Susan Thomas, Oxford: 2011

Sunday 18 December 2011

Oxford Politics

Printed in the Oxford Mail

Good leadership

10:00am Wednesday 14th December 2011 in Letters

IT WAS brave of PM David Cameron to give the V sign to Europe. He has shown some true leadership at last.
The eurozone is a sinking ship and frankly we are better off out of the vessel.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy only want us on board their sinking ship in order to exploit our financial services with a transaction tax to bail them out. Sarkozy is two-faced and was really underhand towards our last Prime Minister. He is not to be trusted.
We are better off trading with China as it has not signed up to the loss-making Kyoto protocol and therefore will be able to grow its economy, unlike Europe which has committed itself to this ridiculous treaty.

SUSAN THOMAS, Magdalen Road, Oxford

End of an era

10:00am Tuesday 15th November 2011 in Letters

KEITH Mitchell has done a fantastic job as leader of county council and his departure will mark the end of a golden era in Oxfordshire politics.
During his decade of leadership the county was consistently rated as excellent by the Audit Commission.
Keith is an accountant and he has managed the county finances shrewdly.
He also put in a phenomenal amount of overtime into juggling and balancing the books.
He was undoubtedly a safe financial pair of hands, unlike many politicians and bankers.
He is neither extravagant nor wasteful and that is a rare attribute in this reckless age.
Sadly his own party has let him down with the stringent local Government budget cuts.
Keith should have a word with David Cameron and William Hague about the misguided policy of increasing foreign expenditure at the expense of local spending. Much foreign aid is ending up in corrupt departments. One African official has spent millions on a property portfolio in Mayfair with the foreign aid.
The local Government spending cuts have led to a furore over library closures. A moderate, blue-stockinged lady was incensed at her description as a radical left winger when she voiced concerns about library closures.
Keith, who I have always found to be polite, charming and courteous, is understandably stressed and has lost his diplomacy under pressure.
He certainly has a way with words and I will miss his hilarious comments and hope he continues to write to the Oxford Mail.

SUSAN THOMAS, Magdalen Road, Oxford

Friday 7 October 2011

Turbine spells trouble

I TOTALLY sympathise with the Harwell villagers’ protests against a wind farm on their doorsteps and they are certainly not ‘nimbys’.
These large concrete structures are not so very green or renewable either. They use huge amounts of concrete, which is not a green material and need a lot of maintenance and repairs.
Remember the damaged blades at Conisholme wind farm that some UFO enthusiasts thought was caused by an alien encounter?
It was probably caused by ice build-up on a static blade during a freezing winter anti-cyclone.
The subsidies for these endless repairs come from hikes in green taxes in all our energy bills.
These surcharges added to fuel bills hit pensioners and the poor hardest.
Never mind if impoverished people freeze to death if the winter is harsh again because the wealthy chattering classes who are worried about global warming will be smugly satisfied to see our beautiful landscape littered with these gargantuan follies.
The only people benefiting from wind farm turbines are generally the rich landowners who become even more wealthy at the expense of the ordinary citizen. Lots of people have become very rich on the green carbon-con pound at the expense of others.
Turbines damage wildlife and the infrasound can be very unpleasant and may be linked to health problems.
Infrasounds at seven cycles per second causes anxiety and nausea.
Wind turbines do not protect the environment; they damage the countryside.
It is time for some innovative thinking for energy supply as I predict that one day all wind farms will be dismantled as they are really not that cost effective.
SUSAN THOMAS

Sunday 25 September 2011

HUDSPETH TRANSPORT STRATEGY MISTAKES

Letters RSS Feed

Traffic schemes end in disaster

4:59pm Sunday 15th June 2008

It seems that every time Oxfordshire County Council pours money into a new traffic scheme, it ends in disaster.
At least Ian Hudspeth, the cabinet member for transport, has had the decency to admit that the Conservatives have got it all wrong in Abingdon (Oxford Mail, June 10).
The £3.1m squandered on a fatuous strategy would have been better diverted to other departments, such as social services for the elderly.
If the whole transport department had taken itself off to the Bahamas with the money, the roads of Oxfordshire would probably be in a safer and better condition.
It is not only Mr Hudspeth who makes mistakes, however.
His Conservative predecessor, David Robertson, managed to turn Cowley Road, Oxford, into a wibbly, wobbly way, without the aid of psychedelics!
SUSAN THOMAS

Saturday 24 September 2011

ICE AGE IS COMING IN 2012

THERE HAS BEEN MUCH TALK OF GLOBAL WARMING BUT MUCH LESS INTEREST IN THE SCENARIO OF A FUTURE ICE AGE.

The prevailing dogma is that carbon dioxide emissions are increasing and will inevitably lead to global warming based on the premise of Svante Arrhenius of the role of this gas in the greenhouse effect.

Not being one to follow the herd I have questioned this assumption from the start and have now concluded that it is erroneous. This does not mean that I am not an environmentalist either. It is possible to care passionately about the environment and the damage that man is inflicting on the earth yet still to question the very poor science behind the prevailing zeitgeist.

Indeed the science does not stand up to empirical scrutiny and the data collected is virtually useless.

One third of the climate data was input by the now discredited University of East Anglia. To put it mildly they have been falsifying the data for the last decade and the Met Office has been using this data. So the next time you hear from the Met Office that this was the warmest decade for a century it would be wise to take it with a pinch of salt.

The problem has partly arisen from the huge funding available for global warming research which has encouraged corruption on a truly massive scale. Statistics and graphs have been toyed with to produce the results expected by Government. No wonder the Russians who have been,blamed for Climategate are annoyed. All their data from their freezing Siberian weather stations was discounted by Phil Jones team to make the graphs fit the faulty hypothesis. It is not just this CRU that has been up to mischief. I have inside information that leads me to conclude that a lot more scientists are colluding in the deception.

The sad irony of this fallacy that CARBON IS THE ROOT OF ALL EVIL is the proliferation of dangerous nuclear power stations as a means to lower carbon emissions.Plutonium is zillions of times more deadly than non .toxic carbon dioxide

A terrible legacy to leave our children.

POWER BLACKOUT FEARS

Many experts are predicting blackouts in the imminent future and indeed this has already occurred.

Power cuts can cost lives as well as seriously damaging the economy.

This is due to the renewable energy quota that we have been saddled with from Europe. During the recent power cut not one of the two thousand wind turbines came to the rescue Indeed had they managed to input any energy into the Grid the situation may well have been exacerbated.

During very cold weather caused by an anti cyclone there is no wind either .Solar panels not much use in winter either if covered in snow.

Caroline Lucas has been very busy in Europe and the result will not be beneficial to our economy.

There will be grave economic problems ahead when we close nine coal fired power stations to comply with the Large Combustion Plant Directive; a move that will have no impact whatsoever on the climate I may add.

It is a syllogism to infer that because coal happens to be black it must be dirty.

Mining our buried treasured resources leads to prosperity.

When Great Britain was the wealthiest nation on Earth industry was driven by KING COAL and Britannia Ruled the Waves!

Some say it is not economic to mine our own coal.

I say let us find a way to make it worth reopening a coal mine or two and get all those once proud mining communities back to work and off incapacity benefit.

The Green Party have inflicted huge economic damage via Europe and their unproven hypotheses of anthropogenic warming.

The CFL light bulbs are another travesty we have the Greens to thank for. They are full of mercury, a powerful neurotoxin and will pollute the Environment in the long term.

Please note that one can be a keen environmentalist and not subscribe to the doctrines that carbon is the root of all evil and that CFL bulbs will save the planet. Both premises are incorrect.

Labour has made a mistake in slavishly adopting the policies of the Greens. By all means let us explore new technologies and ways of power generation but only in a measured and calculating manner.

Do we really want to give Denmark millions of pounds for their wind turbines? No is the obvious answer. We need to make our own and explore tidal projects using British engineers.

Thermonuclear fusion energy generation is unlikely to succeed in our lifetime; or the next for that matter as the theory is incorrect.

Therefore ITER is also another blind alley.(INTERNATIONAL THERMONCLEAR REACTOR)

It is ironic that the Green Party has now found itself in the ridiculous situation of having to back NUCLEAR FISSION as a means to plugging the energy gap caused by their LARGE COMBUSTION PLANT DIRECTIVE. This was the Party that spent years organising anti nuclear demonstrations!!!

They have got themselves in a political mess but still people vote for them in the erroneous belief that they will save the planet. Actually I foresee that their policies will bring environmental damage if the GM lobby succeed in pushing their GLOBAL WARMING AGENDA.

Regarding nuclear energy, this may have been a lucrative option had we not sold out on our own brilliant nuclear scientists years ago.

Now we are at the mercy of French power giants.

All so short sighted and all so very avoidable.

TIME TO GAZE INTO OUR CRYSTAL BALL, if we are TO AVOID SIMILAR FINANCIAL ERRORS.

Energy is where the big bucks are to be made but NOT THE CLIMATE.

Climate issues have become confused with ETHICAL MAN. However it is still possible to ethically care for the environment without subscribing to the CARBON IS EVIL FALLACY.

Carbon in the form of coal equals energy equals wealth.

Nuclear Power is being promoted as being environmentally friendly due to low carbon emissions. A truly massive error and one that future generations will curse us for….. So says my crystal ball.

It takes just one speck of plutonium to cause cancer.

When Colwyn Bay flooded an analysis of the silt by geologists found traces of DEADLY PLUTONIUM. This could only have originated from Sellafield.

Thus, coal is probably the lesser of the two evils in the long run.We do have a thousand years of the stuff to use,. By 3000A.D. we will have perfected micro cold fusion devices so no need to feel guilty about using up our coal reserves for now,

Ed Miliband has gone all Evangelical in his new role, would be prudent to rename the position as SECRETARY FOR ENERGY AND ENTERPRISE. He will probably end up as Leader of the Labour Party because of this saintly role.

Therefore keep an eye on Greg Clark. ENERGY EQUALS POWER.

It is a potentially very important position on par with that of Home Secretary.

Finally my sister has told me to retract my comments re AID to overseas .She says it is BAD KARMA, Still it is a fact that it is a waste of money to try and prevent global warming, An ice age will inflict far greater damage to the World economy. Last year thousands of pensioners died because of the cold weather, COLD WEATHER EQUALS FINANCIAL RUIN

Sea levels will not rise if carbon dioxide levels rise and the Maldives will not be flooded either, Tsunamis and tidal floods are caused by plate tectonics not by global warming.

The Government also wasted millions on that inane advert about global warming.

I am sure that Lloyd George is turning in his grave at what has become of this country. Did Great Britain dish out billions of pounds then to other countries to help combat global warming???

Did the Industrial Revolution during which tons of coal were burnt IN MANUFACTURING ENTERPRISE cause an increase in temperatures??

NASA was trying to find the answer to this question when it launched a satellite to search for this unaccounted for carbon dioxide. Unfortunately the satellite crashed into the sea leaving the mystery of the missing carbon dioxide emissions unanswered. NASA need not have bothered with wasting so much money on the project. Most carbon dioxide is recycled into the soil or plants. Back to school NASA!!

And lastly let us not forget that we currently have no reliable empirical scientific data to prove any rise in world temperatures.

Even the Met Office data has to now be discounted in the light of CLIMATEGATE. So the next time someone solemnly professes that

This has been the warmest decade on record take it with a pinch of Salt.

That is if there is any left.

ATOMIC ENERGY TRANSFORMATION PROMOTER ITER

ATOMIC ENERGY TRANSFORMATION PROMOTER 2010

Energy can be gained from the fission of heavier elements or the fusion of lighter elements.

Nuclear fusion has proved more difficult to achieve on earth though is thought to occur in stars like our sun which has an abundance of lighter elements such as hydrogen.

The theory is that to achieve fusion nuclear particles need to be separated from their associated electrons and collide with each other at great speed.

This approach requires very high temperatures and conditions that are difficult to sustain such as the JET venture in Culham.

Instead of inordinately high plasmas why not experiment with different angles of alignment of particles and fields as a hypothesis to create fusion.

Also try various pulses and adjustable frequencies or resonances.

Remember that our sun has been shown to be humming or singing its own unique song of magnetic frequencies .

We need to try various permutations of song to achieve a lower temperature fusion. Remember that per square metre the sun is not actually that hot at all.

In other words at the start of the atomic reaction the atoms need to be relatively cold and quiescent possibly in crystalline magnetised form and not at the wasteful searing temperatures which are too expensive to maintain as at JET.

NUCLEAR COLD FUSION IDEA

NUCLEAR FUSION IDEA 2010-01-07

ERROR OF THE STANDARD APPROACH

IN THE STANDARD IDEA OF THERMO NUCLEAR FUSION RATHER THAN NUCLEAR FISSION TWO PROTONS ARE PUSHED TOGETHER WHICH CAUSES ONE PROTON TO SPLIT BECOMING A NEUTRON AND A POSITRON.

THE POSITRON ANTIMATTER THEN MEETS AN ELECTRON AND THEY DESTROY EACH OTHER YIELDING ENERGY.

THIS METHOD REQUIRES A LOT OF ENERGY YET THE RESULTING OUTPUT HAS BEEN LAUGHINGLY DESCRIBED AS PRODUCING ENOUGH ENERGY TO HEAT A SINGLE LIGHT BULB.

A HUGE TEMPERATURE IS REQUIRED TO HEAT THE ATOMS SUFFICIENTLY TO STRIP THEM TO BARE PROTONS AND SECONDLY TO FUSE THEM TOGETHER.

AS A COLLABERATIVE PROJECT INVOLVING MANY NATIONS ITER IS A WORTHY ENTERPRISE BUT AS A FUTURE SOURCE OF ENERGY THE VENTURE IS DOOMED AND HAS YET TO DELIVER THE GOODS.

WHY????

POSSIBLY….

IF THE POSITRON IS THE ANTIMATTER COUNTERPART OF THE ELECTRON IT SHOULD YIELD ZERO ENERGY WHEN IT COMBINES WITH THE ELECTRON.

IF THE PROTON IS LOSING NEGATIVE MASS ENERGY TO BECOME A MORE MASSIVE NEUTRON THEN IT NEEDS TO LOSE NOT ONE BUT THREE ANTI ELECTRON MASSES OF ENERGY.

IF THE PROTON IS SPLITTING TO BECOME A NEUTRON THEN IT IS ESSENTIALLY A KIND OF DECAY WHICH MEANS IT SHOULD HAPPEN FAR MORE EASILY AND FREQUENTLY AND WITHOUT SPECIAL CIRCUMSTANCES.

THE PROTON SHOULD NOT BE SEEN AS SPLITTING BUT RATHER AS ABSORBING SOMETHING TO BECOME A NEUTRON.

THIS PROPERLY REFLECTS THE RARITY OF THE EVENT.

HADRON COLLIDER IN CERN AND HIGGS BOSON

The Hadron Collider in CERN, Susan Thomas

Oxford Mail, September 2008

Oxford

Sir,

Sir David King, chief scientific adviser to the Government, criticised the Large Hadron Collider initiative (Oxford Mail, September 11).

He felt that the billions of pounds spent could have been invested in a more worthy project.

I agree with him for the following reasons:

1. The project is using a phenomenal amount of electricity, enough to power a large city at a time when we are all being encouraged to reduce our energy consumption.

2. I met three of the leading scientists working on the project at a forum in Oxford. They struck me as youthfully irresponsible and even had a rap song to commemorate the switching on of the collider. During the question and answer session, they did not answer my scientific questions very satisfactorily. This did not inspire my confidence in the venture.

3. The project has already malfunctioned and having met the leading scientists, this does not surprise me.

4. The project’s aim to find the “God Particle (Higgs Boson)” strikes me as somewhat irreverent. Although I am not overtly religious, I believe that the ultimate origin of the Universe and the mind of God should remain ineffable and mysterious to man.

5. If the project did succeed in creating another Big Bang, our Universe will certainly come to an end and a new one will be born.

Do we really want that?

For all of these reasons and many more, I sincerely hope that the plug will be pulled on the British investment of 17 per cent towards this project, as it is a considerable waste of taxpayer’s money.

Postscript (December 2009):

Two scientists in agreement with myself have recently proposed a theory that the Large Hadron Collider is doomed to permanently malfunction. Why is this so one may ask? Apparently they posit that the Higgs Boson particle is anathema to mother nature. Therefore were the Collider to create a Higgs Boson the particle would travel back in time to stop the machine from creating it in the first place.

An analogy is the situation where a grandson travels back in time to kill his grandfather to prevent himself from being born.

The machine has been switched off yet again on the 18^th December, 2009, for further work on making the magnets safe. This follows on from a whole year spent making magnets safe from September 2008 to November 2009. One wonders if this is a viable venture.

KINGSNORTH POWER STATION

Sir,

Thank you very much for the recent correspondence explaining the Government’s resolve to utilise carbon capture technology in coal fired power stations, such as Kingsnorth.

During the industrial revolution, when a great deal of coal was burnt, a lot of carbon dioxide would have been emitted. Scientists have realised that approximately one third of this carbon dioxide is missing and cannot be accounted for.

Recently NASA launched a satellite to try and determine where the missing carbon might be. Unfortunately the satellite crashed into the Antarctic ocean! This issue of missing carbon dioxide has important connotations.

The fact is that all life is carbon based on our planet and the Earth is a giant carbon recycling machine. Carbon and carbon dioxide are constantly being recycled and therefore theoretically it is not possible for carbon dioxide levels to build up in our atmosphere.

Most of the carbon ends up in the soil, sedimentary rocks and of course all plant life recycles carbon via PHOTOSYNTHESIS. Photosynthesis is a very important carbon capture process, crucial to life on our planet.

Carbon capture technology on the other hand, is presumably very important to the engineers whose jobs depend on exploring this technology! Yes it is important to create more jobs for engineers, but it’s also important to remember that mother nature does the job very efficiently in capturing carbon via photosynthesis. Therefore it would be very prudent to encourage the preservation of forests, Green Belt land, and of course domestic back gardens.

Since soil recycles carbon it is important to life on our planet that people do not concrete over their back gardens and driveways. Apparently the back gardens of Great Britain collectively cover more area than all our National Parks combined and therefore pay a crucial part in keeping our ecosystems healthy.

I feel that too much emphasis has been placed upon the evils of carbon dioxide, which is a very beneficial gas essential to life on this planet. There are far more pressing environmental concerns such as soil erosion and the rapid depletion of Earth’s resources due to the growing population. However, because the Earth is a carbon recycling machine I do not feel that is wrong to use fossil fuels if the alternative is power cuts in the future.

Recently a lot of big investors have pulled their money out of wind farms because they have realized they will not get a good return for their money. Furthermore during our recent cold winter the wind did not blow for several weeks because of the anti-cyclone. If our country had been solely reliant on wind technology and renewables we could have been in serious trouble. We also came within four days of losing our gas supplies partly due to the Russian dispute with the Ukraine.

If you stood on top of a tall building and threw 5.5 billion pounds into the wind people would think that you were crazy! Yet that is exactly what the Government is proposing to do by investing this amount of money in wind farms.

It is economically DEAD MONEY. Furthermore, wind farms in sensitive areas of outstanding beauty, such as Dorset’s “Jurassic Park” have greatly antagonised numerous bodies including the CPRE.

Certainly these monstrosities creeping over our beautiful green Albion are not a vote winner! There is already a marked tendency for countryside dwellers to vote Conservative (Countryside Alliance) and this will be further exacerbated by pursuing these wind farms.

THEY ARE BOTH A MONEY LOSER AND A VOTE LOSER.

The climate will certainly look after itself! I recently watched Al Gore’s film, ‘An Inconvenient Truth’. It was riddled with so many scientific errors that I spent most of the duration of the film in fits of giggles.

Faced with the choice of 5,000 wind turbines destroying the countryside or one coal-fired power station, (the equivalent in energy output), it is surely preferable to choose the coal option. These new coal-fired power stations would create infinitely more new jobs than the wind option.

Our economy needs more help right now than the climate.

Because of such issues, it seems prudent to continue the investment in coal-fired power stations, although the EU directive is making this very difficult.

With a lot of input from Caroline Lucas, Green MEP, the EU decided that coal-fired power stations must be curtailed. While I am not saying that this form of energy is perfect I have noticed a strange conundrum. In the bid to combat “global warming” some scientists have suggested pumping sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere. Sulphur particles act as a coolant by reflecting the sun’s rays back into space.

Paradoxically one of the complaints against coal-fired power stations is that they emit sulphur dioxide and therefore are considered dirty! So we seemed to have gone around in a complete circle here! It seems that coal-fired power stations will both cool the planet via the sulphur emissions, and warm it via the carbon emissions! Something to keep everyone happy! I think I will sign off here because this letter could become interminably long and boring.

Best wishes,

Susan

IMPRESSIONISM

Impressionism And The Post Impressionists

Nowadays everybody knows that Impressionist paintings are very colourful and filled with life.

Yet when the Impressionist paintings were first exhibited in France they were met with great derision and hoots of laughter.

This is because the style of painting was completely new to the public and unlike anything that the Victorians were used to.

The cartoonists made merry and wrote satires about the new style of painting.

They considered it to be crude and rough and not very precise. At the time people were very conventional about art and had expectations from their artists.

Impressionism was the first great modern movement in art.

Because of this it’s had a large struggle to convince the art buying public.

Later in the next century, when Cubism appeared, it found easier acceptance because of the great struggle that had preceded it.

Impressionist painters such as Renoir, Manet, Monet, and Degas embarked on a new artistic journey.

The result was a wonderful collection of light filled pictures.

Many of these paintings were done outside in the fresh air to capture the moving speckles of sunlight and flickering shadows.

This is very important to the paintings as in a studio you would not get these speckles of sunlight.

Painting outdoors made it possible for the artists to capture fleeting effects, caused by changes in the weather and light.

It made it possible to catch movement in nature.

Colours were greatly enhanced by the light and reflections.

Shadows which are normally seen as black or grey, now became sprinkled with little colours.

The art critics were puzzled by the way the brush strokes were not smoothly blended in.

Instead the canvases were covered with small touches and strokes of colour.

So two colours that would have been mixed by a traditional artist, were now kept separate and unmixed. This created a whole new way of paintings.

So Impressionist art had a feeling of capturing momentary effects.

Many impressionists preferred to use light pastel colours which gave their paintings a gay, sunny and happy feeling.

During the 1870s Renoir created some of his most enchanting works with sun dappled scenes.

The artist Degas liked to paint in pastels of dancers and used indefinite textures.

Many impressionist paintings seemed slightly blurred as if the seer has lost his glasses and cannot see the world clearly.

Also when rain is pouring down against the window and I look out of the window I see everything as blurred and looking like an impressionist painting.

I sometimes wonder if this is where they got the idea from.

Post impressionist artists include Cezanne and Van Gogh.

Van Gogh also used many small rough brush strokes in vivid colour and not blended in.

The effect is really striking and makes the paintings jump alive.

Sadly Van Gogh did not live very long as he shot himself in a field of corn.

I have been inspired by Van Gogh and his pictures of paintings of shoes which I have used in my lost and found study of shoes.

These artists were great pioneers of their day as they were doing something completely different.

Many of these artists were mocked and ridiculed for not conforming to the classical and realistic style of painting.

In the old fashioned style of painting the

COAL MINING ERRORS

Published Oxford Mail

May 2008 Susan Thomas

Sir,

I agree that the closure of the coalmines was a terrible mistake for our country.

There is now a higher rate of depression and unemployment because of this.

Once proud miners are reduced to claiming incapacity benefit and we are having to import our coal.

Our country desperately needs new coal fired power stations such as Kingsnorth and I certainly do not believe that it will cause any climate change as Caroline Lucas Green MEP fanatically claims.

It will provide jobs and electricity and is a sensible project.

In the days when one of my great grandfathers was Director General of the mines, COAL WAS KING, and Britain was a proud industrial nation and the richest country in the world.

Our Government is going down the right path in opening a new coal fired power station.

Maybe they could even think about re-opening some of our coalmines?

POLITICAL SEX SCANDALS

Political Sex Scandals , Oxford Mail Susan Thomas

2008

Sir,

It was amusing to see Michael Gove, MP, on TV recently with a couple of soft porn magazines by his side.
What was all this about I wondered? I decided to forgo an early night to hear what he had to say. He was expounding the virtues of living the puritan lifestyle.
Immediately a wave of Conservative scandals flooded into my memory, somewhat mischievously.
The last Conservative Government under John Major was bursting at the seams with sleaze and scandal. There was Jeffery Archer and his dalliance with loose women and then there was David Mellor and his toe sucking escapades with a Spanish beauty.

Let us not forget the unbridled passion between John Major and the blue stockinged Edwina Currie.
Going back further to the swinging sixties there was the Profumo affair. The sixties were the time of the Cold War and the Reds were lurking under the beds, or a Soviet Naval Attaché, to be more precise!
Theoretically a security risk was posed by all this risqué behaviour. So poor John Profumo had to resign as War Minister.
David Cameron was attempting to deep clean and white wash his Party's image with the angelic looking Michael Gove. It really was quite amusing to watch this sanctimonious piety with all these memories of Tory sex scandals!

BARONESS SCOTLAND

Oxford Mail, September 2009 Susan Thomas

Sir,

There has been a lot of controversy recently about the behaviour of Baroness Scotland who has flouted her own immigration laws.

It seems that not only has she made a mistake about the passport of her employee, but she is now alleging that thousands of pounds worth of jewellery has disappeared from her home in an attempt to slur her cleaner from Tonga.

This is not very satisfactory conduct from a Law Lord.

However, I always felt that the worst crime was committed when she wrote that awful book, "Ugly", which demonised her own hardworking mother who had sacrificed so much to bring up her daughter. This poor lady had to sew buttons on cardboard for hours to support her ten children. Instead of showing gratitude and compassion towards her long-suffering mother, the Baroness chose to attack this impoverished lady and ridicule her in the public arena.

The book she wrote chose to focus on all the shortcomings and peccadilloes of her poor mother who later challenged her daughter unsuccessfully in court about this character assassination.

The Baroness should be ashamed of herself. Her mother should be reaping the rewards of her daughter’s financial success after enduring such a difficult life bringing up her large family. Instead she has had to endure further suffering and humiliation.

The Bible teaches us to always "respect and honour thy Mother and Father".

All parents have shortcomings but we should never show disrespect towards those who have sacrificed so much to bring us into the world.

HABEAS CORPUS

CONCERNING HABEAS CORPUS AND 42 DAY DETENTION

Sir,

There are several anomalies and inconsistencies in the view points of civil liberty campaigners Shami Chakrabarti and David Davis.

I recently watched a very edifying episode of David Dimbleby which included the former Shadow Home Secretary David Davis on the panel.

The extremely astute Mr Dimbleby managed to expose the shallowness of David Davis’s stance on civil liberties.

David Davis rather unwisely let it be known that he had supported the incarceration of suspects for 28 days even though half had subsequently been proven to be innocent.

David Dimbleby immediately pounced on this half hearted support of Habeas Corpus and grilled the mortified Conservative MP.

“So you think it is alright to lock up suspects for 28 days but not for 42 days, even though half of these detainees have subsequently been found innocent?”, Mr Dimbleby asked the hapless MP.

There could be no backtracking now for the exposed civil liberties campaigner. “Yes” he replied, “That’s right, that’s what I said”.

Me Dimbleby was completely stupefied and amused by his response and muttered something along the lines of “Either you support Habeas Corpus or you don’t.”

David Davis was left looking an absolute fool by the perspicacious David Dimbleby.

Civil liberties campaigner Shami Chakrabarti has also been exposed as a sympathiser of the Country Alliance and the campaign for blood sports. David Davis even wants to bring back hanging!

I think it is a great shame that the other main parties are not fielding a candidate for the Yorkshire by-election as they would stand a reasonable chance of winning. It is quite apparent that David Davis is interested only in making a political name for himself following his failed leadership bid for the Conservative Party.

IAN HUDSPETH MISTAKES

June 20^th, 2008 Susan Thomas

Oxford Mail

Sir,

It seems that every time Oxfordshire County Council pours money into a new traffic scheme, it ends in disaster.

At least Ian Hudspeth, the cabinet member for transport, has had the decency to admit that they have got it all wrong in Abingdon (Oxford Mail, June 10)

An awful lot of residents are unhappy with the ill conceived scheme.

The £3.1m squandered on a fatuous strategy would have been better diverted to other departments, such as social services for the elderly.

If the whole transport department had taken itself off to the Bahamas with the money, the roads of Oxfordshire would probably be in a safer and better condition.

It is not only Mr Hudspeth who makes mistakes, however.

His transport predecessor, David Robertson, managed to turn Cowley Road, Oxford, into a wibbly, wobbly way, without the aid of psychedelics !

Again, a mere two million pounds was spent on this innovative layout to ensure a reasonably nerve rackimg experience for cyclist and motorist alike.

Let us not forget the hapless motorist who wrote in to complain about the hazards of the new Hamburger roundabout in London Road. Apparently his vehicle had been hit twice since the new roundabout was installed at a great financial cost.

Gosh! Only twice! I thought they were aiming tor at least twenty with their TWENTY IS PLENTY scheme.
~

It never ceases to amaze me that the Highways Department is blessed with such a large budget.

LOOMING ENERGY GAP POWER CUTS