I didn't quite catch that...

Saw Star Trek last night. It was very good. That is all.

TLG agrees. But seeing as how she exclaimed No, don’t hit the fit one at one point, I don’t know that she truly appreciated the sci-fi-ness of it all, and may have been distracted by some menfolk on the screen…

I think that the end of the last bit of the moral authority of the House of Commons just disappeared out the door.

The next time a minister claims that benefit thieves are doing wrong, they’ll have too look next to them and note that their neighbour at the table has diddled the taxpayer out of many thousands for something that didn’t exist.

The next time they complain about a pension pot, they’ll have to answer questions about their own somewhat cushy number.

And the next time anyone of them dares to open their mouths about golden goodbyes and rewarding failure, I do hope that they can keep a straight face over their own little setup.

MPs who stand down after expenses revelations should not be entitled to large tax free pay-offs, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has said.

Since stories about expenses claims began, 13 MPs have said they will stand down at the election, although three say they are going for health reasons.

They will be entitled to a pay-off worth up to a year’s salary of £64,000 depending on their age and experience.

And it’s there specifically to reward failure. How is that not considerably worse than the standard golden goodbye?

Rejoice, London: there’s even more fun to look forward to when the Olympics come round. On top of the city being brought to its knees by traffic, and clouds of things going wrong, and the inevitable failure of the city to be allowed to get on with life, they’re going to mess with a lot of things in your own home.

Regulator Ofcom is looking at the best way to provide new spectrum in London during the 2012 Olympics.

Demands on the airwaves will be huge as thousands of wireless devices will be used during the games to serve athletes, officials and broadcasters.

Ofcom is considering temporarily borrowing spectrum from public sector bodies such as the Ministry of Defence.

It believes that it can set aside a sufficient amount of spectrum without having a major impact on current users.

I’m sorry, but how much faith do you have in Ofcom’s ability to dish out lots of temporary spectrum without killing wireless networks, or Bluetooth, or whatever new gadget has come along in the next three years? Because I have little or none.

So, not only will Londoners be expected to stay at home for the duration so that the tourists can get to the stadia, but they’ll not be able to surf the web from home to pass the time. That’ll be fun, won’t it…

Boo. It’s really quite disappointing when your team just doesn’t turn up for a game. Especially when it’s a game that matters.

But, on the plus side, due to some offers from random off-licences, I discovered a rather pleasant beverage with which to drown my sorrows. And it’s not hurt my head, which is even more pleasant.

The continuing furore about expenses, tax fraud, dishonesty and general lack of accountability at Westminster is showing several things. It’s showing that our politicians lack any sense of accountability; it’s showing that many of our MPs are entirely out of touch with their constituents; and it’s showing that many of our MPs lack any respect for the laws that they write for the rest of us to obey.

And that’s the rub; we’ve now seen the the people who write the laws for us don’t stick to them. So why should we?

When the laws about tax are so complicated that the very people who write them can’t understand them without getting advice at our expense, why should the rest of us worry too much about staying within those rules?

When the Prime Minister gets away with being a bully, a coward and a fool in work, why should anyone else bust their balls to be a good boss?

When the Business Secretary has been convicted (in the court of public opinion, obviously) of dodgy financial practices, why should we worry about declaring all of the dodgy loans we get from our mates?

In short: clearly the rule makers don’t care, so we shouldn’t. Let the rest of us just pick and choose which laws to bother about.

This should be fun for a while, shouldn’t it?

Alan Johnson is one of those Cabinet ministers who constantly talks nonsense, and he seems to have decided that this week should be no exception to that.

He seems to be of the opinion that the best way to distract from the ongoing nest-feathering by MPs is to get rid of the one constantly effective part of our democracy.

Gordon Brown should hold a national referendum on electoral reform, Health Secretary Alan Johnson has said.

The prime minister should offer the public a “genuinely radical alternative” to the present system, he wrote in the Times.

A referendum could be held on the same day as a general election, said Mr Johnson, who has denied his reform call is part of a Labour leadership bid.

The problem with referenda in the United Kingdom is that they have a) no legal standing and b) an unpleasant track record.

The unpleasant track record is this: the only national referendum asked the question “Do you think the UK should stay in the European Community (Common Market)?” in 1975. Eighteen years later, the Common Market ceased to be an economic entity and instead became a small part of a Byzantine political creation that we never once asked to be in.

But that’s not even the big problem that I have; Mr Johnson is proposing holding a referendum to change the system of voting in the country from first-past-the-post to something else that would include some proportional representation and two classes of MPs within the Commons. As for proportional representation, I feel I’ve made myself clear on breaking the direct link between individual MPs and their electorate, and I’m not keen on having two completely different types of MP either.

But again, that’s not even the biggest problem to my mind. No, that is this:

But Mr Johnson said the government had the mandate to change that and should hold a referendum on “a specific new system”.

What planet does Mr Johnston live on? This government has absolutely no mandate, for it has not faced an electorate. It has no mandate because the people have not had a chance to see a manifesto, nor have they had a chance to vote on Brown as PM, nor have they had a chance to vote following the revelations about expenses abuse, nor have they had a chance to judge the government’s performance.

And for a government minister to mistake this lack of anything for a mandate shows nothing more or less than a complete disregard for everything that representative democracy is meant to mean.

So, if he’d like to shut up, that’d be fine.

In keeping with my unbridled raising of Terry Pratchett to the rank of God Among Men, I direct you towards his opinion on taxation, accountants and government policy.

Pterry, we are not worthy.

Knowing about a subject has been known to make it more difficult to enjoy entertainment that touches on that subject. A mate of mine was banned by his then-girlfriend from watching CSI because he couldn’t keep quite when they did stupid/impossible thing with IT, since that’s his area of expertise. TLG has been known to get somewhat tetchy when a serious medical condition is misrepresented in film, since she has family with that condition.

I suffer from this problem in several areas. In things like 24 and Spooks, I get a little irate when a CCTV image is magically turned 270° to get a facial image of someone facing away from a camera; the entire representation of computing in Swordfish was beyond farcical. In political movies I tend to get annoyed when the inevitable soft-left slant is accepted as gospel. Shows that walk into Norn Iron situations without having a single clue have been known to get my chortling with derision.

And now there is another area of concern. Because I’ve started to gain a bit of an understanding of helicoptering, and that means that any time a film-maker decides to do something silly with a helicopter, I start getting itchy in my pedantry bone.

Examples:

• Die Hard 4; yes, I know, looking for any realism in a Die Hard movie is a lost cause. But they try to explain away McClane knowing how to fly a helicopter (at night) by saying “I took a few lessons”; he then proceeds to get his tail caught up in a fence without so much as the fuselage tearing itself to bits due to unhealthy vibrations.
• 28 Weeks Later; again, it’s a zombie flick but still. No helicopter pilot is ever going to think that the best way to clear a field of zombies is by doing it with your rotors – human bodies contain more than enough solid bits to ensure that the damage to your blades, gear box and windscreen become problematical. However, they get bonus points for using the Gazelle, which is one helicopter that would let you get away with sustained flight with that attitude.
• Dante’s Peak – what kind of a muppet takes his big, healthy helicopter and goes IMC with it in a mountainous area and overloaded? None, that’s who… No matter how good the money, it’s no use if your dead. And you would be.

So, I now have a whole new area where I have to bite my tongue while watching movies. Joy for me, joy for those all around me…

Ladies and gentlemen, I present for your consideration the reasoning behind the George Cross.

The George Cross is the civilian counterpart of the Victoria Cross (VC) and the highest gallantry award for civilians as well as for military personnel in actions which are not in the face of the enemy or for which purely military honours would not normally be granted

And why should I tell you this? Because I think I know of a man who should be next in line to receive this prestigious decoration.

And who is that man? It’s a former SAS man who has done this nation a great service in the face of a terrible threat. It is Mr John Wick.

The man who arranged for leaked MPs’ expenses details to be given to the Daily Telegraph has been named.

Former SAS man John Wick acted as a broker, passing the details from an anonymous source to the newspaper.

Yes, he may have been the postman, but the package he delivered was of critical import and has blown the lid of a terrible secret. Hurrah for him.

The only problem is that we have to get the award signed off on by the same government that has been critically wounded by his actions… You don’t suppose that would be a problem, do you?

I don’t think I’ve made any secret of the fact that I don’t particularly like Lewis Hamilton. I’m not a fan of McLaren, and he is the personification of McLaren; additionally he walked away with a title when I’d much prefer it to have been won by Ferrari.

However, the more I see of him, the more I respect him. As I’ve mentioned, his behaviour after winning the championship was exemplary, and his behaviour thus far this season has been similar.

And after qualifying my respect has gone up a little bit more. He made a mistake, and he didn’t blame anyone else or the car. He put his hand up, said he made a mistake, apologised to the team and said that he’d learn from his mistake.

As Eddie Jordan said afterwards, Hamilton will likely learn considerably more from this season where he’s in the second or third tier of cars than he did last year when he was definitely in the top tier. Which means he’ll likely come back stronger and more knowledgeable. And more of a threat to the beautiful red cars. Which is a shame, but for all the right reasons.

Also: how was that for a final thirty seconds of a qualifying session?

Am I paranoid? Yes. Am I paranoid enough? Mayhap not.

Three years since ANPR was started. And they switch it on within months.

A national network of cameras and computers automatically logging car number plates will be in place within months, the BBC has learned.

Thousands of Automatic Number Plate Recognition cameras are already operating on Britain’s roads.

Police forces across England, Wales and Scotland will soon be able to share the information on one central computer.

Read my lips, for I fear that there may be some misunderstanding if attention is not paid: there is no need, excuse or justification for this action.

A national, searchable and centralised database of the movements of every driver is in no way beneficial to any individual, save those that mine the data for personal financial gain. Like advertisers, housebreakers and kidnappers.

ANPR is a very interesting technological solution to a problem that doesn’t exist. Crime now is no more complicated than it was twenty years ago; the really scary crimes are not any more common than they were then. Crimes in the eighties were solved by the same means that they are solved by now: interviewing suspects, speaking to witnesses and collecting forensic evidence at the scene. They are not solved by CCTV, and they will not be solved by keeping track of us when we go about our legal business.

However, legal actions by citizens that make life difficult for the state and for the police – legitimate protesters, journalists, lawyers and the like – will be tracked, and then it will become that little bit easier to make their lives difficult.

In current cases that means that protesters get stopped any time they approach London. If you mixed it with a little bit of Norn Iron history you could get very detailed travel details or troublesome individuals passed to murdering bastards. Neither of these is a good thing, to my mind.

So am I paranoid? Yes. But the things that I worry about I only worry about because things like them have happened before, and they will happen again. And they’ll keep happening until we all wise up to it.

William Hague suggests that some MPs may have committed fraud.

Really?!?!?!?

How’d he figure that? Was it the fun an interesting way that some of them have had three second homes in two years? Or the way that tax declarations and expense declarations had different second homes, so that capital gains weren’t paid? Or was it the way that nigh had everyone almost exactly the same amount of interest on mortgages, and that it tended towards the higher end of the scale?

With brains like that in the shadow cabinet, we’re in for a right royal treat come next election, we really are…

Science (!) has today informed us that the genes that make men men will disappear in a mere five million years.

Men may be on the road to extinction as their genes shrink and slowly fade away, medical students have been told.

A researcher in human sex chromosomes said the male Y chromosome may run out within five million years.

Clearly this particular scientist hasn’t been paying attention to the other scientists throughout the world who have told us, without a shadow of a doubt, that we’ll be extinct long before those five million years have run their course.

Examples of things that will stop us getting to a point where we have to worry:

• Global warming/climate change – we’ll be drowned/frozen/baked before then, depending on which climate change model has yet to be proven wrong.
• The dreaded cross breed of swine flu and bird flu that’s going to kill us all – the flying pig strain.
• Toxins in the water.
• Lack of toxins in the water.
• The ozone layer packing up and going home.
• BSE.
• Poor dead dolphins taking us with them.
• Mobile phone emissions.
• … any number of other things that will never happen but get funding for whatever pet project the scientist in question likes.

So I think that I’ll hold off on worrying about the levels of specific genes on the Y-chromosomes. Other things to avoid worrying about just now…

So, my opinion of the phone, one week in.

It’s still pretty damn fine.

The messaging is very well integrated, although the purist in me would like to be able to delete individual messages more easily, rather than just deleting entire threads. The email (both Gmail and other types) is very good. The Google Talk is something of a novelty, but one that I could see being useful in the future.

The applications are something of a revelation to a Nokia/Sony user, although I accept that Apple Drones will have gotten used to them long ago. Between the metal detector (that actually works), and the games, and the GoogleDocs it’s all pretty tasty. And each of them for free. Huzzah.

The battery life is a bit of a pain, but aside from that, I’m happy. Despite the best wishes of good Dr ‘Blade and her Apple loving ways…

Back when I was in the Scouts, the most fun¹ was to be had in canoes, seeing if you could find interesting animals where they weren’t supposed to be, throwing yourself off of perfectly serviceable buildings that sort of thing…

The sort of thing that Bear Grylls stands for, far more than Peter Duncan. IMO, at any rate.

I’d like to see the first Jamboree that Mr Grylls is involved in. I suspect it’ll involve being dropped out the side of a helicopter three miles out to sea and told to swim to wherever the camp site is. Whereupon you’d be expected to build your own shelter, forage for your own food and still have a perfectly presented uniform at the end of it to impress at parade.

It’d be epic…

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¹ – the less said about the activities that the leaders didn’t approve of the better. Small scale riots, drunkenness and drooling over young ladies were fun, but they were things that you could do anywhere, and thusly aren’t dependent on the scouts.

I’ve been enjoying myself laughing at the behaviour of the political “class”¹ recently. They’ve been caught with their snouts in the trough, and they’re falling over themselves to justify it. Some are brazen, some are lying and all are squirming.

It’s fucking marvellous, so it is.

But it’s lacking something… At the minute it’s the system within Westminster and the individuals that are getting caught out. What of the systems outside Westminster that teach those individuals to expect that they’ll get away with it? What of the political parties that nod and wink as it goes on; what of the constituency associations who expect that the MP will get free newspapers and staff their office with family members?

The individuals will get shafted; and the Fees Office in is for a right royal beating. But I hope that the parties and the local accomplices get something back as well…

We’re faced with a unique opportunity to remind the entire political class that they’re here at our sufferance. Let’s hope we make the most of it.

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¹ – I also find it interesting that it’s largely Labour grandees that are defining themselves as the political class. What happened to the classless society, lads?

Drawing at home with Arsenal might not be the best way to do it, but winning the Premiership again more than makes up for it.

Hooray for that.

It is a brave man that uses the phrase foolproof and means it. For, as we all know, the ingenuity of the true fool cannot be overstated.

It may be Duplo bricks; it may be Mars Bars; it may be the legendary computer game Snake. Someone, somewhere, will have died because of each of them. That is the level of foolishness present in the world; that cannot be legislated away and that cannot be bred out of humanity.

It’s a sad fact, but no matter how fool-proof your system, Mother Nature will respond by bringing the perfect fool to it and proving you wrong.

Which is why I’m concerned by this:

Better Place has demonstrated a prototype battery swapping machine for leccy cars, able to exchange the flat battery of a modified Nissan with a fully charged one in just over 60 seconds.

I have to say, it all looks mighty sharp. All you have to do is drive in, stay still for 120 seconds and then drive off. Idiot proof, yes?

I expect that there’ll be at least one fatality, one explosion and one station damaged beyond repair in the first year though. Because we’re all human, dammit, and that’s what we do best…

That said, it’s a mighty interesting concept. Now if only batteries like that could be made light enough that the car holding them was in anyway quick…

Someone asked me t’other day: what would be my perfect ending to the scandal about MP’s thieving from us?

And my answer is simple, but would take a while to kick in.

Step 1: A paper releases details of the freeloading being done at out expense, enlightening the public to the behaviour of those that we have chosen to represent us. Check

Step 2: The vast majority of the Commons lose their seat in the next election, as a result of local campaigns against their perceived corruption.

Step 3: We get a new lot of thieving bastards in, who say they’ll be different but none of use believe them.

Step 4: Details come out of the behaviour of the new lot.

Step 5: The vast majority of the Commons lose their seat in the next election, as a result of local and national campaigns against their perceived corruption.

Step 6: We get another lot, who say they’ll be different, and try to be. But, as is inevitable, they get corrupted by the system a little bit.

Step 7: Details come out of the behaviour of the new lot, who, while better than both previous lots, still think they can get away with some mild fucking of the electorate.

Step 8: The new lot get turfed out in the next election.

Step 9: The latest new lot arrive, and are terrified of claiming a single penny, and have to learn to live on their measly £60k.

So, a minimum of about three elections and half a decade before the dust would settle in my perfect world. But just think how much cheaper and less threatening government would be at the end of it…

It really doesn’t feel like it, but yesterday was the climax of two years work.

There are some people that I know of who keep a proper diary of everything they do towards earning their Private Pilots Licence. They list every lesson, with a summary of what they do. They list every exam, they list every conversation with anyone about it, they list their plans. I didn’t do anything like that.

I kept a log, to be sure, but I didn’t really keep track of things like exams. And it’s only when I went back to look at it yesterday (to complete all the forms that I have to send to the CAA to actually get a licence) that I realised how much work it was. I don’t seem to remember it being that much work, but I’m sure that I bored people at the time with it. Here’s a few very basic numbers:

When I look at it like that, it seems to be a bit more effort than I first envisioned. Totally worth it though. Because I’m now able to call myself Captain Hillan. Which rocks.