5th April 2023
By Christopher 'Chopper' Hope The Telegraph |
Afternoon, |
Wednesday, 5 April 2023
The time of ‘peak SNP’ is almost over - Chopper's Politics
Sunday, 30 October 2022
Nicola Sturgeon’s plans for an independent Scotland rubbished by leading economist
Nicola Sturgeon's plan to kickstart the economy of an independent Scotland through North Sea oil and gas revenues has been rubbished by a world-leading economist behind Norway's £1 trillion oil fund.
https://uk.yahoo.com/news/nicola-sturgeon-plans-independent-scotland-173156790.html
In her keynote speech at the SNP conference earlier this month, The First Minister said a £20 billion fund would be created within the first 10 years of independence to keep the country's economy afloat.
The “Building a New Scotland Fund” would be bankrolled by North Sea revenues, Scottish Government borrowing and other “windfall income”, the SNP leader has said.
However, Tony Mackay, an Inverness-based economist who first proposed establishing a wealth fund with Norway's oil and gas revenues alongside economist Terje Lind in the early seventies, told the Sunday Times it was “extremely doubtful” there would be enough oil and gas production in the North Sea to finance the fund.
Mr Mackay, who now serves as an adviser to Norway's energy ministry, told the The Sunday Times: “The Norwegian oil fund has been very successful, more successful than I ever imagined.
“However, I have many doubts over this proposal for a New Scotland Fund because I believe future oil and gas revenues will be very small in the first decade of independence.
“North Sea oil and gas production has declined massively in recent years as many fields have ceased production. Only a few remain in comparison with the 1970-2000 period.”
“The SNP's policy towards future developments is far from clear and the Scottish Greens are strongly opposed. How a New Scotland Fund would be financed is therefore very unclear.”
His comments come ahead of a planned visit from the newly-elected Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to Scotland who will also hold a meeting with Douglas Ross, the Scottish Tory leader, on Monday to discuss resetting the strategy on the Union.
While an exact date has not yet been announced, Mr Sunak is expected to arrive “in the next few weeks,” The Herald reported.
Nationalist campaigners have long used the North Sea Oil industry to convince Scottish voters of the benefits of independence.
During the “Yes” campaign in 2014, Alex Salmond repeatedly said the industry belonged to Scotland alone.
The proposed fund has provoked a backlash from environmentalists who have accused Ms Sturgeon of reneging on her promise to shift away from fossil fuels and drive towards net-zero carbon emissions.
A Scottish government spokesman has insisted it is still opposed to new oil and gas exploration in the North Sea and that “unlimited extraction of fossil fuels is not consistent with our climate obligations”.
Question marks about the fund’s viability is the latest in a series of blows to the SNP’s economic strategy for an independent Scotland.
Last week, Ms Sturgeon had to fend off accusations of lying after experts and EU insiders excoriated her insistence a separate Scotland in the EU could avoid committing to the euro and move to a Scottish pound.
Rejecting the accusation by Mr Ross, she argued that a range of existing EU members did not use the single currency.
However, Mr Ross pointed out that all countries in the EU have to commit to the single currency, with insiders warning that the rules would be more stringently applied to new members since the Brexit vote in 2016.
He cited four unnamed Brussels sources in a report from The Times who stated a separate Scotland would have to commit to the euro, with one saying: “No euro, no membership.”
https://uk.yahoo.com/news/nicola-sturgeon-plans-independent-scotland-173156790.html
Monday, 10 October 2022
Liz Truss forces Department for Education into embarrassing climbdown over China policy
Liz Truss forced the Department for Education into an embarrassing climbdown over China policy ...
Liz Truss forced the Department for Education into an embarrassing climbdown over China policy when it issued a surprise statement backing the controversial Confucius Institutes.
A Departmental source had told The Telegraph that China is a “leading member of the international community” when the Department defended the Chinese centres in universities.
In a furious backlash, Conservative MPs told Liz Truss to “put her money where her mouth is” on China and overrule the Department.
The Prime Minister on Sunday ordered the Education Secretary Kit Malthouse to revise his Department’s language on China following the backlash. Downing Street and the Foreign Office required the Department to issue a revised statement, The Telegraph was told.
A Government spokesman said: “The Prime Minister’s determination to stand up to China is unwavering and the UK government is committed to doing more to adapt to China’s growing impact.”
He added: “As with any international collaboration, universities have a responsibility to ensure that any partnership with a Confucius Institute is managed appropriately and the right due diligence is in place. We would encourage any providers with concerns to contact the government.”
The 30 institutes were set up in partnership with the Chinese Government to deliver culture and language classes. However, a report by the Henry Jackson Society found that the vast majority are engaged in other activities, from political lobbying to expanding China’s reach into advanced manufacturing. Researchers also alleged that staff at some institutes in the UK are having their political views and ethnic backgrounds filtered by Chinese officials.
In an initial response to the report, a Department for Education source had said: “China is a leading member of the international community, and we have a strong and constructive relationship with China in many areas.”
'Openness and freedom of expression'
A spokesperson for the Department had said that the institutes are “required to operate transparently and with a full commitment to our values of openness and freedom of expression.” The Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill, which is currently passing through Parliament, “addresses concerns about the possible influence of overseas money in English Higher Education whilst ensuring that lawful freedom of speech is supported to the fullest extent,” the spokesperson added.
The U-turn came after Sir Iain Duncan-Smith, the former Conservative leader who is running to become the next chairman of the foreign affairs select committee, said: “If Liz Truss wants to be tougher on China, then let her put her money where her mouth is. And the first thing you’re going to do is ban bloody Confucius Institutes. Out. All together. Gone.” He said the prime minister must “overrule [her] education department and say that they’re not welcome here.”
He added: “I don’t know who authorised this statement…It’s a shocker really.”
Tim Loughton, a Conservative MP, said a group of MPs has called for an “urgent meeting” with Kit Malthouse over the “deeply disappointing” statement, which he said was “completely out of line with current Government thinking”.
Rishi Sunak pledged to ban the institutes, which he said are being used to promote “Chinese soft power”, during his leadership campaign. Ms Truss said she had been much more willing than Mr Sunak to stand up to Beijing.
Bob Seely, another Tory MP, said: “I am a little bit concerned about it, because in some countries Confucius Institutes have been shut down, because they’re a means by which China spies on its students in this country. The Government has made clear its commitment to having a stronger approach to China, and I think Confucius Institutes have to be part of that approach.”
The Government could grant itself the power to ban the institutes via amendments to bills going through parliament including Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill and the National Security Bill. In other countries such as Sweden they have been banned. The US has clamped down on Confucius Institutes by restricting funding to any university that hosts them. In 2013, McMaster University in Ontario, Canada, shut down its institute after a lecturer lodged a discrimination complaint that her religious beliefs were being suppressed.
The Chinese embassy has defended the work of the institutes, saying the “educational exchanges between China and the UK” should be seen “in an objective and sensible manner” and “the huge public interest in learning more about Chinese language and culture” should be “respected and recognised”.
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Tuesday, 13 September 2022
The coffin fit for a Queen – and why it is lined with lead
The casket was manufactured by the same specialist firm that produced the Duke of Edinburgh’s coffin
Queen Elizabeth’s coffin was made more than 30 years ago by the same firm that made the lead-lined casket in which the Duke of Edinburgh lies interred.
Royal coffins are traditionally made from well-seasoned oak from the Sandringham estate, but precise details about the manufacture of the late Queen’s coffin are thought to have been lost in the decades since it was ordered.
The lead-lined casket - which is effectively a coffin within a coffin - was made by the specialist firm Henry Smith, which closed in 2005 and which also made the Duke of Edinburgh's coffin, as well as those of celebrities including Diana Dors, Freddie Mercury and Jimi Hendrix.
The brass handles and other fitments, which include clasps to hold the Imperial State Crown, orb and sceptre in place when they are placed on the coffin for the lying in state, are thought to have been made by the Birmingham foundry Newman Brothers, which is no longer in business.
Until the 1990s, the casket was maintained by the London-based funeral director JH Kenyon Ltd, which handled the funerals of King George VI in 1952 and Winston Churchill in 1965.
When another London firm, Leverton and Sons, took over responsibility for royal funerals in 1991, the Queen’s coffin was passed on to the company, which has little detail about when or how it was made other than that it was before that year.
Andrew Leverton, who runs the family business, told The Times in 2018: “It is made from English oak, which is very difficult to get hold of. Oak coffins are now made from American oak. I don’t think we could use English oak for a coffin now. It would be too expensive.”
The coffin has to be lined with lead because the Queen will be interred in the King George VI Memorial Vault, rather than given a traditional burial. It is so heavy that it requires eight pallbearers, rather than the usual six.
Henry Smith made coffins using a method called lead shell and case, in which a simple inner coffin is made of wood, covered in lead and then placed inside an outer coffin.
When Henry Smith closed in 2005, the company was taken over by T Cribb & Sons, of Beckton, east London. However, the order books did not survive the takeover, according to a spokesman for the firm, meaning the precise date of manufacture has been lost.
It would have taken around a week to make, and was in storage for so long that the brass handles, made to a design called “royal gothic”, were replaced by Levertons after they took possession of it.
Although Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral will, naturally, be the most prestigious ever undertaken by Levertons, the firm - established in 1789 - handled the funerals of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, Princess Margaret, Margaret Thatcher, George Orwell, Michael Foot and Peter O’Toole, among others.
Mr Leverton told The Times that in some ways Thatcher's funeral “put more pressure on us”, because for a state funeral the arrangements are handled by the Earl Marshal and coffin bearers are provided by the Armed Forces - limiting the involvement of the funeral directors themselves.
“We have to attend meetings and help with practices. There are practice coffins which are weighted appropriately. We are a relatively small cog in a very big machine,” said Mr Leverton.
“For a normal funeral we have very close contact with the family. We take instructions from the Royal Household, not, obviously, directly from the Royal family.”