking advantage of customers and ripping them off.”

Finding myself agreeing with a Glasgow Labour MP as well as Caroline Flint and Owen Jones is a whole new experience for me I must say.

  

Perth-based formerly Scottish and Southern Energy, turnover of £28 billion, operating profit of £800 million. 'Sustained real dividend growth' and recently fined £10.5 million for prolonged and extensive miss-selling of contracts.

ofgem grants the licenses that allow these companies to operate in the UK energy market. And it's first principle is to protect the consumer. So what is it doing in light of the above facts?

Meters, clarity of information (yeah right) marketing practices (since so many are fined for miss-selling), notification of price changes and prevention of theft. So the square route of fuck all then. How will meters, smart, traditional or otherwise have any impact on prices? Telling us more clearly that we're being royally ripped off will not help us to pay the bills. Stopping miss-selling is fine but the whole fucking industry is currently miss-selling in that it is ripping us all off with the government's approval. And the only really important theft taht is occurring here is that of our money by these energy companies. ofgem is a fucking joke. But the only people laughing are the executives and shareholders of the energy companies.

And what is DECC doing? It's continuing to say that the UK must spend massively on green technology to reduce our CO2 emissions, when the rest of the world, including Germany, the US, Canada, Australia, Russia, China and India have turned away from this discredited scam. So we might eventually redce our CO2 emissions, which currently stand at 1.6% of the global total or, to put it another way, less than China's year-on-year increase in emissions. It's completely mad and will have absolutely no impact whatsoever on the planet, even if man-made global warming was real, which is isn't (more here if you're interested).

What Mr Davey is also doing is lining up stand-by diesel generators to come on-line to meet peak demand in the UK. So emergency generators that are owned and held in readiness for a power outage by organisations including supermarkets, major hotels, residential and office building complexes, distribution and storage facilities, hospitals(?), airports, are being connected up to the grid so that they can be called upon to meet peak demand when the wind isn't blowing (or is blowing to hard or in the wrong place). And the price paid to the owners of the generators will be massive, and sooner or later this practice will become the norm, the supermarkets et al will buy additional emergency generators for their own needs and will then be making mega bucks out of supplying the grid with massively over-priced energy because, sadly, Mr Davey couldn't run a piss-up at Carlsberg. 

Labour are massively to blame for the lack of investment and lack of strategic planning for our energy needs, as well as for the introduction of the Climate Change act that is crippling the UK. Many of the investments and problems we're looking at now should have been remedied ten year's ago. This fact has made the current situation worse, but not addressing it properly, not taking on the current piss-taking profiteering of energy companies when it has the powers to do so, is starting to put our power supply at risk, is starting to create the situation where people will be suffering severely, potentially to the point of losing their lives, and is starting to damage our economy and our government.

Mr Miliband's price freeze is not the answer and nor is Mr Major's windfall tax. Neither actually solves the problem. In order to solve it we need a regulator that has the powers (and it does already) to regulate. To find out where the profits are being made, to investigate the financial shenanigins that these companies are engaging in, and can take proper action. Start by kicking one of them out of the market. Then create a environment where these energy retailers cannot belong to a single wholesaler of energy. Get rid of barriers to entry in the marketplace.

In short, get off your arse Mr Davey and fucking do something man.

Thanks for reading.

Green energy - defined

No agenda here (much), just an attempt to explain what 'green energy' means in reality. There's no point in dismissing or embracing it unless you know what it means, in my opinion. It has become a political, global football but I think you need to know what it is before you decide on its merits. For what it's worth, I think sustainability - in the true sense of the term rather than the way in which it is being used to take control over people as part of the Agenda 21 nonsense (more here) - is a good thing.

But it's about balance, having a rounded approach to meeting our ever-growing energy needs and making use of the resources at our disposal. You wouldn't not eat some food today because people in 30 year's time would therefore not be able to eat it. In many ways that is what we're saying about fossil fuels: I know that they will not 'go off' or disappear like food would over that time period, but shutting down (for example) the coal industry including extraction and the power stations that burn the stuff makes it much more difficult and costly to ever go back and make use of it again.

We certainly shouldn't, in my opinion, do such things rashly or with a gun at our heads just because of some scaremongering and unproven science about man-made global warming (more here). That would just be plain stupid and as we are already seeing, vastly expensive and damaging to our current prosperity. If you close down a working coal mine, for example, even though there are usable (commercially viable) reserves available, and you stop maintaining the thing, pumping out the water etc., it quickly becomes flooded and extremely difficult if not impossible ever to bring it back on line. And, in that instance you have effectively 'sterilised' the works and lost the valuable resource. Which seems a pretty stupid thing to do in my view. The same is true of oil when we have the massively expensive infrastructure in place now, to enable us to make us of this valuable and extremely reliable source of energy.

Anyway some (layman's) details about green energy and the options and alternatives, just if you're interested.

Nuclear energy: Is essentially harnessing a chemical reaction which creates heat and power to drive turbines which turn that energy into usable electricity. It's clean, there are few if any emissions of CO2, but it is relatively expensive to harness, creates dangerous waste and is volatile and somewhat vulnerable to miss-use as it can create unhealthy by-products like bomb-making materials. It is also potentially vulnerable to the elements as we have seen in Japan and also, possibly, to acts of terrorism. But for reliable (and that is a key term in all of this debate) power supply it has to be part of a modern, joined-up energy policy. There are also some exciting new developments in nuclear technology such as Thorium reactors but you can google that. Nuclear fusion technology is also advancing and is perhaps the ultimate holy grail. A bit like perpetual motion. But a potential long term solution in my opinion. More here.

Solar: is plentiful, is probably the ultimate answer to our energy needs, but it is not efficient in the latitudes where the decisions are made and most efficient in areas of the planet where conflict and corruption abound. Distribution of solar power is a major issue - transporting the energy from Africa (for example) where it can be efficiently produced, to northern or southern areas where it is used, is a major issue. If we can crack this - and we must eventually - we'll have solved the world's energy problem forever, to a very large extent. 

Biomass: Is fuel crops essentially, growing plants that produce fuels that we can use (burn) for energy. What's not to like? We can grow our own petroleum and not rely on fossil fuels? From a green perspective the theory is that the plants consume CO2 and then release it when burned, in an environmentally balanced way. Wouldn't that be perfect? Except, unfortunately it doesn't stack up. The plants would have to grow for a hundred years or more in order to 'fix' the same amount of CO2 that burning them releases into the atmosphere in order to achieve a neutral balance. Whereas biomass cops are grown in a single season and then harvested, just like food crops. There are some good examples of trees being grown for biomass and in a sustainable way, but they are quite land-intensive and not really a major solution for that reason.

In many ways coal is biomass, just over a much longer time-frame: It's 'dirty' if you consider this issue in the short term, but the trees that became coal probably did, during their lifetimes, 'fix' the same amount of CO2 that burning them releases now, but that was millions of years ago. Coal is essentially biomass. But not fast enough for our current times.

The other thing about biomass is that we might be able to grow enough fuel crops to keep us warm, but there'll be nothing to eat because we've devoted our land to producing fuel instead of food. So it's not really a major long-term solution.

Wind energy. Not exactly a new thing - we have been using wind energy for centuries to grind corn into flour for our bread. Wind is a natural resource - essentially a free resource although harnessing it seems now to have a massive cost associated with it. On a relatively small and local scale it is a fantastic thing to harness. But it's not reliable enough to guarantee power at all times which is the way we need it these days. So it is a potentially valuable secondary source but difficult to control or rely on. Windmills of the scale we're now seeing kill birds and bats and take up massive areas of land for a relatively inefficient power source. The reliance we're currently placing upon wind power is quite mad in my opinion.

Water or 'Hydro': Is much more reliable than wind, but again costly to harness. But rivers do flow, tides ebb and flow and that movement can be harnessed to generate very reliable electricity. Funnily enough I spoke with someone today who was involved in the major hydro electric scheme at Niagra Falls in the 50s. As part of that scheme they used the power to pump water 'uphill' into storage during off peak times of the day and then released it for 're-use' during peak demand periods. That makes sense to me but you need big rivers and big storage reservoirs to make it commercially viable.

The proposed Severn Hydro scheme which was binned earlier this year would have cost less than HS2 (£30billion) and provided around 5% of the UK's current energy needs for 125 years (at least), but it would have been inconvenient for a few wading birds it seems. If only these birds had some way of travelling a couple of miles further upstream? If only they could fly..oh, wait.. Hydro should be a major part of the answer if we're serious about sustainable and reliable power.

Ground source, air source and geothermal energy: You may be aware of this stuff? Taking energy out of the ground or the air and making it available for our use? It's essentially about harnessing the differential between two places or 'states' in temperature, putting that differential through a heat exchanger and multiplying that difference into warmth - or cooling - depending upon what you want to achieve. It's good and it works. But it is basically about energy efficiency rather than renewable energy.

Many people talk about this technology in terms of 'geothermal' energy. It isn't. Unless you're lucky enough to be living next to a natural thermal 'spa' in Iceland or someplace similar where the earth's heat is bubbling up and you can tap into it, it is not 'geothermal'. What it is, is using the fact that if you dig down into the earth for about 1.5metres the temperature doesn't change much, whatever the weather is doing. There can be a hard frost on the ground (surface) but the temperature of the earth 1.5 metres down will be the same as it was in summer. And you can use that differential to draw the relative heat out of the earth, through a heat exchanger to multiply that differential, and deliver warmth into the building or your environment. You can, theoretically do the reverse and achieve cooling in the summer months.

But its not 'creating energy' it's using differentials to enhance what you have. And it takes significant amounts of electricity (to power the heat exchangers) to do so. So your gas bills go down considerably, but your electricity consumption goes up. It has a role to play in efficiency but is not a strictly 'renewable' solution.

Energy From Waste (EFW): This is, in theory, a very attractive option given that it helps to address two major issues - energy requirements and the massive amounts of waste we produce. Many landfill sites in the UK and around the world use gas engines to burn the methane produced and turn it into electricity. And that's very positive, but it is 'shitty' gas (technical term) and wreaks havoc with the massive and very expensive engines and shortens their effective life considerably.

Burning waste as a fuel is also a potentially positive option but no-one wants an incinerator near to where they live and there are some credible scare stores about the release of dioxins and carcinogens into the atmosphere. I think filtering could well make these things viable but they're very high on the NIMBY's 'no go' areas.

Anaerobic digestion is another option that is starting to gain some ground in the UK. This is the use of micro organisms to speed up the decaying process of carbon-based waste - food and garden waste generally speaking - in a sealed environment to produce gas which can be used as a fuel in the usual way (power station way rather than fuel-in-you-car way obviously). There are some (albeit fairly small) viable plants already operating in the UK.

Although not strictly 'green energy', energy efficiency also has a major part to play in all this, but not necessarily on an individual domestic basis. Yes you can insulate your home to the nth degree, install efficient boilers, combi boilers, condensing boilers etc; double glazing etc., although I'm personally not convinced that an hermetically sealed house is a particularly healthy environment, but hey ho, it's certainly less expensive to keep warm. And we should do (some of) this, but on a house-by-house basis it's relatively expensive when compared to the cost/energy savings achieved (with, typically a 25+ year payback period); it adds about £40,000 to the cost of a new build house (Eco Homes standard) and is considerably more expensive to achieve the same level for the retrofit of an existing house.

Much more economically viable are district heating schemes where electricity is generated locally and used across a largish housing, office or mixed use development. But it's not simple to achieve since you will have to install traditional boilers & systems into the first 1,000 or so homes until you reach the required scale for the district heating system to be viable. And then you have to persuade Mrs Smith (x 1,000) to give up her trusty boiler...

Combined Heat and Power (CHP) is another potentially efficient option - using the heat produced in a manufacturing process (for example) to heat local homes and offices. Heat that would ordinarily just be voided to the atmosphere. But like many of these options it is fiendishly costly and difficult to retrofit and really needs a green field plan in order to design it in to the finished development.

And there you have it. Green Energy. Boring as fuck I'm sure you'll agree, but quite important to our future. Reliability is the key really. Which is why Nuclear, hydro-electric and EFW are key elements, used alongside our existing fossil fuels - why would you simply waste that fantastic resource we already have available to us when there is no credible evidence that CO2 emissions are causing harm to the planet? Reliability is also why wind is a bit-part player in the solution and will never replace other energy sources despite what Mr Davey et al are trying to tell you.

If we had a proper, intelligent, grown up and long-term energy policy that might help too. But heck you can't have everything. It might just stop us being royally ripped off by the piss-taking profiteering of our current energy industry too. More here. 

Ultimately it will all come down to solar - an inexhaustible supply of energy from the sun, which is, incidentally (but quite importantly) the thing that controls the temperature on our planet, not our CO2 emissions. How Canutesque of us to think it's us and even more absurd that we can control it! Madness.

So now you know.

Thanks for reading.