Back in September when he announced the UK’s nuclear ‘renaissance’, Gordon Brown’s government insisted it would create 100,000 new jobs. ‘Building a new generation of nuclear power stations will create thousands of jobs in manufacturing in the UK,’ said Derek Simpson, the joint leader of Unite. That figure has since fallen to by 10% to 90,000 but that’s still a big promise.

Thanks to French nuclear company AREVA, however, we’re now getting an idea of how those numbers break down and the spin around nuclear job creation is revealed. AREVA’s EPR reactor is one of two designs the UK government is looking at building and is also being considered in the US…

…a new U.S. EPR™ would create up to 11,000 direct and indirect jobs during component manufacturing (including AREVA’s Newport News heavy component facility in Virginia) and plant construction. On top if this, construction and operation would also create more than 400 permanent jobs and spur billion of dollars in investment in the local economy.

The UK government wants ten new reactors, so that would create 110,000 ‘direct and indirect’ jobs according to AREVA’s numbers, wouldn’t it? Well, it might. That number is in the same ballpark as the UK government’s figures of 90,000-100,000 but it assumes that all ten reactors are built at the same time. continue reading… »

In the Times yesterday columnist David Aaronovitch went to work on the popular idea that we as citizens are caught on CCTV camera 300 times a day. He was tenacious, dogged and vociferous in his quest to debunk the misconception.

He should be congratulated on his little scoop. It’s worthy of a blogger, in fact. If only, however, he’d shown the same tenacity, doggedness, and vociferousness in chasing down the facts in 2003 when spurious statistics and misconceptions were left to fester in the public imagination without correction and ended up taking us to war.

If I remember rightly, Aaronovitch was quite happy then to take the peddlers of those spurious statistics and misconceptions at their word. Indeed, he crowed those false assertions from his column in a national newspaper. Afterwards, feeling a little sheepish, he said on the subject of Iraq’s WMDs:

If nothing is eventually found, I – as a supporter of the war – will never believe another thing that I am told by our government, or that of the US ever again.

Given his propensity to shovel down and regurgitate any amount of government say-so since he said that, we can only assume his promise of future disbelief was also a misconception of some kind. Would anyone care to chase it down with Aaronovitchesque tenacity?

I note the irony that Aaronovitch once won the Orwell Prize for journalism. Can anyone pinpoint the precise moment he went from speak to power to speaking for it?

(Cross posted at Chicken Yoghurt)

Liberal Conspiracy is publishing a series of discussions about the government’s Community Empowerment White Paper. This is a summary of the third chapter.

Chapter 3: Access to information
How can I find out information in a way I understand and can use?

Information is power say the paper, and a lack of information leads to powerlessness. Jargon can ‘alienate, confuse and frustrate citizens’ and be exclusionary. Barely half of local authority residents feel that their council keeps them very or fairly well informed about the services and benefits it provides.

The Internet is a powerful information delivery system but those without online access should not be forgotten. Information across the range of issues is being made available via the likes of NHS Choices. The government wants to support the use of new technologies.

A ‘Digital Mentor’ scheme in deprived areas will support groups to develop websites and podcasts, to use digital photography and online publishing tools. Community radio can have a unique role in working within communities.

Comments
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It’s probably unfair to expect high-flown rhetoric and complex ideas from a presidential candidate’s speech. They’re designed to get the candidate’s ideas and policies across to potential voters in the most simple and shortest way.

That said, you can take the simplicity too far. Take John McCain criticising Barack Obama’s stance on nuclear power…

You know, the other night in a debate I said his eloquence is admirable but pay attention to his words […] We talked about nuclear power. Well, it has to be safe, environment, blah blah blah. […] Nuclear power is safe. We ought to do it now.

Pay attention to Obama’s words, says McCain. What about McCain’s words? Blah, blah, blah? Is that an ‘admirable eloquence’? Sure, the arguments around nuclear power and safety can be complex. They often need to be simplified so that people who aren’t nuclear scientist can understand then, but blah, blah, blah? Do the workers cleaning up at Hanford, the most radioactive place in America regard nuclear safety as blah, blah, blah, do you think? John McCain is 72, as if we needed reminding, not 7.

And ‘nuclear power is safe’, says McCain. Really? If it’s so safe why is McCain on the record as saying he would not want nuclear waste being transported through his home state of Arizona? Is it safe or is it not, Senator? If it’s as safe as you say, let’s see you call for nuclear waste to be trucked through Arizona. Let’s have a straight answer and make it a little less simple than blah, blah, blah. We’re intelligent enough to understand.

(Originally published at Nuclear Reaction.)

With EDF and British energy doing the will-they-won’t-they and France looking to put itself at the centre of the so-called ‘Nuclear Renaissance’ across the world, it’s worth taking a look at just what’s being going on inside France’s own nuclear industry recently. All is not well.

The latest troubles for the Tricastin nuclear power plant in southern France began in early July when a solution containing unprocessed uranium was allowed to leak into two rivers. Areva, the company running the plant, said that although 30,000 litres had been spilled, ‘only’ 18,000 litres had reached the Gaffiere and Lauzon rivers. That’s a strange use of the word ‘only’, isn’t it?
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Mmmmmm. Is there a daintier dish than jerked right-wing knee? The Bishop of Stafford writes an article about climate change and rather unwisely uses Joseph Fritzl as an example of human selfishness. Watch the right-wingers hitch up their skirts and squeal like the housekeeper in the Tom and Jerry cartoons.

It could be argued what the Bishop said took the argument to the acceptable limits of taste. So. without further ado, let he who is without sin cast the first stone…

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Here’s another law of politics: all public service tends towards infantilisation. It’s a law in two parts.

I have a seven year-old daughter. She’s not particularly tidy. Most days her bedroom looks like how I imagine how Daily Mail readers imagine how Eastern European migrants live. You see, she can and does make the most stupendous mess without the help, input or consultation of anybody.

But when it comes to tidying that mess? Ah, that’s not a job for a single person at all. No help is begged in making the mess but much is begged in its reversal. There are tears and shouting. A team effort tidies the room but a few days later…

And so it is with government. Or at least this government. Think of all the messes it has made in the last eleven years. Now think of how little clearing up has actually been done. How much mess has been edged away from, swept under the rug of media manipulation and generally ignored? Because all public service tends towards infantilisation. Someone will be along at some point to clean up for them.

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Some people in this country, me included, believe there’s something pretty wrong with ‘democracy’ in the UK. It’s blown a gasket. It’s belching stinking pollution. It rattles and it bangs and threatens to seize up altogether at any moment.

Most people just stand around it, kicking the tyres and exclaiming, ‘nah, it’s alright, it’ll go round the clock another couple of times no bother.’ Jack Straw thinks it just needs another coat of paint and it’ll be sorted.

You get the impression that he knows what’s going on under the bonnet but doesn’t want to admit it to himself let alone those of us risking our lives by riding along in the death trap. It needs rebuilding or trading in, if we’re honest.
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The government’s plans for super ‘Titan’ jails holding up to 2,500 prisoners haven’t gone down well, it seems. Ann Owers, Chief Inspector of Prisons, said:

[I]f we look across the Channel we see the French who built one of these kinds of prisons in the 1980s and have never done so again.

Jack Straw dithered, Gordon Brown didn’t.

It occurs to me that the next step would be to wall in a town like they do in Escape From New York. Look out for it being announced soon as the parties try to outdo each other in the run up to the next general election.

One of the concerns about Titan jails is that all the money is spent on building the things and funding for other programmes could be lost. Programmes to cut the unbelievably high levels of re-offending for example.

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Yesterday marked the tenth anniversary of American blogger Matt Drudge breaking the story of the Monica Lewinsky affair. Things were never the same again. The world was rocked to its foundations by the astounding news that older men like getting their knobs sucked by younger women.

There were many crimes committed by the Clinton Whitehouse. However, I don’t think there are many sane people in the world who think Bill getting a nosh from an intern was one of them. Or at least one of the major ones. How the odd happy finish from Monica impeded the Clinton presidency before right-wing prurience attempted to derail it has never been adequately explained to me.

Still, we are where we are. In his paean to Drudge, Guido Fawkes somewhat prematurely hails his hero’s coup as the end ‘once and for all [of] the gate-keeper ability, if not the mentality, of the mainstream media elite’.

Guido’s love letter to his mentor is interesting in that it fails to offer a qualitative judgement of how things have changed. How much Drudge earns and where that income allows him to live seem to be the essential yardsticks rather than any explicit estimate of whether what he produces is any good. That people in large numbers are prepared to consume a product is not always the most reliable gauge of quality. It’s a thought that’s kept the likes of Rupert Murdoch, Bernard Matthews and Noel Edmonds warm for many a year.
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Give ‘em before Grave-robber Gordon takes ‘em: Become an organ donor.

The complaining about Gordon Brown proposing an opt-out organ donation system is great. Selfish, pig-headed and self-contradictory whining is always a joy.

Needless to say most of the umbrage is coming from the Right. They might as well be saying ‘Gordon Brown can pry my liver from my cold dead hand’ for all the sense they’re making. They bang on about the ‘murder’ of foetuses by the ‘abortion industry’ but are seemingly willing to stand by and let walking, talking people die because their politics have been offended.

What it boils down to is putting your principles before the lives of dying people. And what’s more, you’ll be dead anyway and won’t even get to enjoy the smug satisfaction of putting one over on Gordon Brown with your clever principles. Because you’ll be dead (did I mention that?).

Unless you believe in heaven, obviously, in which case I suppose you could look down and blow raspberries in Gordon’s direction. If they let, smug, selfish, gloating pricks into heaven, that is. And unless you’re expecting an Assumption, you can’t take your guts to heaven either.
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Last week I wrote this piece for Liberal Conspiracy about how government websites aren’t exactly built to facilitate the new era of positive political engagement with the public we’re told our masters want.

Specifically, I highlighted Lord Goldsmith’s citizenship review, it’s call for the views of the public, and how if you don’t have the resources to print the review’s PDF pamphlets from the website, you are asked to contact the review team.

So, I did. I asked how I obtain a hard copy of the pamphlet ‘The Future of Citizenship Ceremonies‘. On November 6.

Still no reply a week later.

I’ve been giving some thought to positive engagement with political processes – I like the idea of producing a kind of rough and ready primer for the man or woman in the street who wants to get their voice heard.

The Queen’s Speech seems the ideal place to start. So, head to the Number 10 website. Click on the special section all about the Queen’s Speech and select the list of bills, draft bills and statements to see what issues were covered in the speech.

Let’s take a look the Citizenship and Immigration Draft Bill. They’re hot, emotive issues right now. There’s not a lot of detail in the PDF document (what is it about this government and PDFs?) but there is a link at the bottom to Lord Goldsmith’s citizenship review.

Except the link doesn’t work. You can’t click through to the review’s webpage from the PDF document. You can either type the web address manually into your web browser or try another angle.
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It’s all very well wanting a civilised, engaging debate on the Internet but some of the Left’s opponents aren’t interested in fighting fair. They’ve taken the gloves off. On some prominent right-wing blogs debate is at a standstill with homophobia and defamation becoming tools of the trade. But the way the owners of these blogs behave, getting redress for a slur on your character is fast becoming impossible.

Now, many people put this down to the normal Punch and Judy of blogs and blogging but when this is happening on what the media regard as the go-to blogs, it means trouble for all of us who have higher hopes for the blogging medium. You can’t ignore these people and expect them to go away. They’re the shock troops of a resurgent Tory party.

Comments deleted to shape the narrative of discussions. Criticism ‘disappeared’. Offensive, libellous comments left unchecked to be catalogued by Google for anyone to find. A refusal to give a right of reply to those who have been slurred. Leading right-wing bloggers are creating an atmosphere in which the admission of fault and the apology are taboo; they have their own ‘reputations’ to protect after all. People on the wrong end of this treatment find themselves in a dead end. Sooner or later one of them is going to have to reach for a lawyer to get redress. Anybody got a few grand to spare?

Why should liberal-left bloggers be concerned? So far, the big guns of Tory blogging have given left-wing bloggers a free pass because until recently most of us spent our time attacking the various sins of the Blair government. It was a marriage of convenience. But try sniffing around how prominent Tory bloggers conduct themselves and you’re off the Christmas card list pretty damn quick. ‘Stalker’, ‘obsessive’ and worse are the labels you can expect to have pinned to you by them if you dare to press for a straight answer to a straight question. Their online supporters (and they do have a lot of supporters) will question your mental health and your sexuality and libel you under the cover of anonymity. And you get no right of reply.

It pains me that more left-wing, Liberal, liberal and decent right-wing bloggers don’t get stuck in on this. Come a Conservative administration this could very well be the norm in political blogging instead of the behaviour of a just handful of high-profile opportunists. It’s a disease and it’s spreading fast. Tory central office would be fools if they aren’t paying attention to how debate can be controlled and opponents smeared online. At least one Tory MP has already adopted some of the tactics.

I have a feeling that a lot of bloggers trying to stick it to a future Tory government and their online cheerleaders in a few years time are going to wish they’d paid more attention to what’s going on right now. Sooner or later they’re going to target someone you care about. Real world reputations are at stake and are being damaged. It’s time to get in the ring and go toe to toe.