The Jinx of Jonah Brown

Jonah Brown has just had his first UK wide elections as supposed Leader of the Labour party. It notched up a number of notable firsts.

• First Loss in Wales since, well for about forever.
• First Loss in Scotland since, well for about forever.
• First BNP person elected in a National Election since, well forever.
• First time Labour have come third in a National Election since, well for about forever.
• First time as third party of local government in England, well for about forever.
• First time under 20 per cent vote share, well for about forever.

I'm sure there are more but I haven't time just now so this will have to do.

Let us hope that the Labour PLP has the sense today to see that it should, for the first time, depose one of it's Leaders before he has been through a General Election, you know it makes sense.

FFS Gordon just Go Now

More Embarrassment for Jonah Brown

Gordon Brown tries to do exit stage left from the chambers after a hard PMQ's forgetting he has a statement to do. What an embarrassment this man is to the UK.

Watch the Dickhead

Boulton & Co. - Political gossip blog from the Sky News team | Sky News Blogs

Guido Catches up - Jonah Brown jinxes Mexico

Guido has caught up with the fact that Jonah has jinxed Mexcio.

Jonah Brown’s Mexican Wave of Tragedy - Guy Fawkes' blog

Jonah Brown curse hits Mexico

Less than a month ago Our Jonah met the Mexican President and infected him with his own form of illness, the Jonah Jinx. Gordon Brown is surely not the man that any President or World Leader wants to meet these days. The Pakistani president even pulled out of Press Conference with Jonah.

Now we have Swine Fever and an Earthquake in Mexico. What more can this man do to the world.

Please sign the petition to rid us of this man who is making the world fall apart at the seams.

Hat Tip Habib Butt on PB.Com

42-day detention dropped as unworkable

What a waste of all our time and money. This unworkable bill will be dropped just as Gordon Brown will be dropped at the next election.

The only good thing is that Gordon Brown wasted so much of his political leverage on this bill. He has only achieved much bad feeling amongst his own party. This was supposed to be the clunker showing the strength of his hold on Labour.

It is typical of Labour that this bad news is buried on "Brown" Monday.

42-day detention dropped as unworkable - Times Online

The Curse of Jonah hits Mandy

According to the Sun

PETER Mandelson was recovering this morning after being rushed to hospital last night with a mystery health crisis.

The new Business Secretary was taken ill as he dined with health minister Lord Darzi.

Sources refuse to confirm it was a heart-related condition.

He was whisked to St Mary's hospital, Paddington, from the west London restaurant.

Today government sources refused to give details of Lord Mandy's illness.

But a source said: "It isn't life threatening."

Lord Mandelson was having dinner with health minister and world-renowned surgeon Lord Darzi to discuss NHS reform.

The fact that the internationally-renowned surgeon was with him and unable to assist suggests it was a serious attack.

Sources say the Business Secretary will have to return to hospital for treatment.

But the scare means he will miss the inaugural meeting of the new National Economic Council this morning.

Update 09:50: According to the BBC he will need an operation.

Peter Mandelson's late night dash to hospital | The Sun |News

Don't Buy a house in August...

... the number of houses sold in August/September should plummet now this news has been "leaked". Another shot in the foot for "Jonah" Brown and his team of Brownies

However at least in later months he may be able to say the temporary scrapping increased sales!


Ministers Consider Plans To Temporarily Scrap Stamp Duty To Boost Housing Market Business Sky News

Recommendations from Child Benefit CD data loss

Recommendations from the IPCC investigation of the Child Benefit data loss are as follows, I have tried to highlight what they really mean. In one word CLUELESS.

The report does not seek to make detailed recommendations, nor does it comment on the developments needed to ensure that HMRC's systems and practices meet the challenges involved in modern-day data handling. HMRC did not have a clue what they were doing and had no idea how to deal with computer based data.

1. HMRC should review and develop a strategic working relationship with the NAO in respect of any audit of its resource accounts. HMRC should implement a strategy of communicating the detail and requirements of an audit to HMRC staff in order to facilitate audit work. Bothe agencies are clueless on how to work together. HMRC should work with the NAO to sort out how they communicate and stop losing data and providing data not required
2. HMRC should review the security controls and protocols associated with generating large volumes of data, and the subsequent handling of that data in whatever format both internally and on disclosure outside the organisation. Clueless. HMRC have no security in place and need to work out how they are going to secure their data.
3. HMRC should develop a data security strategy, training strategy and communication strategy for all HMRC staff to raise awareness and understanding of data protection and data security, and in line with the principles of the Data Protection Act. HMRC have no strategy for data security or training for people in data security.
4. HMRC should review and develop its role and responsibilities as data controller within the meaning of the Act in order to demonstrate a management commitment to information security throughout the organisation. Clueless. HMRC should read the Data Protection act and conform with it. Senior Management need to realise that they have to do some work to justify their salaries.
5. Consideration should be given to sharing this investigation report with the Information Commissioner, who is responsible for data protection issues under the Act. Clueless. HMRC should be prosecuted as a business under the Data Protection act and if this was a normal business would be heavily fined and hung out to dry. Resignations of senior IS staff etc would be expected.
6. Where breaches of security are discovered, HMRC should report these promptly so that any remedial or recovery action can be taken. This did not occur in this particular case. Clueless. HMRC did not have a clue what they were up to.

If HMRC were a run of the mill business they would now be under severe pressure. The whole management of their IS department is to blame. Where was the proper audit of this system.

This is the sort of organistation which is or will be responsible to

• Look after your health records (aka The Spine)
• Look after your DNA
• Look after ID cards

I wouldn't trust them with a single bit. They are clueless and hopeless. This is beyond parody that an enterprise entrusted with our vital data have no apparent strategy for the handling and securing of data. Both management and employees are at fault here. The management for not providing the correct structure for the proper running of the business and employees for not ceaseless complaining about this lack of structure.

Alistair Darling has called this a "Cultural" problem. I call it criminal irresponsibility. Now guess who was responsible for the merging of the two departments and was in charge of them for over 10 years. Yes, of course, it was our Jonah, Gordon Brown. He is the man ultimately responsible for this problem, however he will have retired to his Bunker again to sulk whilst leaving his underlings to face the music. A true man of Courage.

IPCC publishes report into missing HMRC data CDs (full version)

Arse and Elbow - Gordon Brown

Gordon Brown as usual showing he can't tell his arse from his elbow. The Three Line Whip reports:

One of Gordon Brown's flunkies ought to tell him that there is no such unit in the British Army as the Second Parachute Regiment (10pm news BBC).

The five soldiers killed in Helmand last week came from the 2nd Battalion, The Parachute Regiment, also known as 2 Para.

The Prime Minister might think that such small errors don't really matter but I bet the wives, mothers, father, brothers, sisters, relatives and friends of those five dead young men who died in service of this country do.

It's these sort of "little" things that get you in the end. The inability to get the details right of something as simple as this is why Brown is now becoming one of the most despised Prime Ministers ever. RIP.

Gordon Brown’s Armed Forces gaffe : June 2008 : Three Line Whip : Politics : Telegraph Blogs

Brown on Brown - A Ditherer

In the British Forces the expression Blue on Blue is used to describe "Friendly Fire" incidents when your own forces are attacked by allies.

Now we have Nick Brown The Labour deputy Chief Whip saying that Gordon Brown's indecision over an Election last autumn was a "watershed" from which his reputation has not recovered. Not so much "Blue on Blue" as "Brown on Brown".

Apparently during the Channel 4 Dispatches documentary subtlety titled, Gordon Brown: Where Did It All Go Wrong? - Channel 4, tomorrow, 8pm, to mark Brown's first anniversary in No10 on June 27th, we will also see Jack Straw and Jacqui Smith question the Prime Minister's judgment and character. Looks like one not to miss.

PM's oldest ally goes on TV to call him a ditherer | Mail Online

Jonah Brown Saves the World

Ok then it's only in a comic book but surely it'll soon be coming true otherwise why do we need 42 days detention.

Have no fear, Brown is here to help save the world - but only in new comic book 'Captain Britain' | Mail Online

Jonah Brown hits New Low

I don't often post on Polls but this one makes for some interesting reading if you are not a Labour supporter (and there are now fewer of them than ever).

In just one short year our "Jonah" has taken a Labour party to it's lowest level of support since polling began. A superb achievement that merits some sort of reward, can I perhaps suggest early retirement and disappearing back to Fife to reflect on his legacy to us.

Perhaps the most interesting bits of the Poll are as follows:

• 75% of people survey were dissatisfied with Gordon Brown as prime Minister
• 60% of those polled thought that even replacing "Jonah" wouldn't help Labour. 32% thought it might. Jonah has contaminated Labour to the voters.
• With a forced choice over Conservatives and Cameron and Labour under Brown the Tories lead by 54% to 29%.
• The Lib Dems are stuck in nowhere land with 18%. They really should be challenging Labour by now.
• Brown’s personal popularity on a par with Major’s low.
• Labour’s lowest score under Foot was only 23.5

In a further article in the Telegraph, Anthony King, professor of government at the University of Essex, makes the point that there is now no way back for Gordon Brown. He says

Most of the electorate has now fallen so far out of love with Gordon Brown and New Labour that a divorce between the two seems all but certain to be finalised at the next general election.The findings of YouGov's latest survey for The Daily Telegraph suggest the break-up could be an angry no-holds-barred affair. The chances of a reconciliation look slim.

All in all a very satisfying poll for the Tories. As Nick Palmer Labour MP so elequently put it on Political Betting:

Brrrr!

Need I say more.

Labour: Gordon Brown support slumps to its lowest since polling began - Telegraph

Jonah Brown and North Sea oil.

Edmund Conway Economics Editor of the Daily Telegraph has a good analysis of how our "Jonah" Brown has landed North Sea Oil in "Choppy Water".

In it he says the following

The Prime Minister cannot be blamed for the fact that Britain's oil production peaked at precisely the wrong time, nor can he really do anything meaningful to the oil price - despite his pledges yesterday. However, the rising price has underlined just how fast the North Sea is declining, and raised questions over
whether Mr Brown's policies have served to accelerate its demise.

He follows this up later on with an analysis of the changing tax regime that our "Jonah" implemented. Initially what looked like a good idea has, as usual, been fiddled with and changed so that now it is just another tax on us. Edmund says

However, the Government is culpable for its management of the tax regime. Some years ago Mr Brown switched the system to a more modern scheme, charging oil companies a supplement to corporation tax for their North Sea profits, but allowing them to offset the investment they poured in.It was a sensible change, designed to encourage companies to spend more on finding new fields. However, in 2005, the Treasury suddenly and unexpectedly raised this supplementary tax rate.

As I pointed out yesterday it is these sort of changes in the fiscal and tax regimes that cause major problems to Oil and Gas companies that are making large investment decisions based upon the current conditions and likely changes. All businesses are reluctant to invest in a region if they fear its tax policies will change suddenly and without warning. Edmund continues

Crucially, the tax cut announced yesterday affects only older oil fields, which are covered by a separate tax regime, and does not reverse this new windfall tax.
This is hardly surprising. Over the past decades the North Sea has become one of the Government's biggest corporate tax cows, generating more than £230bn in revenue since 1968. The Treasury is expecting to make around £10bn this year from oil revenues, though experts at Grant Thornton think this could rise as high as £16bn due to higher oil prices.
However, this windfall has come at a price. If, as thought, it is responsible for depressing production in recent years, it has helped make the UK a net oil importer two years earlier than expected

Note that last sentence "It has helped make the UK a net oil importer two years earlier than expected". This is a telling statement and shows how much our "Jonah's" short sighted changes have cost the UK and its taxpayers. Edmund then says

Not only does this have serious implications for energy policy, it has pushed the current account deficit sharply higher and contributed to a weaker pound. It has meant that whereas a few years ago Britain was well positioned to benefit from a high oil price, the implications today are far more damaging for the economy.

This just goes to show that despite our "Jonah" trying to sell himself as a wonderful Leader and former Chancellor he is nothing of the sort. He has dug the UK into a deep hole and now has nothing to extract us from it.

Gordon Brown landed North Sea oil in choppy water - Telegraph