Why is Alex Salmond misleading people in order to justify himself ?

Alex Salmond was just on Radio FiveLive justifying why the SNP deserves equal treatment in TV debates with the three main parties. The problem is, he tells lies in order to justify himself not realising seemingly that these lies undermine his whole argument.

Firstly he made the comment that he deserved to be speaking as the SNP's representative in the debate even though he would not be standing because "We do not have a presidential government in this country". Indeed not Mr Salmond. But we also don't have a system where people who are not members of the Houses of Parliament can become Prime Minister.

Secondly, and this is where the lies started to come in . He said in reply to the point that as this was a debate about who wanted to be Prime Minister, he never could be as the SNP only field candidates in 10% of seats, his response was to claim that Nick Clegg was invited to the debates and he would not be Prime Minister. Putting aside the silly rivalries and put downs Lib Dems always get in such circumstances, the fact remains that Nick Clegg could become Prime Minister since the Lib Dems field a full slate of candidates.

Then came the outright lies when it was put to him that many of the issues that the Prime Minister would debate (health, the police, education) were nothing to do with a Scottish party since they have their own parliament to deal with these issues. In response Salmond raised the issue of Trident, commenting that "all three Westminster parties were committed to Trident". As Mr Salmond knows, the Lib Dems are not wedded to trident.

Still, never let the truth get in the way of SNP mud slinging.

David Davis backs Lib Dem line on Trident

It is interesting to note that David Davis, the Tory MP, is effectively echoing the Lib Dem line on Trident, although you won't be surprised to read that Iain Dale has failed to mention this fact on his blog.

It will be a cold day in hell before Iain gives any credit to the Lib Dems.

What price do you put on our Nuclear sovereignty ?

Before anyone makes the point that there are plenty of unilateralists in the Liberal Democrats, I'll make it quite clear, I am not one of them.

So I was amazed to hear that the Labour Government has sold out its remaining shares in the Aldermaston Nuclear Weapons establishment, the company that actually produces nuclear warheads for our independent nuclear deterrent.

So in effect, a key strand of our independence has been cut as we are now reliant on a US owned firm.

We all saw how Labour under Tony Blair tied us to the folly of the Iraq war, and now Brown perpetrates this further by making us totally reliant on an overseas company for our own nuclear defence.

This government has a knack of selling just at the wrong time

Te government is apparently considering selling its stake in the UK's largest Nuclear Power supplier to French firm EDF.

When energy security is a growing concern, it does seem odd to be selling the stake at this time. But coupled with the recent announcement that Britain is to pursue a nuclear future, surely this is exactly the wrong time to sell.

Just like the government did with the UK's gold reserves, just like it did with the Defence research firm Qinetiq, this government follows the reverse of the normal economic policy of " buy low, sell high."

Why are we subsidings India's Nuclear Weapons Programme ?

An interesting point made by many people after my last posting about India is that India is, according to them, a poor country that needs our support, which is why we are given them £825 million.

Looking on the internet though brings up some useful information about what India considers to be its priorities. Unlike the UK government, India does not consider its poor to be its main concern. Instead, an expensive nuclear programme is India's number one issue.

India gets away with not supporting the poor in its society because we (the UK) does it for them, and what happens to this money the Indian government saves ? It goes on weapons. India could introduce a proper education system throughout the country with the money it spends on nuclear weapons, but alas no.

According to the South Asian Journal ;

"A very conservative estimate of the cost of an Indian nuclear weapons programme suggests that at a minimum this would costs Rupeess. 800 billion over a decade at 1998-99 prices, or Rs. 700-800 billion a year. This is equivalent to an incremental cost of 0.5 percent of India's GDP every year. The dollar costs over a decade on an Indian nuclear weaponisation programme will be around US$. 16-19 billion (at the average 1998-99 market exchange rates) or US$. 81-93 billion (at the 1999 purchasing power parity, PPP, exchange rate). The larger component in these costs would be the outlays on delivery systems (missiles and nuclear submarines) and on a command and control system.

To give an idea of the financial implications of a Rs. 700-800 billion Indian nuclear weaponisation programme spread over a decade:

India's defence expenditure (revenue and capital) in 1998-99 was Rs. 398.97 billion, which was equivalent to 2.23 percent of GDP. (If India had begun a 10-year programme in 1998-99 to complete development of its nuclear arsenal then this would have raised this outlay by about 20 percent.)
The Government of India's own tax revenues in 1998-99 were Rs. 1046.52 billion. This means that every year 7-8% of every rupee collected as taxes would have to be used for creation of the nuclear arsenal.

An Indian nuclear weaponisation programme that would cost 0.5 percent of GDP a year is equivalent to the annual cost of introducing universal elementary education in India. This 'high' cost was for years cited as one of the reasons for not universalising elementary
education in India. The question then is of choosing between sending every Indian child to school and acquiring nuclear weapons, both of which are going to make similar financial demands on the Government of India. Although India's Parliament in 2001 enacted an amendment to the Constitution guaranteeing elementary education to every Indian child, the initial financial allocations suggest that the government is giving a greater importance to nuclear weapons than to universal elementary education."

I do find it odd that the Lib Dems who argued against me are in favour of getting rid of the UK's nuclear weapons but support us giving £825 million to India whist it spends $19bn in US dollars in its nuclear programme.

If another person writes a comment telling me India is poor when it could afford £10bn in UK sterling on weapons then they are living in cloud cuckoo land.

I am not against UK overseas aid, but I want to see it spent on poor areas which don't have £10bn to waste on weapons, not on rich countries that care little for their own poorer citizens.

An offer from the government too good for any councillor to refuse

Malcolm Wicks, the energy minister, was on Newsnight tonight talking about the nuclear issues, and came up with an astonishing statement that almost stopped Jeremy Paxman in his tracks. In response to Paxman's question as to where all the nuclear waste would be stored, Malcolm Wicks replied

"We are seeking volunteer communities to come forward and indicate that they would be prepared to become nuclear storage sites"

Well, what an offer. I bet there are councillors all across the country tight now writing motions to put before their council's demanding that their area's become a nuclear storage site.

Was it really sensible for the Government to sell off Westinghouse ?

For all those who do not know, Westinghouse are one of the world's leaders in Nuclear Power technology, both as a designer and builder of nuclear reactors and nuclear power stations. And they were British. However, if the government have their way, they won't be for much longer.

From 2005 the government was been obsessed with selling Westinghouse, currently part of British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL), of to a foreign owner.

The delays and initial announcement that the UK was considering a Nuclear future saw the price of the sell of rise from £555 million to £2.8 billion in only a year, with the price jump being attributable to the growing concerns about energy supply and a more pro nuclear sentiment across the world in the wake of the war in Iraq and concerns about dependency on Russian gas.

Given though that it has been clear that Britain was set to turn to nuclear for its future energy needs, and given that one of the core reasons for turning to nuclear was a guarantee of energy security, was it really the right time to sell off this prize asset ?

With Westinghouse very likely to be the biggest winner form a new drive for nuclear reactors in Britain, it appears the government may well have sold off an asset for a fraction of its true value at exactly the wrong moment, just as they did for the defence specialist Qinetiq which was sold for less than a quarter of its true value.

If you favour nuclear or not who maintain the old Conservative belief that the private sector is best, Westinghouse was a world leader, run as a private for, but state owned with no profits going to shareholders, just the UK exchequer. Given what the government knew of the nuclear debate, it was a stupid decision to sell Westinghouse and one that the British tax payer will live to regret.

Was Scotland right to vote no to Trident ?

I'm being thoroughly stereotypical in the way I act on Trident I am afraid. You see, I'm generally a fence sitter on this issue. I know that there are some within the Lib Dems who would like us to throw away our Nuclear weapons. I'm not one of them. Similarly, there are some who think we should immediately back a replacement for Trident. I'm not sure.

After disagreeing with Ming on housing, I have to say I completely back his judgment on all matters foreign and defense related. Ming has been proved rigth time and time again and for all his detractors in other parties, the one thing you never hear him criticised about by Tories is his judgement on issues. Ming feels that we have more time than Labour state before we need decide on a replacement for Trident. given that Labour are not renowned for their timing in defence matters (they might tell us we have 45 minutes to make a decision), I think we can be certain that Blair was trying to railroad parliament in to a macho decision as part of his legacy.

So, some of you ask, why is Trident an issue today. Well the Scottish Parliament today voted against Trident renewal. Okay, so we're all in agreement then ? Well no, we're not.

The problem is that it was a rather unholy alliance of Lib Dems (wait and see), SNP (we want to oppose Labour), Labour rebels (long time CND) and Greens (wave the white flag - we surrender) who voted against Trident.

There will come a time when a decision will have to be made. With a resurgent Russia threatening to aim nuclear weapons at us again and Iran arming itself, I think it is clear that a non Nuclear Britain is a non starter.

Of course, the SNP are playing political games. But they also know, like Belgium, that they don't need Nuclear weapons. After all, when you share a land border with another Nuclear power you can sit back and let them bare the costs. Looks like England will be subsidising the Scot's again !

Tories prop up failing Labour administration

Which ever way you look at it, the Trident vote will show clearer than any other parliamentary vote just who Labour can rely on to prop up their failing administration.

Already Tony Blair's Labour Party have had to rely on Tory support to pass higher education laws, and now "Dave" and his chums will come to Tony's aid again to help him out over Trident.

What ever do you think the Torie would say about the Lib Dems if they were to back Labour in order to subvert Labour's own rebels ? They'd be having an absolute field day.

Irrespective of the issue, this government is failing and cracking and the only thing that will prevent its early collapse will be Tory support for the government this week. Forget Tory gossip about Lib Dems wanting coalition with Labour. It ain't gonna happen, and it won't need to whilst the Conservatives support Labour on every key vote when Labour's own backbenchers won't even support the government.

So why are they doing it ? Quite simply, the Tories do not have any policies so cannot go to the country yet as they would have no manifesto. So keeping Labour in power for another two years will strengthen the Tory hand.

Vote Tory, get Labour. Simple.

With thanks to Beau Bo D'Or for the image of Blair and his missile.

Labour Deputy Leadership hopeful John Cruddas backs Lib Dem policy over Trident ?

Make your own mind up, but THIS looks remarkably like our party's policy.

Its best summed up as "Let's not rush things, let's make the right decision, let's have a mature debate".

Labour MP Jim Devine resigns as PPS over Trident

Oh my goodness, a Labour MP with principles ?

Jim Devine is reported to have resigned his position as Parliamentary Private Secretary to Health Secretary Rosie Winterton because he opposes the replacement of Trident.

Although a PPS is often described as a parliamentary bag carrier, it is the first rung on the ladder to becoming a minister and resigning from his PPS role with probably cause long term damage to his chances in the future. However, as former agent to the late Robin Cook, perhaps some of Robin's honesty and stubbornness has rubbed off.

Either way, if you agree with Jim Devine or not over the issue of Trident, it is refreshing to see a politician who is prepared to speak and act without hypocrisy.

Labour want to use Nuclear threat

The BBC reports that government ministers have been warned not to lower the criteria for when Nuclear weapons could be used. Read about it HERE.

What the government seem to want is to be able to use the threat of nuclear attack to make the rest of the world do as we would want them to do.

Shocking, worrying, against international law, and another sign why we should never support Labour in any coalition.

Lib Dems right to back Ming on "wait and see" policy on Trident

A close vote today in the Lib Dem spring conference saw Menzies Campbell win the vote on Trident.

Well done to Ming for making clear his support for the wait and see policy, which takes account of the fact that in a turbulent world where it is difficult to predict the future, making instant decisions now not to replace Trident makes the party seem out of touch with British people who, although not supporting Trident wholeheartedly, want a government which will look at what is going on in the world before making decisions.

Staying Nuclear - The right decision in an uncertain world

After listening to Tony Blair; statement today about replacing Trident, Iam convinced his logic is right on this issue and there is a need for a continuing submarine nuclear deterrent.

Of course Trident was xommissioned in the cold war, but likewise, Trident will still be in service until 2020 at least, and who knows what situations we may face in the world in another 15 years.

I agree that we cannot leave it to lady luck to hope we have a decent deterrent, likewise, if we want to be more independent of America, we cannot rely on sitting under the USA's nuclear umbrella either.

Of course, its a lot of money, but what price security, what price insurance against what might happen ?