Conservative competence?

One strength that the Conservative party prides itself on is that it knows how to do things, how to govern. If you don't like their policies, you at least get competent government, they say. But that kind of competence seems to be in worryingly short supply nowadays. The airbrushed David Cameron posters, for instance, were an own goal waiting to happen. And it looks as if they could be a long term millstone round his neck. I particularly like "Tough on jobs. Tough on the causes of jobs."

But the inspiration for this post today is Boris Johnson. He is stepping aside as chair of the London Police Authority. It was always a bad idea for political and managerial reasons, although we never expected such issues to cut much ice with BoJo. But the reason he is giving up is, the BBC say, because "he was finding it difficult to devote enough time to the job." Should we not expect a greater level of competence than this? The country's most senior elected Conservative is incapable of figuring out beforehand that the demands of that job and the mayoralty will be too much. Was he too incompetent to notice that they are two very demanding jobs, which each require the utmost attention? Yes, he was. Londoners are beginning to find out what kind of fool they elected.

Nothing to fear, nothing to hide

Government mantra as we know. So, if the government has nothing to hide, why is keeping secret the post mortem details on David Kelly for seventy years? Norman Baker's assertion that it cannot have been suicide is looking more likely with every new turn the case takes.

Land raise

A lot more detail about East Sussex's proposal to dump land raise sites around Ringmer and the Weald can be found at:

No To Land Raise
and the No To Land Raise blog.

The blog includes a report of the meeting held at Hailsham on January 23rd.

And an illuminating post about zero waste alternatives. The answer is no, they've just stuck us with an incinerator and the possibility of artificial hills all around, slowly subsiding as they release methane and who knows what into the atmosphere.