How Government Works

To mark the passing of actor Pete Postlethwaite, John Prescott pens a moving tribute to the courage, decency and effectiveness of..... John Prescott. He writes how Postlethwaite influenced him:

His character, band leader Danny, after spending his life wanting to win the national brass band trophy, symbolically turns it down because he knows it's the only way he can get publicity for the 1,000 miners who were sacked from his pit.

The line that got me was: "This government has systematically destroyed an entire industry – our industry. And not just our industry – our communities, our homes, our lives. All in the name of 'progress'. And for a few lousy bob."

You can watch it here. I defy you not to cry.

These communities had their heart ripped out by successive Tory governments. 200,000 were thrown on to the dole and were just left to rot. That led to increasing rates of worklessness and despair.

It made me so angry and I thought we must do something. I then realised I was the minister in charge!

So presumably if  Prezza had watched Toy Story he would have directed his ministry to create a programme to tackle the problem of old toys being discarded when children get newer, shinier ones.

Prezza Preaches Privacy Probe Priority, Pronto!

I don't approve of journalists hacking into John Prescott's phone, but everyone must remember they didn't do it to invade his privacy they just wanted an up to date directory of every fast food outlet in London.

Me Am Impressed.

I've just discovered that John Prescott has a blog. It's a better blog than 'Labour List' but I was wondering whether the former Deputy Prime Minister really takes time out of his croquet schedule to write the entries himself or does he delegate it to some Labour flunky? Then I read the first post on the page which begins:

Today me and my fellow MPs in the Council of Europe delegation had the chance

Yep he writes it himself.

Update: Julia in the comments earns the offical condemnation of Bulimics Anonymous for saying "he's probably just regurgitating someone else's text"

The Undead.

Darling: I Can't Rewrite Budget.

Well obviously not, because that implies that he wrote the original budget himself. I've got a theory that Alastair Darling is actually a ghost and therefore cannot touch anything so he can't hold a pen or touch a keyboard in any case. It was when the cameras filmed him walking along Downing Street on Budget day that I noticed how he just appears to glide down the street making no contact with either the ground or his colleagues, in short he appears to be insubstantial and incapable of making an impression on anyone. It is likely that he is unaware that he's been dead for a couple of centuries.

One of his ex colleagues who could never be accused of being incorporeal is John Prescott who made the hilarious shocking revelation at the weekend that he had been bulimic when he was Deputy Prime minister. Actually he suffered from Bulimia by proxy, a rare condition in which the sufferer stuffs his face and makes the rest of us throw up.

Building Buzzwords.

A big rise in shared home-ownership deals for young people will be promised by ministers today, in a move to give local councils in England more control over providing affordable housing for key workers and first-time buyers.

The phrases that I've bolded in this Guardian report of the government's housing policy are ones that seem to have been accepted as neutral terms by the media when they really are not. They originated, or gained popularity at least, when John Prescott was in charge of planning, (and I don't mean planning how to fit groping his female staff around his croquet schedule).

Anyone trying to sell unaffordable housing would quickly go out of business, so presumably "Affordable housing" is not meant literally so it presumably means "cheaper housing". The presumption behind the phrase is that the current high prices are the result of property developers and planners having decided to build sumptuous palatial residences for the rich whilst neglecting to provide for everyone else. In reality the problem with the UK's housing situation is that that there are not enough homes period, it doesn't matter whether the new homes are aimed at the higher end of the market or not, if 2 million new penthouse apartments are built it will have pretty much the same effect on house prices as building 2 million Noddy boxes. However artificially intervening to force developers to restrict the value of new houses will simply achieve exactly what de facto price controls achieve anywhere, to reduce the supply.

"Key workers" is the other buzz phrase that annoys me. First of all who decides which workers are "Key Workers"? From what I can tell the chosen few are exclusively public sector workers. Apparently the private sector consists of work that is essentially trivial to the functioning of the country, so whilst Social Workers, Bus Drivers and Diversity Consultants are "Key Workers", those that work in the manufacturing or service sectors of the economy will have to damn well learn to commute. Rather ironically the builders who are supposed to be erecting all this "Affordable Housing" aren't "Key Workers" whereas those employed at the council planning office creating obstacles to development are.

Secondly we are supposed to believe that there is a tremendous problem in retaining "Key Workers" in some parts of the country. This may well be the case but surely it would be simpler to raise the salaries. This isn't an appeal for even more public sector pay inflation, but rather to ask why public sector pay doesn't take account of local conditions. At the moment central government operates national pay scales in many of the sectors where shortages of frontline staff exist, pay rates that are very attractive in the North East of England where the cost of living is lower are less appealing for someone in the South East. The only reason this situation exists is to appease the public sector unions who have correctly come to the conclusion that local pay scales would result in a large majority of their members being paid less.

Ghostwriter Needed....

John Prescott is planning on 'writing' his memoirs, and colouring them in too.

Along with his political achievements, such as working towards the Kyoto protocol on climate change, his memoirs would be expected to tell the inside story on other events that had pushed him into the headlines.

His political achievements! Holding on to grace and favour properties despite being sacked from the functional aspects of his job is an achievement of sorts I guess.

And his memoirs will be scrutinised by political analysts wanting to understand the relationship between former prime minister Tony Blair and present incumbent, Gordon Brown.

Or trying to understand what on earth he is saying, reading hieroglyphs is easier work than comprehending a Prescott sentence.