Looking for diamonds in the Hansard mine
However, here's an MP working hard for his constituents:
Mr. Steen: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions for what reasons Mr. John Coombe of Brixham did not receive a £10 Christmas bonus payment and subsequent additional £60 bonus payment under the Real Help for Pensioners Christmas bonus payment scheme; and if she will make a statement.Angela Eagle [holding answer 8 June 2009]: The acting chief executive of the Pensions, Disability and Carers Service has responded to the hon. Member separately on 3 June 2009 with the information requested relating to his constituent Mr. John Coombe of Brixham.
Shame Steen won't be able to to roll up to the door of John Coombe of Brixton and say 'Look what I've done, do the decent thing and vote for me'. Because he's standing down...
Mr. Hands: To ask the Prime Minister whether he plans to reply to the e-petition which closed on 9 April 2009, relating to the BBC World Service, on the Downing Street website.The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the reply issued on the No. 10 website: http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page19451 A copy of this webpage has been placed in the Library of the House.
Mr. Dai Davies: To ask the Prime Minister whom he consulted on his proposals for constitutional reform announced on 10 June 2009; what public consultation he plans to hold on the proposals; and if he will make a statement.
The Prime Minister: Public consultation will be a key part of the proposals for constitutional reform, and the Government will set out their plans for taking this forward shortly.
Not 'its'? Perchance he thinks he will not be there when it happens.
Aviation related factlet o' the day:
Mr. Gerald Howarth: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what the hourly cost of air-to-air refuelling of an RAF VC10 is.
Mr. Quentin Davies: The full-cost hourly rate of operating a VC10 tanker in the air for financial year 2009-10 is calculated to be £29,235. This figure incorporates a variety of costs to enable an aircraft to operate such as personnel costs, servicing of the aircraft and fuelling of the aircraft. It does not include the costs of the fuel payload VC10's carry to refuel other aircraft.
Odious though the turncoat Davies is, he missed the opportunity to say to Howarth - who cares how much it costs, mid-air refuelling is just awesomely cool.
Sticking with VC10, say hello to this week's most contrived acronym: "Maintenance of the RAF VC10 fleet is provided by BAE Systems under a partnering agreement called JAVELIN (joint approach to VC10 engineering and logistics integration)"
Guess who does not represent a naval constituency:
Mr. Ellwood: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what assessment he has made of the merits of transferring control of the Fleet Air Arm to the Royal Air Force.
Bill Rammell [holding answer 16 June 2009]: No such assessment has been made.
Ellwood represents Bournemouth East, and may well have set himself up for a lifetime of letters from Disgusted of Portsmouth, Disgruntled of Plymouth etc etc. Given that the FFA is only five years off getting its hands on some really hot planes for the first time in decades, Ellwood is being really mean.
Guess how many lags per screw there are in the nation's category C prisons, which hold 'those who cannot be trusted in open conditions but who are unlikely to try to escape'?
Dizzy just volunteered 500, my guess would have been maybe 20. In fact it varies from 2.3 to 5.1 per prison. A far cry from 'Porridge'. Meanwhile, I also discover that there are some 525 septuagenarians (or older) doing time.
We, the Great British Public, are somewhat unimpressed by the criminal justice system:
Mr. Grieve: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what assessment he made of the level of public confidence in the criminal justice system in 2008.
Mr. Straw: Public confidence in the criminal justice system (CJS) is measured using the British crime survey (BCS). In the year to March 2008 44 per cent. of people were confident that the CJS is effective in bringing people who commit crimes to justice. This rose from 39 per cent. in 2003, and met the Government’s target for the period 2003—2008.
That's pretty dire.
Andrew Robathan is a chiropteraphile. That's a bat lover.
"I like bats, I love seeing bats flying and I want bat populations to flourish"
Which is nice. Doubtless bats feel the same way about the family Robathan, although probably not the flying bit. Way back lost in the mists of time, the one time family home of Ma and Pa Croydonian had yearly visitors in the form of Leisler's bat, a comparative rarity in England. Chiropteraphiles would descend on Croydonian Towers to capture, tag and gaze in awe at said bats. There was also the fun of a Christmas card addressed to the family 'and your bats'.
Labels: arms and the man, crime and punishment, furry creatures and similar, Parliament
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Ere, guv, what larks the strike at Lindsey. Now the left has to reverse its bizarre support for immigration (implication:Brit workers are useless). TUC has nothing, preferring to attack BA "luxury food", & Unite has 0, preferring to worry about the climate in ...2080. SWP has 0. Will the left implode? No such luck.
F-FRW - Yup, not a mumbling word from either the TUC or Unite. Maybe they have given up the unequal struggle of getting anyone to listen to a word they say.
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