Donate or your child will be punished.

My nine year old brother in law arrived home from school with a letter from the head teacher. My gast was well and truly flabbered when I read it.

Dear Parents/Carers,

Playtime For Pakistan

As you will know from media coverage millions of children in Pakistan have lost their homes and have no food or clean drinking water due to recent flooding. On the afternoon of Thursday 2 September we are offering an extra playtime to encourage our pupils to bring a donation for this appeal. Thank you for your support.

Regards

Blah Blah
Head Teacher

I've had dealings with the school before about their dubious methods for raising cash for 'charity' but this is a new low. Using pester power and punishing those who will not or cannot donate is way out of order.

I wonder if the school has been set a target of how much to raise by the council?

Needless to say, their will be nothing donated from this household. And the school can fuck right off.

BBC 'news' report.

Private toll roads not the answer, screams the headline. A report by the Campaign For Better Transport says it's been a huge big waste of money.

The Campaign For Better Transport, what's that about then?

About us

We are the UK's leading authority on sustainable transport

We champion transport solutions that improve people's lives and reduce environmental damage. Our campaigns push innovative, practical policies at local and national levels.

Ah, treehugging loons. That explains why the BBC have ran with the 'story'.

Remind me we are forced to pay for this shite?

Councils start squabbling for business...

Further to my 'War on Motorists' post the other day, we have this.

Which I whole-heartedly applaud.

Look at what socialism has done to Scotland...

Before socialism....

After sixty+ years of socialism.

The war on motorists continues

Remember the grand announcement by the government during the first few days of taking office?

The "war on the motorist" will be ended by the coalition Government, Philip Hammond, the new Transport Secretary, has promised.

Good stuff, we all thought. But it looks like the message hasn't got through to the councils. To ensure that the council's chief executives tax payer funded Lexus is protected from the cuts, they have decided to use legislation granted to them during the previous Labour administration to impose a parking tax on people who have the cheek to actually have a job and, wait for it, drive to work!

The first council to start this madness is Nottingham, with a few others to follow suit.

I would love it if council employees were somehow exempt or, as will probably be the case, the tax payer will pay their share. It may tip a few people over the edge.

How much more will people take before the revolution starts? Why isn't there rioting on the streets of Nottingham?

Well done Maggie Thatcher!

Thatcher personally confronted Gorbachev and protested that the Soviet Union was meddling in British matters

link

(awaits Mr Mxyzptlk, (Niko), to spout shite in the comments...)

Saturday Sixties

No blogging today, so have a top notch tune from before I was born.

ConDems are a bunch of bastards.

From Conservatives.com earlier today....

Ministers today called for Labour to apologise for all the community pubs that closed their doors thanks to the Labour Government’s policies.

Official figures show there was a net closure of 3,530 pubs across England under Labour from 1997 to 2010.

"Labour hiked taxes on pubs and did nothing to stop unfair loss-leading by supermarkets" said Grant Shapps, Minister for Local Government.

(italics are mine)

I would be interested to see the amount of pubs that closed down since the smoking ban came into force. An overturn of the smoking ban would do wonders for the pub trade, Mr Shapps. Or even legislation that we see in Spain. But no, it's the big bad supermarkets to blame.

Because 'loss leading' is a new thing, isn't it?

Action must be taken then...

From the Localism Bill, due to be introduced in November,

There will be a ban the sale of alcohol below cost price, helping protect local pubs from unfair ‘loss leading’ by some supermarkets.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

Meanwhile, up here in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Controlling Bastards, we have this and this.

Next week, expect the announcement of a wanking tax.

Councils to kill puppies due to cuts.

If I was a cynical type of bastard, I would say that our local authorities and police forces/services are headline grabbing about the cuts that they, quite rightly, need to make.

This week, we've had this and this from the polis, with the fantastic quote from Les Gray of the Scottish Police Federation....

"The people will not be safe on the streets”

Yes, quite Les. Perhaps the polis can prioritise the cuts a touch better. Getting rid of desk jockeys and big shiny 4x4 'company' cars for the senior officers would be a decent start. To be fair to Les he has the interests of his membership at heart and I understand his position.

However, over to Glasgow City Council for the cuts headline of the day...

'Fruit off the menu as council battle cuts'

Seems to me that our services are playing silly buggers. As I mentioned in a previous post, just shut your mouths and do your jobs. Properly.

Simples.

How to make a fortune playing the property game.

It's a piece of piss, this property lark. All you need is a small amount of cash and a lot of patience.

Right, here is the Rab step by step guide to making a fortune, all courtesy of the tax payer!

1) Purchase an old building in a town centre, or buy a failing business that is located in an old building. Make sure the building has some sort of 'historical interest'. Even better if a quango already has it listed.

2) Vacate building/close down business. Leave building derelict. Wait a few years minimum or two or three decades maximum. Resist all pressure from councils and community groups to tart up building by saying that the quango who has it listed as a building of 'historical interest' prevents you from investing in your property. Your hands are tied etc etc...

3) Watch as other property owners in the area do the same as you, with the result that the entire area turns into a ghost-town.

4) Patience, nearly there....

5) Rub hands as yet another quango is formed. Quango gets a shit load of cash from the tax payer to splash around.

6) Quango buys your building at way over the market price. You ride off into the sunset counting your cash.

7) The quango spends our cash doing up the old buildings to, umm, stand empty as they cannot get tenants to move into the properties.

8) Celebrate as one tenant has moved into a building. Oh wait, it's a 'social enterprise' company, (double speak for parasitical company leeching off tax payers cash).

9) Notice that the Chairperson driving all this is also in charge of the London Olympics Legacy Company which is responsible for ensuring the olympic's budget isn't spunked up the wall...

10) Wish best of luck to the Olympics. They'll need it.