This is an extract from my latest book Build Back Green
We live in revolutionary times. A movement to harness the state to root carbon out of our lives has now entrenched itself in government as the prevailing policy. Joe Bidenâs America joins hands with the European Union in declaring war on carbon dioxide. A clever China agrees in principle and corners the market in many green products, whilst still increasing her output of the unpopular gas.
The protagonists strike an optimistic tone. They assure us the revolution will be carried through with a wide range of new green jobs. They hold out the promise of skilled people running windmill and battery factories, joyously powering the revolution of their dreams. They comment little on the other side, as they effectively sign the redundancy notices of all those in the oil and gas business, in drilling technology, in internal combustion engines, conventional ships, planes and vehicles, gas heating and much else. They have in mind a huge transition from the fossil fuel economy to the green electricity economy. They want us all to dump our diesel and petrol cars, replace our gas boilers, change our diet away from meat, give up foreign holidays and take to our bicycles.
The conversion to carbon free has not developed the same momentum and pace yet that the petrol and diesel vehicle enjoyed when they were introduced. The problems include a perception that the newer green products are not as good as the fossil fuel products they wish to replace, and a view that the green items remain too expensive. Where the advent of the car, van and bus widened peopleâs choices and offered longer range journeys to people who otherwise had to walk, the arrival of the electric car or heat pumps does not offer the consumer any new service or capacity they do not already enjoy. The problem with the green revolution is it comes from the top down. Government are the revolutionaries, not the hordes at the gates of power urging change. Government is trying to persuade or make people change their lifestyles without convincing them they will be better off if they do.
It is a paradox that a revolution should come from the very establishment that is threatened by it. Car companies making a good living selling excellent diesel and petrol cars queue up to decry their old products and promise a new range of electric cars as soon as they can get round to making them. Governments that enjoy huge revenues from oil and gas taxes, vehicle excise and fuel taxes sacrifice them with abandon, pretending that electric cars or electric heating will come tax free in contrast to their predecessors. The elite who have enjoyed dining out on the finest cuts of meat complain about the number of cattle on grassland. The powerful who have lived a charmed life flitting by first class jet to another five star hotel in a remote country warn us off such a lifestyle. The press delights in uncovering hypocrisy, as some of the staunchest advocates of a new austerity or restraint in lifestyle fall foul of their own recommendations to others to cut the carbon miles.
It is time for a proper debate about this ersatz revolution, these grand plans often drawn up by people who think they should have some kind of exemption from the rules they set. So far the green movement has spawned so many long haul flights for delegates to arrive in air conditioned five start hotels to urge the world to stop international flights and much else that many aspire to. It is now at the point where it has to translate aspirations into practical policies, and vague distant targets into shorter terms targets with bite. It will only do so if it unleashes a range of popular products that are affordable and better than the ones they seek to displace.
November 28, 2021
God morning.
Ask yourself this. Reading the extracts above from our kind host, what political style of government would you say is at play here and, what political party in the UK currently is in power right now ? And then he goes on to say.
The biggest hypocrisy is the same party masquerading as Conservative.
Sir John. As I said on these pages a little while ago, this is not about environmentalism, carbon dioxide or saving the planet. This is about getting in policies that would no ordinarily make it past a first reading let alone the statute book. They are designed to facilitate wealth transfer from the middle classes to the super rich, and from the West to the Far East and especially China. This is about protecting the Western Elites investments in China and elsewhere. Nothing more.
November 28, 2021
+1
November 28, 2021
What about the high price of diesel and petrol still ongoing? Leak from govt caused panic buying and shortages resulting in price hikes. Today ÂŁ1.50 a litre for diesel where the govt gets the lion share through fuel duty and VAT!
JR, what scam is the govt currently running against the people of this nation? Why has it not forced a reduction? If it can cap home energy why not transport?
Your govt stopped gas self sufficiency. A choice made by May and Johnson. Not global your party and govt. – also deliberately increasing fuel poverty to those worse off. Is this to force your govt.âs green stupid policies on the nation? Your govt has deceived the green cost in energy bills to poor people. The deception worked so far, but now your govt has created a further hike costs to bring more into poverty, how long before it all becomes common knowledge despite lies from your govt?
Cameron stated capping was âMarxistâ, nevertheless May wanted to build on Milibandâs ideas! Your govt caused small energy firms to go bust, by capping, then placing covid financial restrictions on them to the point they could not survive. This was caused by your govt by known policies. None of this a global issue. One created and brought about by your party and govt.
Will dissent be opposed by using the political police again to decide what protests are allowed? Or will the vexatious covid be used as the excuse?
Read article in CTW by Canadian specialist how Hydroxichloriquin and ivermectin used by successfully by poor nations to prevent illness and how it now shows fewer variations and people becoming ill compared to nations who vaccinated! Is covid being used as part of the green scam?
November 28, 2021
I see the headlines that China and India are to receive ÂŁ1.5 billion in climate adaptation funds as developing nations , ÂŁ38 million from us. It is clown world.
November 28, 2021
The idea that China and India are developing nations is such a stupid and filthy LIE that you wonder how the government gets away with this. I suppose it is a combination of the supine media and backbench Tory MPs, who fail to challenge this, and the fact that the government is failing in so many areas that this one just slips through the cracks! Nevertheless, it is a vile waste of OUR money, and proves once more that the repulsive traitors in government prefer to help foreigners rather than their own people.
November 28, 2021
This has always been about wealth transfer west to east by manufacturing etc. Not the madness you cute but madness of levelling up world! Or rather levelling down! Just like accepting Chinese immigrants as part of trade deals etc!
November 28, 2021
China and India have nuclear weapons. How dare they call themselves poor and how dare our Government not expose the big lie for what it is.
November 28, 2021
India has over 100 resident Billionaires….
China won’t tell us but it is lots too.
November 28, 2021
X-Tory +1
I dread to think what Boris will do next. Does he own a brain cell and is he really British? Does he have any cares for the Brits he governs?
November 28, 2021
SirJ really needs to stop this from happening
November 28, 2021
The green revolution comes from the Davos set.
Johnson and co. – now that they are elected – pursue policies to win the approval of these people, in the hope of gaining vast personal wealth after leaving office.
âBuild Back Betterâ and other empty slogans.
The only way around this is to get people in office who do not subscribe to this mantra. That excludes Conservative, Labour, Liberal Democrat and (obviously) Green.
November 28, 2021
Prefer your other book âI donât believe youâ.
I have read hundreds of articles, thousand of pages, about the threat of âClimate Changeâ, and the need for us all to go back to the standard of living of the Middle Ages. The more I read, the more sceptical I become. And the more cynical about the forces driving this agenda.
The establishment funded âClimate Changeâ alchemists have been forecasting imminent collapse for thirty years. It hasnât happened. And itâs not going to happen in the next thirty years either.
November 28, 2021
GILESB
It goes in 10 year cycles and each time the prophesies fail to materialise, they double down on more wild predictions.
November 28, 2021
JR’s book is a good short guide.
For more detail and some science try Powering the Future: How We Will (Eventually) Solve the Energy Crisis and Fuel the Civilization of Tomorrow
By: Robert B. Laughlin and/or Energy or Sustainable Energy without Hot Air (free on line).
The mad simplistic ideas of the Net Zero religious loons & politicians will not work nor ever be politically acceptable. Democracy would have to die if they really are to push this job destroying lunacy.
Some idiotic politicians really do think they can change the laws of physics – in reality 90% of MPs (at least) do not have a clue.
November 28, 2021
The Hydrogen Illusion by Samuel Furfari is also well worth reading.
November 28, 2021
Transferring wealth from the poor and middle classes to the super rich.
This is normal Tory policy, been going on for years. The only way this greencrap can be implemented is by pricing everything else off the table – here at least, not in the rest of the world. Hence we see petrol and diesel prices the highest ever, whilst oil prices per barrel are historically lower. Gas ever rising in price – why? There is plenty of it, just profiteering and to make it on a par with electricity and our government colludes by not allowing UK gas to be produced. Food, that most basic of commodities rising in price as a result, to satisfy the the eco zealots who are not short of a bob or two. It goes on and on whilst the government cares not a jot and puts dinghy people up in 4 star hotels full board, free smart phones and spending money, whilst for people in poverty here, living in B&B or vermin infested and mouldy rooms, no money for any of that. Get to the back of the queue, we have foreign cheap labour to import which must surely be the aim of such a sclerotic system of assessing asylum claims where tens of thousands come in and only five are returned.
November 28, 2021
What a disgrace. 5 out of 25,500 illegals deported. No more borrowed votes.
November 28, 2021
Well, you don’t know what proportion of the 25,000 are actually here illegally until their cases have been determined and that that is the judgment.
Why the system is so very, very slow in doing that is a question for the Government to answer, but e.g. Germany – and they are in ECHR too – seems to be literally hundreds of times faster, so it would appear possible to speed things up greatly.
November 28, 2021
The ECHR is a corrupt globalist organisation along with the the remainder of the EU plus the UN, WHO, WEF, Council for Foreign Relations, Trilateral Group, Bilderberg Group, the Tavistock Institute and many many more. The people are despised by these groups.
November 29, 2021
If you listed them all then they would be nearly all of the people.
November 28, 2021
Why do even they bother deciding on asylum claims when all can stay anyway? Rather a waste of public money (unless you are going to act on it). Just five yet Priti Patel wonders why they keep climbing onto the RIBS.
November 28, 2021
You canât build electric cars when you donât have enough lithium. The liblabcons are about to be assigned to the political dustbin.
November 28, 2021
Do you not trust the good lithium from St Austell (British Lithium plc)?
November 28, 2021
Indeed Mark, this is all about the self declared “elite” thriving in luxury whilst the rest of us are forced onto the breadline; quite possibly in order to bring about the UN agenda of a greatly reduced population. Government has enjoyed a level of control previously not possible except, perhaps, in war.
Time for all the “greenies” to waken up and realise that CO2 is not a pollutant and the climate change agenda is just a fairy tale based on flawed “science” and statistical manipulation.
We need rid of Boris and his “green” crew before they push us past the point of no return.
November 28, 2021
YesâŠwellâŠweâve been restricted again.
For just TWO cases of an alleged something or other.
Letâs build back sky blue pink!
Whatâs âgreenâ anyway?
Just buy an indulgence with carbon credits.
November 28, 2021
Agreed. A weak government petrified of political criticism completely spoiling hundreds of thousands of people planning Christmas breaks, adding unnecessary costs, isolation for a mild variant etc Anyone with a basic knowledge will confirm viruses mutate all time.
I remember previous BS from Shapps needing PCR feedback re the Delta variant only to learn that a very small percentage of tests were ever utilised.
This government couldnât care. Genuine legal travellers hammered, illegals, come in, hereâs your free bed , food, phone ÂŁ40 a week.
You deserve to be hammered in Bexley next week.
November 28, 2021
I pray they ARE hammered.
November 28, 2021
+1
And not by far Labour or liberal!
November 28, 2021
So do I. It’s the only way to deal with the Tory incompetence and arrogance.
November 28, 2021
They won’t be wrecking my Christmas. # I’m done with their moronic “rules.”
November 28, 2021
So you’ll help to wreck other people’s, and perhaps more than just Christmas.
I wouldn’t have expected anything else, mind you.
November 29, 2021
NLH – Rubbish.
Lockdown kills too. More and more people are realising it.
November 28, 2021
+1
Spot on!
November 28, 2021
Two important points about this: 1. There is NO evidence whatsoever that this new variant is any more harmful than the existing ones; in particular, there is NO evidence that those who have been vaccinated are more likely to die from it. There is therefore NO need for the stupid panicked mask-wearing compulsion introduced by our great useless jelly of a prime minister.
2. I am frustrated and angered beyond words by the continuing focus on mask-wearing by everyone as a measure to prevent the spread of the virus by the tiny number who might be infected, instead of the more obvious solution of encouraging the vulnerable to protect THEMSELVES by wearing better masks. Back in June I wrote here about the study conducted by Addenbrooke Hospital in which they found that wearing the superior FFP3 masks (commonly available to everyone) provided 100% – yes, 100% – protection to the WEARER. If the vulnerable will not take responsibility to protect their own health then I certainly will not accept responsibility for doing so. I repeat, this is not some misleading internet nonsense: this was a study conducted by one of our most respected hospitals, and you can see the results for yourself by simply seaching “Addenbrooke ffp3”.
Why hasn’t the government publicised this more? Why don’t they encourage the vulnerable to wear these better masks? Backbench MPs should be quizzing the government on this (hint, hint!). The only explanation I can think of is that the government is just too cowardly and afraid of criticism from the left-wing media for telling people to look after their own health, as they fear being criticised for being ‘heartless’, or leaving people to ‘fend for themselves’ or failing to take responsibility for the nation’s heath. This is nonsense, of course, since people SHOULD be treated as adults who are responsible for themselves. That, surely, is the Conservative philosophy, but as I have said previously, the government is just too cowardly to stand up for this.
November 28, 2021
In short, X-TORY, they are ignorant idiots. They claim that computer modelling of mask efficacy is better than RCT evidence. Why not look at real world evidence. Germany and Austria have effectively mandated N95 masks since January this year. However, the public donât wear them in clinical settings, and real world evidence has shown that they have not stopped infections spiking in those countries. As I have said before, most of the Western world is governed by Canute like people (without the intelligence) who are so hubristic that they think that the can actually âcontrol the virusâ. In short, we are governed by a bunch of Canutes.
Zorro
November 28, 2021
New Zealand and China controlled the virus perfectly until the arrival of vaccines, and in so doing saved millions of lives.
November 28, 2021
‘Until the arrival of vaccines’, NLH? So you mean, once vaccines came along, cases numbers spiked? Surely not. Oh – yes they did.
I didn’t have you down as an anti-vaxxer, but there’s no arguing with the figures, I suppose.
November 28, 2021
You walked right into that oneâŠ
Zorro
November 28, 2021
NLH- They are not vaccines they are unapproved experimental gene therapy jabs.
November 28, 2021
In addition to getting the vulnerable to wear proper FFP3 masks, the solution to the Covid crisis is:
1. Vaccinations. I am not an anti-vaxxer, but given the fact that the current ones seem to wear off very quickly and are too specifically targeted to existing, known, virus spikes, we clearly need better ones. What is the government doing to promote the development and production of these in the UK? Not much, is the answer. It is an absolute disgrace that the VMIC is STILL not ready and is, in any case, too small to produce sufficient vaccines for everyone.
2. Treatments. These are probably the very best long-term solution – treatments that cure the disease and mean nobody has to worry abouty it. And better still, these treatments are NOT specific to one strain or variant, but cure covid WHATEVER mutations might occur. There is an excellent article in today’s Telegraph about a new cocktail of two existing drugs (named Spidex) that can be repurposed to fight any strain of Covid. See here: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/11/27/spidex-drug-cocktail-could-defeat-new-covid-variant/
In addition, I have previously written here about the two treatments which have been proven (in proper, randomised, placebo-controlled clinical studies) to prevent Covid deaths, namely Calcifediol (a more powerful variant of vitamin D) and Synairgen’s interferon-boosting inhaler. What has the government done to accelerate the use of these treatments? Absolutely eff all. The government has been utterly, utterly useless. What a disgrace.
November 28, 2021
Actually I think that the only thing to say about all this cr*p ( let us not dignify it with debate) is that it is cruel.
We only lived our lives as decreed by governments.
We obeyed orders and followed the herd.
Then suddenly, we are plunged into a punitive madness.
As if it were all our fault!
Not to mention the fact that Johnson has turned us all into very sick people.
November 28, 2021
Itâs an abusive relationship. If you keep complying, they will keep on telling you to assume the position.
Zorro
November 28, 2021
Yes they will, but the impact on monetary and life might just not be worth the price.
The whole green process of saving the world is now a religion and is driven by threats and fears of hell and damnation.
The vast majority of the world’s politicians have taken it hook line and sinker with no real plan on where is the infrastructure to support it.
Only China will reign supreme when all this nonsense collapses in that they will have the majority of raw earth materials that is the linkpin to the whole process under their control.
November 28, 2021
@Turboterrier
Rubbish. The infrastructure is going in. Already there are more EV charging points here than petrol/diesel pumps. BP has announced the installation of another 50,000 over the next three years. Toyota will have a long-range EV on sale next year with their new solid-state battery. It will do 700 miles between charges and utilise the latest ultra-fast 10 min charging technology. Do try and keep up with the technology
November 28, 2021
And you have just outlined a major reason not to buy an EV! Paying out for an expensive one now only to find the developing technology rendering it of little value in a short time is not a sensible move, unless you have so much money you don’t care.
November 28, 2021
Indeed the more you delay the better off you will be. Delay until they can go 500 miles and can recharge fully in five mins (for another 500) and they only cost about ÂŁ3000 as my secondhand cars all do. Also when they can give you a 15 Guarantee on the battery and not a 5 year one. Except this idiotic government will force you off the road by law, ULEZ or other taxes.
November 28, 2021
Turboterrier is right. It is the new religion, complete with sale of indulgences in the form of carbon credits. As for charging points they will need more because charging takes much longer than refilling from the pump. Claims are one thing, actual delivery another. It is all driven by the claim that climate scientists can predict global temperature some 80 years hence to an accuracy of 0.1C. Even more remarkable the claim is made that man can actually control the temperature to that precision against the forces of nature. It is preposterous.
November 28, 2021
OLDTIMER
I think there have been many flights over the cuckoos nest.
November 28, 2021
The acid test, I’d say, for religious status is whether a creed’s adherents blame its failure to deliver the promised miracles on some people’s not believing fervently enough in its dogma.
Now, I don’t know any atmospheric physicists who claim that, but I have heard a few brexiters say something very much like it indeed.
Haven’t we all?
November 28, 2021
If you were keeping up you would be praising the small electric planes we will all want and must have very soon.
Is Toyota’s new proposal of a car made from an exotic reinforced papier amache?
November 28, 2021
damn keyboard – – mache ofcourse.
November 28, 2021
You are obsessed with motor cars SG, like our Government.
It is tiny part of the total UK’s emissions and a tiny part of total world emissions.
The switch to battery cars will reduce global temperatures by a decimal point of one degree.
November 28, 2021
No, CO2 emissions from transport – mainly road – are a very large part of both.
November 28, 2021
Tell us the figure you are claiming as a total of UK CO2 emissions then NHL
Note.
We are talking about cars
November 29, 2021
It will not even to the point of one degree EVs increase CO2 all considered and anyway the CO2 link to climate is hugely exaggerated.
November 28, 2021
I can keep up with the technology Sakara but not the cost. That new Toyota with it’s solid state battery sounds wonderful but will I be able to afford it? I doubt it somehow.
November 28, 2021
SK
You can put in all the things you mention and they are not worth diddly squat if you do not have the power generated and delivered to where its needed. Yesterday 80k houses without power how do yo think they were going to charge their tool batteries up ever mind their cars. You are typical of what plaguesthis country and world at the moment. Go and get a degree in power generation and distribution work for over 40 years in the industry.
Better still try getting and applying basic principles to the foundation of an all electric world or even better cut out all the emotions and apply basic common sense.
November 28, 2021
@Sakara Gold
It may be a little optimistic to expect a solid-state battery powered vehicle to be on sale next year … and to initially expect 700 miles between charges, but progress is being made.
https://www.electronicdesign.com/markets/automotive/article/21177144/electronic-design-those-big-bets-on-solidstate-batteriesthe-payoff-is-getting-closer
November 28, 2021
Sakara Gold :
“The infrastructure is going in. Already there are more EV charging points here than petrol/diesel pumps. BP has announced the installation of another 50,000 over the next three years.”
There are 32 million cars on our roads so 50,000 over the next 3 years is not going to get very far.
âToyota will have a long-range EV on sale next year with their new solid-state battery. It will do 700 miles between charges and utilise the latest ultra-fast 10 min charging technology.â
If this is true, then we will not require many more charging points than existing petrol/diesel pumps or the need for every house to be fitted with a charger.
Furthermore, I would think it would destroy overnight the $1 trillion value of Tesla with its Li-ion battery technology and strongly demonstrates that we should not be implementing our unilateral net zero strategy until we have the technology to make the transfer to total electrification workable and affordable.
November 28, 2021
Its all ‘jam tomorrow’
November 28, 2021
+1
November 28, 2021
More EV charging points than petrol/diesel pumps.
That claim just proves how inefficient these things are. Millions of cars etc. on the roads, relatively very few EV vehicles in comparison, yet these few need more refueling points than all the rest? What happens when another 25 million are put on the road? Who will afford the new 700 mile ones? The ten minute charge is still slow in comparison and probably years away for the majority, at what cost will they be and what happens to the ones already built and being built? They will still need the slow chargers. This has all been introduced before it is ready and will result in great waste and even more carbon emissions as they are scrapped. Good products need no subsidy, people will buy what is best for them. By the way, do you, with your superior knowledge have to be quite so rude in making your point?
November 28, 2021
Which MP recommended the firm (s) to make all these unused charging points?
November 28, 2021
Thats ‘charging points’ funded and subsidied by the taxpayer
November 28, 2021
I have no problem with the technology but there are a snags still in being. For a start, no one has yet produced a viable plan as to how the energy needed to charge millions of EV can be produced – not least when the sun doesn’t shine or the wind doesn’t blow.
China has in fact collared a significantly high proportion of the known rare earth materials needed to manufacture the batteries, because China has steadfastly collared the majority of currently known sources of, for example, Lithium and in effect can control the battery-manufacturing processes.
There is, we are told, legislation being planned for all new domestic EV chargers to programmed to automatically switch off during peak power load times.
Certainly technology will, if it is profitable to do so, eventually overcome battery and range problems but the essential question remains, from where will the energy needed to charge millions of EV?.
November 28, 2021
+10
November 28, 2021
If EVs are so good why introduce a law banning ICE vehicles
November 28, 2021
It takes under 3 minutes to add over 600 miles of range to my diesel. That would require 200kWh of charging for an EV, which would take about 30 hours on a domestic charger, and 10 hours on a typical medium fast charger. If you want to charge faster than that you need a very expensive EV that can handle fast charge rates, and a willingness to sacrifice battery life.
November 28, 2021
Why can’t EVs be designed to facilitate battery exchange for ready-charged ones, like is done with a power tool?
Yes, some things would have to be rethought, but these are not insurmountable, and it would address the undeniable problem which you raise.
November 28, 2021
Cable hand drill – 10-15+ years life-time
Battery hand drill – 2-3 years life-time
November 28, 2021
It is plain you have no understanding how EV vehicles are designed and built NHL.
Not that I am surprised.
November 28, 2021
Nottingham Lad Himself :
“Why canât EVs be designed to facilitate battery exchange for ready-charged ones, like is done with a power tool?”
I’ve just Googled the weight of EV car batteries and the Tesla S’s weighs 544 kgs.
So I think a little difficult to exchange by oneself on a garage forecourt.
I’ve also read that the batteries will be part of the sub frame so, like iPhones, if you need a new battery you will have to buy a new car.
November 29, 2021
So you purchase a brand new car then get the chance of a clapped out battery in exchange for your new one, no thanks.
November 29, 2021
You will still have to find a national power source to further charge all the interchangeable batteries you speak of.
People have little idea of what POWER itself actually is, far less the QUANTITY required, simply to keep us mobile and warm, before we even begin to power our industries.
Our current education system today, leaves us woefully ignorant in the fields of simple mathematics, physics, and chemistry, required to quantify fundamentals of the Real World.
Economically utterly useless Social Sciences Politics and Government seem to be the only games in town.
November 29, 2021
You have forgotten History of Theatre. And PPE.
JF
November 28, 2021
âThe proof of the pudding being in the eatingâ might be the 10-mn fast charger on the Lidl parking in Whitley Wood, Reading. Today there were one Renault Zoe being charged (10-mn charge would add between 10 and 15% of a total charge) and otherwise one Peugeot e-208 and one Tesla on the 40-spot parking when I went there.
Plus eight hybrids (3 Hyundai, 2 Kia, 2 Yaris, 1 Clio).
So a bit more than 25% of the cars (EV + hybrid) on a Sunday morning.
If Lidl customers start to get hybrids and EVs that must mean something âŠ
November 29, 2021
Um… that hybrid and EV owners are now so broke that they have to shop at Lidl ???
November 29, 2021
Thatâs a possible explanation. Another one is that more people are interested in this type of cars, specially when monthly leasing charge of an EV is not so much more expensive than one similar contract for a petrol or diesel car (which tends to disappear from the advertising from the main brands).
November 29, 2021
NLA. Why not shop there if it saves money? Just because you are better off doesn’t mean you need to spend more than necessary. What a silly comment.
November 29, 2021
Not one car in the Tesla charging station at Winnersh when I passed today.
You know, the site that is built on a flood plain (next to the roundabout) and gets flooded from time – time, sometimes with flood water halfway up the height of the charging stations.
Assume they are thus all being used on the road !
November 28, 2021
What an excellent summary of the situation John. The infrastructure simply does not exist for this electric revolution. Unless you can afford to spend thousands extra on products that are inferior to those you are using at present yiu are not going to change. Many people are struggling now to pay their way in life with all the extra taxes coming next year. It is unrealistic to expect us to pay more for colder homes and inferior transport. I’ve looked at these hybrid and electric cars and unless you can afford over ÂŁ40k the choice and quality on offer is rubbish. Why is the government still charging extra road tax for vehicles costing over ÂŁ40k even if they are electric? If you need a good sized car then most decent electric cars are over ÂŁ40k. Self charging hybrids are simply rubbish and the return on fuel consumption is not great due to the weight of the vehicle which incidentally won’t be doing our roads alot of good. Full electric is a problem because there aren’t enough charging stations around and staying in friends homes or guest houses etc is made difficult. I’m sure those people in parts of the country that experienced power cuts yesterday weren’t happy when they couldn’t use their cars. Unless you are wealthy and can afford to pay for this green privilege then the whole thing stinks. You don’t have to do much research to find this so called green revolution is anything but green but just a big con and a way for the rich elite to make more money from the surfs.
November 28, 2021
What a rubbish post. if you cannot afford a ÂŁ40k car, you should’nt be a conservative
November 28, 2021
What a silly post. Perhaps you need a car to get to work every day but are on a low wage. A ÂŁ40k electric car with finance costs, charging, parking and depreciation might cost 10k plus (taken out of the already heavily taxed and NI income. Perhaps you can afford it but only of you live in it too and only eat porridge!
Lots of people on low pay are not daft socialist or the Tories would never win elections. Though currently the Tories are alas daft Socialist and in love with this insane unscientific war on CO2 religion. CO2 that âgreensâ the planet very nicely indeed.
November 28, 2021
There are cheaper EVs than the Tesla, the Nissan Leaf at ÂŁ25,995, the Peugeot e-208 at ÂŁ27,225 and the Renault Zoe at ÂŁ27,595. Still a lot of money but in the past we have had contributors talking about the beauty of their various Jaguar, Land and Range Rover (F-Pace at ÂŁ40k+, Evoque at ÂŁ32k+, Discovery at ÂŁ53k+).
November 28, 2021
All small and cramped Hef.
November 29, 2021
Presently I can get a petrol Octavia estate for less than an electric mini Leaf.
November 28, 2021
Is that 40k on the nail or on tick?
Didnât know there was a wealth test for Tory membership.
Rules me out..lolâŠ.better join Reform! đ
November 28, 2021
Has Two -Jags got one?
November 28, 2021
Two-Jags? Iâm sure that I heard him called âOne Carâ Prescott.
November 28, 2021
He is now no Jags I understand.
November 28, 2021
Maybe the ÂŁ65k I-Pace Jag?
November 28, 2021
So what should you be if your car purchasing budget is less than ÂŁ40,000?
November 28, 2021
My family currently have 4 cars, combined value perhaps ÂŁ12,000 max for all four, all have plenty of life left in them and all can go about 500+ miles on a tank and then refill in about 3 mins. Running all four costs about half of the cost of running Just one new EV car. Much of that running cost is the 80% tax on the fuel that EV cars do not pay.
November 28, 2021
What a rubbish post SG
There are many millions who are not Conservatives and who also cannot afford such vehicles nor do they have the type of homes where they can charge them.
November 28, 2021
? ! ?? !! To use your own mot du jour, ‘rubbish’, SG.
November 28, 2021
SG
I assume this is some sort of a joke, yes ?
November 28, 2021
There are a great many conservative people who can’t afford a new ÂŁ40k car Sakara – and sometimes they even vote for the Conservative Party.
However, I’m very sure inflation is already going to make many peoples lives much harder without this Government adding further taxes and forcing upgrades to vehicles and home heating. Boris is frankly fortuate that there is not a vialble political alternative available or many might be tempted to vote for it.
November 28, 2021
But rarely do they get a real Conservative party.
November 28, 2021
SG, perhaps you should lay off the Saturday night “pop”. It doesn’t seem to be doing you any good.
Oh! and by the way, you shouldn’t be on this site if you cannot put your apostrophes in the right place.
November 28, 2021
I was going to mention that!
November 28, 2021
Oh Dear!!! What a give-away.
November 28, 2021
What arrogance. People are entitled to their views and it was a most reasonable post in most people’s experience I would say. Obviously you have such wealth as to not be bothered by things like price increases and 40k cars. It is the ‘little people’ who struggle every day who provide the services for the likes of you, yet you have contempt for anyone else and their views. Most unpleasant.
November 28, 2021
Nope. I can’t afford a ÂŁ40k EV car and so shouldn’t vote Tory… and WON’T !
(I’m on a good salary but have been screwed getting two kids through long STEM courses at Russells.)
November 28, 2021
Sakara. I’ve only just managed to get on my phone to reply to your ultra snobbish and class driven reply, ironically because my battery was flat and we’ve just had a 6 hour power cut. What has voting Conservative got to do with money? My parents were poor working class but voted Conservative all the time. They despised Labour with the backing of big powerful unions which did nothing to help those in poorly paid jobs with no unions. The only working man Labour helped were those with big unions. Blair seemed to appeal to all sorts, wealthy and poor. Your post is really demeaning and I’m not alone in feeling that way. Yiu have certainly been taken in by the new religion and as others have said you need to get out more.
November 28, 2021
I have a self charging hybrid – it cost ÂŁ28k and is the best car I have ever owned. Next.
November 28, 2021
In our free society thatâs your choice, however in 8 years my freedom of choice is being curtailed with this current Marist government bringing forward a ban on what type of vehicle I can buyâŠIâm worried when governments start banning thingsâŠbooks next
November 28, 2021
You are perfectly free to buy a car which doesnât contribute to climate change. You can walk if you like.
November 28, 2021
Comrade â so my choice is a tesla in red or a tesla in red
November 29, 2021
By your own admission you have chosen to buy a car (a hybrid) which does contribute to climate change – so what exactly is your point.
November 28, 2021
Probably less than 8 years glen. Why would car manufacturers keep shipping RHD ICE cars into the UK market in 2029 when they know they will be banned at the end of that year?
November 28, 2021
Good for you Andy! đ
November 28, 2021
There is a time and place when an electric car may be useful:
If you predominantly are only ever going to use it on short journeys.
or
If you have a second alternatively powered or hybrid vehicle for longer runs.
Remember that the vast majority of electric vehicles cannot be towed if you breakdown, due to the fact they do not have a neutral gear, so you will possibly cause permanent damage all of the transmission and drive gear, which is constantly engaged.
Thus to move a broken down EV you really need to lift it onto a flatbed lorry, if it cannot be fixed roadside.
November 28, 2021
A flatbed lorry powered by what? – – just asking.
November 29, 2021
They cannot be towed with the four wheels on ground. If the drive wheels are lifted they can be towed like any other car. Another myth bites the dust.
November 28, 2021
It will soon be a non compliant vehicle in London’s ULEZ zone young andy.
November 29, 2021
When is âsoonâ?
November 29, 2021
Look it up heffy
It’s on the TFL website.
November 29, 2021
P2âs usual escape route who heard something on the grapevine but is not able to give a proper information.
Practically all cars made after 2015 are compliant including Euro 6 Diesel cars, so not a very stringent criterion, but certainly a vacuousisimo comment from P2.
November 30, 2021
It’s not on the grapevine heffy.
Wrong again
Go and troll someone else.
November 28, 2021
Well the ones we looked at were underpowered and mpg was rubbish. Not as good as a diesel.
November 28, 2021
you stated over and over again that you HAD a Tesla – best car you’ve ever had, we should all get one…..blah blah.
SO YOU LIED.
November 28, 2021
Thanks Micky. I thought I was going mad as I distinctly remember Andy saying he drove a Tesla. It’s difficult remembering your exaggerated claims eh Andy? Do you really own a second home in France?
November 29, 2021
Actually, It claimed to own two homes in France
November 28, 2021
Andy. Self charging hybrids still use fuel and lots of it.
November 29, 2021
A “self charging” hybrid is not an EV, it requires petrol or diesel fuel, and in no way prepares you for the realities of operating an EV.
November 28, 2021
Excellent article John. There is no demos for this green lunacy.
It is driven by the unseen hands of the UN, WHO and WEF as a means of bankrupting the west in favour of the east.
There is absolutely no gain for the general public only for the top 10% who won’t be inconvenienced by this revolution.
There will be blood spilt over this nonesense and politicians had better find somewhere to hide.
November 28, 2021
@Ian Wragg
What alarmist rubbish. The green revolution will not cause any blood to be spilt. The end result will be a better life for everyone who enjoys breathing clean air. Remember how lovely that was during the first lockdown? There is no “green conspiracy” organised by the Chinese to take over the world.
November 28, 2021
I bet the kids mining cobalt and lithium would like a nice breath of clean, fresh air.
November 28, 2021
That’s the private sector for you.
November 28, 2021
No that’s dreadful socialist dictatorships for you NHL
November 29, 2021
No, the children mining cobalt in the Congo are generally employed in small family businesses or even self-employed.
In a joint-investigation with African Resources Watch (Afrewatch), an African NGO focusing on human rights in the minerals and extractive industries, Amnesty International says it interviewed 90 adults and children working in five artisanal cobalt mine sites. Workers spoke of labouring for 12 hours a day with no protective clothing, and with many experiencing significant health problems as a result.
The report says that child miners as young as seven carried back-breaking loads and worked in intense heat for between one or two dollars a day without face masks or gloves. Several children said they had been beaten by security guards employed by mining companies and forced to pay âfinesâ by unauthorised mines police sent by state officials to extort money and intimidate workers.
Socialist it ain’t – it seems to be tribally riven, with various strongmen constantly vying for supremacy.
November 29, 2021
The Congo is a dreadful socialist dictatorship
Poverty and civil war have riven the nation for decades.
To try to claim it is an organised free market capitalist society is probably the single most ridiculous post I have ever read on here in years.
November 30, 2021
Looks rather more like Victorian laissez-fair capitalism with child workers to anyone with eyes to see.
November 30, 2021
No
Thay was a time of great increases in standards of living for everyone.
Your example is effectively modern day socialistslavery.
November 28, 2021
Spot On
November 29, 2021
Better stop using your laptop, tablet, phone and watch then.
November 30, 2021
P2, whataboutery, indeed.
But if people here were honest (or simply aware of history), they would accept that most of them never said anything about the exactions (pollution in particular, bribery of local politicians) done by Western oil companies in various African countries (going back to Biafra in 1967!)
Now because their favourite newspapers/websites, (im- or ex-plicitly) taking the side of the âpoorâ oil companies likely to see a drop in their profits, have recently started talking about the âworkersâ conditions in cobalt and lithium mining, the plight of those workers becomes one of the main arguments against EVs.
Typical hypocrisy of the first kind, defended by people like P2.
December 2, 2021
Thanks for the idea: Iâll get a chocolate one for my next birthday.
November 29, 2021
What about the children in Nigeria where it has been shown again and again that (some of? ed) the oil extracting companies have been polluting the water for years. Donât they need as much attention as the kids mining cobalt and lithium?
November 30, 2021
Classic whataboutery heffy.
Don’t you normally deride those who post such comments?
November 30, 2021
I love your self awarded intellectual superiority heffy
You are superior to all on here in history and climate change and pollution and all things scientific.
Not only that only yourself is honest and not hypocritical and completely honest.
If I were you I would award yourself a medal.
November 28, 2021
It doesn’t need organising, the West is lead by blind idiots.
November 28, 2021
@Sakhara Gold “There is no âgreen conspiracyâ organised by the Chinese to take over the world.” – so says the brother of the alleged Chinese spy!
November 28, 2021
SG
You are confusing action to deal with climate change with action to deal with pollution.
Two different topics.
November 30, 2021
If a great specialist of these two potential problems says so who am I to disagree.
So, where do you put action on cars and lorries exhausts? Pollution or climate impact? Idem for exhausts from mega-ships? Spillover from petrol and gas extraction: local pollution or potential climate impact? Deforestation in tropical areas: local or potentially global impact? Darkening/melting of glaciers: local or potentially global impact?
November 30, 2021
heffy in his sarky and grumpy mood.
A rare double.
December 2, 2021
A rare double indeed. And as usual with P2 no follow-up on the questioning of his initial comment âyou are confusing action on climate change with that on pollutionâ. Wasnât he the one who wants decent debates?
November 28, 2021
Me thinks a rather over simplification view of the future !
November 28, 2021
You should get out more.
November 28, 2021
Sakara -How many more windmills and the capture of sunlight square mileage will you insist are built and where? Are you happy that the countryside and seascape will be industrialised and spoiled? I presume you are and also that you are no-where near any of that.
November 29, 2021
@SG You are very mistaken that “The green revolution will not cause any blood to be spilt”.
The issue will be the same as with oil where there is a restricted amount of a valuable key resource, there are always greedy or desperate people prepared to do anything to access and control such resources.
Why do you think so much blood has been spilt in the Middle East?
November 28, 2021
+1 insane electoral and economic suicide too. The ERM and poll tax disasters x 10+
November 28, 2021
If Johnson is serious about electric transport then tge holiday cottage industry had better start installing charging points at their properties. It’s no good turning up at a property in a very rural area only to find no charging facilities. I haven’t seen a single property offering this service yet when I’ve been looking for a holiday let.
November 28, 2021
Indeed, you will really find out who your friends are as well, go visit them for a dinner party, and they pay for your return home as well !
November 28, 2021
Strange. I just did an online search for holiday cottages with EV charging points and I got hundreds come up. Maybe you are inventing problems which donât exist?
November 28, 2021
Andy
Yes a simple 3 pin plug and an extension lead will do the trick, other than when the owner finds out what has been going on.
Rest assured it will happen, so holiday lets will then be on prepaid meters, so you pay for your own power supply instead of it being included within the rental price.
Rest assured it will happen if too many plug in !!
November 28, 2021
and by the time the holiday stay is over you might have enough charge to drove home.
November 29, 2021
Even a 3-pin granny charger will put 100+ miles range in the battery in a day or overnight. Is there anywhere in the UK more than 100 miles from a 3-pin mains socket?
November 28, 2021
Last week it was reported (and quietly removed) that over a thousands tesla owners couldn’t get into their cars via its âappââŠ..if theyâre reporting over a thousands that means tens of thousands
November 28, 2021
They could still get in with the keycard. Which is their key.
November 28, 2021
But it highlights the fact that you don’t have full control of the new electronic green device you’ve purchased….and not allowed by law to modify
November 29, 2021
I had the same problem when my diesel merc key fob failed and had to use the “hardware” key. The issue is modern cars not just EVs.
November 28, 2021
Quite!
Itâs all a hypocritical, âdo as I say, not as I doâ, non green , top down power grab from the elite because thereâs too many plebs living too well!
If thereâs a revolution it should be from the people to stop this destruction and take over of modern life.
The Club of Rome certainly were concerned by the speed with which humans are progressing.
November 28, 2021
Sharon – maybe a Ceaucescu moment would wake up the globalist UK Establishment?
November 28, 2021
Green Obscene
On a day like today when the wind is chill and the sails on the frozen mill stay stillâŠ.
We will all bleep bleep freeze to death!!đ„¶
November 28, 2021
But the Sun is shining bright and the tides still ebb and flow.
November 28, 2021
Are you in N.Africa? – Sun shining, wind blowing….?
November 28, 2021
Only slightly sunny here Andy and because we had a power cut no energy produced by our solar panels was transferred to the grid or was available for our use. Brilliant eh? Not.
November 28, 2021
Indeed.
If they really want to save CO2 then on flights they should ban private jets, helicopters (other than emergency ones) first class and business class flights and the flying of aircraft that are not very full. On trees they clearly should chop down all the old ones use for building or something long lasting or bury it and grow new trees in there place. Old trees do not absorb net co2 much or even at all. So we can see clearly they are not really remotely concerned about CO2.
JRâs book is rather optimistic particularly on Hydrogen. There are no hydrogen mines It will cost about 6 times as much as natural gas to make, will produce more not less CO2 fully considered plus it is very expensive to store and transport.
November 28, 2021
God bless the paraffin heater
November 28, 2021
… and the log burner. Just come out of 35 hours of power cut (Andy, take note). The burner provided warmth, boiled kettles and toasted bread, plus a pleasant glow. Not to be permitted under net zero, so cold, no water, no warm food would have been the regime. Stone Age, not just taking us back to the 1950s.
November 28, 2021
Humans seem to have controlled fire even back in the early stone age. It seem that Boris/Carrie and the fake Tories want us to go back to the very early pre-fire stone age! Not for them and the COP 26 hypocrites though – all on their private jets.
November 28, 2021
And logs, the wood you chop yourself warms you twice.
November 28, 2021
You’re still not saying what needs to be said. I understood that. As a party loyal MP you’re nobbled and neutered.
You state ‘it is time for a proper debate’ on such matters. Why? What difference would that make when you yourself belong to and indeed encourage voters to vote for the very party that is carrying out such nonsensical policies.
We have entered a world in which truth, reason and morality are being deliberately supplanted by an extremist ideology and Tory MPs shrug their shoulders for fear of losing their livelihoods.
Again, I watched Neil Oliver last night. He made references to the authorities embrace of the poison and racism of Critical Race Theory and the psychotic, warped ideology of gender politics. When told by someone like this it begins to dawn on one that such ideas are being driven by forces from within not from without. Not one single Tory MP has ever condemned these ideas in Parliament. Why?
I don’t see the purpose of a party loyal MP writing a book that inevitably excludes what needs to be said.
People simply desire normality, truth and natural justice.
Reply So if everything I do is no good why do you bother to visit my site?
November 28, 2021
@DOM
I fear that in many ways JR is between a rock and a hard place – He knows what is going on, but to retain any influence over the government, he has to do things his way, which is with normal Parliamentary procedures.
If he used the same techniques as we do to attack irrationalities, his stock would soon go down.
I am thankful that this site is here, frequently it brings new data to the table, and allows for further honest discussion.
November 28, 2021
I visit your site to provide a counter argument.
And I have said a number of times that I genuinely appreciate your efforts in providing a public forum for those who seek an outlet for our frustrations triggered by events that now impact our lives
Neither am I suggesting everything you do is ‘no good’. I am simply saying that as a party loyal MP you inevitably self censor and that detracts from what most people seek, clarity and truth
I bought your book ‘The Death of Britain’. It didn’t expose what needed to be exposed but I appreciate the efforts you go to.
Your political, not personal, weakness is that you’re still a party MP and party MPs inevitably compromise. That’s the tragedy of party politics
November 28, 2021
I generally very much agree with what you have to say Sir John but it’s unforunate that in voting for you, I also lend my vote to those who don’t deserve it (and normally wouldn’t get it) – including Cameron, May and now Johnson. I fully understand the problems that the pandemic has brought to our shores but there are a whole host of other problems & opportunities that are simply not being addressed and which are going to cost the Conservatives votes at the next election.
November 28, 2021
DOM
I agree with both you and SJR.
As I see it, I do not hold with the party political discipline that does not allow MP’s the leeway to also be individuals able to have their own voice heard. I also disagree with the Parliamentary system that allows Ministers to reply to very pertinent questions from JR and a few others with pure flannel because they cannot be seriously cross questioned. I object to the sheer size of the Cabinet which makes it numerically impossible for the Government to be voted down.
We need an entirely new party in power to change all that but the current system makes it impossible to break the corrupted old system.
November 28, 2021
So, it’s happening again – Masks mandated, and Christmas about to be cancelled with a lockdown! This is on the back of 2 people having contracted the new strain and rising ‘cases’.
The Health minister told us he was going to increase testing.
We all know how inaccurate the tests are – the more tests done the more false positives you get, but that was the intention, wasn’t it, to find / create justifications for economy and life destroying oppression!
None of this is about following the science — The big question is; HOW FAR OFF FOLLOWING AUSTRALIA WITH THEIR FORCED INJECTIONS, ARE WE?
If it is still not clear to anybody that our government is rogue and is working against our best interests, then they have no brain cells left — WE ARE BEING TYRANNISED BY A GLOBAL ESTABLISHMENT, OUR LEADERS ARE MERE PUPPETS, AND FAR WORSE IS TO COME.
November 28, 2021
+1
Agree entirely.
November 28, 2021
Now we are told to wear masks in shops and on public transport.
For the little difference wearing a mask makes, if going into a shop or on public transport is too risky without them, then the answer has to be to shut non-essential shops and suspend public transport.
November 28, 2021
The mask is a football net and the virus a pea
November 28, 2021
It’s not a ‘new strain’. See the Chinese financed WHO website for details. This variant was noted way back in Nov 2020
Johnson publicly stated that we don’t yet know enough about this Covid variant. This is from a man who can barely tie his own shoelaces
Maybe John and his colleagues should write a book condemning his own party’s embrace of extremist racial and gender ideology and trying to pass it off as ‘social justice’.
I’d like to climb inside the head of MPs like Steve Baker and John to see what they TRULY think about the destructive nature of what we are seeing
November 28, 2021
In the Express News.
Doctor Angelique Coetzee says the symptoms being presented to her are; sore muscles, tiredness, feeling of being unwell for a day or two and maybe a slight cough!
November 28, 2021
Also reported in the GB News but not in the BBC or Sky
November 28, 2021
Sounds just like how I react after trying to concentrate on the nonsense our PM spouts forth on TV.
November 28, 2021
+millions.
Oh your last paragraph!
Me too!!
I just donât know how they bear it.
But you know, much of what JR writes seems to me to be ironic/sarcastic.
He donât approve over muchly.
Heâs great!!
November 28, 2021
On the other hand I guess all the MPs etc must KNOW that this is all about a reset because our fiat currency has failed.
Passports not about health but about a kind of digital Domesday Book.
Nudging the scared sheep towards a totalitarian, dystopian future.
Non compliance is the only answer. They need 100% compliance for it to work!
November 28, 2021
+1
“OUR LEADERS ARE MERE PUPPETS” – MPs and the media are complicit. Our democracy is being destroyed by those elected to uphold it.
November 28, 2021
@Brian Tomkinson +1
November 28, 2021
Bryan Harris,
The big question is how much fight is left in the general populations of the countries affected?
Protests will be under-reported in the mainstream media, but we can already see violence in The Netherlands and elsewhere.
November 28, 2021
@Peter +1
It doesn’t seem to matter to those in control just how many protest – they feel they have the upper hand with the law and force on their side.
The only partial solution to any of this, that I’ve read, is to use civil rights to arrest the tyrants, and get new elections, but I fear that would be almost impossible to achieve.
November 28, 2021
+1
It was always said that protests would be factored in. The powers that be were expecting trouble and just donât care!
AND that the protesters would eventually be fired at.
And that it was all aimed at having an excuse for martial law.
November 29, 2021
+1
Martial law and worse
November 28, 2021
Another way of looking at this is that Boris has imposed some pointless but irritating restrictions in order to buy off the headbangers who are crying out for ‘passports’ and lockdowns. ‘Something must be done’, so he has done ‘something’. We are still in the happy position of watching the main battles for freedom and democracy being fought elsewhere. Latest news on the ‘Moronic’ variant is that it appears more virulent but less severe, following the usual pattern of RSVs.
November 28, 2021
If that were the case, I’d hope Boris would give us a little more, or at least a clue as to what he is fighting.
November 28, 2021
With ear to the ground every single person I know will be ignoring lockdown.
The destruction of pubs and businesses will be futile but so be it.
Cancelled Christmases and face masks look like becoming permanent yearly events.
November 28, 2021
NLA +1
Not just at Christmas – some countries are mandating masks every minute of the day, even at home.
I fear we will follow the worst example of tyranny.
November 28, 2021
No Longer A
Looking at the reader comments on four different mainstream news articles – I agree! Most people are planning to ignore any new restrictions. Some have even cancelled their booster jabs as a result of the news if re-introduction of masks.
November 28, 2021
and there are still more deaths due to flu
November 28, 2021
How I wish that I could disagree with your post or see you as a conspiracy theorist.
But I cannot and have to agree with every word you have written.
From Candace Owens on Twitter
” ‘Experts’ told you if you complied with lockdowns, censorship, masks and vaccinationsâlife would return to normal.
âConspiracy theoristsâ told you Covid was never going to end, and governments would use it to usher in a totalitarian new world order.
Who do you believe now? ”
Why are ordinary MPs so complicit ?
November 28, 2021
@Maylor +1 Several good questions
I hate the way the term experts is used, generally to imply that someone knows all there is to know about a subject, when they just know a little more than the rest of us. For that reason, words from ‘experts’ I take with a pinch of salt, knowing how well they can twist the truth.
Listening to these so called experts made me realise early on that this ‘pandemic’ was here to stay – There have been too many hints from the UN and high profile figures that a global reset was on the way, and lockdowns was a part in achieving it.
MPs get their data from a closed shop, IE it mostly comes through the civil service, who have never been known for their impartiality or complete honesty sine Thatcher’s time. They have their own agenda, which has nothing to do with the public they are meant to serve.
Without impartial data or other views, MPs have little else to go on, so they stick with the official government line, and almost always contradict data supplied by constituents.
At times like this you can only trust your own instincts, while obtaining data from different sources, but generally speaking, alleged conspiracy theories are often too close to the truth for comfort.
November 28, 2021
Correct. There have been far too many “long-term policies” advanced very quickly under the cover of the Covid “crisis” for it to be anything BUT a planned event. The climate change hysteria is one.
Another of the most obvious is the speeded-up push to get cash out of general circulation: first increasing the tap and go from ÂŁ30 to ÂŁ45 and now to ÂŁ100 …… and at the same time Sunak talking about a digital currency.
Use cash …. or you’ll lose it. The more use it, the harder it will be for them to scrap it.
November 29, 2021
@Donna +1
Indeed – If we lose cash they can totally control our money – close our accounts, whatever – Without access to our own money we will starve.
November 28, 2021
Maylor, +1
November 28, 2021
BH
I agree. It is a tragedy for the human race.
November 28, 2021
@BF +1
November 28, 2021
What a load of sensationalising caricature we read above.
Still, it worked on your usual suckers here, so I see why you wrote as you did, Sir John.
However, fortunately, they are not representative of that many out in the country at large, which is shown by e.g. the polls, which generally strongly favour measures against covid19, but to which they are implacably opposed.
November 28, 2021
Polls at the time supported Hitler, I believe. ‘So what?’ (âą Sajid Javid)
November 28, 2021
Those polls you describe lead the person to a desired outcome.
Majid Nawaas is investigating further, because he disbelieves that 77% if people want further restrictions.
November 28, 2021
Nobody wants restrictions.
But plenty of normal, balanced people want hospitals to be overwhelmed far less than they want whatever reasonable restrictions are advised to avert this.
It’s that simple.
November 28, 2021
Hospitals are not anywhere near being overwhelmed.
It’s that simple
November 29, 2021
No, not yet.
Owing to incubation lag it’s a bit late when they are.
November 29, 2021
If they are….
Huge capacity still available.
November 28, 2021
I am not an advocate of the green lunacy being promoted by this pretendy-Conservative Government on behalf of the people it really serves: the Globalists / “Davos man.”
Their policies have nothing to do with climate change, very little to do with improving the environment and everything to do with CONTROL of the masses; restricting their lives and the appropriation of what little wealth they possess by a small number of Global “Elite.”
“You will own nothing” ….. because they will own everything, and they really don’t care if you’re happy or not.
Johnson’s Eco Lunacy is one reason why I won’t be holding my nose and voting CONservative next time. I am not voting to make myself colder, poorer, less mobile and with a restricted diet. I am not voting to have to completely redecorate/renovate the house I only finished decorating/renovating 3 years ago because Johnson wants to rip out my gas central heating system.
If that means my Conservative MP gets ditched in favour of a LibDem one (most likely here) it has become blindingly clear over the past 18 months that it won’t make a scrap of difference.
November 28, 2021
Donna
Agreed, just when condensing gas boilers have at last become rather more reliable, now years after their problematic original introduction, the Government now wants us to rip them out, and to encourage us to spend even more money on a new system, which is not as efficient at keeping the house warm, and certainly not anywhere near to being proven as existing methods.
November 28, 2021
+1 they probably use more van fuel in extra maintenance calls than they ever saved in gas. CERTAINLY they COST FAR MORE.
November 28, 2021
Agree – all innovation in gas boilers and ICE cars to be banned by this government – 20 years ago ICE cars where producing 30 mpg now they are making 60-100 mpg…..all those improvements, and continued improvements to be thrown away
November 28, 2021
Donna, +1
November 28, 2021
There is no debate about the so-called green Revolution. The green blob has shut down the debate. It probably controls much of the civil service and certainly controls the Dept of Energy. In its biggest triumph of all the blob controls the office of Prime Minister, the “elected dictator” such is the power of the office just as it did in the Blair years. Nothing will stop or slow down the “Revolution” so long as Johnson remains PM. So how much support can you rely on among Conservative MPs to seek and secure change? Who is there with the means and ability to remove the Prime Ministerial thumb from the self destruct button?
November 28, 2021
+1 but no one any better could get elected.
November 28, 2021
Green statism, socialism and protectionism probably more than anything else has rendered Brexit pointless and meant the govt wonât do anything significant to take advantage of the potential freedoms of Brexit. It seems for example to be the reason the new trade deals (eg with Australia) are so cautious and slow-moving. It also means we may as well have a Labour govt. I suspect thatâs what weâll get, and by the late 20s weâll be back in the EEA.
November 28, 2021
Excellent Sir John!
Electrifrying indeed -our present way of life sold to us and perfected over 100 years and now green too down propaganda by bureaucrats…..
November 28, 2021
Top down arrogant “We know best ” (Don’t we?) .
Meanwhile China and Russia are on course for 2050 dominance by stealth while the West lives in Chinese interesting times confused and confounded by cyber, fake news and daily threats…
November 28, 2021
Here in leafy Lib Dem Buckinghamshire you cannot move for electric cars. They are everywhere. Not just my favourites Teslas but electric Audiâs, BMWs, Peugeotâs, Nissanâs, Volvoâs, Porscheâs- and so many more.
Strangely I never see any of these cars broken down by the side of the road – having run out of power. Which Lifelogic assures us is a certainty. Apparently all the people he knows drive further than 200 miles every day. Anyway âŠ.
I myself have a hybrid, the best car I have ever owned, and I now have multiple friends and acquaintances with electric cars. They are all delighted with their vehicles.
You all lost. Petrol is heading to Dodoland.
November 28, 2021
And down here in Dorset they’re as rare as hens’ teeth. There are very few charging points; at least half of the houses don’t have garages/driveways to charge them on; there’s not much in the way of public transport; if an electric car runs out of juice in the middle of nowhere you’ll be stuck for hours or face a long walk.
They may be OK in metropolitan areas but not in the countryside.
I have a nice little Hyundai petrol driven car. I’ll be replacing it with another one a year before Johnson’s lunatic policy of banning new petrol driven cars is imposed on us (assuming he’s still in Office to do it).
November 28, 2021
Sure. I don’t doubt they’re great but EVs need to be phased in and ICE’s not punished too heavily.
I also doubt that you grade a car as I do – generally being the third owner. They need to be repairable with affordable parts – preferably by me, though I do use a garage for more technical things.
November 28, 2021
They are being phased in. Petrol cars arenât being banned in 2030. Just the sake of NEW petrol cars.
November 29, 2021
Punitive taxation is already here and getting worse and worse. As are anti fossil fuel restrictions. All BEFORE replacements are in place.
November 28, 2021
They burn fossil fuels in the power stations to generate over half the electricity you need to charge these EVs young andy.
November 28, 2021
Indeed, and even wind power needs lots of CO2 to build, backup and maintain.
November 29, 2021
Not so, a year or so ago it was reported that a large proportion of EV owners in Europe, including the UK, predominantly used domestic PV to charge their cars. I don’t know what the proportion is now but you can’t simply go off the grid supply generation mix as a good measure.
November 28, 2021
You must be mistaken – they sold you a ‘Tesla’ and you found out its a hybrid…. what a mug.
November 28, 2021
Andy, Iâm pleased to learn that you never see a broken down EV because a breakdown will cause more of a problem with these vehicles than with ICEVs.
I believe some cannot be towed and must be transported on a low-loader.
But a bigger problem will be when it does happen that the battery runs flat.
This could occur, not because of any fault of the car or the owner, but simply because the vehicle has been caught on the motorway in a traffic jam or accident â perhaps one of those terrible incidents when hundreds of vehicles are trapped overnight on the motorway from snow.
Partially re-charging the battery or towing away will be more complicated and time consuming than a dash of fossil fuel from a jerry can.
November 28, 2021
Actually, they bolt on special wheels where the part that contacts the road rotates but the center bolted to the motor stays still.
November 28, 2021
Know -Dice
Do the brakes still work ?
They will need to if you are towing with a rope !
November 28, 2021
No…
This is for when the breakdown lorry lifts up the front and leaves the back ones on the road, not for straight forward towing with a rope. I believe it’s something invented by the AA.
November 29, 2021
Know dice
Yes fully aware, so you either need to belong to a breakdown organisation (more cost) and wait your turn to be rescued, rather than if simply local, get a friend to tow you home, to the nearest garage to fix the problem.
Can you jump start an EV ?
I thought not, even though they have two power systems, the main one for drive and a second one with a standard type battery to power the ancilliaries.
November 29, 2021
Partially recharging is not more complicated and the latest EVs from Kia and Hyundai provide car-to-car charging.
November 29, 2021
So if they are your favourites why aren’t you driving an EV?
November 28, 2021
Climate alarmism (as professed by government) is best met with the cry “we don’t believe you!”.
Mr. “back of the queue” Obama was told by his climate chief Dr. Steven Koonin that humans had such a small effect upon climate that any counter-action would not have a noticeable effect. There must, therefore, be some other reason for the grand strategy of carbon neutrality to which we cannot be privy. Accordingly, I carry on as normal, whilst having an eye to cost and to reducing pollution.
November 28, 2021
formula 57, +1, perfectly sensible , therefore unarguably wise.
November 28, 2021
Liquid fuels are a far more intensive energy source than batteries, even given the higher efficiency of electric power. So why not use power stations to manufacture synthetic fuels to run vehicles?
Improving battery technology is never going to close the gap and recharging will always take much longer than filling a tank for the same energy transfer.
November 28, 2021
This is an interesting thread as it shows why we ended up with Brexit and other such nonsense. Old people can be easily -and quite irrationally – scared for no apparent reason.
I would urge you all to take a test drive in an electric car. Even if you have no intention of buying one. Youâll have someone from the car dealership with you – you wonât run out of charge. You can see that these are, in fact, the best vehicles on the road.
November 28, 2021
It’s the cost of them and the charging infrastructure that puts me off.
I’m not “scared” of the future.
I’m just waiting for reduced EV vehicle prices and more charging points near me.
November 28, 2021
I just want a ‘level playing field’ and a world without subsidy….but above all the freedom of choice
November 28, 2021
We need to get back to nature and a more natural way of life everywhere . The problem is convincing those countries and individuals who cannot see past their own exploitative noses.
November 28, 2021
Well, Andy, nice to hear you love your EV. Does the cabin heater work on resistance heating? If so, your advertised battery mileage range will drop by around 33%.
Or if it is the more modern heat pump version (refrigeration in reverse) it will will only drop by around 25%. Either way, may I wish you good luck with a trip to Cornwall on a cold, dark Winter day?
Those figures by the way are not something I’ve dreamed up – they are factual, proven by trials and experience.
November 29, 2021
It drives a hybrid, not an EV
November 28, 2021
There is no electric vehicle that begins to offer the load flexibilities of my estate car, let alone the range (I have a regular need for longer range trips sometimes at almost no notice, so I can’t afford 10 hours to recharge the battery before having to stop for another recharge en route). There is therefore no EV I would remotely consider buying on the market at the moment. Your requirements for a vehicle are not mine.
November 29, 2021
+1
November 29, 2021
So why didn’t you buy an EV?
November 28, 2021
Green is a cover for socialist redistribution whilst telling us it’s for our own good.
The soon-to-be officially opened borders will run a coach and horses through any claims to be Green, anti Covid, law-upholding, levelling-up and culturally conservative.
The rank hypocrisy of Royals and celebrities stinks but worst is the Tory Govt lying to us and deceiving us throughout.
You can’t hide this anymore. Not even a BBC news blackout could hide it.
The migrant crisis has reached the utmost emergency (by sea , as I predicted it would on this blog years ago) the public deserves an address from the PM at least as important as the Covid briefings – we need to be told (and trusted to be told) why mass immigration cannot be stopped and why we have lost control of our borders.
Do NOT set up a covert ferry service. As with child-migrants-with-beards you will be found out.
Yet again I’ve been with friends (all non-political people) raising this subject and woke-ism (unsolicited by me) and all of them ask “Just what the hell is going on ?” the disbelief runs the length and breadth of the nation going by friends and family in most regions.
PS, Are Christmas lockdowns and useless masks to become a yearly event ?
November 28, 2021
NJA
Many similar conversations being held by many who we know as well !
November 28, 2021
NLA: Your friends and family are asking the right question, but until they start looking for answers they won’t find any. They don’t have to be ‘political people’ to see the evidence of what’s going on. But they do have to be able to get past saying to you: ‘No, that can’t possibly be happening.’ Those were the last words of Tsar Nicholas before he and his family were shot, and surely of millions of Holocaust victims too.
November 28, 2021
Hat man, +1, the loss of choice, of liberty, of control of oneâs destiny, the helplessness when confronted by a uniformed apparatchik, it all started small and without the ability to challenge it or to get support from friends or family.
Reasoned debate holds no sway, appeals to fairness and respect for the individual are futile and absent.
Austria? Be jabbed or fined, comply or be ruined.
Mengele would be amused at our predicament.
Thank you, DOM, and thank you, Neil Oliver. Your voices are not going unheard.
November 28, 2021
“Where the advent of the car, van and bus widened peopleâs choices and offered longer range journeys to people who otherwise had to walk”
It was the advent bicycle that “widened peopleâs choices and offered longer range journeys to people who otherwise had to walk”.
November 28, 2021
Fresh from the success seen in virus-inspired locking down people and restricting their movements, chucking printed money at them to keep them happy, we now have Act II. Use carbon dioxide as an excuse to do the same. In each case, it should be possible to sell the panacea to the supposed problem without chucking cash if a/ these problems were a significant risk and b/ the panaceae were worth buying without subsidy.
November 28, 2021
âIt is time for a proper debate about this ersatz revolutionâŠ.â
Followed by a referendum.
November 28, 2021
hear hear
November 28, 2021
âIt is a paradox that a revolution should come from the very establishment that is threatened by it. Car companies making a good living selling excellent diesel and petrol cars queue up to decry their old products and promise a new range of electric cars as soon as they can get round to making them.â
It is not a paradox when you see the huge taxpayer funded subsidies they are receiving.
November 28, 2021
Profits are nolonger by margin of selling price to customer, profits are realised by the rate of governments subsidy
November 28, 2021
Masks are back. Travel restrictions are back.
Who could possibly have predicted this? Well, me for a start.
I guess the mutant virus in Number 10 was asleep at the wheel again.
November 28, 2021
But the government’s Behavioural Psychology Unit so-and-so’s are tireless in getting him to do their bidding, Andy, so you needn’t worry.
November 28, 2021
Masks do nothing. Especially ungraded ones such as a tubular scarf which will be perfectly legal. No difference whatsoever between wearing one of these and going maskless.
Surgical masks shove it all out to the front and back .. . making these things WORSE for use on public transport. Would you wear one stripping an asbestos roof or in an ebola outbreak ? No. You wouldn’t.
Have a look at “Vaping through a mask” videos on YouTube to see just how useless all but N95s are. If a picture paints a thousand words then a video paints a million.
This is a sop to the headbangers who want total lockdown but who look like they’re going to get their way.
As for travel restrictions.
For nearly two years I’ve complied with what the Government told me to and my mum has rapidly gone down hill under these conditions. I’ve lost nine friends to illnesses and none from Covid – arguably all of them were down to lockdown measures and lack of NHS attention.
It is quite clear that variants are going to be with us forever.
One life. Live it.
It’s not to be wasted hiding away.
November 28, 2021
Surgical masks shove it all out to the *sides* and back …
November 28, 2021
Thatâs why our military donât have gas masks, they have air tight filter respirators
November 28, 2021
Would you have permanent lockdown then young andy?
No flights
No ships
No dingies?
November 29, 2021
Andy. And so they are in the rest of Europe with some in lockdown. Your point is??
November 29, 2021
Would you share your prediction on which Party will win the next GE, please?
November 28, 2021
An excellent start on introducing some of the issues around net-zero. <blockquoteThe problem with the green revolution is it comes from the top down. Which makes it dogma rather than an evolution.
I trust there will be some reality in Chapter 2 for the MMCC zealots to consider – for too long we have had pseudo science imposed on us, along with all the mass media hype, false stories, as well as climate models that are politically motivated.
An open and honest debate is badly needed, but could we guarantee it would be honest without government psychologists telling us what to think, and the BBC poisoning the debate with their own socialist agenda.
——-
(How do you get your books so reasonably priced? My publisher insists on a much higher price, especially paperback.)
November 28, 2021
âThe problem with the green revolution is it comes from the top down. Government are the revolutionaries, not the hordes at the gates of power urging change.â
Absolutely correct.
In fact I would go further and describe them as eco terrorists.
PMâs speech to the UN 22/09/2021 :
âWe [the UK] started this industrial revolution in Britain: we were the first to send the great puffs of acrid smoke to the heavens on a scale to derange the natural order.â
Again, BTW, a common confusion between pollution (“acrid smoke”) and the plant food CO2 which is 0.04% of our atmosphere.
Furthermore there is no proof as to whether the Earthâs temperature follows CO2 concentration or vice versa.
November 28, 2021
There are so many conflicting research forecasting model that thereâs doubt if the global temperature is actually rising or failing, if the oceans are rising or falling or if co2 is the cause or result of climate change
November 28, 2021
Whilst I recognise the initial barriers created by a lack of energy infrastructure, they can be removed by market forces. Whar really concerns me at the moment is this question; What taxes will the Treasury raise to replace the loss of Fuel and large vehicle Excise Duties?
Who will pay them?
November 28, 2021
It was the advent of the bicycle that allowed offered longer range travel to people who previously walked.
The car just released the rich from having to stable carriage horses.
After that settled and developed we waited to the 1960’s for a car that most could afford.
November 28, 2021
âThe problem with the green revolution is it comes from the top downâ.
Indeed and alas at the top we have clowns & fools with almost zero understanding of energy, science, energy economics, practical engineering, transport or climate and are suffering from the new âwar on CO2â religions.
We are led by ignorant clowns – all but a handful even voted for the appalling climate change act.
November 30, 2021
âAll successful revolutions need to build from the ground up and cannot be imposed from aboveâ: How âinterestingâ to read this from Sir John, as if Mrs Thatcherâs âmonetarist revolutionâ had not been a top down event imposed by Mrs T and the group of politicians around here.
This blog certainly brings me joy every day.
November 30, 2021
It was just a different economic policy which reduced the dreadful effects of inflation.
The election manifesto promised economic policies to do just that.
Hardly a revolution.
December 2, 2021
Indeed, but not ground up, but top down, isnât it?
As for its effect on inflation, I guess you are old enough to remember 1979-1981. In Q2 1980 RPI went to 22%, it went down to 5% between 1983 and 1988 then up to 10% by 1990. Unemployment at 3 millions between 1983 and 1987. Interest rate at 16% in mid-1980, fluctuating down around 10% till end of 1987, then again up to 14% in mid-1989.
Mortgage rate at more than 20% in 1980, down to 10% till 1988, then 15% in Q4 1989-all of 1990.
It was certainly a different economic policy, whether it reduced the effects of inflation is another story.
But the Falklands war made all the little Englanders so proud âŠ
November 28, 2021
Good luck with your new book.
My soon to be sister in law just bought a new electric Volvo, she drove from Sheffield to Stoke and realised the energy sheâd used on the first leg of the trip wouldnât get her home to her charge point, she looked on her little onboard advisor app of where the nearest charge point was for her car – Knutsford around 20 miles away, way out of the way home. These charge points may be coming on line well (maybe in the big cities) as Sakara Gold indicates but not everywhere and they donât appear to take all makes of car.
November 29, 2021
Tell you SIL to try Zap-map or other 3rd party service, there look to be quite a few public charge points in the Peak District – maybe the one at Morrisons in Leek would have suited her better.
November 29, 2021
thank you Dixie I’ll pass that on.
November 28, 2021
John
I am sure we will become more fuel efficient and more environmentally conscious in time, but it needs to be evolved by education and demand, not forced on us by coercion, punitive taxation, or the banning of products before their natural expected time expired lifespan.
It really should then be an easy sell, but the way government is going at the moment it is winning no friends at all other than perhaps the fanatics, and it is risking alienating completely people who simply cannot afford to move at speed, and dump their existing way of life, when they simply cannot afford the alternatives which are still in effect in their development stage in many instances.
November 28, 2021
‘It is time for a proper debate’: Indeed it is, Sir John, but who do we see as hosting this debate? The BBC ? Sky? Hardly.
Parliament? Well, I took a look at a Ho. of Commons document you must know, called ‘Climate change: an overview’. The first page, ‘Climate change explainers’ tells us it’s setting out ‘impartial’ guidance. It includes this statement: ‘Research shows itâs extremely likely that these emissions have led to global warming in a short space of time. This in turn is causing climate change.’ In other words, the anthropogenic account is imposed from the start, while other voices are excluded. I would recommend other readers of your Diary to read it, to see how the terms of any parliamentary debate would be pre-set in a way that favours the Green narrative. So an unbiased debate in what should be the country’s chief democratic forum cannot happen, and that I find worrying.
November 29, 2021
I agree, the situation is polarised beyond rational debate and there is no forum that would be acceptable to all parties.
November 28, 2021
Lets looks at the con between the EV and ICE cars
Traditionally vehicle manufacturers would secure market investment, test a concept & design, seek a market entry point, confirm the customers wants & needs, than manufacture by best practise, advertise to customer, secure local distribution and dealers to sell vehicle
The new green model for vehicle manufactures is to secure government subsidy, target the green lobby and politicians to take over the whole market, ignore how base materials are secured, push design & cost and sell vehicle directly to customer
Electric vehicles have been about for a 100 years and never caught on, apart from milk-floats and fork-liftsâŠ.The current push for EV is due to the billionaires Elon Musk and Al Gore lobbying governments and using their vast resources to manipulate the social media, the green lobby and the new woke society
What ever happened to a free market economy, customer demand, freedom of choice, capitalismâŠ.good old fashioned conservative principals
November 28, 2021
Your first paragraph exactly applies to Tesla Motors. Tesla Motors did not start by securing government subsidy, nor continue with state money.
November 28, 2021
Technically not a subsidy but an award
ââTeslaâs total subsidy value according to the data is $2,441,582,590 ($2.44 billion), across 109 âawardsâ â 82 federal grants and tax credits as well as 27 state and local awardsââ https://cleantechnica.com/2020/08/03/tesla-subsidies-how-much/
November 29, 2021
Are you claiming that the oil industry and ICE vehicle industries received no grants or awards at all, ever?
November 29, 2021
I’m claiming that tesla and the whole green revolution is driven by government subsidy and not by public demand
November 29, 2021
@glen, read the article you linked to, if it were solely the EV manufacturers that benefited from taxpayer funding and government money I would agree with you, but that has not been the case at all. Tesla had a federal loan but paid it back early – 9 years early, while ICE manufactures haven’t.
The Oil industry and its dependents have enjoyed massive grants and tax breaks, not to mention military support and intervention over the years.
November 29, 2021
Dixie I agree we shouldn’t subsidy either EV or ICE but we shouldn’t ban either…allow market forces (the people) to decide what they want to buy or political system they wish to support and follow
November 28, 2021
Well let me just start by saying that it won’t work. The new heating for houses, the electric cars, the cull of the cattle and people will not all become vegetarian. Greencrap will remain exactly that.
If the attempted changes are forced by enough Western governments then the scarce availability of resources is likely to inhibit them carrying out their policies, or perhaps that will be an excuse for WW3? Copper resources will never supply the Western World with enough for all the ev’s alone. Does anyone think things through? Quite obviously not and what we are seeing is blind politicking and a drive to control people, largely through fear.
Which brings me to the latest fear mongering over the new strain of Corona virus. I have never seen such blatant terror tactics as this. We wait for the ‘reluctant’ but ‘unavoidable’ Christmas lock down. So what, as the man says.
November 28, 2021
BOF – Once it was ‘three weeks to flatten the curve’. Now there’s hardly a curve.
November 28, 2021
It is surprising that so little of the actual science involved is ever mentioned. Atmospheric warming occurs because greenhouse gases prevent some of the sun’s infra-red radiation from being reflected back into space. The effect of this warming is to increase the temperature by 33 degrees C, in other words instead of -18 deg it is plus 15 deg. Of this 33 deg, about 3 is caused by CO2, the rest mostly by water vapour plus other greenhouse gases. “Zero carbon” is a policy of insanity given that the UK accounts for no more than 1% of global CO2 output. There is no way that the grid capacity or adequate charging infrastructure can be ready by 2050. The grid capacity will need to triple and the total costs of the “Green Agenda” will exceed ÂŁ3 trillion.
We need a “minimal carbon” strategy, with sensible, practical and cost effective measures to reduce emissions, not an agenda conceived by politicians who are gripped by groupthink, dazzled by data and obsessed by looking good on the world stage, who do not have a clue about the technical, engineering and infrastructure issues involved. A modern society which depends on technology for its existence cannot exist on intermittent electricity.
November 28, 2021
I worried about the smart meter and the black box fitted to our homes and new EVs and the introduction of new laws to control their functions, to collect taxes and to limit electricity usage in regions or at certain timesâŠthe future is soylent green
November 28, 2021
I wonder if we might arrive at a situation where we will be asked for our ID and vaccination status on going into a restaurant or theatre but we still won’t have to identify ourselves when we vote.
November 28, 2021
Good point, Rose, and keep thinking… then what would that tell us about how much our vote mattered, for how the country is run?
November 30, 2021
You need your unique poll card to vote.
And what ever has that to do with public health measures for crowded places during a pandemic?
Guess what, the police sometimes ask to see your driving licence too if you are stopped by them, and you can’t drive without one.
November 30, 2021
Connecting the poll card to the person walking into a polling station is important.
November 28, 2021
Congratulations on your new book Sir John! I think you are spot on, as usual, and that what people object to is having unnecessary costs and restrictions forced on them, not the green “vision thing” per se. Electric cars, for instance, would be great (they are quieter and don’t pollute the air we breathe) IF they didn’t cost more than existing cars and IF they performed as well. I’m sure that, given the current progress in the development of these, better and cheaper electric cars will become available soon, but we need to wait for these to be produced before forcing people to change-over. Similarly with energy. Non-polluting, renewable power would be great, IF it was less expensive and more reliable.
So what the government should be doing is investing in R&D (both directly and through tax incentives for industry) to develop better and cheaper electric cars, and investing in nuclear energy, which is more reliable than wind and also makes us self-sufficient (while at the same time satisfying the government’s obsession with cutting CO2 production). And when all these investments bear fruit then we will all be happy to be ‘green’ – but not before then! Not that what we do will make any difference whatsoever to global temperatures, of course, but that’s another matter …
November 28, 2021
OT ish. Question for ‘Boris’. How many of your environmental fanatic friends flew into Cop26 from southern Africa? Did the new covid variant not exist then? I think of the words deceit hypocrisy and elitism.
November 28, 2021
It’s time to let political dinosaurs go extinct
The Drum / By Tim Dean.
“Simply put: we’re currently governed by 20th century political dinosaurs that are offering ill-fitting solutions to 21st century problems based on obsolete ideologies from the 19th century. It’s not just about a lack of narrative or vision, it’s that whatever vision either party can muster is tailored for the wrong century.”
“This is also the generation (under 30) that will bear the burden of climate change, and they are sick of Baby Boomers eating their carbon cake and having their grandkids pick up the bill.”
November 28, 2021
“The unpopular gas”
Only amongst those trying to force “The Great Reset” onto us. People who grow the food we need to survive, frequently pump extra CO2 into their greenhouses, in order to increase production.
“Non-polluting, renewable power would be great, IF it was less expensive and more reliable”
Power developed from the Sun & Wind will NEVER be reliable, simply because those sources are constantly changing. Any suggestions that storage will solve the problem show a woeful lack of understanding about just how much energy the world really uses.
November 28, 2021
While weâre discussing and debating the virtues of the green revolution; three quarters of the world couldnât give a toss and will continue living their life as they always have
November 28, 2021
Unfortunately the political system in this country is in the hands of people who are not qualified to understand the modern world; they believe that their liberal education enables them to ask the right questions to formulate policy. Actually it does the opposite; it enables people without scientific understanding to turn what is a scientific issue to a political issue of right or wrong, left or right, green or not-green, the latter defined for them by people whose motives they are unaware and of which they have no knowledge.
Science works on the basis of first principles; scientists know that if they want to understand something they have to keep digging until they to have all the answers and have not taken anything on trust. Politicians are incapable of doing this because their education or lack of it precludes such a course.
November 28, 2021
No one voted for this eco-loonery.
No one voted to import the third world.
This Government is the enemy of the people.
November 28, 2021
Stop the World – 2 now 3 cases of the disaster version of Covid have been found that will decimate the UK population.
ERR – — -maybe not, maybe it is just another of dozens of versions – but The Government seizes the opportunity to begin Lockdown all over again .
Informed voices reporting no evidence of anything disturbing at all……
November 28, 2021
”itâs extremely mild” and thats from the doctor that discovered the new omicron variant
November 28, 2021
While we’re building back green the GB News are reporting today –
”A convicted human trafficker is being deported from the UK for a third time in less than two years.
After a National Crime Agency investigation to trace him, officers found Albanian Hazir Lala, 39, in Walthamstow, North London, on Friday night.
He was arrested, taken into custody and handed over to colleagues from Immigration Enforcement for deportation.”……I suppose he’s now in a 4*hotel
November 28, 2021
So when the Home Office said theyâd been five deportations back to Europe this year did they actually mean one person five times
November 28, 2021
Wouldn’t locking him up at our expense be cheaper in the long run?
November 28, 2021
So if we have existing plant and machinery which is still functional then it should be used until the end of its useful economic life.Reference Germany and UK planned closures of old but serviceable nuclear plant. Lets make sure at least in the UK that decision is driven by real risks and not globalist interests supporting investments elsewhere?
Then how about a rational C02 driven tax policy, based on all carbon costs, added to all imported goods and services.
Perhaps a new tax system based on low % level for a modest energy use .Then increasingly punitive taxation to an absolute cap per year. Very limited exceptions.Being emergency services etc but not those who would want to be exempted.
Lets review taxation on billionaires and those not subject to UK taxes. Ensuring they pay tax on the same basis pro-rata like every other individual in the UK.
After all we are borrowing money to pay for all this migration and green wokeness which the elite desire.
November 28, 2021
Who knew we had so much moneyâŠwhy did we have the years of austerity â its as if the magic money tree is working 24/7
November 28, 2021
Itâs all very well for the Government to push for the complete electrification of everything but we will need the green electrical energy to power all of this if we are not to experience decreasing prosperity, (price) rationing, rolling blackouts and a complete change of lifestyle
On P94 of âNet Zero Strategyâ the Government says they will deliver 40GW of offshore wind, including 1 GW of innovative floating offshore wind by 2030 (not far off our current figure of 34GW bearing in mind increases in population and use of EVs and heat pumps) and all electricity will come from low carbon sources by 2035.
But this is less than half the actual wind turbine energy that is required if fossil fuel generators are to be closed down. This is because the stated figure of â40GWâ actually becomes an average of 20GW over the year because of the times when the wind isnât blowing. At the moment fossil fuel generators provide the instant power to stabilise the grid and the long-term back-up when required.
If the fossil fuel generators are to be closed down then it will be necessary to at least double this 40GW wind turbine generation to provide the additional energy required and even more as energy storage will not be 100% efficient.
If the power generated from nuclear will decrease between now and 2030/2035 where will the additional green energy come from and bearing in mind that electricity currently represents less than 20% of our total energy requirements how many wind turbines does the Government think we will eventually need by 2050?
November 29, 2021
“This is because the stated figure of â40GWâ actually becomes an average of 20GW over the year because of the times when the wind isnât blowing”
A synchronised AC grid has to supply the exact demand at all times, or there is a very real risk of cascade failure. As far as wind is concerned, an “Average” figure is just as useless as an installed rating, because the ACTUAL output can fall to as little as 1% of the rated value*. Therefore the backup has to be capable of making up ALL the difference, or the lights go out – it’s that simple.
* I have numerous data captures (over the past 5 years or so) from Gridwatch where wind output has, essentially, fallen to zero. These events can last for several hours, or even a day or more.
November 28, 2021
I find it sad that someone is – and has been – an MP for many years is unable to do anything about this other than agree with the population’s view of it in a blog.
Reply The aim is to change government policy
November 28, 2021
Reply to Reply – it will not change government policy. The Globalist UK Establishment decide what happens and have done for centuries. It is all part of their plan. Control the masses.
November 28, 2021
Why the continued reference to the WEF Build back better jargon? We do not need further debates as they get absolutely nowhere and are loaded against a sensible outcome. We need action to reverse all this global warming,climate change, carbon and green crap BS to regain some common sense.
November 28, 2021
In order to ”build back” things must be destroyed. Someone is doing a good job thus far.
November 29, 2021
Agreed John, the whole thing is a delusion. It’s the longest suicide note in history.
November 29, 2021
I’ve just seen a school where the interpretation of the “Covid rules” is they must have ALL the windows open ALL the time.
So they have all their big windows open, snow blowing in through the windows (yes really), heating on full blast but still freezing in the classrooms, and the poor kids have their outdoors coats on in the classroom.
Now remind me who is paying their heating bill? ah yes that will be us. Remind me how much safer it is to freeze the kids into illness on the supposed lower chances of getting Covid?
And this is the “green” country Boris is supposedly running? You have to laugh at the stupidity of it all.
Nothing at all like “green”.
Now make the teachers responsible for the heating bill and see how long this nonsense would last?