Honorary Proletarian

Oxford’s on flood alert again - some areas near the city have actually been flooded and walls of sandbags are going up on the Botley Road.  The Environment Agency advises us not to panic, but the river channel across the road from my flat is at full capacity; and besides, no-one in Britain is going to trust the Environment Agency after last summer.

I really don’t see the point of the Environment Agency.  They refuse to build effective flood defences because (they say) they’re too expensive, and they insist that de-silting river channels is unnecessary.  Every time it rains heavily the Thames turns brown with all the mud and other things washed down from the Cotswolds.  This sinks to the bottom of the channel and builds up the bed, thus reducing the capacity of the channel and increasing the likelihood of a flood.  It’s so simple you’d think even an expert could understand it - but apparently not.  So what does the Environment Agency actually do?  Apart, that is, from turning up whenever something bad happens and shouting “Don’t panic, Captain Mainwaring”?

In other news, a superabundance of a different kind looks likely to come to Parliament.  Today’s papers report that an independent review body has recommended above-inflation pay rises for MPs for the next three years.  The hypocrisy of this, when Gordon Brown is trying his utmost to limit public-sector pay rises to 2%, effectively a pay cut, is staggering.  There’s not much sign of pay restraint in the corridors of power.

MPs are already paid more than £60,000 a year as basic salary, and on average claim nearly twice this in expenses.  Now for an active MP the expenses at least are actually necessary - paying several caseworkers, sending out thousands of letters a month etc. is very expensive.  Even some MPs who I otherwise vehemently disagree with are scrupulously honest to the point of annoying their Westminster colleagues, and must be acknowledged to spend literally every penny on representation and campaigning.  But the controls over MPs’ spending are often more honoured in the bnreach than the observance, and they didn’t prevent Iain Duncan Smith, for example, from paying a big wodge to his wife.  Jobs for the boys (and girls) anyone?  Get a job as a Tory Parliamentary bag-carrier.  The Labour equivalents are, generally speaking, not so well-paid, and I sometimes think what they need is a couple of good shop stewards and a short period of carefully targetted industrial action…!

P.S.  How’s this for a shameless bit of capitalist propaganda masquerading as “news” on the MSN email sign-out page?  Isn’t capitalism great, equal opportunities for all, everyone who works really hard becomes a multi-millionaire!  Remember, it could be you…but it won’t be.