Cllr. Gavin Ayling

As promised, I have included Dig in the Ribs’ (Brighton) reply below (quoted precisely). I have to say I am reassured by this e-mail and I will ensure the information that was requested is provided.

If you receive appalling service from a Brighton restaurant, let me know because this site appears near the top on Google searches due to the number of visitors and links.

Their reply:

People, since power shifted away from the nomadic tribe’s elder towards a monarch or bureaucracy, have been annoyed with their rulers for imposing tax.

Those in power fail, a lot of the time, to put through the reforms they wish to because so much time is spent on deciding how much tax to levy and what to spend that money on without focussing on the key element - what will be delivered. If a government could know how much money people were willing to give up of their earnings, then they’d be able to look at what needs to be spent and allocate funds as they see fit. This isn’t too far from Gordon Brown’s experiment with the Bank of England - take control of interest rates away from meddling Chancellors and let politics and economics stay as separate as they really are.

Now it isn’t true that tax is separate in the same way as interest rates are, but it is fair to say that the electorate regularly likes the policies of a government, but not their tax policy or vice versa. What if there was a way to separate these two issues and allow the blame for value for money to rest fairly and squarely on one group’s shoulders?

I think there may be. I suggest two parliaments,

• One that is elected based upon the amount of tax they wish to levy on the people, a “tax parliament”, and
• One that uses that money to run the country, a “policy parliament”

The people would elect a group of people who would decide tax levels not based on the policies they’ll pay for, but based on the amount of money the elecorate is willing to pay. The people, when making their choice, would balance their desire to pay, with their desire to have public services.

The “policy parliament” would then be given the funds that have been raised by the “tax parliament” and allocate them as the people preferred (having voted for this parliament based on their policies).

With the parliament as it is currently made up, if Gordon Brown (or any number of his predecessors) runs out of money, he just raises taxes as carefully as he can to make up for these earlier mistakes. This does not compel Mr Brown to be as frugal as he would be were he running a home, private company or anything else that uses money in the real world. It is possible under the proposed scheme, that the vote would show that people really do wish to spend inordinate amounts of their earnings on paying for public services. If this were the case, a government would have a clear and guilt-free mandate to spend more money than they do currently.

There are obvious complications to this plan including but probably not limited to:

• Stealth taxes and whether a flat tax would become a requirement
• Corporation tax and how people would vote on something that they normally have no involvement in
• What would happen to tax as policy
• What would happen if people voted for a severely conservative “tax parliament”
• What would happen if a conservative “policy parliament” failed to spend the liberal “tax parliament’s” levy

I will revisit this topic at a later date with some more thoughts… Let me have yours below.

Wells Bombardier is running a a campaign to have St George’s Day recognised as a bank holiday.

As English patriots and campaigners for democratic justice, it is a good idea for all readers to add their names to this petition.

Rehabilitation assumes a child-parent relationship between the criminal and state. Rehabilitation has been used, by so-called liberals, as an excuse for providing luxurious accomodation in prisons. I believe in individual freedom - to the extent that I would abolish if I could, many of the UK’s laws that inhibit personal freedom for no-one’s benefit - but with freedom comes responsibility and, particularly, responsibility for one’s actions.

A Tangled Web has rightly observed that Clarke’s rhetoric about local prisons is yet more pandering to the rejects of society. We must be thankful the Liberal Democrats aren’t more popular - then criminals would have the vote.

A Tangled Web also, rightly, makes the distinction between the majority of prisoners, who are there for nasty crimes, from those like the retired vicar imprisoned for not paying the unreasonable 8% increase in his Council Tax.

See ATW’s post.

Dig in the Ribs is a restaurant in Preston Street in Brighton. Those of you who know Brighton, will know that Preston Street is a street of many restaurants so, if you’re in the area, you can easily change your mind about going to Dig in the Ribs.

I was dining with someone who does not eat pork and the waiter was unsympathetic and unhelpful when asked about the contents of one item. Poor service, but not the end of the world until….

You’ll know from a previous post that I have coeliac disease which means I am unable to eat foods containing wheat flour (or, more correctly, gluten). I provided the waiter with the Dietary Card (which I also mentioned in the earlier post) and explained that I am unable to eat foods with gluten in them and asked him if he knew whether there was anything in the nachos. The waiter’s initial reaction was to say “I don’t know”!

I was surprised because when eating in many restaurants in Brighton, London, Paris and elsewhere, I have rarely been treated to that reaction. Normally a waiter(ess) offers to go and find out. I suggested gently that he did that.

On his return the waiter said that a lot of their food was sweet and that “very, very, very little” could be eaten by me. I did not bother to explain to the poor chap that I can eat steak, as I had previously, but I did explain that gluten is not glucose.

The chef (maybe) had seen the Dietary Card which is not subtle in explaining what I am unable to eat, so the reference to sweetness is extremely worrying. Companies have, since the Disability Act came into force, been obliged to provide equal services for the disabled and able-bodied. I would not expect people to go to extraordinary lengths, but to tell me I cannot eat anything when I can identify items on their menu myself, is terrible for a restaurant.

Because we were on Preston Street, we went to Cafe Royal instead. Cafe Royal were told the story (but not shown the card) and I referred to my food intolerance by talking about wheat flour. On dishing up my modified food (no sausage and two eggs instead of one) the waitress said “One gluten free breakfast”. 10/10 for Cafe Royal, 0/10 for Dig in the Ribs.

The following restaurants go to extraordinary lengths to help provide gluten free food:

• Donatello’s, Brighton (they even provide gluten free pasta)
• Pinnochios’, Brighton (they even provide gluten free pasta)
• The Emperor of China, Brighton Marina
• Imperial China, Worthing
• The Old Ship Inn, nr. Lewes
• Thai Elephant, Peacehaven
• Memories of India, Brighton Marina
• A Taste of India, Brighton
• Nooris, Brighton
• Others I am sure I have forgotten…

Dig in the Ribs - one to avoid!

I read the following this evening and I thought you’d like to share in the delight of reading Aslan’s words.

The e-mail below was written further to an e-mail conversation that I mentioned previously:

Link to the post

Typing secrets on your keyboard may not be safe for much longer. Prying eyes are not all that is needed according to the following Scientific American article: Sounds of Typing Give Messages Away.

During conversation today it was suggested to me that to talk of an “English Parliament”, “England” or to speak of the “English” may imply something to do with being white.

Let me make it quite clear, the reason that I and others in the CEP want an English Parliament is entirely political. We want equity with the Scottish, freedom from the British parliament (and so-called Scottish Raj) and democracy closer to the voters.

People like Yasmin Alibhai-Brown completely miss the point: click here for more info.

Update: Wonko has made an excellent contribution to this story and I urge you to read his post: The advance of the police state.

My concerns about government increasing its power to detain and to treat people inhumanely and to insist on branding them like cattle by imposing ID cards, have mostly been about the principle. I took it as a given that the UK’s government was largely trustworthy and unlikely to take political prisoners or otherwise abuse its power.

Then I set to thinking about the EU and how much power Thatcher, Major and Blair have given away with the Single European Act, Maastricht and Nice respectively. I wondered about their gung ho attitude to what is largely accepted as the majority opinion in England and, despite Scotland, the UK. If the government is willing to treat the electorate like that, what might they do with:

• ID cards
• the power to imprison without being:
  • allowed to question why;
  • allowed to ask what evidence is held; or
  • given a trial
• The power to restrict and stop peaceful protest

Trust betrayed
Then the Blair government made sounds to suggest it could invoke anti-terror legislation to keep fuel protests being repeated as in 2000.

This makes me angry.

It isn’t just an abuse of power over constitutional change. That could be undone in the future when the EDP or Tories take power (under a new leader). This is an open threat to those who would protest that if they do, they will be treated like terrorists. Let us remember that the terrorists that this legislation was written for, were people willing to commit multiple murder. That they may use this legislation this way is stating that peaceful and legal civil disobedience shall no longer be allowed. It is a suggestion that the state has primacy over the individual.

This is morally wrong in so many ways. Not even the socially conservative Thatcher government would stoop to such levels - and they invoked Clause 28.

At the next election (because our constitution does not allow for a popular recall) we must take these despots out of power. If you are reading this and were brought up by someone who told you

ignore them for the next election because England cannot and should not cope with more erosions of civil liberty.

Once again Justify This has found an ‘oversight’ of the British media: Click here.

It is a worrying that terrorist organisations may be gaining, or learning to exert, power in the Gaza strip. Ariel Sharon should not consider further withdrawals from the West Bank until it is clear how this power struggle is going to pan out in Gaza.

This is my new ‘WordPress’ blog on my own webspace… I’ll look at changing its appearance now…

To view the real blog, click here.

I’ve been having more and more frequent visits from people in France, Turkey and the United States. Welcome!

Blowing your own trumpet always sounds better than listening to someone else’s… Or maybe that’s just me!

Anyway, I thought I’d share with you how clever the BBC’s editors are and how consistent.

First they placed my response on their Action Network on the front page for a day - it pleased me a little, I have to say.

Second, today they’ve used my photo as the main photo of the Noticeboard:

The caption says “photo by Gavin Ayling”. How very exciting for me only!

The following picture shows another view of the planned new Frank Gehry King Alfred in Brighton & Hove.

I know you want them so let me know if you find any other pictures and I’ll include them here.

David Davis has shown, in one speech, why he is the leader the Conservatives and, indeed, England, need.

He has made an impassioned speech that talks of the very basis of his beliefs and looks to his origins. David Davis has said what everyone secretly knew but couldn’t articulate - that England needs opportunity for all not limited by a welfare state but augmented by state-sponsored compassion.

I commend David Davis and hope he wins the leadership contest.

See:

• The BBC’s article; and
• David Davis for Leader Blog

COMMENTS FROM OLD BLOG: Click here

Knowing, as I do from individual research, that the Daily Mail cannot be trusted to tell the truth the whole time, I am making this post despite my reservations.

According to the Daily Mail Weekend magazine’s review of Murder Blues, a BBC1 program airing as I write, London is the 3rd worst city in the world for gun shootings. When you consider that this is in ‘competition’ with cities like Los Angeles, Rio de Janeiro, Nottingham and any number of third world and other US cities, that is truly shocking.

The US is world renowned for having legal, even protected, gun ownership - the so-called “Right to bear arms”. And yet they manage to only have a maximum (as I don’t know what the top two are) of two cities above London? Incredible.

SEERA is the South East England Regional Assembly. It is an assembly set up by the Labour government which is unelected but which makes decisions above the County Councils which are elected.

The Regional Assemblies of England are part of the EU’s plan of creating a “Europe of Regions” with areas of size similar to the German Lander. The English need a parliament and they don’t want these Regional Assemblies. The North East were given a referendum on an elected regional assembly because the government and their Liberal Democrat allies thought that the North East was the region most likely to agree to be split from England. Click here for the result.

Now the SEERA has released a news release stating that they must be consulted (an elected body must defer) on planning applications that have “regional significance”. We must remember, dear readers, that these regions have no historic or cultural merit and are designed purely to contain the right number of people. The “regional significance” that the SEERA refers to is a significance that happens to have bearing over an arbitrary area drawn within England.

It seems obvious to me, and probably every other person who doesn’t have a vested interest in the EU or splitting the English nation for political ends (for there are significant advantages for Labour in resplitting England along lines other than its real borders which house mostly Conservative voters), that an English Parliament should be making these decisions for us, not unelected ‘representatives’.

I found this parliamentary transcript courtesy of Hansard which was transcribed as the Conservatives former MP, Teresa Gorman, proposed an English Parliament to countenance the Scottish Parliament and Welsh assembly in 1998: Hansard transcript. In it Mrs Gorman makes observations and predictions that are spot-on. Some of the things mentioned in the debate have already happened and others are likely to happen yet.

Unfortunately, an English Parliament is not yet Conservative policy, so I urge you to write to your MP. The people of England are the ones who can make a change in this policy which is one of the most dangerous pro-EU policies at the moment.

Thank goodness the application was passed: Brighton Council’s article.

This is a partial success on the way to an exciting proposal that is taking a frustratingly long time to get even this far. The site confirms that there is yet more bureaucracy to get through. For more information about the design etc, try the following page: The plans.

Update: Thanks to John for his comment. The post on his site is excellent and I recommend you visit it.