Household tips from the PM
G8 SUMMIT, HAKKAIDO, JAPAN: Has Prudence left the Treasury to move into the nation's kitchens? Will "Mr Brown's Book of Household Management" be the prime minister's next magnum opus? What tips does the PM have on how to turn your leftovers into a nice soup or a stew?
I suspect that the PM knew that he'd be mocked for his tip to the nation's households to save themselves eight quid a week by wasting less food. I suspect that he also knew, however, that it would be a story that the media couldn't resist and which would highlight that he was, at least, trying to do something about those soaring bills at the supermarket.
He is trying to demonstrate how people themselves as well as his government and the G8 can help us all to live with rising food prices. His aim is to demonstrate that he is helping top create a global plan to deal with one of the public's top concerns.
To cut prices, the prime minister wants to increase the supply of food and to decrease demand for it.
Thus, he wants the G8 to help Africa to double her food production.
Thus, a government commissioned report will today advise ministers on how they can ensure that subsidies for biofuels don't stop farmers growing corn for food to grow it to produce alternatives to petrol. The message of the Gallagher Report is, apparently, that the ministers should subsidise "good" biofuels - ie those that don't substitute for food - and not "bad" ones that do.
And, thus, the PM advises us not to bin the stuff we never quite got round to eating or, better still, not to buy it at all. Much more significant than that waste, of course, is the estimated 40% of food that never makes it from harvest to our tables and trays thanks to losses in the processing, storing and transportation of food.
Back when the G8 (or the G6 as it was then) was founded - in the early 70s - the leaders of the world's richest countries discussed how to change interest and exchange rates. These days they are relatively impotent in the face of similar pressures. That is why, perhaps, we're left talking about what to do with your leftovers. Risotto or omelette are my favourites...
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Nick
MPs get around £5000 a year tax free just for food - that can't encourage care.
Brown and his government could have done something about that last week.
He didn't.
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What a lot of tosh.
What next from this numptee? Government Inspectors checking our bags at Supermarket checkouts to see whether we have bought too much?
Roll on Glasgow East and the unelected Brown forced to spend more time with his family........
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The timing of Gordon's advice is rather interesting! It all rather smacks of 'I can't/won't do anything as your PM to reduce costs (largely because the extra tax on fuel is bolstering my balance) so I am putting the monkey on all your backs!' Saves me having to blame myself or take proper action against oil producers.
Phew - thanks for helping us Gordon! Oh and by the way - does your food bill get paid by the Country?
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What a hypocrite. Gordon has no credibility as he wasted billons of our tax pounds. Shut Mr Brown, and go away.
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Nick
I got my food allowance figure from another blog entry of yours
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/2008/06/cost_of_expense.html
At the end of which you say that HMRC don't tax expenses for 'working away from home'.
Ignoring which house an MP claims to be their 'home' for the moment...
HMRC will only not-tax expenses if they are incurred 'wholly, exclusively and necessarily' in connection with your business.
Have you checked whether they verify this for MPs claims? (apart from the sudden decison to to a 'random audit' on David Davis (now theres a coincidence)).
It seems MPs are trusted to ensue that expenses are only claimed where they are 'wholly, exclusively and necessarily' - on the face of it, they don't seem to...
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What utter utter garbage from a failing "leader". Not content with watching and interfering in our lives already Gordon Brown wants to interfere in another part of our lives.
How much is your salary again? How much do you get in expenses perks? And yet you have the nerve to tell people to save their leftovers? Hypocrite.
Come out from your fantasy land and live on a single parent's benefit for a month. Then we can see just how frugal and creative you can really be.
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Ar last a viable position for Hazrl Blears. She can check out citizens' rubbish bins, and any food thrown away can be transported to MPs homes to make Brown Meatloaf. The poor old things need it as they have two households each to provide for - the first and the second home!
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How about:
"Stop wasting our money, Gordon"
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Nick
I have heard a rumour that Gordon will be in his bunker during the East Glasgow by-election.
If he does actually put his head above the ramparts and decides to show his face in that by-election then I presume he will be preaching this to the good people of Shettleston, on their doorsteps.
Nick please dont tell him this would be a sure fire vote winner?for the SNP.
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This topic is typical of the reason why Brown is finished. The other reason he is finished is that he doesn't even realise it!
With the continuing backing of his equally useless cabinet colleagues it's not likely to get any better for him either - thankfully.
What on earth makes him believe that 60 million Britons creating less waste will affect world food prices? This is the same argument he uses over greenhouse gases. We reduce them by 20% by the year 2020 and China opens several new coal-fired power stations.
A man out of touch with the people and reality.
Leave now and give us all a break.
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You've captured the arguments well here, Nick and placed a lot of strands all into context.
On the issue of wasted food, Brown should put his own house in order before lecturing us on waste.
http://theorangepartyblog.blogspot.com/2008/07/stop-wasting-our-time-brown.html
And, sadly the G8 leaders will do nothing about world poverty or crucially biofuels.
http://theorangepartyblog.blogspot.com/2008/07/leaders-turn-blind-eye-to-world-poverty.html
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Re #2 from adrianfife2 and #3 from Jabbajake
How ungrateful. The Supreme Leader managed to spare some time away from the golden trough he and the important people have their snouts in to give us some prudent advice and you complain.
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I se GB as given up trying to be PM and is attempting to become my mother.
Unfortunately that position is currenlty filled and I have no plans to make any changes to current personnel assignments.
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It is interesting to read the comments.
Along with all the other waste issues of Western style living food is a very important one. We are continually encouraged to buy more and more. How did we ever manage when we had to buy our groceries from the corner shop?
At some point this is unsustainable, does this sounds familiar.
Yet whan a politician states the obvious he is ridiculed.
All the supermarkets expect to increase their market share, sales and profits, clearly this must be wrong.
Shopping has got out of control. It is plain wrong for us to throw food away, and we are almost being encouraged to do this by the way it is sold.
In future the human race will look back in shame at what we now are doing with food and many other aspects of our lifestyle.
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##The message of the Gallagher Report is, apparently, that the ministers should subsidise "good" biofuels - ie those that don't substitute for food - and not "bad" ones that do.##
Any extra level of complexity that our current government would digest about as easily as a house brick!
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"Has Prudence left the Treasury to move into the nation's kitchens?"
What planet have you been living on, Nick? Prudence packed her bags and left the Treasury at least 8 years ago.
The obvious point you should have made instead is the contrast between Brown's silly exhortations for us to waste less food and the phenomenal waste of taxpayers' money he has presided over.
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Is Brown using the same survey a few months ago with a ridiculously small sample population? The one that included bones and tea bags as food waste?
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Gordon's 'Cones Hotline Moment'?
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I would like to know if the PM does know the price of a loaf of bread or a pint of milk. If you can ask that Nick then we can see if he is in touch or not.
As far as this issue is concerned, surely he would be better to get people to compost and not bin food waste as that would save the country money. Also he would be better to ask his chancellor to drop the fuel duty by a few pennies this month, whereas at the moment they are taking and taking.
UK PLC is almost on its knees and this fool is telling us to eat up our leftovers, heaven help us!
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Let's face it - there's nothing wrong with reducing food waste so we can't fault GB on what he has said. The problem is, as others have replied, I am angry that our PM has gone to the G8 summit and said it! Surely his job, is to influence other country leaders to increase food production or something similar and get a junior minister (or a non-political ally) to tell us to increase our domestic stew production.
He does this on every issue - ignores what people are saying is the solution and goes for something other solution which just makes people think he is out of touch (e.g. asking opec to produce more oil rather than reduce duty)
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GB wins a Gold Medal for Stupidity
Thanks to his tax and spend policies most of the country has already tightened its belt and is trying to waste less food.
What he has done is classic Broon "Its not my fault, Food prices arent higher because of my failed policy on Biofuels or my No1 in the world fuel duty taxation or my VAT on fuel tax policy,Or indeed the leftovers from the last mansion house banquet. Its because you failed to eat your crusts and you through out all the food in your cupboard that had reached the government imposed use by date, Especially all those jars of honey that you thought you could keep forever."
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It is a shame that the PM is getting lambasted for pointing out what has been pointed out before. What would be interesting is seeing how the average cost was calculated. Surely the Common Agricultural Policy has a role to play as well? I reckon that many who are used to a tight budget don't waste that much food. I know our bin is usually full of packaging. I think the PM has said this at a bad time. You know off to a summit where surely extravagance awaits. What he should do is encourage us all to go out and pick wild fruit once they have ripened! A small punnet of raspberries costs £1.89 in some places when if you look you can find them for free! Also brambles at the end of the summer! What he could also say is that he plans his households week worth of meals. Not as easy as he says. A couple of days is probably better and more realistic. Good luck in Japan Nick!
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How about a grown up debate on food waste and and the global problems surrounding supply? It seems a shame that the anti GB bloggers cant scratch enough brain cells together to have a proper debate!
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Like anyone is really not going to pick up that second net of tangerines when it's got BOGOF written on it!
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What idiot advised GB to make this statement? Or was it his own idea?
Coming days after MPs, presumably with his covert encouragement or at least tacit agreement, voted to keep their snouts in the trough, this smacks of a leader who is completely out of touch if not worse.
"Those whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad."
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@#23
Well Metalwork its good to see your input to the debate.
I will answer your points one by one here.
Oh wait I cant there werent any!
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I'm not taking any advice on 'waste' from GB. Quite apart from anything else it's a statement of the b................. obvious. If we don't know this already we must be fools! There have been innumerable documentaries and news items on this very subject in the past few months. Don't ask me why. It stands to reason that you don't buy more than you can afford and then compound the crime by wasting it. Sound familiar?
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My granny used to tell me 'Waste not want not". From a granny to a child - good advice. From a Prime Minister to a nation - patronising, wholly ineffective guff.
Gordon must know very well that :
- the proportion of food waste represented by thrown out food is miniscule, not to mention the impact of biofuels
- the people hit hardest by price increases are the least likely to be throwing out food, use by date notwithstanding.
- the people who can afford to throw out eight pounds worth per week on average will carry on regardless.
- even if the problem was eliminated, the reduction in waste/weekly food spend would not cause a corresponding drop in prices.
The other headline grabber re no return to the old ways with the unions - a classic Billy Bunter defence. "I didn't take the cream cake from behind the bread bin on the top shelf" cries Billy - before anybody had noticed it was missing.
This puerile stuff surely gives lie to the talk of Alistair C being back in the fold. In his day, the headline diversions helped Labour and/or damaged the Tories.
If I was Labour supporter I would despair. If I was a Tory I'd be quite happy to let GB make the running. I'm neither but the banality of them all is a bit depressing.
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I think that we all should have web-cams in out fridges connected through to the Ministry of Food Waste run by a cabinet minister.
I propose Hazel Blears as the best candidate.
She could then employ Inspectors of Food Waste who could come round and lock us up for wasting food.
Now about knife crime and Terrorist agitators. Let them go free as it is against their human rights to keep them incarcerated in jail. Far better to allow them to create mayhem on the street.
While "Phil" Mac Cavity's away the cats will play.
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Mind your shopping while I hire a luxury jet to fly me to Hokaido to talk about 'green issues'.
Gordon you must be one of the thickest.........................skinned politicans this country has ever seen.
To use an acronym you seem to disapprove of, Gordon BOGOF (thats buy one, get one free, but I'll leave it up to everyone else to see if thats what I really mean).
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Gordon Brown is a Stalinist fool. His weekly pronouncements on global poverty, oil prices, food use and the like are as ineffectual as a Pravda Tractor Production newsletter.
The man seems incapable of dealing with reality. Our country is in real trouble economically, but he wants us to give more money to Africa. Food prices are rising but he refuses to deal with the CAP and CFP or to fight the EU's biofuels targets. Fuel prices are rising but he demands higher production rather than cutting fuel duty.
It can't be just me who thinks that the answers to most of the problems are obvious, and who wonders how it's possible for Gordon Brown to get it so badly wrong every single time.
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In a perverse way I?m quite enjoying Comrade Brown?s daily sermons on how we should live our lives. A couple of points though:
a) Will Labour now issue targets to households to force them to reduce waste food?
b) I notice that Brown isn?t mentioning the fact that EU directives now mean around 3% of our fuel (I can?t remember the exact figure off-hand) has to contain bio-fuel thus pushing up food prices more.
c) ?or that the EU CAP means farmers are paid not to grow food and are fined if they produce too much.
d) ?or that the UK?s transport costs are so high they result in higher food prices ? food has to be transported somehow, and despite the truckers clearly saying enough is enough ? is Brown listening, is he hell!
e) ?and is the fact I didn?t eat that last slice from my pizza last night going to make that much difference ? it?s been made anyway.
Oh truly, I despair at this Government.
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Will the next stage be ration cards? How Brown would love that; just think of all the bureaucrats he could employ and how much more control he would have over everyone.
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"How about a grown up debate on food waste and and the global problems surrounding supply? It seems a shame that the anti GB bloggers cant scratch enough brain cells together to have a proper debate!"
Tips on fridge management do not make a basis of a debate on th dynamics of global supply and demand of and for food.
If he were to be using the event to push forward ideas for tariff reform on food and agriculture, that might have been a basis for a debate.
What we got were trite trueisms, not even useful for day time TV.
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Much as it pains me to do so, I am in a relative degree of agreements with Brown on this one. Doesn't excuse his mistakes or make his economic record any more laudable, mind...
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I suggested eslewhere on Nick Robinson's Newslog there was more we could all do to save money and avoid waste, so I was rather pleased to hear the PM was on the same wavelength. It is cheaper for a family to eat together and saves on fuel to prepare and cook food for half a dozen than one or two. My favourite recipes for leftovers are soup, fried potato and bubble and squeak, although I will probably try out Nick's cullinary tips now.
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Re #23 metalwork:
"It seems a shame that the anti GB bloggers cant scratch enough brain cells together to have a proper debate!"
How can anyone take seriously the words on waste of a man who:
1. Last Thursday, could have made a real difference to the wasteful practices of the House of Cards with a few well-chosen words but instead gave a poor impersonation of Pontius Pilate?
...and...
2. Could have set an example to us all and the G8 leaders by attending this bunfight by videoconference at a cost to us taxpayers and the planet of nothing but instead cannot get his minions to organise a charter flight effectively?
It seems a shame that NuLabour sycophants can't see what a mess they and GB are making of almost everything thing touch: Midas in reverse.
PS: If we didn't laugh, we'd have to cry.
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Sure it's cynical but then what do you expect from politicians? And the issue is well worth raising nonetheless. I suspect Gordon has been very effectively lobbied by the team behind the lovefoodhatewaste website where you'll find many useful tips on using leftovers and avoiding waste. As you will, hopefully, on my regular blog The Frugal Cook.
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It does have to be said, that a good comedy writer wouldn't dare put forward a script like this, because it'd be seen as too ludicrous and unbelievable.
Or is that the plan?, Gordon is so fed up with satyrical comedians taking the micky out of him he's decided to flood the market with his own stupidity to try and drive them out of business ...Gordon, I see your cunning plan!
Gordon is totally realiable in my eyes, no other politician I have ever seen can so regularly shoot himself in the foot on the national and global stage as Gordon Brown.
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Re #25 badgercourage:
How true.
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Re #32 from ghanimah:
In a perverse way I?m quite enjoying Comrade Brown?s daily sermons on how we should live our lives.
Agreed. You really do have to laugh or cry.
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Thanks again Gordon, it's a pity YOU'VE put the economy in this state. Why don't you stop telling people how to live their lives. You seem to think that were all thickos who can string a scentence together,and you keep tying us into more red tape. I can't wait until your gone. You're fast becoming a dictator,and your about as popular as syphalis. So much for Labour. The peoples party.HAH!
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And we thought that he didn't have a sense of humour!!
What airline did he use?
Jet away with MacCavity Airways.
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Re #33 jaydkay:
Please stop handing them bright ideas.
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My Personal top 10 tips.
1. Buy all the BOGOF's you can before Gordon and Hazel Ban them and freeze them before they manage to hit your wallet any harder than they already do, because their figures on waste are probably five years old and not reflective of the post Gordon Brown appocalypse end of the world tour to destruction of an economy.
2. Use Freecycle where possible to redistribute unwanted or uneeded items, you'll find millions of people already using such facility without the interference of Gordon Brown who to many of us seems about ten years behind.
3. Don't drive unless you have to, in cities use a bus, in rural areas plan your journeys to get more done in one trip and cut down before Gordon gets rid of all our Post Offices and surgeries.
4. Let your teeth rot, because there are no dentists, so you can save a pound here and there on tooth paste. (not really, look after your teeth, because there's no one to fix them)
5. Buy a bicycle for your inlaws, with any luck they'll be run over by a foreign lorry driver who can afford diesel and doesn't pay speeding fines and save the national health service money in the long run.
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6. Grow your own vegetables, I took it up five or so years ago and currently I have a row of cabages I call the cabinet fronted by a rather lame looking lettuce called Gordon.
7. Buy energy saving light bulbs and dream about the day that the council won't refuse you planning permission to mount a small wind turbine or a homemade solar water heater on your house because 'it not suitable for the enviroment'.
8. Improve your household fuel bills, request that Gordon Brown comes round your house once a week so he can fill it with hot air.
9. Bath with a friend.
and
10. Write down all of your personal details, Name, Address, Bank Account, Passport and post them on the internet so that the criminals can get hold of them easily so that we can save this goverment money on Identity cards, because lets be honest about it, the criminals are going to get the information anyway and it'd save Hazel Blears from having to cough up for new laptops too often.
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Re #39 Old_Rocker:
Perhaps his retirement plan is to go on stand-up gigs. If he could find the right straght man he might make National TV.
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Sometimes I sense Gordon Brown borders on the founding principles of communism -
'Don't do as I do, do as I say'.......
'Everyone is equal, it's just some of us are more equal than others'.......
Until Gordon convinces me otherwise, he reminds me of a chicken desperately flapping it's wings in a hopeless attemppt to get of the ground and fly into it's roost. Are the rest of the G8 leaders in Japan aware of the utter contempt with which the UK 'leader' is held back home?
Sorry, but I just can't see it.....I am quite sure that what Gordon wants to throw away of his unwanted food, Gordon throws away.....and I'm sure it amounts to much more than most of us. While he and his cronies continue to sit on their ridiculous benefits and MP subsidies, what right do they have to tell us about easing world poverty.......to use a good old Scottish expression - "You're a two-faced git Gordon".
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Before you start nagging us to eat our leftovers, don't forget the 1.6 million tonnes of food (retail value £18 billion), dumped every year by supermarkets.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/insideout/yorkslincs/series7/supermarket_landfills.shtml
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/green-living/supermarket-waste-hits-new-high-780513.html
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#23
why don't you start the 'grown up debate' about foodstuffs?
Let's start with some NewLabour targets for reducing household food consumption. Let's say each household will recieve a tax credit if it reduces its household food consumption by 10%. Let's suggest if they cut by another 10% they get preferred status on NHS waiting lists. If they can reduce by 30% they get free travel on public transport.
As a result of the law of unintended consequences of NewLabour targets in its first year of operation 5000 households are found to be selling their food tax credits for cash to the overweight. 10000 people have been admitted to hospital suffering anaemia due to iron deficiencies costing the NHS and additional £3bn a year and an additional 2000 have fainted waiting for their free travel to arrive and fallen under a train.
Targets, targets, targets. How many tractors have been built this year, GOrdon?
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Brown's government have allowed unlimited immigration, both authorised and unauthorised, plus built on farm land and intend to build 3 miilion more homes to satsfify this immigration influx. This means less land in Britain to grow the food needed for more people. This causes imports of food, food-miles, pollution, etc.. And now he has woken up to the need to conserve. He has taken a leading part in Britain having to increase pollution in order to feed an uneccesarily larger population. Either just plain stupidity or planned but incompetant foresight.
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1 the real truth , Parliament didn't.
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I hear that next week Gordon is planning a new initiative.............
At the moment the country wastes £40m a year throwing away the last tiny remnants of a bar of soap. The caretaker-PM is due tell us that we can save money if we collect together the tiny slivers of well used bars of soap and press them together making a bigger bar of soap.
I love this brave new world that Labour is creating:
- My bin gets emptied fortnightly and examined.
- At last positive discrimination of white men in the workplace is to be introduced. (finally!)
- There are more nurses to look after me should I catch MRSA whilst in hospital.
- We'll soon have ID cards to stop us getting blown up on trains.
- The minimum wage makes it impossible for bosses to pay me low wages cash in hand anymore.
- Those clever green taxes have forced me out of the car and onto my push bike. I'm really doing my bit for the planet now.
- All my friends have got great jobs in Quangos. Writing reports on what schools should be doing is such rewarding work.
- Our taxes would have been even higher, but luckily Gordon sold off a load of gold that was just sat in some bank vault doing nothing.
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Gordon seems to alternate between opening his mouth and putting his foot in it and shooting himself in the foot.
In the interests of efficiency savings, he should combine to two processes. Not only would the energy consumption be halved but he would only have to do it once.
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I have lot of respect for Nick Ferrari who hosts a morning show on LBC Radio 97.3
This was his reaction to the latest suggestion from our P.M.:
"and this is the man we are entrusting to manage our interests in Iraq. Oh dear dear dear dear dear dear dear .....................!
Says it all really!
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The biggest wasters of resources are this Government - I would suggest that their campaign actually starts in their "home" and that they leave us, the ever harder pressed, over-burdened, over-legislated, over-taxed public to get on with our lives without any further of their nannying interference.
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I like the neo-Marie Antoinette style of the government. First it was "Don't let them eat cake...cos' they'll get fat". Now it's "Don't let them buy the cake...cos' they'll just let it go stale".
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So let me get this straight. The government backs biofuels because Bush wants it. There are many voices raising concerns about more of the Amazon being ripped down and impacts on food prices. There is duly a biofuels impact on food prices and some people starve.
Now the public should be less wasteful?
This man is totally and utterly out of touch.
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"Thus, he wants the G8 to help Africa to double her food production. "
Great idea! Restoring order to Zimbabwe, formerly "the bread basket of Africa" would be a good place to start.
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We definitely need to pull Gordonbennet up on this one. Giving us advice on what not to throw away??? Cheeky, given all that 'good stuff' he's thrown away lately. I mean, he's thrown away his chances of winning the next election. He's thrown away whatever trust the public had in our political class. He's thrown away the possibility that New Labour will actually produce any decent non-intrusive policies before the next election etc etc.
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When Gordon starts getting value for money on public spending then I'll start listening to him.
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Re #53 from jonathan_cook:
It's the discrimination against men in white coats that bothers me.
Who's blocking their essential visit to No.10?
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14 nosida, I absolutely agree with you . these doughnuts on this blog sit and wait for every new blog that comes out purely so that they can make some excuse to rubbish Gordon Brown even if they agreed with him they wouldn't say so, they vent there spite ,then when a little bit of commen sense and debate comes in they disappear back to whatever place they come from then await the next blog. Sick'oes
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Personally I think binge drinking is the answer to our food waste problem.
Think about it. loads of food that is bought is wasted, but how many cans of beer are thrown away without being opened (even if past the sell-by date), I reckon only about 0000.7 %, so don't buy food buy beer instead, problem solved.
Also it has the added bonus, after consuming a couple of cans, of forgetting how bad Gordon Clown is at being PM.
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re: 29
"I think that we all should have web-cams in out fridges connected through to the Ministry of Food Waste run by a cabinet minister.
I propose Hazel Blears as the best candidate."
Don't give them any ideas!!
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#14 NOSIDA and #23 metalwork: There are flashes of sense such as yours on here, but I'm afraid that the majority simply see a new topic and post the same knee-jerk responses they have used numerous times before.
I think I saw figures a few weeks ago showing that we in the UK throw away 40% of the food we buy. That's a lot more than I put in the bin, but I know that I should do better and I don't mind the PM reminding me of the fact.
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How much have all the stealth taxes this government has imposed on us all cost us per week? My bet is substantially more than £8. Go GB now you and your muppets have really lost the plot.
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Yes fuel costs are high but that is because of high oil prices. Maybe giving the truckers a break would be a good thing but to be honest as the range seems to be 7 to 15% with an average (mean or median I don't know) of household income spent on food I think at least in this country that is the least of our worries. As soon as it reaches a maximum of 20-25% then I think we should complain. Of course we could stop being so materialistic (myself included) and stop spending our money on more frivolous items but then there really wouldn't anything to moan about then. As Private Eye pointed out it's public transport costs that have truly rocketed in the last 10 years not actual fuel costs duty (consider that many trains do still run on diesel). A return trip between Aberdeen and Edinburgh without any pre-purchase is now close to £70. A 40L tank of petrol costs just over half that (what about £43). Rising food costs doesn't affect us as much as other countries. Trying to limit our own waste might just delay the impact here.
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26 potkettle,23 has in his small posting more common sense than anything that you have written on this blog. Do you think for one moment that we all wait with bated breath to hear your constant diatribe.
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Food used to have something called 'preservatives' in it. It also used to be enclosed in something called 'packaging.'
Some bright spark decided for us that this was bad.
Now the food goes rotten in days and gets thrown away.
Any connection here?
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Soddball - whilst we might be in a poor economic state people die in Africa because they don't have enough food. Not quite the same. The fact we live in relative luxury whilst famines occur 5/6 hours flight away is morally repugnant and I am as guilty as anyone not doing enough about this.
That aside the comments by the PM are a PR disaster and smack of fiddling whilst Rome is burning. Who ever advises him should find the nearest exit.
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63 Grandantidote:
Surely you can't be arguing that we throw away all the these perfectly good 'doughnuts'.
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Politician talking common sense hands out sound advice. What a nerve.
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#46
"6. Grow your own vegetables"
They're called "The Cabinet"
(an old joke, I know, but in the light of the performances of Blears, Jaqui Smith, Des Browne, BuffHoon et al. I can't resist).
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Doughnuts of the world unite!
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Leave Gordon alone....He's just doing what he knows best...........BLAMING SOMEBODY ELSE!
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Before Gordon Brown introduces the "bin police" to monitor wasteful habits in the kitchen, perhaps he should look to his own Governments fondness for waste when it comes to our taxes.
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You moaning old malcontented, die hard, Tories.
You wanted him to LISTEN to you about all the waste and inefficiency.
Well he has????. and hes decided that you all need to look in the fridge.
Its been right under your noses all along.
The down turn is over Yipppeeeeeeee
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23. metalwork
Food is cheap, 8 quid a week is not worth a thought.
Can we have a debate about the hundreds of billions of our money the he wastes.
I think that might be a lot more productive.
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31Soddball your remarks are faily typical of the poorly thought out nonsense that is poured out daily on these blogs, utter utter nonsense , when are some of you going to put your brain into gear before putting your two pennyworth on here, if you write something sensible we can treat you with respect but come on all this Stalin nonsense.
You say that he wants to give more money to Africa where for an example quoted only yesterday five thousand women die in child birth every year that beside all the other deplorable statistics, have you not heard,
"that I used to complain that I had no shoes until I met a man that had no feet".
Any body that supports the abject poverty in Africa has my respect and there isn't a politician in the world that has done more than Gordon Brown and his wife but does that ever get a mention.
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One thing I'd like to know is: where do these stats on food waste come from? We're all bandying them about, but, does anyone have any idea who produces these figures? Is there a group of government civil servants sorting through my, and your, bin at this very moment? Be afraid, be very afraid, because my bin is laden with excess stuff. Is your Bin Laden? Is it the Bin Ladens that are responsible for this food problem? I feel a conspiracy theory comming on.
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I've just watched the daily politics and they had one of these celebrity chefs on there agreeing with Gordon Brown.
Are these celebrity chefs who're charging fifty pounds a head for a bowl of scampi and chips and a bottle of cheap plonk under some kind of illusion that they have any idea of what a household budget is?
I know on Can't Cook, Won't Cook, they have a small budget for the ingredients, but thats before they put about thirty quids worth of stock ingrediants in to make it taste nice, olive oil, fresh herbs butter etc etc.
Perhaps they need to rename the show to Don't have a clue, Won't get a clue.
SAVE MONEY, EAT AN OVERWEIGHT CHEF!
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Nick...as ever you are showing your supremely neutral views on GB...
"He is trying to demonstrate how people themselves as well as his government and the G8 can help us all to live with rising food prices. His aim is to demonstrate that he is helping top create a global plan to deal with one of the public's top concerns.
To cut prices, the prime minister wants to increase the supply of food and to decrease demand for it."
Well..how about reducing fuel tax as a starter?
Perhaps the public would have a little more confidence in the man if he actually started to do anything about the massive increase in the cost of living ,that he has presided over,instead of lecturing them like a demented headmaster!
And ...perhaps you could advise him to hire advisors who can see political own goals before they require him to make a public fool of himself...again!
Or,is that the Grand Plan?
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Bah, I took Gordons advice on selling Gold right at the bottom of the market, I'm not falling for it again!
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Reading the comments to date, I don't think anyone doubts that it is a good idea not to be wasteful - in fact it's very good sense at any time. I certainly agree.
However I do not agree that our being more careful does anything to change the high price of food! If it costs more, it costs more. We might be able to make it go a bit further but some may not be able to afford it in the first place.
And the timing stinks too. Has Gordon ever said this in the past few years? No. So instead of tackling high prices by looking at things like tax on fuel or actually getting fuel prices down from producers, he tells us to be more careful with the ever increasingly expensive food.
Stop blaming others and start taking control PM.
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with regards to what gordy says about having to cut back on waste food,iv just read that whilst our leaders are at the g8 summit,no fewer than 60 (yes,60!) chefs have been flown in to fill our leaders bellies with copious amounts of top nosh!
i wonder how much will go in the bin?
unless,of course, they hand out doggie bags to our great one`s, and they can drop them over the poorer folk as they fly home!
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The underlying message 'we should not waste food' is sound enough.
The real problem is the political mouth it is emanating from.
As the first post (#1) on this subject points out, by awarding themselves gross expenses and allowances, these politicians have totally undercut their moral right to pontificate on subjects like this.
Now hear this Gordon Brown and other politicians ... we the English people have mostly stopped listening to you and your ilk!
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Who does this man think he is. I was born just post war and brought up not to waste food. I live on a meagre pension, pay all my bills and have very little left for food to eat let alone to waste!!
Please can we have a general election and give someone else a chance to berate us for our wild spending!
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
66. jimbrant
If that 40% figure is anywhere near true, then it can hardly be wasted in the homes.
For an average of 40% to be true some must be wasting 60-80%.
So addressing the public is pointless.
You have to accept some waste is an inevitable part of feeding a family, you can not buy the right quantity as you can not accurately predict demand, how hungry children will be or who will be eating at each meal.
The waste is much more likely to be on the production and transport side and as a result of government policy, subsidy and the CAP.
The reason for the chorus of howls and derision is a result of the hypocrisy of a man who has squandered hundreds of billions of our money telling us to look at our food shopping habits for any sort of a solution.
I for one would hope that he may have had a better idea than that.
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@69
Aha Granantidote has awoken for the day.
I would willingly engage in a debate if any point had been raised. The fact that 23 just slated people for not debating is not in itself a point to debate.
You also have not raised any point of debate, you just state you dont like my diatribe, but that is obvious to all on the blog before you type it because my point of veiw isn't your point of veiw.
So lets have your points and i will debate them one by one.
Or perhaps you would like me to start.
Reducing The ammount of food this country wastes will not directly influence food prices to the extent that they will return to pre 1997 levels
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I'm a little irritated at all the negative responses to what is a genuine issue.
Unlike many kneejerk reactionaries I belive that supermarkets have done a lot to benefit us, however one area where they have created an issue is with the amount of food you have to buy to shop there.
I live alone and it's no surprise to me at all that £8 a week of food is thrown out - it is very, very difficult to shop for one unless you are prepared to eat an endless supply of ready meals.
I spend almost as much on food now as I used to when I was half of a couple and I'm very aware and very annoyed by the amount of it that I have to throw away.
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To be lectured on waste by Gordon Brown, how ironic?
Will he be offering to restore value to my pension fund next?
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Don't throw away leftover wine - just use it to fuel your Aston Martin.
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@Grandantidote.
You havent contributed a thing to this blog.
You have done nothing but slate the writings of bloggers that you dont like.
We do still have free speech in this country So lay off other bloggers and make some valid points otherwise you are increasing your carbon footprint powering your PC/Laptop for nothing!
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Here's a new idea for Nulabour.
Crematoriums add a huge amount of greenhouse gases.
If instead we used this:
http://www.thisiseco.co.uk/invessel_overview.asp
nulabour councils could compost your nearest and dearest then you could put them back on the garden.
Don't burn it compost it.
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27 Waldof, come on now waldorf you might be the epitome of frugality but that doesn't mean that everybody is, and its far from being obvious to everyone, we all ,maybe not you, waste a tremendous amount of food and other things like clothing and with women look at the money they waste on shoes that they can barely walk in, that cost enough to buy twenty pairs of shoes for children in deprived countries that have never had a pair of shoes.
There is nothing wrong in reminding us of the money that we waste that could be spent more wisely.
The waste in supermarkets is appalling just imagine how much food is thrown out when it reaches its sell by date and rightly so but they shouldn't have put so much up in the first place.
When I was a child my Dad would send me across to the greengrocer for a bag of damaged fruit I used to take it home we would cut out the bad or damaged bits and we kids would have a feast, my Mum would buy damaged tomatoes and fry them, there were lots of things that we used to do that people these days think is below them but there is nothing wrong with GB or anyone else giving us a reality check there is to much waste and we should treat our food with more respect. please dont bring up the vote on expenses I made my views quite clear on that on"heroes to zeroes. Now I am off to have my cold chicken bubble and sqeak and home made pickle onions, and believe me I will enjoy the meal.
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"You say that he wants to give more money to Africa where for an example quoted only yesterday five thousand women die in child birth every year that beside all the other deplorable statistics, have you not heard,
"that I used to complain that I had no shoes until I met a man that had no feet".
Any body that supports the abject poverty in Africa has my respect and there isn't a politician in the world that has done more than Gordon Brown and his wife but does that ever get a mention."
I am surprised that it is as low as only five thousand women who die in child birth in Africa, considering the lack of resources in most African villages I would have expected it to be quite a bit higher.
I also think that you need to rethink the last part of your comment - "Any body that supports the abject poverty in Africa has my respect" implies that you respect people who are in support of poverty in Africa. While this is possible (some people have an interest in keeping Africa in poverty) I expect you mean the opposite.
My personal feelings are that while it is commendable that Gordon Brown cares about Africa his first and most important consideration should be the state of the country he is charged with running.
If he wants to go about trying to save the world then he should do it on his own time and with his own money.
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@81 - grandantidote
"Any body that supports the abject poverty in Africa has my respect"
On balance, I would tend to respect anybody to tries to do something about it rather than support it.
Even giving you the benefit of the doubt for a typo, I am with Pot_Kettle. Make a point and we will debate it.
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To the statment "The peasants are unable to buy bread", do you,
a) Tell them to eat cake?, or
b) Tell them to buy less?
Tricky one there for the
Kirkaldy 'Let them not eat cake either' Kid!!
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#93 Cheese_Me_Too:
Quite right.
Perhaps you could explain to Pot_Kettle and others that nobody claims that reducing waste will reduce prices in our shops very much, but that it would reduce our weekly shopping bills to help us pay for the rise in the world price of food and oil. That seem to be too complex a thought process for most.
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@98
Grandantidote
your true colours have come out at last.
How have you survived in this NuLabour world when you are so sexist?
It really is low to have a dig at women that buy shoes, their VAT alone must pay for your pension
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But Nick: if you have three eggs left over, do you make one big omelette or two little ones or three parsimonious ones? Do ask Gordon, now you can have a chat, as this could be a matter of vital national importance.
PS Risottos usually work best with fresh ingredients.
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#99 Mark_WE: "If he wants to go about trying to save the world then he should do it on his own time and with his own money."
Good grief!
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There is a serious issue here. For the last decade people have increasingly bought food items purely on impulse, "Oh I'll try that" and then never get round to using them. The amount of food some people throw away while others don't have enough is obscene. However people aren't going to take lectures from an unelected and uncredible PM whose own record on waste is appalling.
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one can only imagine the waste of food that comes out of the Houses of Parliament every day .Please tell Gordan that my mum throws no food away ,is on a pension that's being fast eroded .
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Sorry Nick, but I must disagree with your view that
" he [The Kirkaldy Kid] was, at least, trying to do something about those soaring bills at the supermarket. "
What it has done is highlight the problem and reinforced the belief that I, and, I presume, many others, hold, that he has done absolutely nothing to alleviate the problem that we face. If he had, he would have been all too quick to point it out!
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I must agree with everyone else on here Mr Brown, just who do you think you are?
Keep out of our lives and get your own "House" in order.
By the way, I work hard, "earn" MY money so what I want to spend it on is my business! AND if I want to throw away my food, that is MY concern and no-one else's!
Got it? GOOD!
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@#102
Jim GB IS claiming that reducing our waste will reduce prices.
But if I concede that he isnt claiming that then what you and he are saying is that we should save on our shopping bill so that we can pay him more taxes elsewhere because he would surely have to make up the lost tax revenue somewhere!
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I believe that whilst the PM has a valid comment about waste in general it is lost in the malaise that surrounds his premiership.
Also you have to reflect on his background and up bringing which appears to be wrapped in the phrase ' dour'.
He seems to genuinely believe in a 'parsimonious' way of life which does not tune with the aspirational culture which is what we need and which will overcome the challenges.
It has been said that he does not understand the desire of the middle classes for a conservatory. This reflects this underlying weakness.
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"To cut prices, the prime minister wants to increase the supply of food and to decrease demand for it. "
I can just see the queens speach now.
"My government has decided that there are too many obese people in our country and so we are introducing a food rationing policy. anyone caught eating too much will be locked up for 42 days as we can do this now under terrorism laws and clearly overeating is an act of terrorism against the starving of the world."
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Now this arrant nonsense is coming not from a superannuated Blair's babe or similar comedian but the top of government, and the trivialisation of public office is complete. Waste not want not. I foresee many fewer votes being wasted on Mr Brown's party from now on. Where else we waste them is another matter.
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"Britons must stop wasting food in an effort to help combat rising living costs, Gordon Brown has said as world leaders discuss rising prices
The PM said "unnecessary" purchases were contributing to price rises,"
Incedentaly Jim your contention in post #102 is wrong. As you can see above the PM does think us buying too much food is contributing to the rising prices.
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Dear Pot_Kettle
prices are a meeting of demand and supply,
the KK cannot fix the supply, (he would have to give the suppl;iers more of our money to boost their production) so by having us all demand less, the price falls.
Problem is, we are already feeling the pinch and cutting back; many are already at quite basic levels of spending; if consumer spending cuts back on food too, the overall effect on the economy will require a big spend from Government to avoid recession.
So then the question will be how to pump that cash into the system.
a) buy two aircraft carriers that will never be fully required or used, [do not buy any aircraft for them...that would just be too silly!]
or,
b) pump the money into the system via some section of the economy...ah! I have it!
Put up M.P. salaries and expenses!! lol.
It would be funny, if I did not know that I was paying for it all!
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So, it is all OK for us to feed John Prescott and all the other MPs who voted not to change the system for paying their expenses out of hard earned tax payers money. For a man who did not even have the guts to turn up and vote over MPs' expenses and second home allaowances, and has forced the UK to support the EUs food wastage regime Brown has got a damn cheek asking the population to be careful. Brown just goes from bad to worse to awful and now he is just off the scale into ridicule mode. Cannot someone in New Labour put Brown and the elctorate out of our respective misery.
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We'll me and Missus Soupey have taken GB's advice and are cooking leftovers for tea tonight.
Unfortunately for GB - me and the missus eating leftovers is not a new occurence as we practice 'prudence' - as taught by the previous chancellor (whoever that was).
In order to stop the country wasting so much food you need to tackle some key areas:
1) BOGOFF's need banning, as do all other offers based on increasing the volumne as opposed to simpy reducing the price of a particular item. This will of course send the Government into battle with supermarkets (who don't care if food is wasted, as long as it gets bought)
2) Standardise the best before and use by dates - retailers have been shortening the shelf life of many products, simply to ensure a fatser re-purchase turnover.
However both of these solutions are 'regulation' and therefore do not fit in nicely with the free market economy and will have the supermarkets complaining about profits being damaged. Therefore the only solution is...
3) Let food prices rise, or decrease disposable income
- yes that's right, the only way to do this the free market way is to allow the country to go into recession or allow inflationary food prices to persist.
Asking people to reduce the amount of food they waste is like asking the fat people to stop eating, or the smokers to stop smoking, or the drivers to stop driving, or the holidayer's to stop going on holiday - or even the MP's to stop fiddling their expenses!
IT 'AINT NEVER GOING TO WORK GORDON.
Unfortunately, due to decades of under investment in the education system, the majority of people in this country are too stupid to understand how their little "it's only me" statement contributes to the massive issues this country (and others) face.
Remeber Loadsamoney in the 80's? Well the version for 2008 - loadsawastage.
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Isn't Gordon Brown the man who subscribes to the Common Agricultural Policy which deliberately creates food mountains in order to keep the price of food artificially high? Why can't his Government arrange for the surplus to be released for the benefit of British shoppers?
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Maybe if Gordon had been elected by the people of Great Britain in the first place, we'd take him more seriously.
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92 pot kettle, So you think that attempting to reduce food prices to the level of 1997 is reasonable to debate, thats about as reasonable a debate as asking why food prices in 1997 could not be compared to the prices in eighty five or the wages at both those dates hardly a debate but I think you'll find that food prices increased more between 85 and 97 than they have since 97 to the present, if thats what you call a debate I call it what some people on these blogs love statistics and I'm sure we'll get some from both sides of the fence.
You complain about me slating other people off well if they were saying any thing that was half constuctive I would'nt need to slate them off, when some one gives their point of view all you do is dismiss it, what have you contributed to this blog that isn't almost exactly in the same vein every time you post. Nothing but spite and discourtesy but thats your style I guess and nothing that I do or say will change that.
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So Brown patronisingly suggests that we focus on reducing kitchen waste. Putting aside the isult of this, let's look at this is positive way to allow us to draw some helpful conclusions.
In business terms buying food to eat and allow us to work is called a direct or operational expenditure and reducing waste is good practice. Other costs are capital expenditure (spending on physical items to allow you to live / work) and overheads.
When a business fails, it is usually because either someone else can do the job cheaper so revenues fall, or the cost of doing business goes up and the cost cannot be passed onto the purchaser.
To address this, managers always try to focus on the operational expenditure for 3 reasons.
1. It is usually the largest single part of the cost.
2. Capital expenditure is longterm and usually spread over many years.
3. The managers are overheads, so what incentive do they have to reduce them?
In my job which is to restructure failing business, I am always offered the janitor and the receptionist posts as cost savings, followed by a proposal to reduce the cost of labour by minimising pay increases or reducing benefits such as pensions etc. These quick fixes buy time, but normally only compound the problem in the medium to long term.
The truth is that there are only 2 ways to solve the problem. Either you need to find a fundementally more productive way of doing business (use less to make more), or you need to reduce the overheads. Ideally both.
Gordon has spent the last 10 years indulging in a spending spree paid for by the tax revenues from the booming market. We have a term for it in business. "fat, dumb and happy". Spending on capital and operational expenditure has grown unchecked. This has resulted in a huge growth in overheads.
Having spectacularly failed to put anything aside for a rainy day (first principle of leadership - maintain the reserve), he is now trying to find ways to reduce the expenditure by squeezing pay awards for civil and military servants. It won't work, it never does. The proclimation from him to reduce waste is valid, but flawed - he is only focussing on waste in consuption - not waste in production.
It is not particularly likely that the biggest costs to the public purse, being the social and medical infrastucture can be resturctured in any meaninful way that will reduce costs in less than 10 years there is only one way that he can go - he has to focus on overheads. In business terms he has to reduce the cost of the most expensive 50% by 15%-20%.
While that would be painful for those concerned, it would give him some wriggle room to find ways to allow those at the bottom of the pile some more wriggle room.
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hmm Brown is of course right in principle (for once) so I've got to very slightly admire him for that - but will he take the big decisions? most food is lost before it reaches the consumer, yes we should be more careful and I'd like to think necessity will drive us to that - but we need to see less edible food wasted because of minimum standards and sell-by dates, their reason is obvious, wasting is the cheaper option in a standardised, globalised world but it's also decadent, very tricky situation that needs some big changes to our system
a PM saying 'make more shepherd's pie' is not enough, he is already seen as not doing anything himself so just encouraging people to do something smacks of arrogance, even if the point is in the right direction
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This morning's BBC Breakfast included an outside broadcast from a kitchen with some top tips on maximising that food budget.
Apparently you can put your food in a special cupboard called a "fridge" which makes it last longer by keeping it cold. Who'd have thought that would work! These devices are widely available from electrical retailers, it seems.
Thanks BBC! Let the prices soar, I'm safe with my fridge machine!
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I live in a 2 person household, and we constantly have to throw things away because we can't eat it all before the sell by date is up. I'm all for bringing back preservatives! It's fine if you've got a family of 5, but with only two of us in the house, you can't buy food just for two people, it's always in family sized packs. It's the supermarkets that are at fault, not the general public.
I'm sick of the government trying to demonise us all for 'wasting food'. Part of the reason I don't vote is because the government don't care about women my age (21-30 age bracket) who are co-habiting but aren't married and don't have any children. We aren't 'families', which is the government's favourite buzzword. Bogoff, Gordon Brown, bring back Blair who at least had some charisma and didn't blame the public for everything.
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103 pot kettle well as I said earlier just a load of nonsense your posting at an enormous rate and its almost all snide remarks and your being suported by the once a week club, take a look at this post again and see how absurd it is, the VAT paying for my pension you mean in the same way that my tax paid for their mother's family allowance and her schooling etc, we all pay to help one and other, I see that some of your suporters only want to help themselfs
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Gordon Brown obviously thinks we are thick.
In his last budget he finished with the cut of the standard rate of income tax to 20% as if this was a success. He appeared to think we were all too thick to notice the abolition of the 10 pence band earlier in his speech and link the two together. Now he is stating to obvious about wasting food as if we couldn't work it out ourselves.
Maybe he has been watching too many of those Despatches/Tonight type television programs that tell you things like if you drive a bit more consistently and take the roof box off you car you will use less petrol, or if you shop at your local discount supermarket (the ones that only stock half of what is on your shopping list but charge less for much of what they do sell) rather than at your local convenient 'big 4' barn things cost less. Maybe Gordon thinks we don't know. Maybe Gordon thinks that that is the level we operate at. After all if the TV companies can get away with it...
I find it hard to believe that this was a thoughtout statement by Gordon and his advisors. Because if they really think we need telling the obvious there are far better ways they could go about it.
One of the next big crises to hit Britain for which we are hopelessly ill prepared is the energy gap. Britain is now a net importer of energy and its price is rocketing. Our energy deficit is set to grow massively. Its effects will be much more far reaching than the credit crunch. The effects on our standard of living and the way we live will be huge. We are totally unprepared. Britain is built for cheap energy. That is, it is built for yeaterday.
So if Gordon wishes to teach us things, a government campaign (on TV) about where to get grants to insulate your home and how much a lick of insulation is going to cost you would be far more use. I know its been done before but there are still millions of homes not properly insulated that could be done. It would help our balance of payments and the public might be receptive to it with all the doom and gloom going about. It would only scratch the surface of the huge energy gap problem but at least it would appear that Gordon was trying to face the problems rather than just coming out with condescending comments.
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@#120
debate (n.) a discussion in which reasons are advanced for and against some proposition or proposal : "the argument over foreign aid goes on and on"
debate (n.) the formal presentation of and opposition to a stated proposition (usually followed by a vote)
debate (v.) argue with one another :
I believe you only know the third definition so i thought I would introduce you to the other two.
I hope you enjoyed your pickled onions
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54. threnodio wrote:
"Gordon seems to alternate between opening his mouth and putting his foot in it and shooting himself in the foot."
If only he could combine the two, and shoot himself in the foot while it was in his mouth!
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#98, grandantidote,"there is nothing wrong in reminding us of the money we waste that could be spent more wisely".
I completely agree, that's why us doughnuts (although the tone was pejorative from you I don't mind the Homer Simpson link) like to remind other bloggers of the huge waste of taxpayers hard earned by Gordon and his cronies.
In essence I don't mind being told to be thrifty.
The trouble is when you put it in the context of who's saying it.
When Gordon allows me to keep two days wages to myself after working for five, whilst he takes the majority of my wages and then tells me that I'm a bad person for buying too many bananas that week I find it insulting.
Yes the citizens of this country waste money by buying too much food, and that should be avoided where possible.
But the far worse crime pereptrated by Gordon's chums is to waste billions of pounds every year, and worse that they cannot see this and instead demand more and more tax revenues every year compounding the problem.
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nick I am sorry for my error 81 it should read "anyone who helps to erradicate the abject poverty In Africa has my respect"
thank you to those that pointed this out.
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98. grandantidote
Sir
Those days are long gone, simply because the modern family does not have the time to do these things as both parent work. That genie isnt going back in the botttle.
Most buy all their food from one shop a week at Tesco. That leads to waste. But if it only costs you 8 quid so what.
Also good cooking is art form that is lost to many and that is partly due to government control of education. What happended to Home Economics.
The CAP means food is cheap and never short. It just isnt valued any longer. In the war a meal could be measured in a percentage of a life lost to get it to your plate. Now it is simply measured in terms of a subsidy given under CAP.
It has no value and 8 quid a family is a pointless statistic.
What people really care about is the huge areas on waste in terms of government spending, daft initiatives and inefficiency.
Its like your next door neighbour, who heats his garden and moaning at you about leaving the porch light on over night.
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I agree completely with Cheese_Me_Too (comment 93) who wrote about how difficult it is to shop for one unless you are prepared to eat an endless supply of ready meals.
In fact, even the ready meals have '3 for the price of 2' and other offers, encouraging consumers to buy more than they need - just the same as every other product. I know when I was shopping for one it definitely causes consumers to buy more than is needed in the interests of saving money, and they buy in the hope of being able to eat it all before the 'use by' date expires. Of course, that is often impossible.
It is at least partially, this concept of selling consumers more then they need that creates excess consumption and excess waste.
Rewarding excess consumption with discounts has to stop.
Gordon should make it illegal for shops to offer discounts on multi-buys, so that small consumers can get the same deals as big ones without the risk of having to throw away the uneaten portion.
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grandantidote
Sir
Perhaps the governemtn could look here
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3953922.ece
Rather than in my fridge
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What in the world is wrong with jimbrant and grandantidote on this blog?
NewLabour apologists seem incapable of acknowledging that all the 'same old issues' are still the same old problems and questions that have not been addressed.
Is it any wonder the public holds Gordon Clown in such disregard when he can't even be bothered to turn up to byelections to make his case? And he can't be bothered to answer questions in parliament.
The longer his apologists continue to protest about spiteful comments being made rather than actually answering questions the faster the demise of NewLabour will be. Politics is not a tea party and people want answers.
For instance why is the man responsible for more waste of the public purse in eleven years asking people to stop waste? The man is a hypocrite.
Physician heal thyself.
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Mr. Brown wastes both food and in future NHS resources. He's clearly significantly overweight, certainly from eating too much food, probably also taking too little exercise. Thus he's building up a statistically significant higher cost to the NHS in the future.
Glass houses, stones, and throwing don't go together too well, nor does moralising from a politician with a substantial element of "do as I say, not as I do"..
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#110 and #114 :Pot_Kettle : "Incedentaly Jim your contention in post #102 is wrong. As you can see above the PM does think us buying too much food is contributing to the rising prices."
As of course it is; it is called supply and demand. Read my post 102 again, especially the last two words of this bit: "nobody claims that reducing waste will reduce prices in our shops very much". See the 'very much' bit? Because world food prices are rising our cutting waste will probably only moderate prices - they will be lower than they otherwise would be, not lower than they are now.
You will also see from your own post that Brown said that ""Britons must stop wasting food in an effort to help combat rising living costs". That is the main point - if you buy less by cutting waste you spend less than you otherwise would have done, whatever is happening to prices. If you don't agree with him on that, just see what happens if you double the amount you waste; will your bills go down? And if you do agree with him, what's your problem?
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This is interesting, It seems that HMRC give tax allowances for essential expenditure ref buisness away from home i.e. MPs food. Iwonder then if I can claim for my lunches in the works canteen for I do not have a long enough break to go home for lunch, As lunch represnts 25% of my daily food intake an allowance of £1250 per anum would be most welcome.
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#132 glachlan:
Agree entirely.
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People would have more respect for Brown if he didn't appear to be leaping from one new initiative to another.
He hasn't set out a vision of what he hopes to achieve in any way. When we hear a plea to reduce food waste, he just sounds like an interfering idiot. Yes - reducing waste is a good idea - but to get a comment from him coming out of the blue just gets peoples back up.
If, however, he sketched out a theme of removal of waste in all elements of our lives and government then people would be more receptive, to this sort of discussion i.e.
1. Reducing energy consumption in businesses and homes
2. Efforts to cut wasted government spend
3. Plans to reduce supermaket waste
As it stands Gordon Brown telling me to shop more carefully is patronising and I wonder shouldn't he be concentrating on the more pressing matters.
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121. Wopitt
FANTASTIC
Fat Dumb and Happy,
ROFL
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I think Brown comes from the Planet Nanny State.
There are millions on low pay and are unemployed
yet brown thinks special offers like buy 3 for the price of 2 is wrong.
I suggest this is another reason brown will be kicked out at the next election due to his aloofness and being out of touch with the Queen's subjects of the UK.
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I hope Prescott is listening. He probably accounts for half of the wasted food on his own.
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Risotto?!!!! Lucky you can afford the rice!
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@125
Grandantidote
You have stated I am posting at an enormous rate. Current count for me including this one 10
Current count for you not including your reply to this one 8
Can we debate your definition of enormous?
The only reason you are two posts behind is because you were late up this morning and went off for cold bubble and squeak with pickled onions
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In everyones haste to defend/attack Gordon/Labours latest bright initiative.
Let us not forget the incompetence and lack of joined up thinking of the Labour Party.
There is little doubt that the initial study on the amount of waste was performed before Gordon lead us into recession.
Market forces have probably already made a huge dent in the level of waste made in this country each day as most of us simply can't afford to buy on a whim anymore.
Gordon will not have accounted for this, just like he didn't account for those on low wages who were hurt so baddly by the 10p tax fiasco.
Before you leap to congratulate the great leader, remember his ability to get it completly and utterly totally wrong.
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@136
Nicely put Jim
I did see that you had written "very much"
My Problem with GB is that he intentionally gave the impression that it would make "a lot" of diference. And also the hypocracy from a PM who as chancellor presided over enormous ammounts of financial waste.
Another poster put it so well stones throwing and glasshouses dont go well together.
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Wow; I knew Brown was a blithering idiot, but telling people that it's a bad idea to buy things you don't need/use is mind-blowingly stupid even for him.
So, not content with telling the Saudis to plunder their natural resources to help fund his mad taxes, he's now nannying people about how to spend their household budget?
It's as if he's deliberately trotting around the globe trying to tell the world the most stupid and/or obvious things that he can think of so that the whole world knows how stupid he is.
I hope he gets the drubbing he deserves in Glasgow.
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#141 fabprints: "brown thinks special offers like buy 3 for the price of 2 is wrong"
That's right, he does. And he has a good reason for thinking that it is wrong. Such offers encourage people (like me) to buy more than they need. If the shops made the same offer in terms of cost by cutting the price of each single item by 33% the people you are so concerned about would not lose out, and there would be less waste. Get it?
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Hi Nick,
I have nothing to meaningful contribute to this thread other than to add my tup'worth to the stream of derision poured on the head of our hapless Prime Minister.
Thank you for providing me with this opportunity.
[And as for you - yes you: the junior clerk at the Number 10 media unit whose job it is to read the political blogs - please pass the message up the line that Gordon's only honourable way forward is to resign. Any further delay and he'll have to shut himself up in his office with a bottle of scotch and a revolver.]
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How about we take a quick peek in Mr Browns bins and see just how much food he throws away after a lavish meal that has been supplied for entertainment!! I guess he gets an allowance for this sort of extravagance at the expense of the tax payer... Just when is one of our esteemed leadership party going to at least try to save money on food shopping?? I could suggest that they try shopping at Netto instead of Marks and Sparks, they may get an idea as to just how much money could be saved every week... they are totaly out of touch with the whole of the british people and very comfortable in their own rose tinted bubble.
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While I can see why lots of people are frustrated by the Gord, are they so blind as not to notice that the man is practically helpless in the face of the circumstances he's facing.
I'm not in any way a supporter of Brown, and think his 42 day detention plans are repugnant and shameful, it's not for that the Daily Mail and the rest of the disgustingly unbalanced British press are biting him for - it's for things in the global economy that are not Brown's fault.
While the expenses bill should not have been voted through, I think Brown has consistently been in favour of reducing MP benefits! Since 1998, in fact.
And what Brown had to say had merit. I used to overspend, and then throw away stuff I bought from the supermarket myself until my girlfriend played Mr. Brown's role and stopped me doing it. Voila! From £100-120 a week for a single person household, my expenses were down to £70-80! While Brown is (thankfully) not my girlfriend, there is absolutely nothing wrong in him making a comment on the culture of waste we seem to be standard bearers for!
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Whatever else you can say about GB by the look of him I'm pretty sure he eats all the food he buys (unless he's doing a John Prescott). I still think he's got a point.... and it could be worse - he could've told us to "think of all the starving children in Africa". As long as I'm not going to be made to eat liver again I don't care...
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The G8 leaders cannot agree with the producers about whether it is supply and demand or speculation that is driving up oil prices so they are powerless to do anything about it. They know that their collective efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions can never compensate for increasing levels from the developing world. They know that they can continue pumping billions into food aid in Africa and it will net reach the people who really need it until there is a semblance of peace and stability.
If this summit underlines anything at all, it is the utter impotence of the leaders to deal with these problems because the bottom line is that their hands are tied by their own domestic agendas. Are Brown, Sarkozy and Burlusconi going to come home with a plan to tear up the CAP? No. Is Bush going back with a carbon emissions policy which will cost the Republicans Michigan, Pennsylvania and West Virginia at the next election? Of course not. They will mouth platitudes about Darfur but not acknowledge that the AU is out of its depth
and that the UN must intervene. They will roundly condemn Mugabe and give Mbeke a smacked wrist for not sorting him out.
One could sympathise with them were it not for the fact that they insist upon parading their impotence before the entire world at their annual beanfeast while achieving nothing.
But what Brown is doing is unconscionable.
Emails and phone calls are being monitored in the interests of national security but being used to catch petty offenders who pose no risk to the state, citizens can get banged up for 42 days without reason and ordinary people going about their business can be stopped and questioned with impunity.
And it is all our fault. We chuck away eight quid's worth of food a week with which we could feed the rest of the world so they would not hate us any more, so there would be no more terrorism so stock markets would stabalise so there would be no more oil speculation . . and so on.
No Nick, "if the PM knew that he'd be mocked for his tip", he seriously underestimated the consequences. The one thing you do not do is insult the intelligence of the electorate. Politically speaking, GB is now a dead man walking and the sooner someone puts him and his country out of its misery, the better.
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"We Must Stop Wasting Food" says brown.
how about:
"We must stop punching ourselves in the face"
or
"We must stop swallowing bleach"
That'd be equally obvious, and an equally pointless thing to say.
"Are biofuels pushing up food prices?" - Does he really need a review to find that out? Biofuels use land that'd overwise be used to grow food. Doesn't take a genius to work it out.
I'm just completely aghast, this kind of thing is unbelievably stupid, even for him.
I really hope his wife sits him down and has a good talk with him.
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I see Trudy_Victoria is absent this week
Is she on Safari again ?
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The best way for Gordon to gain a little respect is to keep his mouth shut.Because every time he opens it he becomes a laughing stock
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Big mistake for Brown to think to offer advice to voters.
He should know that we are conditioned to pour scorn on politicians, but tend to shriek like spoiled children when even a scrap of responsibility is ladled onto our own plates.
Never underestimate the towering hypocrisy of the electorate.
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#149 ScepticMax: "I have nothing to meaningful contribute to this thread "
Mirabile dictu!! At last I can agree wholeheartedly with you about something, SM - though on further consideration perhaps the 'to this thread' is a mite redundant? And the words are somewhat disordered. Still, small mercies and all that.
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Let them eat cake!
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His comments would be laughable, if it wasn't for the fact that he is attending an impotent and an incompetent conference that is costing in the region of £280 million to stage! Hypocrisy of the highest order - and from a Labour politician, a party whose policies used to be based on morals!
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151:
I appreciate your sentiments but the plain fact is that some of the problems he and we are now facing are very much of his own making. He simply spent too much when times were good and unfortunately has nothing left to cushion the effects of The Global downturn now that times are bad.
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If this truly is the level of inteligence of Gordon Brown, just how did he manage to stay below the radar as chancellor for ten years.
Were we that mesmorised by Blair that we simply missed it?
Grating Gordon now that Teflon Tony can't cover for him.
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Jimbrandt
I can see youre busy.
Sorry to change topic.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/education/article4275054.ece
Relates to a previous debate.
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Dear Gordon,
I know this is weird but in the spirit of things I've been rummaging in my neighbours bins. Now, Gordon, I've collected quite a lot of stuff. There's some erotic 'material' that I won't go into, so we'll forget about that (No 6 Gordongotitwrongagaindad lane, you are very naughty, so stop it) However, from no 10, I found a whole bunch of carrot tops, which I collected. From no 21, half a bar of chocolate (MMmmm very nice indeed), some pickled cabbage from no 16, and a nice big half eaten sausage from no 18. Last, a lovely end- bit of expensive italian cheese, from the big house at the end of the road. So Gordon, you were right we are soooooo wasteful. Errrmmmmm, any chance of some help with a recipe for this stuff??? I've thought of something with pasta, but can't afford the stuff now, errrmmm maybe with rice, ooops, haven't got the money for that either. I tell you what, I'm gonna send it on over to you, being so good in the kitchen I'm sure you can find some use for it.
Yours sincerely:
Dr Gloom
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2 of my favourite Reaganisms come to mind:
"Starve the Beast"
and
"Don't just do something, stand there!"
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Good analysis Nick.
This is clearly meant to give more leverage to his argument at the G8. As you say the govt. must have expected a very negative reaction back home and judged it to be worth it.
If GB really wanted to be king of popularity, he should have suggested that overweight people should eat less. That would have gone down a storm.
Even better, how about forcing people to weigh in for flights and pay duty on their 'excess baggage', which could then be used to offset carbon emissions due to the extra fuel?
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Gordon Brown lectures us about not wasting food, have you seen the menu at the G8 summit? All essential food for important people.
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And this from the party that brought you a deputy leader who ate the entire menu at his local Chinese.
Stop wasting food? Stop wasting our time with useless initiatives and nannying ideas.
Stalin/Mr Bean turns into The Government Inspector.
Charisma bypass Brown and his clowning ways capure the headlines again with a NewLabour-saving non-policy.
Somebody order his bus pass.
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Absoultely sums up Brown's contempt for the British people. He should not be in power any longer. I pray the tories ( should they win the next election) will not behave like the overzealous school teachers that comprise our current government. If there is no real reform in the next government, then there really is no hope for us all.
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In my last post I tried to write some constructive critiscism, rather than my normal rant to let off steam regarding my anger with Gordon Brown.
Then I read the article posted by Carrotsneedaquango at 133 http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3953922.ece
I'm back to angry. Gordon Brown - please go away. The leader of the UK should not be telling people how to shop.
It is depressing that we have nearly 2 more years of listening to this idiot caretaker-PM.
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Nick - I assume the G8 lunch menu was suitably frugal? Can you enlighten us?
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I can feel another tax coming on. Every time we get a recomendation from this bloke, we get another tax.
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Hi Nick
I'm beginning to wonder if David Cameron is secretly writing all the comments on your blog under a series of pseudynyms, since most of them sound uncannily like his comments at PMQs? Or perhaps this is the Tories C21 answer to the old Millbank's "rebuttal machine"
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Once again the Prime Minister is giving us advice on how to live our lives.
When will he stop??
I am a mature person and can work out for myself if I am wasting food or not....I DO NOT need the Prime Minister to tell me!
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Gordon Lunch at the G8 sumit
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article4286365.ece
You really couldnt make this stuff up folks
ROFL
White asparagus and truffle soup
Kegani crab almond oil foam and green olive tapenade
Supreme of chicken served with stuffed thigh, nuts and orange savoury with beetroot foam
Special cheese selection with half-dried fruits
Peach compote, ice cream and raspberry coulis
Dinner
Corn-stuffed caviar
Smoked salmon and sea urchin "pain surprise" style
Hot onion tart
Winter lily bulb and summer savoury
Folding fan modelled tray decorated with bamboo grasses
including
Kelp-flavoured cold Kyoto beef "shabu-shabu", asparagus dressed with sesame cream
Diced fatty flesh of tuna fish, avocado and jellied soy sauce and Japanese herb "shiso"
Boiled clam, tomato, "shiso" in jellied clear soup of clam
Water shield and pickled conger dressed with vinegar soy sauce
Boiled prawn with jellied tosazu vinegar
Grilled eel rolled around burdock strip
Sweet potato
Fried and seasoned Goby with soy sauce and sugar
Hairy Crab "Kegani" bisque soup
Salt-grilled bighand thornyhead with vinegary water pepper sauce
Milk fed "shiranuka" lamb flavoured with aromatic herbs and mustard
Roasted lamb and cepes and black truffle with emulsion sauce of lamb's stock and pine seed oil
Special cheese selection, lavender honey and caramelised nuts
G8 fantasy dessert
Coffee served with candied fruits and vegetables
Wine list
Le Reve grand cru champagne
Japanese saki
Corton Charlemagne 2005
Chateau Latour burgundy
Ridge California Monte Bello 1997
Tokaji Essencia 1999 from Hungary
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How crass. Wee Gordy represents UK PLC goes to the G8 meeting and the only thing he can say at a press conference there is an admonishing "don't waste food" directed at the Bristish electorate...
He is supposed to influence the world at such meetings, not pretend to be "Mother" to the nations. For heavens sake he is supposed to be our Prime Minister.
He has lost the plot big time and has to go, the sooner the better for UK PLC.
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Bring back preservatives and make packaged non-freezable foodstuffs available in smaller packages for those of us without 2.4 children in my opinion.
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Organisers of the G8 summit on the Japanese island of Hokkaido have proudly displayed the menu for a sumptuous eight-course banquet enjoyed by world leaders meeting to discuss international food shortages.
You really would have thought that they would ahve tried to keep the menu quiet wouldnt you..
Let them eat cake.
WONDERFUL
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#163 CarrotsneedaQUANGO2:
An interesting article, though it's a shame that there is no attempt to give a response from the other side of the argument.
What strikes me immediately is that the two exams are often attempting to assess different things, and reflect differences in the priorities given to various thought processes now as compared to then. For example, as is mentiond in passing in the article, kids now are taught an English syllabus that concentrates on creativity rather than what might be seen as rather sterile grammar and spelling. Similar canges have affected Maths.
The result is that kids these days would undoubtedly have difficulty in doing GCE papers that I sat 50-odd years ago, as this experiment found, because thay haven't been taught the things they would need to know to pass them. But I would suggest that it would work just the same the other way round. I don't know whether you have ever tried to do one of the modern papers? I have, and found it very difficult. I have a degree in Geography from arguably the best university in England , and I struggled very badly to do a GCSE paper in that subject! My performance on the Maths paper was even worse.
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I bet I could save 8 quid on that meal
But oh what course to miss.
Not too keen on Peach compote, ice cream and raspberry coulis. Yes Ill skip that one
WONDERFUL. SUPERB. MORE - MORE - MORE.
KEEP IT COMING GORDON
The entertainment value is well worth my tax buck.
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How many people have actually read what he said?
He was largely commenting about a review of Food Policy published today (that he commissioned last summer) and how it fits in with what should be discussed at a world level.
From the BBC report http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7492573.stm:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Speaking to reporters, Gordon Brown said the G8 needed to agree a "global plan" to tackle the issue.
"People recognise that the high food prices in Britain - the price of bread, the price of eggs, the price of milk - this is happening all over the world and we have got to have a global solution to what is a global problem," he said.
Climate change
"We have got to get the price of food down through cutting the tariffs and subsidies in Europe and America, so we need a world trade deal.
"We have proposed that we double food production in Africa so that they can sell to the rest of the world as well.
"It is right to remind people that about £8 a week is wasted in our food consumption and we could do better at home as well."
- - - - - - -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Hardly lecturing people is he? Sounds like sensible comment to me.
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This site is just so negative and politically motivated.
The Prime Minister commented about the waste of food in the uk.
If he'd have said that he didn't think food was wasted in the UK, no problem here just carry on as before, then I could understand the outcry and no doubt it would have come from exactly the same people on here.
What he is saying is true! does anyone deny that food waste is a problem? that we could all make savings and bring down food demand and therfore prices if we didn't sp readilly over-buy and chuck!
Why decry the man for acknowledging a real problem and commenting on it.
Would the same people be on here decrying and ridiculing if Cameron had said this? Does Cameron disagree with what the PM says?
The truth is that 90% of comments on here are through anti labour political motivation and nothing else!
You need to get out more and leave the computer for a while.
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@182
Personally I am decrying his Hipocracy. I bet there is more than £8 per head wasted in their banquet as detailled in many posts here.
Pots very rarely are liked when they call the kettle black.
When he has put his own house in order he can feel free to come calling at my house.
Really what we need to know now is how much food is thrown out from Number 10 on a weekly basis
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re 162 Old_Rocker
"If this truly is the level of inteligence of Gordon Brown, just how did he manage to stay below the radar as chancellor for ten years"
ah, good point; that's best addressed/asked to the media generally (and to the City for that matter), who all knew that the emperor had no clothes ever since he started as chancellor, but who refused to admit it.
Everyone I know always knew he was an idiot; it's not news to any of my friends/family/colleagues, and I don't think it's news to the media or the city either, it's just that now it's so public/obvious, the media now have no option but to admit it.
Well, just think of the logic behind tax credits and there's your proof from many many moons ago that the man had no idea of reality or common sense.
Or, alternatively, just ponder his thinking that hiking tax rates is the only way to get more out of the public system and that reform or economic growth instead isn't a good idea.
The emperor has no clothes.
Hooray, the media has finally all woken up to that fact and started reporting it !
The city still says he's a genius though, but then again they wouldn't want to sow the seeds of their own destruction by pointing out how unstable their house of cards really is and admitting that they've been blindly supporting an idiot who had no idea what he was doing for the last 11 years.
Let's hope it leads to a general election asap and that we don't have to wait until 2010.
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citizendirect wrote:
I'm beginning to wonder if David Cameron is secretly writing all the comments on your blog under a series of pseudynyms.
Don't worry Citizendirect, most the of the conservatives (which I'm not) are wondering if Gordons policy initiatives are being written by mickey mouse, because the Tories can't believe their good fortune.
Perhaps Maggie gave him some advice when she visited him and it hasn't quite dawned on him it was a trick.
CarrotsneedaQUANGO2 wrote:
You really couldnt make this stuff up folks
and I quite agree, even taking into account the man is actually serious, the entertainment value is astonishing.
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Who does the PM think he is. Do you you know the saying sucking eggs. I am very annoyed at what Gordon Brown thinks is acceptable for food usage I have always been taught not to waste food.
The only way that things get thrown out in my house hold is when the sell by dates on some foods have not passed the weekend which is so annoying I normally check these things, but some do get past my radar. It is very unusual for me to throw out milk,eggs,cheese, pasta, nan bread or totilla. I can make the most amazing cheap meals with these main foods.
As for Yoghurt's these are the first to be eaten I buy a pack of 6 each week. I shop on a need to eat basis and think I do a very good job in feeding my husband and child.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson
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# 182
Brown is being slammed on here because he is a Westminster politician with his personal snout in the trough like most of the rest of them.
So it ill behoves him or any other Westmonster politician to lecture us English, even obliquely.
Unfortunately for Brown, his personal store of political capital with the English electorate is almost exhausted.
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balhamu :
At last, one other person who has read what's written. The fact that people arrive at snap judgments without having the first idea of what they're talking about is depressing - one of the tragedies of democracy is how people who couldn't run the country themselves if they were asked to decides who will. A few questions to some of the irrational Gordon bashers:
1. What will the Tories do to set the world economy right? What magic wand does Cameron have that Brown doesn't that's going to get the oil markets to bring the prices down?
2. If banks, which are private entities, lent irresponsibly all these years; and people who couldn't afford to take a mortgage out without thinking if they could afford it, is the government responsible? If Brown had told borrowers to think before they took out a mortgage, would you call him a nanny?
3. Yes, we could reduce the taxes on petrol and diesel. But then, who's going to produce the money to repair the motorways with? (Oh yes, the tooth fairy innit!)
4. What is Cameron going to do about all of this? Has he said anything except some high-sounding claptrap about rebuilding 'broken' society? Has anybody bothered to ask him _what_ his policies are, and what he would do different? (No, 'not doing what Labour does' is not an answer).
5. Why is the public transport system and the NHS in such bad shape? Has anybody thought of Tory rule between 79 and 97, and how they neglected public spending?
6. Remember poll tax? The tories are not the panacea frustrated voters see them to be. While Brown's no angel (and I make no bones about the fact that I do not like Stalinist big-brother intrusiveness in the form of the 42-day law and other anti-terror legislation), he's *not* responsible for our current economic woes!
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Eatonrifle wrote:
You're probably missing the point, the study that lead to this farce was produced before Britain slipped into recession (sorry, I mean economy hiccup), therefore the amount of waste is probably already dramatically reduced.
Which leaves Gordon looking like a bit of a fool trying to say that the worlds problems are caused by BOGOF's and the need to make a rasher of bacon feed the forty thousand.
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@#189
If i concede that he is not responsible for us being in the economical kaka will you concede that he is resposible for the depth and the fact that we are up to our ankles in it but because of him it is head down.?
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# 189
Yes, ideally people would go to the source of the information and carefully examine it in the context of precisely what was said etc.
However, people mostly have busy lives and probably have just read Nicks piece above and posted on the basis of that.
BTW. It really does not matter politically whether Brown/NL are responsible or or for these economic woes.
The crucial thing is that they are being blamed for it - and that is all that matters.
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As I happen to be in Hungary at the moment, I thought I would check out the Tokaj.
It's 375.00 quid a bottle - (11,383,694,044,678,725,632 Zimbabwe Dollars) - about the same as the average UK family wastes in uneaten food every 46.875 weeks!
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Remember the power cuts, industrial unrest, three day weeks, fuel shortages of the 70's, I do, I lived through them.
Well buy me some flares a gold medalion and get me a picket to stand in while I get beaten up by the police, looks like I'm gonna be living in the disco age again.
It's 1973, almost lunchtime, I'm 'avin 'oops!
The only difference is that the terrorists aren't irish this time.
It seems the Labour pancea has gone past it's sell by date.
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#185 What do you think Ashcroft's millions are paying for - a highly effective online Conservative Central Office presence on online blogs. This is why Labour will lose the next election - they're not alive to the need to engage in the online debate as they are becoming so important in shaping people's believes about what the facts are.
Surprises me how these blogs are largely populated with right-wingers, and all the left-wingers (who I thought were all lazy public sector workers scrounging off the hard-working taxpayer who skived off all day) are nowhere to be seen.
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Gordon Brown has a brass neck. How dare he lecture us on wasting food, when last year, he wasted 180 million pounds of our money on "bonuses" for Civil Servants. Arrogant. I do hope that Labour lose the East Glasgow by-election. If that happens, Brown will have to go. My fingers are crossed!!
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@#195
The poor left wingers were let down over the last 11 years by the education system and they havent worked out how to switch on their PC's yet or indeed type.
Most right wingers learned to type during the computer boom of the 80's when you had to be able to type as the microsoft gui's werent up to point and click at that time.
Anyway its much more fun to play on your state funded Wii than to engage in a meaningful debate about a PM bereft of ideas. After all the targets are harder to hit on Halo3 and its no fun defending in a battle that is by in large lost
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Re citizen direct and others:
The ad hominem argument that Mr Brown's critics here must be Tories is surely incompetent. It is possible to have despaired of New Labour on grounds of their manifest drift and clumsiness, and not on grounds of one's own agenda. I have none, but think criticism of Brown is apt . Nor am I secretly David Cameron. Aren't Nick's bloggers worthy of more credit than this lazy assumption gives us?
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# 195
I am politically independent but if Lord Ashcroft wants to drop me a few bob .. well, all donations are gratefully accepted.
I have participated in online blogs since about 1997 and I noticed quite some time ago that the 'left-wing' view was strangely absent.
Often there would just be a couple of people espousing this viewpoint.
It is a great shame because they make a very valuable contribution to debate and the general absence of these people is very odd.
But I doubt if it is because they are all hard working civil servants.
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The UK is to slow its adoption of biofuels, Transport Secretary Ruth Kelly has told the House of Commons.
She said that while biofuels had the potential to cut carbon emissions there were "increasing questions" about them.
The uncontrolled expansion of biofuels might actually contribute to higher food prices and see the destruction of rainforests, she said
Hurrah some one in government appears to know what is going on.
Can someone now tell the cyclists holding up traffic on country lanes that by lowering their carbon footprint they are increasing the carbon footprint of 1000 others sat in the traffic idling behind them!
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It is likely that the 'left-wing' view is not evident because those about to voice it have considered the dopey company they might be keeping, and thought better of it. The interests of the real workers have been lost in a tide of faux-ethical meddling which New Labour have turned into an art
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181. balhamu
I think most here read what he said in full
For those that didnt he said:
Britons must stop wasting food in an effort to help combat rising living costs, Gordon Brown has said as world leaders discuss rising prices
The PM said "unnecessary" purchases were contributing to price rises, and urged people to plan meals in advance and store food properly.
Then he flew off for -- See 175
Ypu cant expect us to be happy with that level of Hypocrisy and not get bloody mad.
The point gets lost when you dont lead by example.
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@Myself
Just as I thought someone in governement new what they were doing one of the qangos that our tax money pays for comes up with this http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7493654.stm
So toddlers are racists now and we must watch out lest little johnny from number 24 says yuck to a curry.
Strewth my cat just read this and started to laugh
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The comments regarding an online right wing blogging brigade are enedmic of the paranoia that now resides in this Labour government and it's supporters and is either a failure to recognise their own failure and the contempt with which they are actually held by the public at large, or clutching at straws praying that their leader really can't be this stupid.
How many of those Labour MP's who voted for a continuation £24,000 to feather their nests and remain in opaquness over expenses are in marginal seats milking the cash cow for one last fling before political oblivion?
...and Gordon has the nerve to lecture us on prudence?
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#173 citizendirect
Millbank is that not the bunker that NuLabour had to flog of because they were up to their neck in debt.
No change there then!
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#197 - good comment - made me smile.
It's a serious point though - I would suggest that the political viewpoints expressed online are not representative of the population as a whole.
I know that the Conservatives have invested (and continue to invest) in managing the political debate online as an important part of their communications strategy. Labour have not (at least to the same extent), and besides probably could not afford to.
It's an interesting point - Labour are losing the political battle to a large extent IMO due to this lack of representation in the blog world - and the lack of challenge that non-factual right-wing pub rants get. People accept these as fact.
Worth researching for any political scientists out there?
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The great British public are encouraged to waste food. Years ago we never had sell by dates except on very perishable foods. Now its on everything.
The naive throw away good food, why because manufacturer's put dates on that in lots of cases are meaningless other than to get the product used or dare I say thrown away. As Mr Coleman said he made his money by what was left on the plate (mustard)
Some manufacturers make one product but put varying dates to suit the market eg 3 months life for some 6 months for others and 12 months if it is exported. So you have a product varying in life, might taste a bit better fresh but perfect edible ..
Also product say use within a week of opening and keep refrigerated, why because you open your fridge more than a cupboard, therefore more likely to us it and think its perishable.
It is governments and the nanny state that make the rules, do something about that MR Brown.
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@206
Do you think it is possibly that many on the left wing are fair weather friends. They are onside when they think they will get something out of it (usually for no personal effort) But generally apathetic.
I think the right wing went through a phase like that in the late 90's and it has taken that long for enough cracks to appear for many of them to be prepared to stick thier head back over the parapit. After all you would be mad to stick your head up too high when the bullets are flying in your direction. For much of the early 2000's being right wing meant you were the devil incarnate.
It would appear that the worm has turned and much of "middle England" (I hate that phrase) is openly admiting its right of centre leaning.
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203. Pot_Kettle
Thanks Pot I shall add that to my collection
Carrot
One for your collection
http://tpa.typepad.com/bettergovernment/2008/06/senior-civil-se.html
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206#
said
"It's an interesting point - Labour are losing the political battle to a large extent IMO due to this lack of representation in the blog world - and the lack of challenge that non-factual right-wing pub rants get. People accept these as fact."
If its non factual right wing pub rants you're after, you're in the right place.
I'd bet my last penny that if GB had said the exact opposite the very same people would be on here saying he should decry the waste of food and encourage the 55 million people who live in the UK to shop more respoonsibly and waste less.
I bet the local Conservative Clubs throughout the Uk are a hot bed of blogging ideas.
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208 Pot kettle
Personally no problem anyone expressing a contrary opinion, it just seems to me that expressing the view that GB did about food waste would be non party political as its more a matter of fact than opinion, it really is a problem.
Seems strange that the response is so vitriolic to what IMO was honest and indisputeable.
Who thinks food waste isn't a problem and we should just ignore the problem? Not me.
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195. At 5:19pm on 07 Jul 2008, balhamu
Naw its just because ever increasingly more people are becoming immune to NuLabour spin, deceit and lies.
But it looks as though you are a basket case and still buying into it.
NuLabour will not only lose the next election, they will be crucified!
Its amazing how quickly 22 months will pass so I will ask you now, before I forget, if occasionally you will come back and let us know how NuLabour are coping in the wilderness.
But please keep it short and infrequent if possible!
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210. Eatonrifle
You arnt LISTENING
It?s the farcical hypocrisy that sends us mad.
And its indefensible
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Does the government not understand how patronising this is? If ever there were a shining example of waste, it's government! And the PM has the audacity to tell us to stop wasting £8 a week?
Gordon - you might bear in mind before you give me advice, that you weren't even elected. You're a stopgap - and a bad one at that.
It's no wonder the economy is in such a mess with muppets like this managing it. The very instant I get an opportunity to vote this clown out, I'll take it.
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Gordon Brown is at the G8 Conference and he is talking about the high worldwide price of food. Not suprising that he suggests that we are wasting too much. When people are starving because of this problem.
Now the problem is with the arguement of the usual suspects is. They have gone on for ages claiming that the Government is wasting their money on trivial things like running the country. But seem happy to waste their money on food they won't eat and will fight to the last man for the right to do so. Don't go shopping when your hungry!
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210. Eatonrifle
Some facts for you to come back on
This G8 summit has cost £283million which could have bought 100 million mosquito nets to save needy Africans from catching malaria.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/japan/2262534/G8-summit-Gordon-Brown-has-eight-course-dinner-before-food-crisis-talks.html
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1391249.ece
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1032909/World-leaders-enjoy-lavish-8-course-banquet--discuss-solve-global-food-crisis.html
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What the Prime Minister has said today about wasting food is perfectly true.
I would question the honesty of anyone who said they have never wasted food.
I have been as guilty as a good many others and have wasted good food by overbuying as though food was going out of fashion.
For the first time in years I took stock on exactly what I had in the fridge, the store cupboard and the garage where we store our own garden produce.
I would normally have expected to have spent at least £20 down at the Supermarket today repleneshing after the Weekend AND! some food would have found it's way into the Dustbin.
I walked to the shop instead of driving to the Supermarket and bought milk that was all I needed instead of wanted.
The problem on here is this, no matter what Gordon Brown says or does, there will be a certain section ready and willing to pull him down at every opportunity they can get. And bring up every issue under the sun rather than admit the man is correct in what he is saying.
Is it so hard to say what this man is saying on this issue alone as perfectly true.
Or would it choke a good many to admit it he is right when it is easier to criticise.?
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214#
There are a lot of clowns especially those that can see no further than the nose on their face.
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66 jimbrandt
Come on - the idea that we throw 40% of the food we buy is simply not credible. More than one third of all the food we buy - and that is on average ! Really ??
I have seen a 40% number but that was in relation to wastage in processing, storage and transport before the food ever reaches the shop. So we are down to 60% of the starting volume before we begin our contribution to waste.
The last published number I saw for average earnings was 457 pounds per week and the report from which the PM quotes says that the average % of earnings spent on food is 9% ie is 41 pounds per week. This means that on average, based on the 8 pounds number, we waste = 12% of what we buy.
I beg leave to doubt even that number. How do they know? Where did it come from?
It isn't true of my household and I haven't come across anyone I know who admits to it.
I'm betting that the margin for error is big and that the data was collected before the credit crunch and associated belt-tightening and reduction in expenditiure.
No doubt it comes from the same statisticians as give us the data on inflation, immigration, crime, levels of taxation etc.
I was going to say you couldn't make it up - but I suspect they did.
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From the G8 menu:
"G8 fantasy dessert"
At least the chef has a sense of humour.
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Whilst I can't argue with the waste-not-want-not sentiment (regardless of the patronising and hypocritical manner in which it's been expressed), it erroneously places blame of the UK's food wastage on the family home, and ignores the part that business has to play. Take a tour of the bins at large supermarkets, sandwich and coffee chains and you will find far more than the stated £8 per week of wasted food, still packaged, within its sell-by date. Supermarkets will often discard perfectly edible food for reasons as trivial as a special offer on the packaging having expired, and this is something that needs to be addressed by the government.
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To the people with many names who congregate on this site.
It is a perfectly reasonable thing to say that we are wasting too much food. The price of food around the world means that many are starving.
Yet you still jump on it. I think some of you are a little obsessive. Why do the names keep changing on this site but the content still looks familiar? The answer seems to be multiple memberships it is quite easy to comment using many names using tabbed browsing. Which will probably happen at aruund by election time when this site will be flooded. Also useful for multiple recommending each other and multiple comments to push any non right winger to the bottom and put right wingers on the top of the recommended list. I would have thought that there might be a few greens on the top of the wasting food HYS but no guess who is. Whether its amateur politicians, Conservative activists using the internet, amateurs or I am completely wrong I don't know. It seems suspiceous though.
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142 hawknic I guess you never watch parliament if you find the time have a look for fat men , its only there that the tories have a majority.
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glachlan @32 wrote:
"Gordon should make it illegal...."
Sure, that's all we need: more laws. Why not just lock us up in camps and feed us according to what nanny says is good for us?
You'd better put up electric fences and watchtowers in case we don't like doing what's good for us.
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221#
What is hypocritical about being told of the food we waste.?
Yes we can all blame the Supoermarkets, uncle Tom Cobbley and all, but the fact remains, there are food shortages in the world and it is only going to get worse. Does balming Brown for being hypocritical or criticising the Supermarkets lessen the facts any.
No it does not, this is just like those Supermarket plastic bags, the havoc they create and the damage they do, it takes a hammer and chisel to get through to some while others run around like headless chickens blaiming all and sundry, but never facing up to the fact.
The fact is, whether we find it acceptable or not, we are a throw away society and if we wish to continue to eat well, we have to waste less.
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181 balhamu,you dont really expect Tories to be interested in what he actually did say do you. I am afraid that Tories like to choose what they think is the truth at the expense of what actually is the truth, I'm afraid thats always been the case and I cant see it changing, but we can live in hope.
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This ideological banter is entertaining but doesn't it miss the point? When New Labour broke with it's traditional 'working class' (if there ever was such a thing) and trade union base, it lurched decisively to the right - they would probably say centre but it amounts to the same thing. They were probably right to do so. No party of the left stood a chance of election in the political climate of the late nineties, but in the process they left a yawning gap in the politics of the left which has been largely populated since by the very 'looney left' adherents they were trying to leave behind. The result has been that the genuine conviction socialists in Tony Benn's mold have been consigned to the political wilderness. At the same time, working people have become more prosperous and more mobile politically as well as literally.
In effect, you either subscribe to the Thatcherite view that there is 'no such thing as society' or take comfort from the fact that we are 'all middle class now'. Either way, the traditional left/right divide is a thing of the past and the fact that this was in part due to ruthless pursuit of power at the expense of ideology in the Labour party does not make it any less true.
Having spent the past 3 years in a former communist country watching old party activists re-branding themselves as born again democrats in the search for public office, I may be a bit cynical but I do understand the disenchantment with all things left wing. But is there a single government in Europe which does not believe in state education, social housing, free medical care at the point of need and a social safety net for the genuinely deprived? The truth is that we are all socialists. It just happens to be unfashionable to admit it.
But what is happening in the UK now goes beyond political point scoring. There is, in effect, a full frontal attack by government on the basic rights and freedoms of the very people who elected them to office which brings into question their fitness to govern. When an administration is reduced to that, it no longer matters whether it is left or right wing. It is time for it to go.
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Nick,
Surely they must have handed out some crumbs of information at their bunfight tonight?
Please throw us a few or at least give us some gossip (no Bliar "thingy" moments?) or at least tell us who's been spending the time with whom.
This forum has got to the end of the "Prudence Brown - Special subject: The bl***ing obvious" discussion and is handing on your metaphorical lips for something to talk about.
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Eatonrifle @182 wrote:
"This site is just so negative and politically motivated."
Well, it is a political blog, and our Great Leader is a black hole so far as positivity goes.
What would you like instead: A Mel Brooks type music number titled "Springtime for Gordon Brown and Great Britain"?
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#219 Only jocking: I'm sure you're right about the 40% figure. I made it clear in my post that I wasn't sure - "I think I saw ..." was what I said.
Your calculation of 12% seems reasonable, and if I could save 12% of my weekly shop I would be very pleased. It would go some way towards making up the rise in prices, and that is the point.
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I am often stunned by the thinking of people on these blogs.
People, regardless of wether or not wasting food is bad, the study that brought up this waste was before the great leader dragged us all into a recession (sorry, I mean economy hiccup).
Therefore, as with many Labour ideas, it is out of date and not relevant, because the simple downturn in the economy has already make a huge impact in the reduction of waste, without a patronising Prime Minster offering cooking tips.
Labour will however, continue with it's blinkered view of a solution, banning special offers in supermarkets, just as their key voters on low wages need them most.
Talk about political suicide, but hey, you all know best!
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threnodio @193 wrote:
"As I happen to be in Hungary at the moment, I thought I would check out the Tokaj."
You have good, if expensive, taste.
375 quid a bottle... not a bad brew for Bottler Brown. But don't worry: it's some other countries taxpayers' who are coughing up for it.
This time.
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To poster number 222:
This is not Have Your Say, try reading the page before coming out with nonsense. Do you really think that there is a group of people with multiple sign ons?
Anyway, people are annoyed about a PM talking about waste - a bit rich coming from one who has wasted billions of pounds.
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225. Trudy_Victoria
You cant tell the public to save 8 quid a week by reducing waste and then fly off to lunch as listed in 175 and expect people to take you seriously.
Thats hypocritical.
Of course Brown has a good point.
But to preach at the family while you yourself are responsible for squandering hundreds of billions is farcical.
Brown just doesnt understand the meaning of timing, nor does understand how the public read his message.
If he went to the G8 summit and refused his 8 course dinner, my respect for him would rocket.
God how do you eat an 8 courses while discussing world hunger.
They should bloody well send you to lecture them on home economics
Ill vote for you.
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Irrespective of what Gordon did or did not say, and leaving aside the patronising hypocracy of anyone in the Government suggesting that waste is a domestic issue, the fact is that food is wasted on a huge scale between production and consuption. And this is not just a by-product of the consumer society. Vast quantities of food are wasted in the 3rd World due primarily to the lack of processing, package and cool storage facilities. It might be anathema to many, but if Wall-Mart, Tesco, Sainsburys etc applied their skill in getting products to market in the 3rd World it would make a significant impact on world hunger. But that isn't going to happen anytime soon.
In the UK, the waste primarily occurs at the penaltimate stage, when products have been sent to the retailer and are deemed unsuitable for sale. The reasons for this are many, but all boil down to the cost-benefit for the supermarket. It is not worth the supermarket dealing with sorting individual items - the cost of labour is greater than the profit for seperating out the good from the bad, only to have to repeat the process the next day. In the old days, there was a thriving secondary market for this sort of stuff amongst smaller pig farms and the like. I believe that was all banned after foot and mouth. Someone correct me if I am wrong, but it is now illegal to divert product from the human food chain into the animal food chain.
Which brings us to the issue that of risk - reward. It is not worth taking the risk of selling a sub standard product and making someone ill. All this came in after the food health scares, and now suppliers have to be so risk adverse, they put a use by date that is normally far shorter than it need be, in order that the risk is reduced to almost zero. This has spilled over to the home, where food is routinely thrown out ijust because it has passed a date stamped on the outside. The fact that you can eat almost anything if you cook it properly is lost on many people who no longer know how to make an informed judgement as to what is reasonable.
Gordon can suggest that we eliminate waste, but much of it is a result of laws, rules and regulations that his government brought it. We can grumble at the rules, but we expect to be protected against inedible food.
The incredible thing is that Gordon chose to mention the waste at home, rather than in the production chain. If he had said something like,
"too much food is lost between the farm gate and the dinner plate, and I believe that we need to focus on this as an issue, in particular the needless waste in the dustbins of restaurants and supermarkets"
then I think we would be supporting him (or perhaps ignoring him).
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dhwilkinson @215 wrote:
"Not suprising that he suggests that we are wasting too much. When people are starving because of this problem."
Absolute rubbish. No-one is starving because we, in Britain, consume too much - or throw away - food.
People are starving because of political and social problems caused by bad governance, corruption and social discrimination.
Show me one example of a well-run, democratic country where people are starving.
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I beleive the phrase is
"Let them eat cake"
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#230
jimbrandt
The question isn't whether you would like to save 12% of your weekly shopping bill - who wouldn't - but whether you are currently throwing away 12%.
Oh well - let's hope the G8 leaders cleared their plates when they sit down to their 6 course lunch today and do so again when they tackle their 8 course dinner tonight
At a summit on which the global food crisis is top of their agenda.
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No better tip than in 215 - never go shopping when you are hungry!
I have a touch of sympathy with those defending the PM here. There can be no argument for wasting food. As the "family dustbin" and having seen the terrible suffering in Africa in the mid 80s the lesson has never been lost on me - I am now 6'4" as a result!
It is stating the obvious though and mildly patronising. As many are saying - those hardest effected by the credit crunch would not dream of throwing food away.
And as much as it pains some - I cannot help but agree that there has been some hideous waste in spending taxpayers cash in recent times. Northern Rock, ID cards, 10p tax compensation .....
The issue is worth a reminder, but the call of hypocrisy is sadly right in my view.
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I went out and on my return looked at the latest postings. Never have I seen so many angry people, disgusted with the
(un)elected prime minister of their country. Apart from the rage, there is a lot of satire, very witty and ironic, which would suit a cabaret. Why is it that highly unpopular, authoritarian regimes produce satirical works that in many cases are really quite brilliant? One can already imagine the clique of gloomy Brownites who will commence throwing scorn upon this hypothesis. Well who cares, let them do their worst, soon the clouds will roll away and the sun will shine again.
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234#
Just read what you have written, it is something out of the School classroom.
No. I GB was referring to a "WORLD FOOD SHORTAGE" which could cut down by wasting less.
And where does his choice of food come into it?
He is being fed by a host nation?
When you have visitors do you not try to extend hospitality towards them?
When you are being welcomed in someone else Country, do you tell them to stuff their food, that you would have more respect for them if they did not offer to feed you so much?
I fail to see where you are coming from. What has any of your criticism got to do with the fact that there is an agreed by all nations "A WORLD WIDE SHORTAGE OF FOOD" and if we are not careful more will be starving.
I cannot see your point.
Such strange people Conservatives are.
But of course you will be telling me soon that you are not a Connservative just a disillusioned Labour voter who is going to vote for Dave next time.
BTW, you Conservatives are letting me down.
I have a fiver placed that one of you is going to fall into the trap I have set.
C'mon who is going to be the first to win me a fiver and a pound for every one after that who falls in the trap?
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Waste is a by product of price. The less we pay, the less we value it.
The rise in price of fuel as a primary product and as a key component of all other products will result in the price of everything continuing to go up. As a direct result, we will buy less, use less and waste less.
This might be a cause for rejoicing amongst the green hair shirt brigade, but for the rest of us will not be so much fun. However, if the worst we have to face over the next few years is to be more thirfty and accept that the necessities of life are more often luxuries, then I think that on reflection we will have got off lightly.
"Dig for Victory" anyone?
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The PMs Dinner tonight
Corn-stuffed caviar
Smoked salmon and sea urchin "pain surprise" style
Hot onion tart
Winter lily bulb and summer savoury
Folding fan modelled tray decorated with bamboo grasses
including
Kelp-flavoured cold Kyoto beef "shabu-shabu", asparagus dressed with sesame cream
Diced fatty flesh of tuna fish, avocado and jellied soy sauce and Japanese herb "shiso"
Boiled clam, tomato, "shiso" in jellied clear soup of clam
Water shield and pickled conger dressed with vinegar soy sauce
Boiled prawn with jellied tosazu vinegar
Grilled eel rolled around burdock strip
Sweet potato
Fried and seasoned Goby with soy sauce and sugar
Hairy Crab "Kegani" bisque soup
Salt-grilled bighand thornyhead with vinegary water pepper sauce
Milk fed "shiranuka" lamb flavoured with aromatic herbs and mustard
Roasted lamb and cepes and black truffle with emulsion sauce of lamb's stock and pine seed oil
Special cheese selection, lavender honey and caramelised nuts
G8 fantasy dessert
Coffee served with candied fruits and vegetables
I hope you lot saved your 1.15 on waste today
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235#
Food is being wasted on a huge scale and for some reason or other which we cannot fathom, even home grown veggie does not keep as it used to.
At one time of day a decent harvest of Potato's, Carrots, Onions and Turnips kept Chemical free grown in our own large garden in those days lasted all winter.
Cabbage Cauli and Kale also used to last but not for quite such a length of time.
Not so now, even although every effort is made to grow it organically as possible.
They do not and will not keep.
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#238 Only jocking: "The question isn't whether you would like to save 12% of your weekly shopping bill - who wouldn't - but whether you are currently throwing away 12%. "
Well because of my circumstances I doubt whether I am. Looking at a recent Tesco bill I see that I spent just over £50 on food, so 12% wastage would be £6 worth.
I estimate that I probably throw out about half that (£3), but I'm retired and I kid myself that I'm a bit more careful than most. Then again I'm just learning to cook, and my portion control is poor so I nearly always prepare more than my wife wants to eat. nevertherless I would reckon that I'm at the careful end of the distribution curve. My daughter, on the other hand, has to work and while she is a trained Chef she certainly throws away a lot more than I do - about the £6 level. Given the difficulties that single people have in buying small sizes of many products, I can easily see them disposing of three or four times the amount that I do. So overall I wouldn't see the 12% figure as being too far from the truth.
However, like you I have no idea how they came up with this figure. Sampling I suppose.
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240 postings in less than 12 hours! What can the subject be - Ah yes Food.
Makes me think that the 1920's cartoons of Tories complaining about their hardship, while the grease trickled down their chins may have had some substance.
By the way, unless you changed the constitution while I wasn't looking, no PM in the UK has ever been "elected" in the sense that mightyangela and others obviously mean. All PMs from the Commons are elected by one constituency, then invited to serve by the monarch, if they can command the support of a majority of MPs.
You must all have been furious when Lord Home of Hirsel was invited to become PM!
If you want a Presidential system then campaign for it - regardless of Party.
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Is that the problem then? if you don't support Gordon Brown's ludicrous ideas, you therefore don't support Labour you're therefore a Conservative?
..and they don't seem to know why they have the lowest polls since records began.
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241. Trudy_Victoria
So if you were invited over to dinner by Gradantidote to discuss A WORLD WIDE SHORTAGE OF FOOD
Youd be quite happy with a 6 course lunch and an 8 course dinner would you.
Given that we had elected you to do this you would perhaps call ahead a month in advance. Lets tone down the menu and not drink Tokaji at 375 a bottle
You bang on about how prudent you have been in the past and how you can afford 3 overseas trips a year as a result. But when you see Brown squandering billions you simply turn a blind eye.
An to be clear. Today Im a Tory, but I might just change my mind. You madam would support Brown no matter what he did and use the name Thatcher to defend his position. Not very helpful in a current debate.
GA is eating bubble and sqeak and home made pickle onions tonight.
Dont recomend you sleep with him.
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246. oldnat
Thats the theory, but most people have no idea who thier MP is or what he stands for.
They vote for the party they like best.
In short the leader they like best.
Even shorter they vote for the next PM
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Re #247 Old_Rocker
I deduce that your post was probably in response to #241 from Trudy_Victoria
If so ... Here! Here!
However do please show the post you're referring to so that we can be sure.
Just as there are a lot here who are anti NuLabour it cannot be denied that there are more than one of The Supreme Leader's acolytes posting here, too.
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Watch out for the following news headlines very soon:
Gordon Brown appoints Hazel Blears as the Food, Health and Waste Control (FHWC) minister with special emphasis on 'control'
Government to take over all supermarkets and nationalise them as ration shops
Hazel announces weekly food rations for each person based on their 'recommended' BMI.This will not only control waste but improve our well being, she said
Government unveils plans for compulsory Bikram yoga for all to improve health and control food waste. Commits 10 billion to opening hundreds of Bikram studios across the UK
Hazel announces plans to install cameras in fridges and bins to monitor waste
The government today commisioned a study to measure FRI i.e Fart Release Index of everyone. Apparently fart is related to excess food consumption which the government plans to conrol
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Re #246 oldnat
Evening oldnat. Good post.
I agree re newslessness. Odd. Nothing from Nick, nothing from Brian when both are where you'd expect it to all be happening.
Could Nick have been sent on a secret mission to feed the starving (well 5,000 of them) of Glasgow East from Gordon's doggy bag?
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#252 Brownedov
Surely you're out of date. In 2,000 years technology has moved on to the point where you can feed a constituency for a year on recycled "Smoked salmon and sea urchin 'pain surprise' style".
Though whose "pain surprise" we wonder.
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#246 (oldnat)
There isn't a constitution for Heaven's sake.
There never has been.
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Brownedov wrote:
I deduce that your post was probably in response to #241 from Trudy_Victoria
If so ... Here! Here!
However do please show the post you're referring to so that we can be sure.
Glad you agree, but it was a general comment to all those who can't quite grasp the concept that disliking Gordon Browns mentalist ideas doesn't by default make them a conservative.
and thanks for the advice, but I'm no noob, as my name suggests.
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CHANGE OF SUBJECT ANYONE?
2 Months of Boris, a Taste of Tory Government? Discuss.
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254#
of course there is, it's just not written down.
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248#
Re Holidays: I thought the Conservatives did not do " The Politics of Envy" tut tut.
I would hope I had the good manners to accept hospitality offered me.
Allow me to straighten you out on another point.
we also spend regular W/Ends in Paris and sometimes a Mon-Friday.
Now there is a bit more for you to envy.
Plus the fact we enjoy the Monday-Friday breaks that are on offer on a regular basis throughout the year and do take them also.
We also pay tax so as your Mummy can collect the family allowance on your behalf.
Whilst our children pay enough in taxes to fund our pensions in full with some to spare for others.
Life's a bitch, ain't it just!
Are you honestly telling me that a man whose Father is one of the Wealthiest Stockbrokers in this Country who is married to a wife whose Stepfather owns half of one of the larger Counties in our Country is going to tell a foreign
host where to stuff his hospiatlity?
What a prime example of a Conservative PM he will make.
The rest of the civilised World would turn their backs on him.
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249# and others.
On the tired old debaye about Brown not being "elected.
I may be wrong but if you apply that logic surely even Churchill wasn't "elected" in 1940? that didn't seem to ilegitemise his premiership.
Either way its a non arguement as oldnat explained for about the 100th time minimum
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250#
And the Band Played "Believe it if you like"
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Re #235 Wopitt
A really excellent and thoughtful post that deserves more discussion, and I very much take your point concerning the penultimate. It's something the LibDem and/or Tory leadership might take up, but not for "listening" Gordon, I fear.
I'm surprised that only #244 from Trudy_Victoria takes it up, and that in a not very positive way.
But another time, I think as CarrotsneedaQUANGO2 is right in #234 when (s)he says:
"Of course Brown has a good point.
Brown just doesnt understand the meaning of timing, nor does understand how the public read his message."
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nick,
are individuals and families that are struggling on £6 an hour really throwing away £8 a week in food that has not been eaten?
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Eatonrifle wrote:
CHANGE OF SUBJECT ANYONE?
2 Months of Boris, a Taste of Tory Government? Discuss.
Boris Johnson?
Boris is actually quite boring so far, I'd have expected a real catastrophe by now, but he's letting us down and he has quite a lot of get out of jail free cards to use up before he catches up with Ken.
But back to Gordon Brown, he's far easier to ridicule because he has such a large and significant back catalogue of disasters.
We could always pick on George Bush and Global crisis, he's had even more disasters than Gordon (so far), but Gordon does still have time to catch up and has good form on dodgey ground, with George leaving in January.
Peace in our time and the George Bush phenomena, discuss the effects committing to the special relationship with america has had on Britain.
Or we could swap gruel recipe tips while Gordons away.
By the way, what do too many chefs make? ...television programmes!
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Re #253 oldnat
Point taken.
Let's hope the pain comes on the 24th and his surprise shortly after.
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Really struggling to remember who elected this man to be our PM. He doesn't speak for me ... does anyone remember who elected him??
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#244 Trudy_Victoria
Couldnt agree more.
To keep mushrooms you just kept them in the dark and fed them a load of s**t, but it sure looks like the times are a changing.
The mushrooms have started to wise up to the brown stuff!
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#249, #254, #257
Thanks for the clarification. So let me get this clear -
The English/British position is to have no written constitution of your own, but ensure that you write them for all parts of the former Empire, and the non-English parts of the UK.
That allows you to maintain a political system which is institutionally corrupt and incompetent, but which allows you to whine incessantly when a party you don't like is in power.
Seems strange to me, but each country needs to make its own decisions.
However, if I may offer some neighbourly advice - a change of constitutional diet, which slims you down would increase your political health significantly, and avoid significant waste.
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263# Old Rocker
I agree by Boris standards a bit quiet so far if you ignore the 2 high profile sackings/resignations.
My personal favourite was the Radio4 interview on the cost of the Olympics and possible overspending that went something like this.
Boris "there is no memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the London Authority and Government on how overspends will be allotted"
Interviewer " But Mr Mayor the MOU is published on your own website"
Boris " Oh cripes, is it?"
You couldn't make it up!
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Re #257 Eatonrifle
Strictly speaking you're correct but Walter Bagehot had a fairly good go at it. A bit dated but still respected.
You can download the 1873 2nd edition in PDF at http://www.efm.bris.ac.uk/het/bagehot/
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Eatonrifle 268
The overspend on the Olympics that our beloved Ken took great joy from tricking the government into by a massive and deliberate underestimate?
As I said, Boris has far too many get out of Jail free cards before he becomes public enema number one and we can have proper fun with him, but we can all take solice in the knowledge that the day will come eventually.
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Eatonrifle
Sorry, I thought I was on a UK website. I didn't realise that I was on one where the affairs of some English local authority were being discussed.
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If Gordon Brown and even today the awful Yvette Cooper are fully aware that the high price of fuel reduces the tax take in other areas as the economy slows down.
and as we're all painfully aware that 70% of the cost of fuel is tax.
Why, instead of offering Mrs Beaton style thrift advice, doesn't Gordon reduce fuel duty so that the economy is stimulated, making us competative with other members of the European Union, bolstering our position in the G8 as a significant player when times are tough, therefore increasing the tax take in other areas from which we all benefit, rather than forcing the country into some kind of financial nose dive that will take decades to recover from.
Because he's an idiot who didn't plan for the nation to be in this state it is now and his former strategies based on a continuous booming economy are in tatters.
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If Gordon Brown wasn't such a moral man. He could solve his problems with one easy speach. He could advise the British people not to drink poison. Immediate cries of nanny state would follow. and many of these jokers would disappear from this site and HYS. and he would get away with it. because he said not to. Legal but immoral so maybe not.
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271 Oldnat
Apology not necessary but accepted nevertheless.
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266#
Funny thing you should say that Dave Cameron has been doing the "Mushroom Syndrome" since being elected to the gullible.
He has all the dyed in the wool Tory following onboard, while at the same time just longing for the day he can give them tax rebates, at the same time he has managed to fool those converts to Conservatism whom he will really show the "Mushroom Syndrome" too.
By keeping them in the Dark and in the "Whoopsies" after they find out too late he is a "Say anything, do anything get elected at any price, flip flopping shallow PR man" and nothing short.
The Mushroom effect is hardly original thinking, it is as old as the hills and just about as ancient as the Conservatives stupid quote of "Tractor production" which is the norm for them to fall back on.
The last time I heard both these things mentioned was from a 18 year old, starting out on a gap year and his head full of Cameron rhetoric.
A few weels before he was just to the left of Joe Stalin now he is slightly to the right of Ghengis Khan and about equally as barmy as both those and his current hero.
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182 eatonrifle,you ask about Dave Cameron and would he be treated in the same way as GB for saying the same thing, the answer to that is no. To find out whether Dave agrees with GB, well you will have to wait until Dave has sussed out which way its going to go ,if its popular then Dave will be in like flynn with his support but if it goes badly then he will tell us all how he told GB that he had no right to say that to the British people. I've yet to hear Dave come out with anything that he could be challenged on. We have heard Gideon come out with one or two daft ideas but Dave makes the bullets for someone else to fire, I am afraid that Cameron is like a good few on here good on insults poor on substance.
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#273
Delicious post!
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273 dhwilkinson:
Gordon said that he'd put an end to boom and bust, Gordon said we need ID cards and then lost twenty odd million peoples personal information, Gordon said that no one would be adversely affected by the 10p tax fiasco, Gordon sold gold at the bottom of the market and lost billions.
Contrary to people crying 'nanny state' regarding his position on drinking poison, I think the majority would simply say...
See, he is an idiot!
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272#
For the simple reason that when the price of fuel is high, spending on other things is reduced and the tax take to the Treasury is also greatly reduced.
Only Osborn, Cameron and Tories do not realise that.
That was the reason we constantly had boom and bust on a regular basis for years under them and inflation sky high not to mention all the reccessions and unemployment amongst other things.
Now you have the short answer to that question.
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scepticmax@236
Food inflation is the problem. People are starving around the world and this country is throwing it away. Throwing money away. You complain when you think the government is throwing it away. But you don't like him telling you not to throw your money away. Food prices are relevant to what they are talking about at the G8 and I am baffled as to why there is this outrage. Actually I'm not but I would be if this site was more representative.
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#274 Eatonrifle
Good response! though the Northern English pigeons may even now be speeding towards you.
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Re #260 Trudy_Victoria
I'm afraid your response to my #250 has completely lost me.
"And the Band Played "Believe it if you like""
Why? Where? To whom?
I cannot say I have heard of this piece of music and none of the usual search engines can find the sheet music.
Could you elaborate please?
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258. Trudy_Victoria
So we have established youre quite happy with a 6 course lunch and an 8 course dinner paid for by the tax payer to discuss
A WORLD WIDE SHORTAGE OF FOOD
And youd do all that while children in Africa die at the rate of 1 every 3 seconds from starvation.
NICE
I think Im getting the picture now.
Enjoy your next safari.
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Current Labour fans, you really do need to do yourselves a favour and stop pointing fingers at Cameron.
The logic is quite simple:
Do you think the electorate believe in Labour? answer according to the polls is obviously NO.
Therefore anything Labour say is a lie in the eyes of the electorate and if you're pointing the finger at Cameron, you're scared of him.
You'd do better to find whatever is left that is actually good about Brown (good luck on that) and play it up, rather than invite the Harbinger of your doom by constantly invoking his name.
As with all things politics, the conservatives can't actually win the next election, but Labour. especially on current form, can certainly lose them.
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#275 Trudy_Victoria
Phew you had me worried there, when I started reading your blog, I thought for one minute you had slipped back into that biography stuff you usually peddle.
But no it looks like, once again, you are up to the armpits in the Brown mire!
By the way Cameron has not been elected yet??watch this space in 2010. Or you never know he may get lucky before then!
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dhwilkinson @280
Your moral outrage may - or may not - be commendable. But it's totally irrelevant - and economically ignorant.
I repeat my point that we in the UK wasting food has no relevance to the starving masses in the third world.
Your position reminds me of my mother (45+ years ago) urging me to "eat up my food because children in China were going hungry..."
Since then, the Chinese got their act together (mainly by ditching most aspects of socialism and the 'cultural revolution') and feed their own reasonably well.
Once other third world nations set their priorities straight they'll do likewise.
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Number 279 Trudy_Victoria
Excuse me, I don't follow your logic.
As I understand it, you are saying that the boom and bust cycles of the 1980's were the result of high fuel prices that were directly caused by the Conservative fiscal policy, and that the current Conservative leadership are responsible for the consequenses. Furthermore, you believe that the Conservative leadership are the only people who do not understand the link, despite the (in)action of the current government to address the issue.
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#284 Old_Rocker
Good point about NuLabours position in the polls!
Even Browns standing in recent polls are amazing to. These polls are zero based and can go below zero or above zero. Browns ratings are below zero!
I wonder if there is such a thing as a Negative Equity PM? Is this a first?
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Trudy_Victoria: 279
Are you saying that we're not in a bust situation now and suffering from a rapid growth in unemployment already higher than under the previous conservative governments when you take into account all those who're not on the unemployment register since the government changed the way the records are calculated, but aren't in active work and on benefits of one kind or another which some would approximate to be as high as five million along with a rapid rise in inflation at double the target rate with fears the it could indeed go much higher and speculation is rife that negative equity is on the way after being hit by an anglo american credit crunch which could have been avoided had the then chancellor put proper restraint on bank lending and isn't a global event as the propaganda mill would have us believe when they quite openly talk about the booming economies in china and india and we're in massive debt following an illegal and unaffordable war in Iraq because we sided with a texan who's eyes are too close together because we thought he was the tough guy on the block, when in reality his vision of world domination was the politics of fear which is dragging on just like Vietnam did and is costing the country billions and is stopping us from using military force where it is actually morally required in Zimbabwee to return it to being Africas bread basket?
Phew, thats alright then, I was worried that Gordons recomendations on saving eight pounds a week was because we're sliding into a recession!
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285#
What planet are you on if he was not elected what is he doing in Parliament?
If he was not elected Leader of the Tories what is he doing speaking on their behalf?
As for the Brown stuff tell me how any person could stand on a platform to be elected in 2005 and then do a complete 90% turn less than a year later?
He changes his mind and what he laughingly calls principles as often as his kacks.
When Brown and Blair changed their policies it took years.
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Re 259 Eatonrifle
"Either way its a non arguement as oldnat explained for about the 100th time minimum"
You're right that it's irrelevant to the "Is Brown legit?" debate but it is not irrelevant to the electorate who need the protection of a simple, clear document - perhaps along the lines of the US Constitution and ratified by a referendum of course.
With NuLabour arguing in court that manifesto promises aren't worth the paper they're written on and the Tories rightly complaining about asymetric devolution, the lack of any constitutional safeguard to stop Parliament sitting indefinitely worries many that more civil rights may be stolen from them.
And before you ask, NO I am not a Tory. I'm a Liberal saddened by the LibDems putting the EU before honesty and democracy.
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285#
Name one Tory who would turn down a dinner at the taxpayers expence?
Course Cameron will as you say so.
Perhaps Derek Conway, Chichester or the Wintertons might take you up on that.
The next Safari is going to be Jaffa in Israel, but not before we spend a few days visiting friends in Scotland.
The one after that I hope is going to be in Petersmarisburg in S.Africa, and hopefully a few W/Ends in Paris, lifes still a bitch for the envious ai't it?
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#283 .... whichever way they try to spin it, a massive banquet that includes vintage wines and champagne is a really crass way to end off a day that, we're told, is being devoted to talking about food shortages and world poverty.
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Food for thought (I need some link to this theme).
Glasgow East by-election
Margaret Curran finally selected as Scottish Labour candidate (makes you feel sorry for the 2 other people on their leet, who have been hanging around since Friday evening while their Executive was on Conference calls to change their constitution to allow Curran to stand, because they were publicly identified as unacceptable before they were even interviewed).
Conservatives launching their campaign at St Jude's (patron saint of lost causes, and no I'm not making that up!)
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Four labour terms? I have them right here:
Arrogant
Incompetent
Unrepentant, and
Unelectable
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289#
I do not know about "Old_Rocker" you sound more like "OLD_SOLDIER" to me.
Sorry I started to read the rant, gave it up as a bad job after a few lines.
You have been listening to Redwood and Osborne too much and you know what Redwood's nickname is?
Going of to bed ROFLMHO and definately not having nightmares of Vulcans and Flying Saucers.
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291~ I have no problem with a written constitution should one be needed.
As for the point
"NuLabour arguing in court that manifesto promises aren't worth the paper they're written on"
a bit of licence used there by any chance?
You may not be a Tory but that sort of comment where you sort of "invent" a fact is reminiscent of many of the Tory Bloggers on here.
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ScepticMax at 286
I don't know how to say this, but I am not sure that when you mother enjoined you to eat your food because of the starving in Africa that she was making an arguement based on the economics of supply and demand and the consequent effect on global food distribution. I think she was trying to shame you into eating the food you needed, and probably meant something more along the lines that my mother used:
"eat your food you ungrateful little git - food that your father slaved his guts out earning the money to buy, and I slaved to cook over a hot stove, and if you think that I am going to throw it out and cook you something else, you have another thing coming"
Perhaps?
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Re #267 oldnat
Brilliant!
Bagehot couldn't have put it better.
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I'll remind you of what Brown actually said (#181)
From the BBC report http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7492573.stm:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Speaking to reporters, Gordon Brown said the G8 needed to agree a "global plan" to tackle the issue.
"People recognise that the high food prices in Britain - the price of bread, the price of eggs, the price of milk - this is happening all over the world and we have got to have a global solution to what is a global problem," he said.
Climate change
"We have got to get the price of food down through cutting the tariffs and subsidies in Europe and America, so we need a world trade deal.
"We have proposed that we double food production in Africa so that they can sell to the rest of the world as well.
"It is right to remind people that about ?8 a week is wasted in our food consumption and we could do better at home as well."
- - - - - - -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Sample comments:
#3 - "what a load of tosh"
#4 - "what a hypocrite"
#6 - "what utter, utter garbage from a failing leader...Gordon Brown wants to interfere in another part of our lives"
#31 - "Gordon Brown is a Stalinist fool"
And it goes on.
I wonder if Cameron said something similar there would be a similar reaction.
The main focus of the comments were that there need to be a lot of co-ordination between global governments to solve the global problems that have led to the price of food rocketing up in every country of the world (not just England - as I'm sure people contributing to this blog appreciate".
Brown added - as the Food Policy Review concluded - there is also a lot of food wasted in the UK. There is some scope for individuals to take responsibility here - fair enough. And - as I'm sure the Government's Food Strategy will work on - supermarkets need to be encouraged to help consumers waste less (which will be difficult given their interests in encouraging over-buying and over-consumption).
What a nerve this man has eh?
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Trudy_Victoria 296,
So, we're back to, if you don't support Gordon, you don't support Labour you're therefore a Conservative.
..and they don't seem to know why they have the lowest polls since records began.
Brownedov, that one was to trudy_victoria, bless her cotton socks :)
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Wopitt @298:
Of course she was. (Bless).
In those days, for a woman who grew up in the war, food was still a luxury and gross over-eating was rare, and obesity was a little-heard medical condition - not a lifestyle choice.
She's grown up a bit since then and relishes the good things in life - as we all do. And, being a lady of high intelligence and good sense she, naturally, can't stand Brown.
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#279
Trudi-Victoria
You leaving something out of the equation.
Your point is that high fuel costs reduce spending and, therefore, tax cuts elsewhere.
If that is right, it follows that cutting fuel costs via the tax mechanism will increase spending and tax revenues elsewhere. Indeed, that would be one of the objectives.
To be honest, I have been expecting Gordon Brown and Alastair Darling do do something like this - rather than just scrap or futher delay the 2p escalator when it falls due.
It is a win, win situation. They cut the cost of fuel, but not the overall tax take from fuel. And, on the 'green' front, there is a perfectly respectable argument which says that pump prices are higher than anybody ever envisaged and well beyond the point where the economics are forcing drivers to limit their vehicle use.
The detail may differ from the Tory proposal but I would still expect to see something along these lines in the autumn pre-budget statement.
If I'd been them, I'd have done it before now - and before the recent lorry driver protests -for both political and state of the economy reasons. If/when they do it now, they will be accused of buckling to pressure groups or dithering or stealing Tory ideas or all of the above.
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300#
Well said mate but on here accurately quoting what was actually said only clouds peoples reactionary right wing pejudice.
Good post by you though, wish there were more.
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302# Sceptic
Why not have a look at 300# and respond to that. A bit more intelectualy challenging.
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#301, 296 etc
Message to die hards on either side of the poitical divide. You know who you are.
NEWSFLASH - Not everybody who disagrees with your views is Labourite or Conservative - delete as appropriate.
Some of us make political judgments based on the content of the parcel, not the label.
Believe it or not, we can be, at one time, anti a government which happens to be Labour and, at another, anti a government who happens to be Conservative.
There are even some who believe that it is a good thing for deomcracy - essential even - for the other lot to get in from time to time.
Probably it would be right to say, when it comes to elections, that some of us in reality are more voting against the government whose time we think is up - than for the opposition.
Doubtless all very strange and unworthy to you "I'll always vote Labour/Conservative no matter what" devotees - but there you go.
So feel free to conduct your dialogue of the deaf with each other in the guise of debate - exchanging lists of 'facts' and insults about past sins and achievements, with no prospect of changing each other's mind on anything.
But do, please, allow for the possibilty that some of us are not committed for life to either tribe.
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300#
Well said and definately well over the heads of most of the Conservative bloggers.
Now a definate good night to one and all, however I am sure all would agree, that was one post which was extra special, to the point and whats more perfectly true.
Once more an excellent post, shame it will be wasted on the ill informed.
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305 Eatonrifle
Sorry to have injected a bit of humour into the discussion. Actually I was making the point that ScepticMax's arguement that domestic waste of food in the UK has no effect of global food supply didn't withstand intellectual rigour, but that is a bit dull.
I will answer number 300
- It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what Brown or his government says, thinks or does. The people have made up their mind and barring a cataclysmic event, Brown hasn't a snowflake's chance in hell of winning an election, and that the Labour party hasn't much more.
We know that this Labour government isn't much better than the Conservative that preceded them, or the one that will follow them. But we also know that changing parties gives us, the long suffering voters a break while the new Government gets its' act together. This will be followed by a period when they enact their more popular policies and try to unpick the more egregious of the laws passed by the previous bunch. In time they too will run out of ideas and before they implode.
It is this cycle of renewal, growth, withering and replacement that makes our political system work at all.
Therefore, it does not matter who the next government is let by, as long as it is not the current bunch. What matters is making sure that they are aware of what we voters really want.
Attacks on Brown, Cameron and the other guy (he should be so lucky) are fun, but pretty irrelevent.
We are at the end of an era. The end of several eras. The end of the Labour era, the end of the Bush era, the end of the neo-con era, and perhaps a few more eras that I can't think of at this time of night. It's all about Change. Barak Obama change, and Brown is yesterday's man. The architect of our current economic position is not credible as the leader to get us out of it. Cameron might not be the guy either, but right now, it looks like he is going to get a chance to try.
It doesn't matter what Brown said. It's over, he had his chance and he blew it.
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dhwilkinson (post 222 and a later one) seems obsessed about HYS.
I already said that this is not HYS.
This is callee debating, and the reason GB is getting so much stick is the constant "advice" our Government seems to give us. If it's not food, it's why ID cards/ EU constitution / war / oil prices etc are good for us.
Patronising and badly-timed announcements are part of the problem. Most people are intelligent enough to realise they should not waste food, and they should also recycle. It's the way that Labour present these ideas that get's my back up.
Anti-terror laws? Great, but then they get abused. ID cards? Sound idea then HRMC loses 25 million IDs.
Food waste? Fantastic! Then he sits down to a rather large lunch, and we of course have had the MPs recently ensuring they can afford to eat plenty.
I don't know who is GB's public relations officer, but I'd suggest he gets a new one fast.
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#308 Wopitt
What a sensible post! You must have been on the wrong website.
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The overwhelming reaction on most Blogs is get stuffed--preferably with high cholesteral vitamin free junk food
Sure Brown did himself no favours by lecturing us while himself stuffing his face at an 8 course banquet and it is perfectly true that this man has wasted far more than £8 a wk of the average earners money
But even so it can be reasonably argued that we do chuck a lot of food away
However people loath the ruling political elite and are simply not in the mood to listen to politicians about anything at all
It is interesting how many different issues bring up resentment bordering on hatred of the political class
The perception that they are good 4 nothing bunch of liars n thieves with totalitarian tendencies very quickly comes up in so many blogs.
People view the State that Brown and Blair built as malignant
As house prices collapse, Unemployment soars and the price of necessities continues to rise and people actually start to suffer a measure of hardship, this hatred will intensify
It will be interesting to see if this hatred, will result in anything other than acid blog threads and David Cameron
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#308 - sorry, didn't realise this was the random rant at Brown thread - my mistake.
This Government isn't much better? Life was so much better in 1993 wasn't it?
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Part of the problem is caused by supermarket special offers that encourage people to buy more than they need - with items not being eaten by the 'use-by' date.
Instead of BOGOFs or buy-two-for-the-price-of-three, it would be better if the price of single items on special offer were just slightly reduced.
Brown is right to draw attention to waste.
If only he could be more careful how he spends our taxes.
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Over the last few weeks I have been coming to the conclusion that Gordon Brown is a Tory fifth columnist in the Labour Party, as I cannot believe that anyone who was a Labour supporter could do so much to destroy a Labour Government and, I suspect, the Labour Party. When the Tories were decimated in 97 I thought I had seen a once in a lifetime event, I coming to believe that in 2 years I will see the Labour Party duo-decimated, in fact I suspect we are about to see then end of One Nation parties, as I cannot see Labour winning Scotland, never mind Wales and England. Something I believed to be impossible for most of my life.
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The line about "the Government wastes our taxes" has really taken hold hasn't it? I'm sure it's true in places, but want to be sure of what is defined as waste on here - is it spending where it shouldn't or inefficiencies where it spends.
Give me some examples, backed up with some facts (I know there's some - always better to debate facts rather than fictions).
How would you reduce spending? What would you do less of? Pay teachers and doctors less (that's where most of the money that has been 'wasted' has ended up). Build fewer schools? End Sure Start? Abolish tax credits?
Or is it that wispy concept of "increase efficiency"? The civil service has a great ability to resist efficiency (you've seen "Yes Minister"). Cameron's plans to increase efficiency will come to nothing - it will be reducing the scope of what Government does or paying civil servants less - nothing else.
And who would you tax less? Conservative tax plans centre on Stamp Duty and Inheritance Tax at the moment. Maybe increase the personal allowance (benefitting higher rate payers more). Perhaps introduce a married tax credit.
Government involves difficult choices. I see no sign that Cameron is willing to make them - might have to upset people by telling them you can't have the moon on a stick. Save the environment - unpopular taxes. Give people decent working conditions - regulate business. Etc. If a Government wants to tackle issues it must annoy some interest groups some of the time. Brown's problem at the moment is he is running scared and his political capital is too low to tackle the interest groups
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Only jocking: 306
I doff my cap to your sir!
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306 and 316:
I've been trying to say the very same thing for a very long time. Just because you may disagree with Government or Opposition strategy on a particular issue an appreciable number of die hards on here immediately jump on your back and assume that you are their worst enemy. I've said before that I agree and disagree with different aspects of Party Policies according to my own leanings. It is difficult to find an amalgam of your own opinions in one party. It's really a matter of considering the overall approach as well as the personalities involved before coming to a reasonable decision as to your eventual voting choice. It isn't a sign of weakness to take issue with your chosen allegiance if they follow a path contrary to the one that you prefer. The die hard approach to blogging it seems to me is a rather defensive, negative response to what might be perceived to undermine your chosen path. If you follow either GB, NC or DC you wouldn't dare admit to disagreeing with them on here in case it provides ammunition for those very die hards who appear to rule these forums.
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Brown points out that you waste 8 quid a week on food
This morning the DWP announced that the amount of benefit lost each year to error has doubled to almost £2 billion a year.
You couldn?t make it up folks
I wonder if this has anything to do with it
http://tpa.typepad.com/bettergovernment/2008/06/senior-civil-se.html
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Quote:
"BEING lectured by Gordon Brown on eating up our leftovers really takes the biscuit.
A man so mean he scrounges the cost of his lightbulbs off the taxpayer has the cheek to instruct families on making their weekly further.
Brown really must have a death wish. Otherwise why would he come out with such an insulting tubload of patronising garbage?
Taking time off from a junket in Japan, where he is feasting on eight-course banquets, our ludicrous Prime Minister says the rest of us must make better use of our plate scrapings.
We throw away too much food, says Brown. If we used a fridge, we would find our fruit and veg lasted longer.
Well, fancy that! Thanks Mr Brown. We never knew that fridges were useful for keeping stuff fresh. Lucky we?ve got you to tell us.
No doubt you?ll be putting spy cameras in our fridges to check up on us.
As for chucking stuff out, doesn?t Brown realise some folk can barely afford to put food on the table?
He tells us that we could save £8 a week by cutting down waste.
But he has never driven, so he wouldn?t know that eight quid equals thirty seconds at a petrol pump ? 70 per cent of it in tax for him.
And why should we be taking lectures on prudence from a man so clever he sold off Britain?s gold reserves at the bottom of the market?
G8 summit ... Gordon Brown has cheek to lecture us
Brown preaches economy to struggling families while presiding over the greediest, grubbiest Government in our history.
He and his fellow MPs have their bloated trotters rammed into every juicy pie going. Why should they worry about food bills? WE pay for their groceries!
Only last week Labour MPs insisted on keeping their privileges: Huge tax-free allowances and the ?John Lewis List? which lets them lavishly furnish their second homes which are paid for by you and me.
One Labour MP is believed to have cleared £200,000 profit on selling his taxpayer-funded second home.
In Scotland, Labour MP David Marshall has stood down after embarrassing revelations that he claimed £500,000 of taxpayers? cash for a home ?office? staffed by one person: His wife.
It?s not just MPs on easy street.
Civil servants in Government departments responsible for some of the biggest bungles have been awarded massive BONUSES.
Useless Whitehall penpushers have shared a pot of £128million. Nothing succeeds like failure, hey?
As for Government waste, where shall we start?
The NHS database shambles. Shameful incompetence at the Ministry of Defence. Fat, fraudulent Two Jags who claimed £4,000 for HIS food off the taxpayer. Pointless regional assemblies.
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Billions upon billions of our cash poured down the drain by a smug, arrogant, nannying Government that has never cared a baked bean for taxpayers.
And still they pile on the pain: Petrol tax, council tax, insurance tax, holiday tax, road tax, property tax, TV tax. If it moves, tax it.
Today we are all fearful as jobs vanish and prices in the shops get scarier every day.
At this moment, our PM is on the other side of the world lording it at banquets and ordering folk here to use their leftovers for tomorrow?s lunch. And he wonders why Labour is losing votes hand over fist..
In my opinion I think this article from The Sun goes over the top on this item. It typifies however the present media perception of an unpopular P.M. If GB had said similar things 2 years ago he may well have drummed up some support for his ideas. It helps to illustrate just how far his mantra has fallen in such a very short period of time.
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Housekeeping tips from Bottler? I doubt it:
Heard on the news this morning that recession is only just around the corner, and there will soon be a ?7.5bn deficit in the country's finances due to increasing unemployment benefit payments and reduced tax take due to lower consumer spending.
What's Bottler's reaction? Instinctive - get us to spend less on ourselves (food this time) so that we will have more money available to pay the increase in taxation that Bottler is bound to inflict on us soon to make up the budget deficit. Wait for new stealth taxes soon.
Although it sounds good in the G8 agenda, he's not thinking of the global situation at all, just his own ability to keep taxation coming in to allow him to spend on the out-of-control public sector, who will soon be clamouring for pay increases. I don't think I'm the cynical one here.
Wait for his sycophantic chefs (Oliver for one) to come out of the closet to tell us how best to eat our past-it cheddar etc - we've got to rally round to protect Bottler the Magnificent's finances.
Did you see the G8 banquet menu? If not, have a look at Guido Fawkes' blog.
I can't understand Nick and co haven't seen through this. Their trip is probably being paid for from our taxes, and all we get is Bottler's propaganda messages.
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The timing of Gordon's "advice" couldn't have been worse as the world's Head's of State all sit down to an 18 course dinner. I wonder how much uneaten food will be thrown out after that?
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Balhamu
No 312,315
I think that you missed my point. My post was not a rant at Brown, in fact I don't think I criticised him at all. My point is that these things are cyclical, and the end of the Labour cycle is approaching. Wrong guy in the wrong place at the wrong time.
My second point was that taken as a whole, no government is all good or all bad. I accept that the country has been improved in some ways that are directly as result of good government by Labour. I also think the same can be said of the Conservative government that preceeded it. The opposite is also true in both cases.
Trying to turn the spotlight on Cameron and the Conservatives is not going to make the slightest bit of difference.
There must be specific issues that you believe in that are more important than which bunch of slimy, thieving, incompetent gits are in power. Make your points, back them up with facts - argue your case, and who knows, you might just win the day.
Some people seem to care only which party is in power. I want a government that power that is a competent administration, which takes action based not just on what it can and can't do, but also what it should or should not do, and leaves we alone to get on with my life without sticking its' nose into everything I do. I don't think I am alone.
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319. waldorf29
Its true its a right old rant, the trouble is that it is all true.
You have to wonder who advises the man.
Its the Hypocrisy people cant stand, the point just gets lost.
When your reputation for prudence is in tatters, dont preach prudence.
Hypocrisy topples governments
Recall John Majors back to basics campaign in 1993
It widely interpreted as a moral campaign, and hence was roundly destroyed by Tory sleaze.
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315 Balhamu
I suggest you read a book called "Squandered: How Gordon Brown is Wasting Over 1 Trillion Pounds of our Money" By David Craig.
OK - so the title is inflamatory, but the book also puts the boot into policies of the previous Tory administration.
People are angry with this government because the value for money it has achieved has been appalling. Whoever wins the next general election really has got their work cut out to bring the country around to a more sensible footing.
In 1997 I was glad that more money was to be invested in public infrastructure. The book, however, articulates very clearly the discrepancy between money pumped into the system and not achieving a reasonable benefit on the ground.
One of the key themes is that so much money is spent on unnaccountable overlapping Quangos rather than directly on the frontline. If you don't want to read the book, then at least take a look at this seperate report which analyses Quango spending
http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/quango.pdf
A large part of the population think that that government has wasted substantial sums of our money. That is why there is such vitriol when Gordon Brown, quite reasonably, reminds us that we could reduce food wastage by £8 per week.
(Never mind the fact that a lot of people don't want nannying comments from our leaders or that they are rather insensitive and eat 13 course banquets at food crisis summits).
Gordon Brown has transformed himself into a lightning-rod for discontent and there is a large upswell in anger and it is not just 'Conservatives' who are hopping mad. I think there are many overlapping reasons for this and they include:
- Recent memoirs have placed GB's hand on the knife in Tony's back
- Economy has caused media to examine more closely Gordon's record as Chancellor
- Recent memoirs have highlighted Gordon as holding back Tony's reforms and thus increasing wasted spend
- That despite a successful start to the job - GB has not painted a vision of what he wants to achieve as PM.
Unfortnately we now have a lame-duck government which is not good for either British progress or unity.
-
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#315
Where exactly do you think the nation's wealth comes from?
There is nothing 'wispy' about efficiency gains; they are an accepted fact of life in the private sector ever since the division of labour during the industrial revolution.
It's typical NewLabour woolly thinking to claim the intellectual high ground about the benefits of public spending but not to even enter into an argument about achieving value for money.
The settlement with the NHS granting higher pay for fewer hours worked was one of the most gratuitous acts of financial incompetence in history. You simply can't give people more money for doing less or everyone else ends up paying for it.
The simple fact is the next governement (of whatever colour) will not have the money to spend on more hospitals, schools, sure start, tax credits or any other barm pot NewLabour initiative. I would have thought the NHS for one would welcome a reprieve from yet another review as a new government allows them to get on with their jobs and avoids the expense of the review.
The savings ratio in this country has fallen from the over 10% inherited form Ken Clarke to near zero as the nation has been encouraged by slapdash tripartite regulation to follow the government's splash the cash ways. There is only one way out of this; a long period of rebuilding personal balance sheets and the next government will have to incentivise people to save more. The dependency culture will come to an end out of necessity because the goernment simply doesn't have the money.
Child poverty is already back on the rise because of rising food and fuel costs and plugging the gap with endless tax credits is just sticking a thumb in the dyke; another hole opens almost as quickly.
People have to lift themselves out of poverty by getting qualifications and working harder. there is a reason Asia is such a powerful economic force and it's largely down to hard work.
of course government involves taking difficult choices but I don't see Gordon Clown taking a single one so far that doesn't involve increasing the overdraft yet again. Everyone knows this game eventually comes to an end as the bank manger rings up and tells you to convert the debt to a personal loan and repay it.
This is Brown's legacy; ultimately he has become a vcitim of his own largesse. He is therefore categorically not the man to sort it out. Giving an addict yet more is simply not the solution. Cold turkey it he only way out.
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#322 - ok, sorry I missed your point.
I think it does matter which administration is in power.
The Government and those with aspirations of Government are constrained significantly by a number of factors which tend to make them sound the same [e.g. the election can't be won without capturing the marginal voter in the south-east commuter belt].
However, their core beliefs will affect the general direction of their administration.
For example, say Major won a third term in 1997 - do you really believe that the strategic decisions made would have been the same. I don't think we would have a minimum wage, a commitment to reducing poverty, record investment in schools and hospitals, de-politicised setting of monetary policy that has to date (though maybe it is only now it is being put to the test) been very successful for the economy etc.
There are real choices to be made here. Cameron believes in small Government. Business should be de-regulated and trusted to do the right thing. The welfare state should be based more on philanthropy and the individual responsibility of individuals and families. It is possible to have a meritocratic society co-existing with high levels of (relative) child poverty and to solve social problems in this way. Brown's beliefs would set him in a different direction in all of these areas - and lead to very different strategic decisions.
Competency in administering policy is a very different thing. A lot of the Government mess-ups can be put down to mistakes made by civil servants which will affect any administration.
To say politics doesn't matter and that they are all the same is wrong
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Its time we showed Gordon Brown just how skint we feel -
FEELING a bit SKINT?
Post the Prime minister a penny !
Sorry mate can't afford a stamp
Address is real easy
10 Downing Street
London I FINK !
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#325 - You misunderstand me. I'm not saying that achieving efficiency gains is not a goal that Government should have. I am saying it is difficult to realise efficiency gains as the Civil Service are adept at resisting attempts to impose them.
re savings rate - how do you propose the Government prevents people borrowing? Should the Government intervene in this area? That's an interesting point. How would this work in practice? Would there Government-regulated maximum debt:income ratios that would be enforced on banks?
Gordon Clown - very witty!
The Government is planning to cut back on expenditure as a % of GDP quite significantly over the next spending review period to keep within its Golden Rules. I don't think spending will continue rising - look at the tough decisions being taken already in imposing real pay cuts on public servants to control Government expenditure and inflation. Very tough decision for a cash-strapped Labour party to antagonise unions. These solutions don't seem to be based on increasing the overdraft.
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326
I accept your point that the Major Government would not have come up with all the policies you list. Every Government has it's own agenda.
However, I suggest that had the Major won another term, he would not have been able to enact any serious changes because they were burnt out and had lost the confidence of the voters. The same is true of the Labour party. Hard though it may be for a Labour supporter to admit it, winning the next election would be bad for the party and bad for the country. We would have a re-run of the backbiting and self destruction of the Major years. Labour are 3 leaders and 2 elections away from taking power again, by which time you will be able to re-read these blogs and replace Brown for Cameron, and Conservative for Labour.
What policies matter most to you - you can have your cake and eat it if you can get the Conservatives to do a "reverse Labour" and nick a few of them.
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#328
The Treasury will have to start reading the newspaper and accepting what is happening in the world around them and to the rest of us. Efficiencies will have to be made as a matter of necessity. If they want their index linked defined benefit pensions they'll have to work harder for them.
Increasing savings is a simple matter on incentivising people through the tax system just as the French, Germans and Italians have done with a phased in income tax relief personal pension contribution. Tessas should be reitroduced and ISAs should be simplified as the replaced a perfectly sound system of long term savings (PEPS) with a stupidly complicated and unpopular system taht has contributed to the decline in the savings ratio.
Of course, none of this will happen under NewLabour whose first instinct is control; God forbid any of us is actually allowed to make any choices in our lives or make provision for our future.
The government's golden rule is meaningless as long as there is so much off balance sheet debris.
Metronet went but and the government just assumed the £8bn debt, Northern Rock went ust and the government assumed the £100bn, the 10p tax fiasco casued another splurge of £2.7bn and it's still not enough, £3bn is being spent on social housing when the housing market is in freefall and thousands of homes remain unsold; complete mismanagement and waste.
It's pointless arguing that we don't have one of the most wasteful governments in history because the list of examples is endless; almost every day they add another worthy cause to their list of interventionist initiatives and it's all being done with our money.
They need to stop and go cold turkey or the IMF will come knocking at our dooor just like they knocked on Denis Healey's door in the 1970s. But New/OldLabour never seem to learn their lesson and carry on spending regardless.
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#324 jonathan_cook
Excellent post and a good explanation of why we're not all Tories putting the boot in.
But I fear you're being a bit optimistic saying:
"Unfortnately we now have a lame-duck government which is not good for either British progress or unity."
The current union is already breaking as Scots and Welsh take different view to the English. The Tories may be starting to understand this with their slight softening of their line on the "English Votes" issue, but it'll not go nearly far enough to satisfy English voters for long and certainly won't satisfy the Nationalists. That situation will almost certainly break the union. If he is seriously a Unionist, Cameron should start the debate now on how to save it.
My own opinion and preference is some sort of federal solution, perhaps with the current House of Commons having English Members only and the House of Lords becoming an all-elected federal senate.
As I've said on other threads, if Cameron doesn't address this before the election he may well have the distinction of being the last PM of the UK and the first PM of England.
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#330
I think that the Treasury are fully aware of the difficult economic situation that recent trends in global energy and food prices , together with the global credit crunch have put us in. We'll have to wait and see if this has long-term implications. Even the most gloomy current predictions see a soft landing for the economy with a couple of quarters of recession at most with a period of below-trend growth afterwards. I don't see massive rises in unemployment or other negative trends in the real economy as yet. And there is significant belt-tightening in the public sector - most departments have a fixed cash over the next 3 years.
Re off-balance sheet debt. You have a point that this may be a concern - though the 40% Golden Rule level of debt was always a bit of an artificial construction - there is no clear economic rationale to set it at that level.
Re Northern Rock - how is that the Government's fault? In any case, to talk about the addition to debt, it's definitely not £100 billion - that could only be the case if every mortgage holder defaulted and their houses were all worth £0. Is that really a plausible scenario? Say 20% of mortgage payers default (and they all have 100% mortgages that they have not began paying off) and their houses are worth 20% less than the book value - that would be 0.2 * 0.2 * £100 billion = £4 billion addition to real debt.
I'm not sure the savings rate will be that influenced by more tax breaks towards saving. I think it is more a cultural problem that will be very difficult to solve (I think Turner's pensions review looked into this issue in a lot of depth). Tax breaks for saving tend to have a high deadweight loss associated with them, as people merely redistribute their saving into the most tax efficient forms.
Government waste is a difficult thing to measure. Most right-wing surveys (e.g. Tax Payers Alliance) will look at areas they believe the Government should not be involved in and call that waste. That's a political judgement. It definitely exists though (as it does in any large organisation), so I take your points.
What interventionist initiatives are you referring to in particular? I don't see much being introduced that involve increases in expenditure.
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Re #329 Wopitt
Very true regarding the economy in general and English matters in particular.
You do ignore the Celtic and Gaelic fringes, though, where NuLabour's asymetric devolution has proved less fertile ground for Cameron yet is also minded towards change.
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#332
The simple fact is that savings go up when you incentivise them; look at the pre PEPS and Tessas savings ratios....low single digits; look at the pre incentive pension provisions on the continent - non existent. So saying you're not sure is saying 'i'm not prepared to accept the facts put in fornt of me' - another typical NewLabour response.
As for not being able to see where the initiatives that involve money... where is the money coming from for VED exemptions? Where did it come from for the 10p taxcx debacle? Where will it come from next year?
The Northern Rock is the first run on a bank in 140 years. This happened because the Tripartite strucutre - despite repeated warnings to the government, failed to take action soon enough to stop its ludicrous business model of wholesale financed mortgages. That system was created by Gordon Brown. It's his fault. QED.
Ecrerywhere else you appear to be backing down; a bit like your incompetent government.
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Trudy_Victoria
If you're still working, I really hope you aren't planning to retire within the next 10 years, unless you are fortunate enough to have contributed to a pension that GB hasn't plundered. My spouse has lost two pension schemes because of this.
Even though our children do contribute to our state pension funds, there won't be enough in the pot for a decent pension by the time I retire in 8 years, which is why so many people are diversifying.
Don't be fooled Trudy. It doesn't matter which party is in power, they will look after themselves first, and the rest of us come a poor, and I use the term literally, second.
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#332
and you statements about the golden rule really do leave me gasping. One minute NewLabour want to boast about financial probity next they are buskling under a mountain of debt and apologies for not sticking to their own rules.
The National Institute for Economic and Social Research is this morning reporting that the government faces another £7.5bn black hole in its finances thanks to plunging tax receipts. That's 57000 teachers, five hospitals or two new aircraft carriers that will have to be cancelled or fired.
What course of new economic miracle wil Gordon Brown magic out of the empty hat this time?
Of course you're mnow beginning to question the meaning of the golden rules becuause you are about to break them spectacularly. Expect another mi numbing journey into neo endogenous macro economic growt theory by the great ditherer.
It doesn't get much better than hung by your own targets.
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Browndov
333
I can't say that I know much of what is happening in Wales, but for Scotland, delete Cameron, insert Salmond, and SNP for Conservative.
Look at what is happening in the Glasgow by election. A majoritity of over 13,000 is at risk.
It helps that Salmond is probably the most competent politician in Scotland. Devolution is working for the Scots, just not for England - yet.
Devolution will be Blair's most enduring legacy - not just Scottish, but devolution in all matters. Communities have got a sniff of what it is like to break free from the petty party politics of Westminster and like the look of it. A trend that has been accelerated by the centerist instincts of Labour for the last dozen years.
It will not be the end of the Union, just a pragmatic readjustment of who decides what, and where.
I am satisfied with the SNP as the party of power in Scotland, although I didn't vote for them. That doesn't meant that I will follow them up the dead end to Independence. Don't read too much into the SNP's ascendancy - they are benefiting from the cycle in Scotland now, but will take the pain in a few years time when they can't pin the blame on Labour. C'est la vie.
If the other parties want to make any headway in Scotland, they need to be able to present themselves as being able to fight for what is best for Scottish communities. Salmond and the SNP have decided that devolution stops at Holyrood. Why? Why not see them and raise them. What about the Glasgow (or Edinburgh or any where else) Party that focuses exclusively on issues for their community and is not afriad of putting one over on anyone else. Why should anyone in one community care what happens in another, and why should they vote for a party that is going to compromise?
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I'm fascinated by the G8 food menu.
So, Gordon and G8 chums are heavily into gastro-porn.
Very apt.
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#334 - not backing down at all. I'm acknowledging that issues you have raised are real issues even if you over-emphasise massively. I'm not coming at this from any particular point of view, other than it would be good to get the debate on this blog to be based more on facts rather than fictions. I know I'm fighting a losing battle - there is so much rubbish written on here to contend with.
re savings - a very quick search of google couldn't find me much research on the effectiveness of tax incentives in encouraging new savings and the size of the deadweight losses involved (i.e. tax relief given to people who moved savings that they already had into ISA/TESSAS etc). The Bank of England/HMT will have some working papers on this I'm sure, and many academics will have researched this area. I'm quite sure the price elasticity of saving (responsiveness of savings rates to marginal changes in the return to saving) is very low though. See p4 of [Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator], where Tim Besley from the LSE concludes that there is strong evidence of savers seeking out the most tax efficient form for their savings and that there is little evidence on strong impacts on the aggregate savings rate from Government initiatives such as these.
re the Rock - The Tripartite regulation structure CAUSED Northern Rock to collapse. Really. Is that what you are saying? I guess the story goes that if the regulatory structures were better than the Government would have been able to intervene earlier, and so avoiding the run on the Rock. Hardly the cause of the collapse though.
This story raises issues for those with right-wing views. On the one hand Government is too big and should not regulate at all - we know regulation imposes costs on business and stifles innovation. On the other hand, when things go wrong and the private sector makes poor decisions Government should have regulated more and is incompetent for not doing so. Isn't there a few inconsistencies in statements like that?
Did you foresee the problems caused by the tripartite regulatory structure? I take my hat off to you sir - why aren't you making the decisions at the Treasury?
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Cutting down on food waste is obviously a sensible plan which has numerous benefits and can save everyone money. However, I don't think many people take kindly to being given tips on frugal living by an extremely well-paid politician who's just travelled (first class) half-way around the world to a luxuriously appointed conference.
It's a shame that Brown's political timing is so phenomenally poor, as he's managed to turn a topic that definitely needs to be debated (food production and usage in the UK) into just another chance to mock his leadership.
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#336 - why do you continually say "they" to refer to me as "New Labour". I have very little to say (well, I might do but I'm choosing not to here) other than reminding people of the objective facts (a nice counter-balance to many of the contributers who make so much of the substance of their arguments up). Is that a political point?
re golden rule - it will be very politically embarassing for the Government to truly break the Golden Rules (though, as you say, you could form an argument that they have already). But, thinking of implications for the economy, I think you would struggle to find an economist who could justify why 40% of GDP is the level debt should be at. Why not 60%? Or 20%? Or 93.4%? There is a wide spread internationally - e.g. US in 2006 had 48% (of GDP) public net debt, Japan 94%, Germany 65%, France 56% (http://www.econstats.com/weo/V008.htm).There will be a level at which the gains from borrowing (e.g. capital investment in hospitals, schools, and human capital) are out-weighed by the crowding-out effects on private investment (and other negative impacts) that public debt has. Economists are unclear where that is. That's an objective view.
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#341
will if you din't want to stick to a rule why come up with it in the first place? And why spend ten years boasting that you stuck to it?
It's quite obvious what the game is here; we're about to plunge through the golen rule of 40% borrowing to who knows where. but I and others know one thing; you simply can't spend mroe than you earn in perpetuity; eventually the bank manager knock on the door and asks for the overdraft to be repaid.
That's where this govenrment has landed itself; with a great big debt milstone around its neck of its own making and the lowest personal savings ratios in history.
Great achievements.
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Re #337 Wopitt
Some excellent points there, and I agree almost all you say, especially that the SNP won't always have NuLabour to blame, just as NuLabour's continued bleating about the bad old Tory days is well past its sell-by date.
However, with the SP election in 2011 likely following closely on the heels of a 2010 Scottish referendum (or the fight over whether to hold one) and the 2010 Westminster election, it'll all be about timing.
Having "a dog in both fights" it was more the English Tories that concern me. If, as seems likely, NuLabour can't pull off a Houdini-like win in 2010 the new UK government will have much to do to restore public confidence in Westminster and may well concentrate on "English" matters.
It's then that it may be crucial for Cameron to have something constitutional ready and waitng if he's really serious about saving the union. Now is the time to think seriously about this in consultation with other parties rather than tinkering with voting rules in the House of Cards.
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#341 - I have no idea whether we will go through the Golden Rule or not - I'm not party to that information. It depends on whether there is a recession (and it is far from certain there will be) and, if so, is it a short, shallow one or a long, deep one. I think the professional view at the moment would suggest no recession, and if there is one that it will be very short (~2 quarter) with little effect on unemployment (though maybe greater impact on constraining real earnings growth) and so little effect on tax revenue and expenditure.
Just saying, it's hardly a disaster economically if they do breach it. Politically very embarassing for the Labour party because, as you say, they made the target (to try and combat the City's impression of them as economically incompetent - they also kept to the Major administrations spending plans in their 1st term, which Ken Clarke freely admits that Major had no plans to do if he was elected), so face the consequences of not keeping to it if that is the case.
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Nick bit late this morning but being one of the ordinary working class [retired] it takes me a while to read all the posts that bring me up to date particularly as most of them would be called in the modern idiom "up themselves" many of the posts are written by people who are in love with their own words. Thats not to say that they all are but the usual suspects are there in force writing essay's not posts, the word truth doesn't come into these posts its a question of who can make the most ridiulous accusations and hope to get away with it. A small example, All English says Gordons sitting down to a 8 course meal, a few posts on and John Cook is telling us that Gordon is sitting down to a13 course meal, then a little further and we have Shellingout telling us that its now an 18, course meal, so where will it end maybe 22/24. I heard on the TV this morning a reporter for the bbc might have been Nick saying it was a 8 course meal and he said " of course you have to remember that the Japaese have a lot of courses but they are very small" personally I dont give a damn its not us who are paying for it, and what do you want Gordon to do, refuse to eat it, and insult our hosts.
What I dont understand is that the G8 are there for a reason whether you agree or not, they are there to try to sort out some of the worlds problems and Britain is one of the G8 which consist of the 8 richest nations in the World, although if you listen to the Tories on this blog we are among the 8 poorest nations, but as I say their there for a reason but their criticised for eating and drinking good food , and yet there are hundreds of reporters camera men photographers who are all eating and drinking well, living in good hotels and claiming expenses after being flown half way round the World [apart from their carbon footprint] whats their purpose there, a few lines in some totally biased rag a few photo's that they will take hopefully for them of the most inapropriate poses that some poor devil will fall into the trap in order for them to make thousands out of it.
Most of these people are the not as guardians of the truth their there to have a damn good time and you dont realise it but your paying for it.
but Gordon said a terrible thing read post181 Balhamu, or try
[Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator]; is'nt he a wicked man,
I've said it before and I'll say it again people in this country have never had it so good, and if we happen to have to tighten our belts for a while because of a World recession then tighten them and stop moaning, you cant have it good all the time.
By the way has anybody had their bill for two thousand pounds yet for saving Northern Rock we were assured by David Cameron that each household would have to pay, dont tell me thats not what he meant, but thats the way he was screaming it from the dispatch box and on TV.
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For information re growth forecasts (I can see RobinJD picking me up on this):
IMF - 1.6% (April 2008) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/04/09/cnimf109.xml
CBI - 1.3% but no recession (June 2008) http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7455483.stm
HMT - 1.8%-2.2% (March 2008) http://www.execdigital.co.uk/Darling-cuts-growth-forecast-in-first-Budget-_5257.aspx
EC - 1.7% (April 2008) http://www.theherald.co.uk/business/news/display.var.2231857.0.EU_slashes_UK_growth_forecast_to_1_7.php
But HMT forecasts have come out closer to actual performance in the past - whether that's luck or better quality of forecasts (through better information) is debatable.
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I'm fascinated by the G8 food menu.
So, Gordon and G8 chums are heavily into gastro-p*rn.
Very apt.
PS. The word asterisked is due to hyper-sensitive moderation!
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345 Grandantidote, So one of you out there is starting to refer again, I dont recall anything that was offensive unless it was about the press and their expenses perhaps one of you out there are press and the message struck home,I thought these press guys were hard men, or was it one of the essay writers.or could it be some uninformed idiot read something into " up themselves" thats not there . That expression means full of themselves but there are people on here that haven't got enough brains to work that out.
Please have a good look at my post moderater its not the first time this has happened and my post has eventually been put back on.
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Hi BBC, can you fix the display of pound signs on this blog, please?
thanks,
Laurence
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#315 balhamu
You ask for some examples of how the government wastes our money.
It's been estimated than Brown 'lost' about £2 billion on his inept selling of our gold reserves. By announcing his intentions, the price plummeted - also reducing the value of our remaining gold reserves.
£2.7 billion compensation for the 10p tax fiasco
ID cards. Cost still unknown - estimates vary between £5.75 billion and £28 billion
£29 billion for the cancelled Bicester 'asylum centre'
See House of Commons Select Committee on Public Accounts:
www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmselect/cmpubacc/316/31603.htm
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Perhaps I should just mention that,
Allenglsh says 8 courses,
Johnathan Cook says13 courses,
Shellingout says 18 courses.
Wonder where they got their information from, I guess it was from the "Tory Bloggers Book of Truth"
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Just how patronising is the Prime Minister!! Who are you to tell us we're wasting food when on your doorstop there is a Parliament full of waste.
Perhaps the PM knew he might be mocked to get attention but for me it has focussed my mind on hypocrisy.
Don't lecture me on food waste when your governement is steeped in fat cat waste: expenses....expenses....expenses.
You're off my general election vote Mr Brown!
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351. grandantidote
I think it depends on whether you are talking about lunch or dinner.
But the menus were published in full. Heres dinner.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article4286365.ece
Wonder what they had for breakfast.
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#350
re gold -I don't know the ins-and-outs of the gold market so couldn't comment on the impact the pre-announcement would or would not have had on the market. It is true that if we had hung onto the gold we would have got a greater return (though I don't know if the assets we bought with the proceeds/increases in Government surpluses had a similar rate of return of the assets we relinquished). I'm not sure the increase in gold price was predicted at the time (otherwise why sell) or that it was a political decision (would be a strange thing for a minister to do against the wishes of his officials). Easier to make policy in retrospect I think.
re 10p tax rate - they messed that up quite a bit didn't they (though it was a transfer of resources rather than actual waste). Brown has been finding it increasingly difficult to stick to bold decisions he has made in the face of his current unpopularity. A cautionary note to Cameron that ambitious tax reform (or even this unambitious simplification of tax law) can create a lot of losers and can come at a high political price.
re ID cards - I'm not sure that all investment in ID cards can be typified as waste (don't know the issue in depth though). I think a lot of work went into exploring the scope for data sharing across Government (which will have value). ID cards may still happen (No 10 appetite for taking on this difficult area of policy at this time and Parliament not-withstanding). I know that there are a lot of inefficiencies caused in Government from inability to share information across different departments (largely due to Data Protection law) - for example, the Child Support Agency was hamstrung in finding absent parents due to the inability of the Inland Revenue/HMRC and the CSA to share information rapidly enough. Some of the ID Cards work will help address these issues.
£29 billion sounds like an enormous amount of money for an asylum centre. Are you sure you have that right?
And (moderators) I'm not sure why I have had an earlier post vanish (#339) - did I offend someone (can't think how)
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re Bicester - just checked the link and can see you meant £29.1 MILLION.
Slip of the finger I'm sure.
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Re: 222
"why do the names ...keep changing...but the content still looks familiar?"
Well, quite possibly because several people have come to similar conclusions. There are a handful that I would agree with in terms.
Wow, conspiracy theory does not come much loopier than this!
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#354 balhamu
The reason I mention the cost of ID cards is because, as with any government IT project, the cost always spirals. The reason it will be a total waste is because ID cards will do nothing to help in the 'war on terror' - the main reason for having them.
The £29 billion wasted on the cancelled Asylum Centre in Bicester is staggering - follow the link to House of Commons Select Committee on Public Accounts in my earlier post (#350). £6 million was paid to consultants, and £8 million was paid in compensation when the scheme was axed. Lots more was wasted on legal appeals.
Also see:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/06/12/dl1204.xml
With regard to your missing comment at #339, I'm afraid I didn't read it. It seems that if someone clicks 'complain about this comment' for any reason, the moderators usually just remove it - which is actually in breach of the BBC's own rules. Moderators are only supposed to remove messages that are in breach of the House Rules (eg racist, sexist, offensive etc). The BBC states that messages "will not be removed for any other reason" - but apparently the moderators haven't read their own rules. I have officially complained about this before!
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#355 balhamu
Yes, you're quite right. It's £29 million not billion! I really should wear reading glasses when at the computer!
Apologies to everyone for my error (also #357).
It's still a lot of money wasted, but not quite as bad as that!
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@357
I dont think the rules include sexist.
I did complain about one yesterday that made a comment about women wasting money buying shoes that they could barely walk in but the Mods held out that it was OK.
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Most IT projects run over budget - managers in all large organisations like the "big-bang" approach that has proven so "successful" in the past, rather than incremental roll-out.
A chief example (which I'm surprised you haven't mentioned) is the CSA computer system which was a complete disaster and is the chief example of Government waste I could find (it was several hundreds of millions to set up, and caused a lot of mess which was costly to clear up).
That would be one area that I would say needs to be improved - though I think the civil service are beginning to learn important lessons there about how not to commission IT improvements. Of course the dividend from successful IT is massive increases in productivity and big efficiency savings.
Re ID cards - I think they could help the war on terror significantly - there is a lot of applications you could think they could have and it should in theory make it easier to secure our borders. I think there are a large number of other applications - the data sharing dividend I mention above, savings in terms of not having to give the same information (and the state to process that information) to different branches of government repeatedly, ID fraud applications and so on. There will be a trade-off between the efficiency and security benefits and civil liberties protections that will need to be built into any legislation. I think the business case for ID cards is in the public domain on the Home Office website (though maybe you wouldn't trust that source on figures, it might be helpful for general cost saving areas).
And on the slip - it would take an "impressive" amount of waste to spend £29 billion on an asylum centre :)
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#346
the growth forecast are being torn up every day of the week.
that's what happens when you go into reverse after leveraging an economy to the max. Events are completely out of the control of the government and that's what it hates most - loss of control.
They should have taken more notice of the woman invited into Downing street on Brown's ascesion; "you can't buck the market".
Boy, they will pay the price for the proud boast "no more tory boom and bust"]
First it was Northern Rock, who next?
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359. Pot_Kettle
Whats sexist about that.
Good old grandantidote.
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#361 - So, you predict a recession?
Let's see.
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Was the pricing of this waste done in accordance with the John Lewis ( Waitrose ) list? or just by guess work?
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360. balhamu Re waste
Quangos are worth a mention
Some 800 employ over 700000 people
Last year the Cabinet Office stopped publishing detailed breakdown of these 800 or so bodies finances and just provided the overall figures. (The break down was proving to embarrassing). They claim that overall cost was £32 billion. That?s the governments own figures. The Times recently reported the cost was a £100 billion.
The Carbon Trust pays its chief exec more than £200,000 a year. I think thats more than The PM. Not sure what he get these days.
Bet theres some waste in there
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358. DistantTraveller
With maths like that I think I might know where there might be rather a good job for you.
Have you considered the treasury
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356 solpugid
Very good! excelent While people in the past pretended to be train drivers with their trainsets. Now we have people playing politicians on the internet. Very clever.
I suppose in a parallel universe where Cameron is the prime minister he would probably sit down to a course of bread and water instead of a 3, 6,8,10,12 course meal or whatever it is now.
You lot really are undiscovered political giants. Maybe you're right about 222. It was written badly. Just a theory to explain the cheating that's going on on another BBC site. Membership to this site gives you access to that one. If its wrong its wrong. Don't boil your head. Gordon brown said its bad for you.
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#365 - I think to say all quangos/NDPBs are entirely a waste of money would be wrong. Most provide a highly valuable service (e.g. the Environment Agency).
I may be wrong, but I think all of them have to publish accounts and are accountable in a number of ways (PQs via their sponsor minister, FOI requests and other mechanisms laid down in legislation). I don't doubt that there is some waste of money there.
Who created many of these quangos? I don't think a change in administration will result in these quangos being abolished or being brought within democratic control. Indeed, a big commitment made by Cameron so far (and there's not many) is to introduce a constitution and insulate the NHS from political interference - or democratic control - depending on your viewpoint. In other words, £100 billion extra of expenditure will be controlled by a quango.
In thinking about waste, if I had a pension I'd be as or even more concerned about waste in the private sector companies in which my pension fund is invested in. Salaries in many companies for top directors are many millions, sometimes hundreds of millions of pounds - it is often unclear why people are worth this much money - often justification in good times is based on sharing in the dividends to shareholders that good management has earned, though this apparently does not work in reverse in sharing the pain of poor management. Expenses in the private sector are also extravagent - while civil servants have to pay for their own tea bags and milk, many in the private sector are milking pension funds capital for trips to lap-dancing clubs, corporate seats at Old Trafford and lavish meals with vintage wine.
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Ref 360. balhamu Re waste
Of course there is my favourite
The Potato Coucil and its 50 staff costs 7 Million per year. They publish wonderful articles such as "Can I freeze potatoes" and many many more
Not forgetting national chip week, hosted by Keith Chegwin. We even have chip inspectors.
www.lovechips.co.uk
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Balhamu
Did you know that the new training centre for London Fire Fighters burnt down as it had no sprinklers or smoke detectors??????
That cost 22 Million
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Oh yes
60 Mil for that wonderful swankey new prison with games consoles and internet in every cell, that the court can fill in 1 week.
Its like a holiday camp said one old lag.
Go visit : http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/2008/03/just_visiting_j.html
Something a little more dour perhaps
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oh yes
300 Mil on 25 tram schemes in Portsmouth, Leeds, Liverpool and Manchester in 2000
So far 2 have opened.
(One of those sad Prescott initiatives).
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balhamu
The realy amazing this about that asylum centre, was that no one is held accountable
You might think the PAC's criticism would cause ministers or at least officials, to hang their heads in shame. But no the Home Office said and I quoye word for word here
"the whole episode had produced an "overall positive impact for the public because officials have learned important lessons"
Well Yes a 29 million pound lesson
Some level of training they get in the Civil Service Eh.
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CarrotsneedaQUANGO2
What an expensive lesson these officials have learned. Perhaps if they had lost their jobs, their colleagues would be far more mindful when spending money out of the public purse. We have so many civil servants, the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing and, worst of all, nobody seems to be acountable for any of it.
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368. balhamu
I agree some must provide some value.
But when the government stops publishing the accounts you know something is up.
The creation issue is interesting. The Tories starter the idea of quangos and when labour came to power there were about 60. One of Browns battle cries was "A bonfire of Quangos" well now we have 700+
Im not sure what Camerons position is on this subject, I think he will have to move against waste though as he doesnt really have much choice given other factors. He will inherit falling revenues from the current down turn, massive levels of debt and has agreed to stick to current spending plans for the first 2 years. Waste and inefficiency is the only place to make savings.
You are also right on private sector waste, but know it just isnt anywhere like it is in the public sector, it also isnt your money its theirs, unless of course you are a shareholder and you have the option to sell up and move on. The private sector generally lives efficiency and People often get fired for cocking up. Not so in government or the civil service.
Market forces give you mulitple choices every minute of the day. Government only gives you 2 choices every 4 years.
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374. shellingout
Youre not wrong
The staff concerned did not even think about waiting for planning permission before signing the contract with the builders.
They had to pay the construction company millions to walk away.
How basic is that.
That is the trouble with the civil service, you cant get fired for being useless and advancement is based on time served.
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CarrotsneedaQUANGO2
I was obviously in the wrong queue when the civil service jobs came along.
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CarrotsneedaQUANGO2
Actually I've just had a thought. I wonder who was on the Board of the building company who got paid to "walk away"?!!!
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Talking of poor quality contracts
Recall the Chinooks we bought from the US.
The MoD?s civil servants, despite hiring consultants to help them, forgot to include in the contract a clause which allowed them to test the Chinooks for airworthiness.
When the helicopters arrived from America, they turned out not to comply with UK safety standards. They could not fly at nigh nor in fog or cloud.
The upgrade has taken two decades and cost 300 million, and will probably cost at least 200 million more.
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#367 dhwilkinson
You could be right when you suggest that the adverse reaction to Gordon's "Waste not want not" advice is restricted to one or two people who contribute to this blog and who have multiple identities to give the impression of wider criticism.
But maybe, just maybe, a lot of people contributing to this blog and well beyond happen to hold similar views - ie genuinely think Gordon got it wrong on substance or timing or both.
Let's accept for the sake of argument that
- the statistic that we throw away, on average, eight pounds worth of food away is accurate and up to date
- his 'advice' was genuine and not just an attempt to generate headlines
- that he believed people would not feel patronised and could and would act on his advice and
- that, if they did, it would make a scintilla of difference to world food shortages or domestic prices
Let's also accept that Gordon had nothing to do with setting the menus and speculate that he is a pretty frugal guy and less likely than Cameron or Blair to seek or enjoy a 6 course lunch and 8 course dinner on the same day.
That still leaves the question. Was it :
(a) a good idea to issue advice about food wastage just before you sit down to a six course lunch followed by an eight course
dinner
or was it, to coin a phrase :
(b) a good day to bury good advice ?
If I was an ardent labour supporter and a big fan of Gordon, I would be despairing.
I would find the adverse reaction wholly predictable and much more understandable than the fact of Gordon or his advisors to behave so crassly.
Could you see this happening when Alistair C was directing the media effort ?
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Yes - I saw that on the TV on one of their more topical BBC News days - when they weren't covering leylandii trees! GB has just commissioned 2 new warships too, which I think is a total waste of our money. Oh how I wish we could just get rid of this complete and utter waste of space, namely Gordon Brown and his Band of Rip-Off Merchants.
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Hmmn, now let me see if I get this.
An unelected leader spends years stealing money from the people, and when they begin to run out of money for food, he tells them it's their fault for wasting it.
Oh, I've just noticed that it's our dear leader. He must be reading from the Mugabe book of "How to run a country".
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If Gordon thinks he might forge a career in Home Economics when his premiership and his party goes down the gurgler, he'll be no match for Delia.
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Carrots - you've certainly got a lot of issues with quangos!
Do you think the problem is a lack of accountability, or does it run deeper than that (i.e. their functions are simply not required)?
I don't have the time to research all the points you raise, so I'll just take 1 - the Potato Council (www.potato.org.uk).
The following will probably be boring unless you are Carrots - return after the 2nd set of dotted lines
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
It's a wholly owned subsidiary of the Agricultural and Horticultural Development Board (AHDB), chaired by Dennis Heywood (address and telephone number provided on the website, as are details of many Potato Council staff members). It is one of 6 sector councils that the AHDB owns - Cereals/Oilseeds, Beef and Lamb, Horticulture, Milk and Pigs are the other sectors.
The AHDB itself is an Non-Departmental Public Body that falls under the remit of the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) http://www.ahdb.org.uk/about/default.aspx. It was recently created (April 2008), replacing several predecessor NDPBs. It is chaired by John Bridge. There is a staggering amount of information provided on their website.
As the organisation has only been running for 3 months, they have yet to publish any accounts, but they will be available on the website when they are published. Its 2008-2011 Business Plan is, however, available online and this also sets out the strategies of each of the 6 councils http://www.ahdb.org.uk/downloads/295584/284074/AHDB%20Business%20Plan%202008-2011.pdf
The objectives of AHDB are to increase productivity and efficiency in the industry, improve marketing and contribute to sustainable development.
The AHDB are funded by statutory levies on producers in the industry. I am not sure what producers have of the activities of the AHDB. The rates are set out here http://www.ahdb.org.uk/about/LevyRates0809.aspx
I am not sure whether the levy payers believe they get value for money from this NDPB which they fund. I'll have to leave that to further research from you.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
So, what have we learned? It seems to me that this quango performs functions that could be very useful to those who fund it (levy payers in the relevant industries). This quango is definitely very accountable. It costs general taxpayers nothing (well, maybe there is some cost through producers passing on costs to consumers). It would be a bit better if they provided accounts for the predecessor councils on their new website.
It definitely is not something that should be under wider direct democratic control - though they need to make sure that they are serving their levy payers well. But I'm generally impressed with the information that is made available.
I think this will probably go for most quangos that they are. They will publish a lot of information on their website, and be accountable to their sponsor minister, and through that channel to Parliament and the British people. Their accounts will be scrutinised by the Government Auditor.
If there is waste, it should be picked up through these channels and be accountable for this.
re waste in the private sector - what makes you think that organisations in the private sector of comparable size will have less waste? Think of all the waste of resources associated with, for example, the dotcom boom. Hundreds of billions of pounds worth of wasted investment. Lots of money spent on expenses etc, similar bureaucracy problems as the civil service. Competition will drive some savings I'm sure, but how much competition are oligopolistic firms in the private sector really under? Food for thought anyway, and an interesting topic.
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#380 - I say again, this wasn't the PM issuing advice in a speech about what he thinks the British people should do. From how it has been reported, it seems like he was asked for comment on what he will be doing to help families deal with the issue of global food price rises. He listed a number of things that needed to be done on a global scale. He also noted that there were significant levels of food waste in the UK. In this context, I don't see how they can be read as arrogance, or of a PM who does not understand the issues, or any of the other negative readings the comments are being given here
See comments #181 and #300 - I repost here (source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7492573.stm):
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Speaking to reporters, Gordon Brown said the G8 needed to agree a "global plan" to tackle the issue.
"People recognise that the high food prices in Britain - the price of bread, the price of eggs, the price of milk - this is happening all over the world and we have got to have a global solution to what is a global problem," he said.
Climate change
"We have got to get the price of food down through cutting the tariffs and subsidies in Europe and America, so we need a world trade deal.
"We have proposed that we double food production in Africa so that they can sell to the rest of the world as well.
"It is right to remind people that about ?8 a week is wasted in our food consumption and we could do better at home as well."
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Carrots - by the way, the Cabinet Office still publishes its annual directory of quangos http://www.civilservice.gov.uk/documents/pdf/public_bodies/public_bodies_2007.pdf
In 2007 there was a total of 827 (a fall from 835 in 2006), which made expenditures of £37 billion, of which £31 billion was funded by the general taxpayer. They employ 95,000 people. There is a breakdown of NDPBs by sponsor department, together with a list of what they are.
I think where the Government could do more is in centralising the holdings of financial and other information on NDPBs - maybe this will help people feel it is easier to hold them to account. At the moment, this information is hold in a range of places. Of course this will cost money in itself to do - maybe Government expenditure that could have a business case that Carrots and others could agree on
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#366 carrotsneedaQUANGO2
Thanks! Not sure about the Treasury. Perhaps the Potato Council would be more appealing...
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384 Balhamu
Blimey - you have been busy...!
Statutory levies on producers is a very specific additional tax - in many cases against small businesses who are struggling. Every penny counts to these people - who are often squeezed by supermarkets within an inch of their lives. These people want value from money from the Government as much as anyone.
I'm sure the Potato Council is a fantastic body....... but surely the point is - maybe the government should rationalise some of the food / agriculture Quangos?
The list of Agriculture and food Quangos is published below - but ask yourself these questions:
1. Do we need this many Quangos in this sector?
2. How large and necessary are the management and admin functions of each of these Quangos?
3. How well co-ordinated do you think circa these 40 Quangos are?
4. Is there overlap in these 40 odd Quangos?
5. Presumably many of these Quangos have their own web-sites, buildings, IT systems and managers and all the usual office gumpf. Could it be rationalised?
6. This is just a list of food and agriculture Quangos. How wasteful is the entire Quango sector?
The Food and Agriculture Quangos:
Organic Standards, Advisory Committee on
Packaging, Advisory Committee on
Pesticides, Advisory Committee on
Releases into the Environment, Advisory
Agricultural Dwelling House Advisory
Agricultural Land Tribunals
Agricultural Wages Board
Agricultural Wages Committee for England
Animal Health and Welfare Strategy England
Implementation Group
British Potato Council
British Wool Marketing Board
Agricultural Valuation
Dairy Produce Quota Tribunal
English Farming and Food Partnership
Farm Animal Welfare Council
Home Grown Cereals Authority
Horticultural Development Council
Independent Agricultural Appeals Panel
Cattle TB, Independent Scientific Group on
Meat and Livestock Commission
Milk Development Council
National Fallen Stock Company
National Non-Food Crops Centre
Plant Varieties and Seeds Tribunal
Veterinary Products Committee
Veterinary Residues Committee
State Veterinary Agency
Covent Garden Marketing Authority
Food from Britain
Sea Fish Industry Authority
Commission for Rural Communities
Commons Commissioners
Gangmasters Licensing Authority
Sustainable Development Commission
Rural Payments Agency
Animal Feedstuffs, Advisory Committee on
Novel Foods and Processes, Advisory
Research, Advisory Committee on
Microbiological Safety of Food, Advisory
Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer
Products and the Environment, Committee
Meat Hygiene Service
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Balhamu
Thanks for the brief on the Tattie Board. It seems to me that it is more of a trade body than anything else.
Anyone any suggestions why it need be a QUANGO and not drop the "Quasi" bit? Is it really necessary for the Government to be involved at all?
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386 Balhamu
I think part of the complaint is that the government has been fiddling its definition of Quangos.
This fiddling has got up the nose of the tax payers alliance:
http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/quango.pdf
They have undertaken research to conclude the following:
1. The Cabinet Office keeps no complete, public, central record of the governments public bodies.
2. Taxpayers supported 1,162 public bodies in 2006-07, agencies and non-ministerial departments, at a cost of nearly £64 billion.
3. Over 700,000 people in the UK work within this layer of quasi-government.
If we were to just stick to the Cabinet Office?s definitions of quangos and public bodies, the number has fallen since 1997, from 1,128 to 827, However, the cost of these public bodies in particular has soared from some £19 billion in 1996-1997 to £31 billion in 2006-07, a growth in real terms of 50%.
This reflects three consistent trends:
1. The merging of multiple smaller quangos into super-quangos
2. The creep of government into every aspect of British life
3. The ever increasing willingness of ministers to farm out the responsibilities of investment, regulation and provision of services.
....... not much rationalising happening here..........
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I can speak from experience on the benefit of the Meat Hygiene Service. It fulfils an important role, but inevietably makes work for itself and the "cutomers" it services. The issue is that the more rules they make up, and obviously they can impose them without any meaningful consultation, the more they justify their existance.
I have been involved in small game dealership that processess deer shot on local estates in Scotland. The rules say that hair nets must be worn. Well, I hear you ask, that must be sensible - not when you are skinning deer it isn't. There is a fair amount of hair kicking around anyway. I could go on and on about the bizarre rules and inflexible attitude.
QUANGO's can embody the worst of all worlds - the authority of a government department with the lack of accountability of an NGO. Since one of the guiding principles for QUANGOs is that they recover costs from the "customers", they can basically charge what they like. Big companies are the ones that can handle this extra administration and hassle. The smaller ones give up. The game dealership employs 3 people in an area of high unemployment and makes a high quality product that is exported. The burden of neverending formfilling ontop of the ever changing requirments all of which cost money to implement is enough to drive a strong man to drink.
I would be interested to know how much of the EU regulations that we all moan about are implemented through QUANGO's. Perhaps if we got rid of the QUANGOs we could have double whammy of saving a few billion, and taking away one of the main souces of discontent about the EU!
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380 only jocking
I kind of agree. 6 course and 8 course meals are outrageous. I can't even imagine what that would entail. Starter,maincourse dessert what else is there inbetween those?I don't eat out much and definately not to those levels. I'm afraid I'm just a lowely citizen.
But the dinner was provided to all the delegates. Not just Gordon Brown and you have to ask if it was a Conservative prime minister and he said we waste too much food while discussing food inflation. Which others are saying. Would he get this treatment? Would he refuse the meals?
I think they were talking about food inflation. in which case the subject of food waste would be valid. But I agree these meals seem like a tactless decision for the G8 as a whole rather than just Gordon Brown alone.
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I think a good name for some of these posters could be "IWantToBeALionTamer". Quite a lot of people quoting from the Bumper Book of anti Government statistics.
On quangos, you keep listing them and their costs and yet you have no knowledge on whether they are effective. Are all quangos bad?(Quasi Autonomous Non Governmental Organisations). Is the BBC not a Quango?, The NHS Trusts? Giving us big numbers is pointless. These people who quote them are not a reliable source of information. One says he updates Wikipedia. That just about says it all. They are quoting big numbers we can't( and probably they) can't possibly understand. Campaining rather than debate I think.
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dhwilkinson
393
Well, todays example was the BBC bonuses. Apparently the managers responsible for the phone in fraud had their bonus marked down by 40%.
In a private company, you would be lucky to keep your job.
QUANGO's might be a necessary evil, but that doesn't mean that they need to be run the way that they are.
It seems to me that the individuals involved in running QUANGO's have the benefits of private sector reward without the risk.
Pay them top dollar by all mean, but hold their feet to the fire.
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In many ways I feel that Gordon Brown is poorly advised. Why else feed your enemies with tasty morsels and patronising gaffes like this when your popularity is at its lowest? He is like a lamb preparing for slaughter. To complain that a Conservative P.M. would have received different treatment is just plain daft and totally irrelevant.
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#392 and 393 dhwilkinson
392: Sorry DHW but you are looking at this through the wrong end of the telescope. It isn't the fact of the lavish meals which caused the personal problem and helped fule the widespread criticism for GB here. It was his crass and politically stupid decision to choose that moment to implore households to cut down on food waste.
393. In 1997 Gordon Brown promised a "bonfire of the quangos", because they were "government in secret, free from public scrutiny".
A cynic might think he was against them in opposition for the same reason as he and Labour have embraced them so enthusiastically in government.
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396:
Hear hear! The number of courses enjoyed by The G8 summiteers is nothing to do with what is being discussed on this particular forum. In the context of the subject thread it is a complete red herring.
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393. dhwilkinson :
You are quite right in a lot of what you say, but finding hundreds of examples of outrageous waste that is clearly caused by incompetent officials amounting to hundred of billions is not hard.
You also don?t have to look very far to find ludicrous initiatives that are merely pet projects of ministers and their ridiculous personal agendas, many of which are completely out of tune with the demands of the public.
Let me give you one simple example I ran into a few weeks ago.
I received an email from a Quango designed to assess preferred companies for Olympic contracts. One of the questions was ?How many transsexuals do you employ?
This department has been tasked to analysis this information, lawyers are drafting legislation, committees will be discussing the initiative and they probably even have a logo in mind. What is more the government seriously expects me to keep records on the numbers of transsexuals I employ.
Funnily enough later that week I had dinner with a mate of mine (he's a Lawyer) who is actually helping to draft this legislation.
Harman wants in encompass into British law anti discrimination legislation covering people who have or intend to have a gender altering operations. However, she also wants to cover those who want to dress as women but don?t actually want to go as far as having an operation. They are having quite a laugh with the wording of that last bit.
Harmans plan is to use government procurement as a means of social engineering. By implication, the fact that you have to answer this question means that some where in the system you are probably awarded points for employing transsexuals. So we gave it some thought and said that we employed two.
How do you feel about your hard earnt tax being put to such a use.
I have no problem with transsexuals, they make life interesting. just invasive government. What the lads do with their evenings is their business not mine and certainly not the governments.
I wonder just how much body armour could be bought for our lands with the funds used for this.
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The size of the public sector is a key election issue.
The UK has 529 quangos financed with billions of pounds of taxpayers' cash - many of which are useless or duplicate each other's efforts, a report claims.
Essential Guide to British Quangos 2005 author Dan Lewis said at least 111 of the appointed bodies had been set up since Labour won power in 1997.
He urged a limit on the number of quangos that could be set up by any individual government department.
Tories and Lib Dems welcomed the report and called for a "slimming down".
'Explosion'
Conservative deregulation spokesman John Redwood said: "The research endorses our policy of destroying unwanted and unnecessary quangos, and slimming down the rest.
'Most expensive quangos'
Legal Service Commission - £2.1bn
Scottish Education Funding Council - £800m
Northern Health and Social Services Board - £550m
Teacher Training Agency - £514.6m
"A Conservative government will axe 162 quangos, as part of its drive for more efficient and more accountable government."
Lib Dem spokesman Ed Davey meanwhile said instead of the "bonfire of quangos" New Labour had promised, there had been an "explosion" of them.
"For over two decades, under both Tory and Labour governments, these unaccountable agencies have mushroomed.
"Liberal Democrats would abolish many, merge others, and make any that remain properly accountable."
Labour representatives were unavailable for comment.
The quango guide follows last year's government-commissioned Gershon Report which recommended significant cuts in bureaucracy across the public sector.
Time limit
He listed what he dubbed the nine "most useless quangos".
They were the British Potato Council, the Milk Development Council, the Energy Savings Trust, Agricultural Wages Committees, The Wine Standards Board, the Westminster Foundation for Democracy, the Football Licensing Authority, Investors in People UK and the Economic and Social Research Council.
Mr Lewis branded the existence of the 60-employee Potato Council, set up in 1997 to research and promote overseas potato markets, "surprising". He said the £80m spent annually on the Energy Savings Trust, which promotes renewable energy, would be better spent on eight million boiler jackets for British homes.
Rooney
And he argued it was "absurd" to charge farmers for Agricultural Wages Committees, which set working and wage standards in the industry, when many were prepared to take advantage of immigrant labour prepared to work for £1 an hour.
"If a football team can afford to pay £27m for Wayne Rooney, why should the taxpayer - not all of whom like football - be forced to fund the Football Licensing Authority to the tune of over £1.1m a year?" Mr Lewis asked.
The report is published by the Efficiency in Government Unit - a joint effort by right of centre think tanks the Economic Research Council and the Centre for Policy Studies.
It says before a new public body is set up, an assessment should be made whether its proposed role is already carried out by an existing charity or other private organisation.
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On the subject of Quangos, surely employing such a vast amount of people would make the government's "Number of people in Employment", and "Getting People Back To Work" stats look extremely good. GB is always banging on in the HoC about this at PMQs. They must be the largest single employer in the country!
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393 dhwilkinson
Sounds to me like you need to read up on the subject of Quangos.
Numerous commentators question the value for money they achieve. Here is an initial introduction for you:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3953922.ece
I am sure there are some excellent Quangos out there. You yourself hit on the key point though - nobody - not even the government, can demonstrate if they are doing a good job on the ground and certainly not you or I. That is the problem.
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What do you think will happen if you abolish the quangos?
If there is a clear economic rationale for intervention, all that will happen is that the function will be performed by the parent department.
Maybe Cameron will abolish some functions of Government, granted, but many of these organisations do have a clear rationale.
e.g. Potato Council - the potato-farming sector is a perfectly competitive sector (or a good approximation of it). Therefore, producers would have an incentive to "free-ride" on any marketing/lobbying efforts made by other members and not contribute financially to it. It is an example of a public good - similar to defence (at least to potato producers). In the absence of intervention (i.e. imposing a statutory levy), none of these activities would happen due to this free-riding effect. This would make everyone in the sector worse off. Therefore it is welfare enhancing to have a statutory levy imposed to finance these activities. However, the council itself should be controlled by members.
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You just know that when the Cabinet Office stopped publishing a breakdown of the bodies' finances last year and provided overall figures claiming that Britain had 827 public bodies that cost the taxpayer £32 billion. Theres a big problem
So much for transparent government Eh
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Balhamu
402
Accepting that there is a need for the functions carried out by at least some of the QUANGOs, the underlying issue is whether the current model is the right one.
You highlight the risk of freeloading if QUANGOs became tradebodies. I am sure that freeloading occurs now, as not all the benefits of QUANGOs will be distributed evenly accross all areas of their purview.
The QUANGOs are a good metaphor for the role of government. Applying can / should rule would be a good start. (Can a government get involved and should it do so) would be a good start.
QUANGOs are the political equivalent of monopolies in business. They are not subject to the cycle of life like everything else and can just grow unchecked.
Your last sentance is critical - the council should be controlled by it's members. This would work in an an advocacy role, but not in a regulatory capacity.
Regulation is the role of government, advocacy of a trade body. QUANGOs are used to try to do both - Meat Hygiene Service is a regulatory board, the Tattie Council to get us to eat tatties. I am not sure that it (the structure of QUANGOs) can do either very well.
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402 Balhamu
I don't think anyone is saying abolish all Quangos. Here are some key points for the government - and indeed Daivd Cameron if he were to win the next election:
1. Demonstrate that Quangos are delivering value for money.
2. Demonstrate that there is not overlap between Quangos.
3. Demonstrate that money spent on the Quango is better spent on the governmental body rather than infrastrucutre or facilities that it directly has responsibility for.
Then I'll be happy. Until then it seems to me that increasingly large amounts of money are being spent for little return.
In 3 years between 2003-06 the annual spending on Quangos rose by £44Bn. That is £10Bn more than the defence budget.
If we can't afford body armour for troops, or to prescribe the latest cancer prevention drugs then someone needs to demonstrate that spending on government functions is paying dividends.
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402. balhamu
Given that we cant afford body armour for troops, or to prescribe the latest cancer prevention drugs
I dont think government should use my tax buck to help market potatoes.
Spending money on national chip week is bonkers.
Remember there is also another Quango promoting healthy eating and to avoid chips.
Government needs to focus on what really matters and let the market forces for the spud business prevail.
Any how why havent carrots got a Quango. Why are potatoes special
Im off to lobby Harman. Its blatant discrimination.
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Carrots - after all that research you still don't listen.
The general tax payer does not fund the Potato Council. It is funded by subscription of potato producers. The taxpayer contributes nothing to it.
Not knowing how the carrot market is structured, I couldn't say why there is no quango for them. Maybe the old wives tale about helping you see in the dark is marketing enough?
re cost of quangos - the Cabinet Office summary of quangos says that total expenditure is £37 billion, of which £31 billion is taxpayer financed. I'm not sure where the £40 billion increase can come from.
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Wopitt - I'm not sure how much I would trust the Taxpayer's Alliance as an objective source of information.
They have a certain view about the areas that government should and should not be involved with i.e. stick to defence and police largely, with some role for HMT and a far smaller publicly-funded health and education spend.
Therefore "waste" to the TPA covers quite a broad range of areas.
I agree with you to a large extent on the accountability of some of these organisations - but this is an issue for all public expenditure. Direct democratic control is a blunt instrument.
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Wopitt - I'm not sure how much I would trust the Taxpayer's Alliance as an objective source of information.
They have a certain view about the areas that government should and should not be involved with i.e. stick to defence and police largely, with some role for HMT and a far smaller publicly-funded health and education spend.
Therefore "waste" to the TPA covers quite a broad range of areas.
I agree with you to a large extent on the accountability of some of these organisations - but this is an issue for all public expenditure. Direct democratic control is a blunt instrument.
And (less importantly) the G8 menu - have you ever eaten Japanese food? Many small dishes are ordered, so saying there were 18 courses is not true at all. And a big dinner is different to big food wastage.
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407. balhamu
Sorry I missed your full point. too much speed reading this morning.
388 sums up my position rather nicely so I wont repeat it.
Governement does little well so it should try to do less.
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#398 "Finding hundreds of examples of outrageous waste clearly caused by incompetent officials amounting to several hundreds of billion is not hard"
It is clearly ridiculous statements such as these that reduces the debate down to polarised shouting.
Let me see:
Total Government Expenditure = £566 billion in 2006/07 [http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/economic_data_and_tools/finance_spending_statistics/pubsec_finance/psf_statistics.cfm]
Several = more than 3
So 53% of all public expenditure is 'outrageous waste'. Come on - really?
I agree with your anecdote about transexual rights - some organisations can go overboard in enforcing the general principle that discrimination on any basis is an unacceptable business practice.
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411. balhamu
Ok Obviously some clarification required.
I didnt mean hundreds of billions in one year, I was really referring loosely and to the whole term of Nu Labour.
And just on a point of order you inserted the word several, where as I missed out the letter s on hundred
Interesting to note that if you type "uk government wasted billions" into google and you get 2,580,000 results in 0.26 seconds. Im still reading.
I accept some waste, its inevitable. The really galling thing about government spending is that when you get it really really wrong, no one gets fired.
The statement the Home Office put out after cocking up of the asylum centre was outrageous. In fact someone should ahve been fired just for drafting the statement.
They might as well have said SO WHAT WE DONT CARE. In fact thats just how I read it.
In short (IMO) NuLabour = Poor value and I think more people agree that disagree and that is what will cost them the next election.
I actually have no problem with high taxation so long as I get value and I dont.
The schools I use are OK and the hospital I use is not far off third world.
They rode to power on a promise of investment and I think they will be kicked out on a reality of waste.
I figure if Cameron gets in the only thing he can really do is go on a massive waste hunt. So as it stands att he moment hes going to get my vote.
Im open to offer though.
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Balhamu
Its worth a mention that we arent talking about "some organisations" we are talking about the deputy PM.
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Balhamu
Did you read this. I loved it.
http://tpa.typepad.com/bettergovernment/2008/06/senior-civil-se.html
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