Global Cooling

I  have always been a sceptic when it comes to man-made global warming, mainly in the belief that whilst climate change maybe taking place, there was very little correlation with man's activities over the centuries, and that in any event, such activities are puny compared with nature.

Today, headlines in both the Mail on Sunday and the Sunday Telegraph tell us that the Arctic ice cap has expanded by some 60% during the summer this year, resulting in the Northwest Passage having been blocked for the whole year leading to the cancellation numerous voyages through the passage. Some twenty yachts which were planning to sail through the passage are now marooned in the ice.

This confirms what a friend told me about the Antarctic, a couple of years ago, when he went there on a cruise. At that time the media were reporting that massive icebergs had broken away from the main ice and were giving dire warnings about the shrinking ice cover. In fact, due to pack ice, the ship, a Russian ice-breaker, failed to get as far south as it had in previous years, resulting in the use of the ship's helicopter to visit the sights. The ship apparently had to beat a hasty retreat northwards to avoid getting trapped as the ice was rapidly increasing, and in spite of it being the Antarctic summer, there was a real risk of being trapped.

This new news is, of course, most embarrassing for those scientists who predicted that the Arctic would be ice-free by the summer of 2013, and a boost for those who believe warming stopped during the first few years of this century. The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which was due to meet in October prior to the publication of its fifth assessment report, is now having to hold a "pre-summit" to discuss the situation, as the financing countries are suggesting some 1500 amendments to the draft report because it does not explain what is described as a "pause" in global warming.

Reading these, and other, reports, it is clear that it is no longer possible to claim that an overwhelming consensus of scientists working in this field believe that global warming is taking place; indeed quite a number are now admitting that the warming experienced during the 1980's has now stopped, whilst some of them are going further and are claiming that we are likely to be entering a prolonged period of cooling.

Clearly, this country's energy policy is in need of urgent updating. If there has been no rise in temperatures for the last ten years, a period during which world CO2 output has increased due to activities in India and China, there is now even less reason to believe that man is responsible for global warming. So instead of spending billions on panic renewable energy schemes, and in particular windmills, we need to get fracking fast in order to ensure that our population does not freeze when the world demand for gas and oil rises in the next few years and their prices "hit the roof".

I am waiting to see what the wider media, particularly the BBC, has to say on this matter. So far their has been total silence.

Stafford Hospital - A Police Investigation?

I was going to keep off this subject as I have not had the opportunity to read any detail of the report. However, according to today's Daily Mail, the Health Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, has come round to my way of thinking in that he has called for a police investigation into the Stafford Hospital scandal which led to the deaths of up to 1,200 people. And that is as it should be.
Can you imagine any activity other than the NHS where a business could be suspected of causing that many deaths and not subjected to a rigorous police investigation? Whether it is a factory suspected of causing deaths due to pollution,  a train crashing for any reason or a drug company whose product had an unforeseen side effect, the police would be involved in the investigation right from the start to ensure that the incident was not a result of criminal negligence. At the least there would be a public clamour for corporate manslaughter charges against those at the top of the businesses concerned.

So why no Police investigation so far? Why didn't they ask any questions when the relatives started their campaign to draw public attention to the situation. I appreciate that there would be difficulties as the evidence is partly statistically based and it is hard to use such data to make a case.  But I'm convinced that a police investigation, with witnesses being interviewed under caution, would not only bring out more information than the official report, but would stand a good chance of identifying those with the primary responsibility for these deaths.

And a further thought. Perhaps there is a case for the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) asking why the local force didn't carry out any enquiries when it became apparent that something was wrong. For all that was known at the time, there could have been another Dr Shipman working in the hospital, but seemingly the police didn't care. We should be told exactly what the police, and indeed the local coroner, did or did not do as a result of the public disquiet.
Without such enquiries, all those with major responsibilities, including Sir David Nicholson, now chief executive of the NHS, will get off Scott free.

Raoul Moat - The Cost

According to the Sunday Telegraph, the cost of finding Raoul Moat was in the region of £4 million. One has to expect that such operations are, from time to time, totally necessary and that it is necessary for the taxpayer to bear the cost.
However, what seems totally unnecessary is all the consequential enquiries and their cost. Before the chase had hardly started, the Northumbria Police had referred themselves to the IPCC in case it was considered that they had not acted correctly in respect of the information received from Durham prison.
Then during the chase, they apparently received a 69 page rant from Moat about how he had been treated by the police and how they had ruined his life, presumably by trying to stop him from breaking the law and beating up people. As a result, it seems there will be a further enquiry to ascertain if there is any truth in this rant from a nut case.
It seems that there will also be a further enquiry as to why the police tasered  him just before he shot himself (or why they didn't, as the case may be).
These days the media and various activists seem to want enquiries into virtually everything that happens - why, what is the point? Can anyone name one recent enquiry which was worth the effort? The Hutton enquiry perhaps; the consensus seems to believe it was a cover up. What about Baby P? Well "Lessons will be learnt"!
I don't know what these enquiries cost, but they don't come cheap. If you take into account all the police time involved, the cost of lawyers, the cost of "experts" being wise after the event, as well as the disruption and inconvenience to police officers whom one can reasonably assume were doing their best, for absolutely no benefit except "Lessons to be learnt" there would seem to be far better things which could be done with the money.

A standard Coroner's Inquest should be more than enough.

If the powers that be want something to enquire into they should consider

1. Enquiring into how Moat got two guns so quickly after coming out of prison.
2. Enquiring into whether T/Chief Constable Sue Sim has a hairdresser, and if so how he/she remains in business.

It should cost very little to find the answer to the last question, and the answer will probably be as relevant as any the other questions likely to be asked by the enquiries

Personally, I was just wondering why on earth was an RAF Tornado involved, and where was all the fancy heat-seeking equipment we regularly see used by the police in "real" chases on TV?