Another MSM outlet looks at Balen

Keith Dovkants at This is London also picks up on the Balen Report angle to the BBC's decision on the Gaza appeal.

Somewhere deep in the bowels of the BBC is a top secret document that could explain a great deal about the corporation's decision to boycott the aid appeal for Gaza. It is called the Balen Report and has been seen only by a small number of individuals at the very top of the BBC. They commissioned Malcolm Balen, a senior editorial adviser, to investigate allegations that the BBC's coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was biased.

The Gore effect

Al Gore is due to give evidence to the US Senate about climate change tomorrow. Apparently they are thinking of postponing it because there is snow and ice forecast.

Too funny.

Insurance and global warming

There's a fascinating new article over at Climate Resistance, where the myriad of links between the insurance industry and climate activism are put under a forensic microscope.

Likewise, we would be less interested in such dodgy dealings if it weren’t for the mainstream media’s tendency to decry Exxon funding as corrupting of the scientific method while deeming Munich Re’s pronouncements - let alone the pronouncements of those they sponsor - as above scrutiny. It’s also worth re-stating at this point that fear is to the insurance industry what oil is to Exxon.

Something's got to give

Instapundit has been reporting regularly on the problems caused by over-generous state pension schemes. With the stock market tanking, these are now showing terrifying deficits, all of which are going to have to be filled by taxing workers in the private sector. The problem is that with no sign of improvement in anybody's economic fortunes anywhere on the horizon, there isn't going to be much that they can actually tax for years to come.

What is worse, this is all happening just as the baby boomers start retiring.

The situation is going to be the same here, and resolving it is going to be messy, if not bloody.

Tories vote for managerialism

The Conservatives have come up with their latest bright idea - a new, disciplined approach to public spending is revealed today,  with rapid response teams being planned, in order to put a stop to inappropriate spending and waste. In other words it is a managerialist's wet dream and is the kind of thing you would expect to be dreamt up by a wet-behind-the-ears Tory boy with no experience of the real world beyond his gilded cage. Since the author of the ideas is George Osborn and this is precisely what he is, I suppose we shouldn't be surprised.

Thatcherism worked because it bypassed the civil service entirely by simply closing things down or selling them off. Osborn appears to be betting that he can avoid these kinds of unpleasantries but can still get the civil service to behave like rational people rather than like bureaucrats.

The odds that he can actually acheive that in practice must be very, very long.

Annual changing of the MCB mind

Every year it seems the Moslem Council of Britain changes its collective mind on whether to attend  Holocaust Memorial Day. This year they are not going to attend.

Cue rumpus.

This will just make them look like extremists again.

Brain training doesn't work

Nintendo's brain training games aren't as good as the advertising puff and the hype would have you think.  Our kids' school recommended them to us, just a few weeks ago. I'm glad we didn't take them up on it.

Guardian makes connection from Balen to DEC

The Guardian has picked up on the connection I made to between the Balen report and the BBC's actions over the DEC Gaza appeal.

Sources within the BBC have questioned whether its internal Balen report into its Middle East coverage, which the corporation has refused to publish, has influenced its decision on the DEC appeal. An appeal to the House of Lords to force the BBC to publish the report is currently ongoing.

Still time to write to your MP about information sharing

Spy Blog points out that there is still time to write to your MP about the creepy authoritarian ideas in the Coroners & Justice Bill.

My toady MP, Gordon Banks, hasn't bothered replying to my email (nor indeed to the earlier one about MPs' expenses). It doesn't matter though. He probably knows he's toast at the next election. The point still needs to be got across.

Fake charities on The Today Programme

Daniel Hannan was on the Today Programme just now discussing EU funding of charities. He didn't mention fakecharities.org by name, but I think it's fair to say that our efforts may have had an effect on the news agenda.

I'll try to post a link to some audio later on.

Update on Jan 26, 2009 by Bishop Hill

The audio file can be found here.

A double whammy for the private sector

Private sector workers are being decimated by layoffs. It's a bloodbath out there and there's no sign of a letting-up in the pace of the slaughter.

Even the lucky ones who survive the cuts are not going to be allowed to escape scott-free though. All those layoffs mean less tax money for the government and Alastair Darling is going to have to fill the gap somehow - there is a public sector machine that needs feeding.

The answer is, inevitably, more taxes. Not satisfied with decimating private sector workers the parasites in the public sector are going to rape the corpses as well.

The big freeze

The Greenland ice sheet melt was meant to be evidence of an imminent global warming Armageddon. Just as well that it has stopped then.

There's also been snow in the United Arab Emirates.

Look who's on the make

The news that a bunch of Labour peers have (allegedly) been tarting themselves about on their purported ability to get legislation changed for their "clients" has given the week's news a delicious fin-de-siecle sense of grubbiness and corruption.

One of the commenters at the relevant post at Labour Home helpfully points out that one of the alleged culprits has previous form:

Typical that Lord Taylor of Blackburn is one of them. He's a central character in the saga of Jack Straw's embarassment by the Committee on Standards and Privileges. It was Lord Taylor of Blackburn who "invited" U.S. company Canatxx, with no previous connection to Blackpool, to make the £3,000 "a non-political donation" to Jack Straw's 25th anniversary party that was never declared. A bit before Canatxx made a planning application to Lancashire County Council to to store gas in salt caverns. Lord Taylor was a paid consultant for Canatxx.

Oh, and Lord Taylor of Blackburn forgot to declare an interest when asking a supplementary question about gas storage. Canatxx's business is gas storage. He made an apology later.

More on the Work Foundation

Still reeling slightly from the shock of reading the Work Foundation's recent accounts, I decided to take a look at an older set, just to get a feel for how long this has been going on.

The earliest year available from the Charity Commission is 2003. Willie Hutton was still in charge back then, and the pattern in the Foundation's activities was rather similar too. For instance, Willie H was identified as the top-paid director by name back then, taking £140k per annum. Nice work if you can get it. Back in 2002 (i.e. the comparative year) the Foundation had over 200 employees, so the salary is slightly more justifiable than the rather larger sum he gets paid for overseeing the Foundation's current 60 staff. It still strikes me as an amazing amount for the head of a small charity to be paid though.

Looking back to the prior year comparatives, it appears that in 2002 the Foundation sold a training business and its associated publishing operation (to Capita - nice to keep these things in the family), making a cool £20m gain in the process. Just as well with a £14m deficit on the pension scheme, I suppose.

It's interesting to compare the balance sheet total for 2002 to the most recent date. In that time, the assets of the Foundation have shrunk by about £10m, and of course it would have been even worse if it were not for the gain on selling their headquarters.

It looks to me like the Trustees need to get a grip.

More fake charities: the RSPB

This one is astonishing: the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds received £19 million in government money in 2008.