Tax and Marriage? Do they go together like a horse and carriage?

I hadn’t thought I was going to post anything this side of Christmas now, but the story on the BBC website (here) detailing a new Conservative green paper on encouraging marriage has roused me from my stupor!

My first question is this: is this not the kind of government interference usually eschewed by those of a Conservative bent? Government has no business compiling huge databases, should not interfere in the markets and definitely ought to steer clear of child-raising, they usually cry. So why do they care what my or anyone else’s domestic arrangements are, and why are they planning on offering a tax break to encourage marriage?

The answer is obvious; children raised in stable households turn out as better human beings. This is very difficult to argue with and frankly, I am not going to, as I happen to agree with it. What I don’t agree with is the assertion that you have to be married to provide a stable environment for kids. And I certainly don’t agree that people should be incentivised to remain married, when sometimes the best for all parties is divorce!

Numerous reports have shown stability is vital to a child’s development but a recent report from Cornell University showed that one group of kids performed worse than those from ‘broken, unstable homes.’ This group consisted of children from families who had remained together for the monetary benefits, but probably would have been served by separating.

The Tory proposals lead onto to further, obvious questions; what about children raised by same-sex couples? Will they get the tax break? And what about widows and widowers? They are not single out of choice, nor are they any less ‘stable’ environments just for their misfortune.

It is not government’s job to encourage marriage or any other domestic arrangement. A stable environment for children can be provided for in any number of ways, it is just a question of finding the right option for the individuals in question. No matter what David Cameron might say, these proposals do create a system whereby some family set-ups are deemed second-class. For once, I agree with Ed Balls!

P

Worst Crapital Disconnect

I am sure that by now most interested people are aware that this year First Group will receive a subsidy of approximately £140m from the Government (i.e. us). This is due to clauses in their franchise contracts that mean the Government (i.e. us) cover up to 80 per cent in any shortfalls in anticipated revenue. This is across all rail lines currently operated by First Group. (See here for the Guardian story.)

Now, I must at this point declare an interest. I am a regular commuter on the Thameslink line of First Capital Connect, so have been subject to the recent cancellations, delays and disruption on that line. It is therefore clear that on this topic, I might have an axe to grind.

I find it absolutely horrendous that we are still passing on government (i.e. our) money to this organisation, despite an inferior level of service and massive disruptions over the past two months. It is saying a lot that since they took over the service in early 2007, it has gotten worse. The old Thameslink franchise holder was not perfect by any means but the current lot make them look like operators par excellence.

All of this is against a background of increased fares too. My season ticket last year increased from £345.60 to £374.40, a rise of 8.3 per cent. This was against average increases (because the TOCs are allowed to aggregate the rises!) of 6 per cent. To be fair to FCC, they have said fares will either remain the same or fall in 2010 (here.)

And finally, we get to the current problems. On Thameslink, First Group have been operating on the assumption that they can rely on the goodwill of their drivers to work overtime and on their rest days to run the level of service they propose. This has recently been exposed as a sham, as drivers have refused and FCC have been forced to decimate their services.

In this instance, I do have a lot of sympathy for the drivers. Management are to blame for this, not having trained up more drivers, knowing (or at least I hope they knew) that something like this could happen, owing to current staffing levels. Perhaps they could have put some of the £51m profit they made in 2008 towards hiring and training more drivers?!

So, in short, I hope the government (i.e. us) finds some way to punish First Group for their incompetence and recoup some of the millions they (i.e. we) are chucking down their gullet. God knows we commuters, who have very little choice when it comes to how we get to work, are paying too high a price at the moment.

Trafigura up to their old tricks

So, it seems Trafigura and Carter Ruck solicitors are once again making a strong case for a law guaranteeing free speech. Apparently, trying to silence the Guardian from reporting matters of public record was not enough and now they have the BBC in their sights. A Newsnight story was deemed too inconveniently true for the wayward multinational and writs ensued, forcing Auntie to remove the offending article from their website.

Anyway, at certain other bloggers' suggestion, I present in all its glory the proscribed piece for your consumption:

The Express are idiots - here are 5 reasons why (there are more probably)

OK, by now most people would have seen yesterday's piece in the Express saying anthropogenic climate change is a myth (if someone can post a link, I would be grateful, I can't seem to access the Express website) and it is all a natural process. Whether you agree or not with this stance (and I do not as it goes), I think most people welcome debate on topics such as this; it is a contentious issue. However, the piece detailing 40 reasons why climate change is natural that appeared in the Express was, to put it mildly, rubbish, though not for the reasons you might expect:

1. Repetition - Several of the 'reasons' are repeated, for example one explaining how the 0.7 degrees Celsius is within normal ranges appears as numbers 7 and 16;
2. Irrelevance - Quoting Peter Lilley MP as saying 'fewer people in Britain than in any other country believe in the importance of global warming. That is despite the fact that our government and our political class are more committed to it than their counterparts in any other country.' If anyone can explain how this 'reason' makes climate change natural rather than man-made (other than by a process of wishful thinking) you are cleverer than I am;
3. Further irrelevance - 'Reason' 15 says '...wind farms will do very little or nothing to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.' This maybe true, I have heard tell that turbines take a lot of carbon to manufacture, but why this is a 'reason' for natural climate change is, again, beyond me;
4. Confusion - At one point, the piece tries to argue that while the IPCC expected a 0.2 degree C rise in temperatures between 1998 and 2008, it actually experienced a rise of .7 degrees C +/- .7 degrees C. Now, forgive my maths but .7 is a bigger number than 0.2, isn't it? And even +/- .7 means that it could have risen by as much as 1.4 degrees or as little as zero degrees, so what exactly are they getting at?
5. Out-of-date - apparently climate change is natural because there was a petition signed by scientists called the Heidelberg appeal, given to politicians in June 1992. Now, I am no scientist, but that seems an awfully long time ago now. Back then there were no mobile phones, no Internet, heck John Major had not even won the election that was to be held that year. Is it too much to ask that they might want to publish more up-to-date information?

I am sure cleverer people can find many more holes in the piece than I have, and indeed there is a general debunking doing the rounds, courtesy of the New Scientist that can be found here, but these were issues that occurred to me when I first read the article yesterday.

Again, I am for vigorous debate, however the Express piece in question is ridiculous. To the casual reader, it might seem like there are 40 distinct reasons why climate change is man-made, and it still might be. However, that is not what the Express published yesterday, instead resorting to irrelevant, dated and confused reporting that does nothing to further the debate, merely muddies the water.

N.B. I have tried to write this piece without resorting to my prejudices in favour of a belief in man-made climate change, as I wanted to discuss the journalism displayed by the Express.

P

Play the ball, not the man

There seems to be a worrying trend pervading the world of politics at the moment, one that does not seem to be limited to the United Kingdom's body politic alone, but stretches across the globe. Perhaps it has always been like this but as I am still only in my twenties, I have not noticed it so much.

What I refer to is the current fashion for 'playing the man, rather than the ball' as a good friend of mine put it to me recently. It seems enough, in our political discourse, to merely infer that someone is compromised in some way, that they are the issue rather than their views, policies and agendae. Very often this manifests itself in an attack on the individual concerned, one that is personal and potentially very damaging, and often more than in just words.

Here are four recent examples that have caught my eye:

1. Tory bear vs Christine Quigley - a spat that blew up because of the former's suggestion that the latter was not abiding by the impartiality clauses stipulated by the civil service code. Click here for more.
2. 'Birthers' vs Barack Obama - it seems to me, a movement borne out of the fact they could not accept losing the election in 2008 and so have to conjure up some ridiculous conspiracy theory about the president not being born in the US and so is ineligible. Click here for an excellent debunking.
3. Massimo Tartaglia (alleged) vs Silvio Berlusconi - ok, taking the 'play the man rather the ball' analogy to its most literal conclusion, but it does, in my mind, represent the most extreme form of 'ad hominem' attacks (besides outright assassination, perhaps.) Agree or disagree with Mr Berlusconi, he is not deserving of that kind of treatment, surely? (The same would apply to the eggings received by John Major when he was PM, as well as John Prescott.)
4. Kerry McCarthy MP vs Iain Dale/Shane Greer/Total Politics magazine - finally, something of a controversial one that might get me into some trouble. I like Ms McCarthy a lot, but her feud with Messrs Dale and Greer, and her accusations of bias levelled against TP seem illogical and based more on her prejudices than fact. It all began when a comment (or a joke, perhaps?) by Ms McCarthy on Twitter did not chime particularly well with Mr Greer, resulting in an almighty spat, which continues to rumble to this day.

I don' think all of this is a very healthy place to be in. I hold my own views and I enjoy a robust debate with someone who opposes these as much as the next person, however there seems to be a growing tendency to undermine one's opponents by subjecting them to personal attacks designed to bring their character into question and deflecting attention away from what their views actually are.

This will have two very tangible outcomes, in my opinion. Firstly, it will serve to turn the 'ordinary' voter off. Noone likes to see adults squabbling like children over the most pedantic of issues, not when serious matters are at stake like poverty, equal rights, the condition of the military and the state of the economy. Secondly, those subjected to these attacks are not abstracts; my opinions can take the abuse, and may emerge the better for it, however if a person is subjected to the kind of attacks I have highlighted above, this could have ruinous consequences for them. Berlusconi has lost some teeth, Quigley could have lost her job (and been smeared for life), Obama could have lost the presidency and the reputations of Dale, Greer and TP could be tarnished.

Let's move past this again, and return to political discussion based on policy, not personality. There the attacks might actually do some good.

P