Dave doesn't care - by Richard... Friday, August 14, 2009

Dave doesn't care - by Richard... Friday, August 14, 2009

Simon Heffer says that David Cameron and his friends are not Tories. But, he says, little Dave doesn't care.

Heffer thinks he should. Fringe parties like UKIP, usually only given big support during marginal electoral contests, could find themselves the repository of protest votes by those who wish – as a result of the widespread disillusion caused by the expenses scandal – to smash up the old, cosy system.

It won't happen in time for the next election but, with a low turnout and a significant proportion of votes going to fringe parties, any hold on power that the Tories have after the next election will be fragile, and their supporters not remotely loyal.

More and more peoples who should be traditional Tory supporters are no longer – a terrifying number see the only way out is for the system to self-destruct. And there's the rub. They know Dave doesn't care. The thing is, neither do they ... about him or his friends.

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The hidden enemy - by Richard...

In an expected but nevertheless "shock" move, bosses at Anglesey Aluminium Metal (AAM) have confirmed that smelting activities at the Wylfa plant will cease on 30 September.

The impending demise of this plant – a major employer in Anglesea – we reported in January, the closure precipitated by EU state aid rules which prevented the state owned Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), which owns the Wylfa power station, selling electricity to the plant at below market price.

Even though that arrangement – a continuation of the previous contract, a type common in the industry for bulk buyers – was profitable for both parties, by virtue of recent state acquisition of the power plant, this was deemed contrary to EU rules and, thus deprived of a cheap source of electricity the aluminium plant was scheduled for closure.

This brought hasty action by the government, conscious of the devastating effect the closure would have on local employment – the plant then employed around 540 people at the site - with the offer of a four-year £48m loan, styled as a "government rescue package" to keep the plant in operation.

However, the joint owners, Rio Tinto Alcan and Kaiser Aluminium, have decided that even the availability of cheap money – which would, of course, have to be repaid – was not sufficient to return the plant to viability and have therefore decided on its closure.

This leaves Welsh secretary Peter Hain to utter the usual platitudes, saying: "I am bitterly disappointed we could not reach an agreement to secure the long-term future of the smelter ..." but neither he nor the the BBC give any hints as to the real reason for the closure.

The BBC, in fact, cites a man who has been working at the plant for five years. This is Peter Owen, who tells the BBC that there had been no explanation of why the £48m rescue package had been turned down. "I can't understand what happened," he says.

With the benefit of the bigger picture, we could tell Mr Owen what had been going on, but you can be sure that the BBC won't. The hidden enemy must never be revealed.

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Jumping the gun - by Richard...

Like vultures watching for the dying man to expire, the serried ranks of hacks and their editors are poised, keyboards at the ready – with picture editors on standby – waiting to the 200th soldier to be killed in Afghanistan.

The suspense, however, has proved too much for The Times, which has already published a piece from its defence editor Michael Evans on the impending death, allowing it to display the statutory graphic showing not 200 but 199 "thumbnails" in a grisly montage.

More on Defence of the Realm.

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The mincer of Sangin - by Richard...

Anthony Lloyd describes the scene at Camp Bastion's hospital when the dead and wounded are brought in by a Chinook Medical Emergency Response Team (MERT). 

After watching the proceedings and then watching young Afghan girl die (from suspected meningitis), "for an awful second," he writes, "I thought I might choke - an unforgivable act of weakness in front of the calm resolve of the young medics." 

More on Defence of the Realm.