Going Digital

In 2015 the UK goes digital on the airwaves, problem being of course that no-one is really ready for it, particularly motorists. Most people know about the change to tv's a lot of people have bought digital tv's or use Sky/Virgin to get their signals anyway. However in 2015 the fm/am radio signals will be switched off and unless you have a digital radio receiver you wont be able to get any radio channels at all. This will be a particular problem for motorists, though there are plans to have all new cars from 2013 fitted with digital radio's. For the rest of us, well we'll have to shell out for either a new radio, not as easy as it could be as many cars use a propriety style to match the interior as Ford do, so a new radio would look out of place. Or you have to buy an adaptor that fits onto the windscreem bit like a sat nav assembly.
Even then your problems are just beginning. You're out of pocket and you discover that picking up a digital signal in a car is tricky as the network is patchy to say the least, you move around, you lose the signal, even moving a few metres, never mind a few miles.
This was of course a Labour idea, they planned to sell off the fm frequencies to telecom companies and so have landed the new government with a problem, something I doubt they'll do anything about, it'll be one of those done and dusted things that Labour used as part of their scorched earth strategy. Oh yes and the new transmitters required? Guess who pays for many of them out of the license fee, yep, that would be us, stiffed with the bill for Labour's plans again.

I foresee the rise of pirate radio again.

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It's ok, he's English not Scottish ;-)

Scotsman Andy Murray crashed out of Wimbledon yesterday in the Semi's 6-4 7-6 (8/6) 6-4 to Rafael Nadal. However there was some good news for Scottish sports fans in that the Daily Mirror has unearthed the fact that Murray is actually English, so national pride can be restored and the entire incident of his defeat explained away at least until the next time he looks like he might win something.

Mirror.

Flower of England! Finally revealed... Andy Murray ancestral roots

Andy Murray may support "anyone but England" in the football but new research reveals his roots lie south of the border.

As the Scots tennis ace powered into the Wimbledon semi-final, genealogy experts traced his roots to England.

Website TheGenealogist.co.uk has discovered Andy's maternal grandmother was born to English parents from York and Berwick-upon-Tweed.

One Englishman already supporting Murray was Sir Michael Caine, who watched his centre court victory with Ben Stiller and his wife Christine.

Murray, 23, screamed with delight after finishing off Frenchman Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in a four-set match.

And he said last night winning his first Grand Slam at Wimbledon would be "extra special". But he warned: "I'm a long, long way from doing that.

I'm sure all Scots are now relieved and can go about their business with a sense of national pride restored with another "Anyone But England" moment in their lives. ;-)

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Catching on

It's finally starting to come out into the open just how much the EU (and the UK) is going to be hit by the rip off that is global warming climate change, not that the warmist camps have given up the ghost yet of course.

Telegraph.

The EU's response to global warming is a costly mistake

Europe's 20/20/20 policy will cost billions of pounds, but yield only tiny results, writes Bjorn Lomborg .

European leaders have a lot to deal with. The financial crisis has prompted several national stimulus packages and a joint effort to keep Greece afloat, while the EU is in danger of being outstripped by other economies that are growing faster, producing more efficiently and at lower costs.

One bright spot is that politicians remain committed to responding to global warming. Unfortunately, their plans do not withstand scrutiny. New research shows that the EU's "20/20/20" policy, which aims to cut greenhouse gas emissions to 20 per cent below 1990 levels by 2020 (and ensure 20 per cent renewable energy), will cost hundreds of billions of euros but yield only tiny benefits. The UK alone will be hit to the tune of an annual 35 billion euros (£28 billion).
As a cost-benefit analysis by the climate-change economist Richard Tol shows, any single regional carbon-reduction scheme will have a very small effect on emissions and temperature rises across the globe. That's not an argument against ever implementing one: but it means that it's crucial that the numbers stack up.
The EU recently stated that it would cost £39 billion a year to meet its emissions target. That figure is implausibly optimistic. Averaging out the best-regarded economic models shows that, even if politicians got their policies exactly right, the cost would come to at least £90 billion a year.
And Europe has not got it exactly right. Instead, it has made things worse, by introducing additional red tape, complication and constraints – in particular, that 20 per cent renewable-energy target. This is expensive because popular "green" energy sources such as wind and solar power cost more than replacing coal with gas. As a result, the real cost of EU policy is likely to be as much as £170 billion. 

In other words they are wasting time, money resources and strangling it in red tape too, how typically EU is it not? But the UK itself does no better, the coalition have stuck an utter moron in charge of the Department of Energy and Climate Change, yes we're looking at you Chris Huhne. This is the man that wants a 30% cut in carbon envisions, 2500 more useless wind turbines, the type that don't work when there's no wind and too much wind, oh yes and is willing to pay them not to work when there's too much power. He even wants to remove the carbon subsidy for the nuclear industry, the only "green" power generating plant that's guaranteed to work when we need it. The man is an utter menace to civilisation and really should never have been allowed near government (he is a Lib Dem after all), never mind a ministry.
The real tragedy is of course further down the article.

The tragedy is that the EU could do much better for the world, and for itself. For far less than £8 billion a year the EU could halve the incidence of malaria, provide micronutrients (particularly vitamin A and zinc) to 80 per cent of the world's undernourished children and prevent a million deaths from TB.

 But sadly that doesn't bring in "green" taxes from the proles, so is not a priority.

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