Zig Zag Jun 1984 - Bone Orchard & Specimen

Flexipop 25 - Punky Party (EP)

Never owned Flexipop 25 so I have no idea where this came from. But here it is. A 29 year old flexidisc. That still plays. Christmas is the time for miracles I suppose. (At least, for those that believe that kind of thing)

Flexipop 25 - Punky Party (EP) 320kbps The Anti-Nowhere League - World War III The Defects - Dance (Until You Drop) The Meteors - Mutant Rock Dance (Until You Drop) - pwd: c4ctusm0uth

"Our Commitment To You"

I have said before that profit is a measure of how much you overcharge your buyer, how much you underpay your staff or a combination of the two.

Scottish Power managed, in the space of one brief 'phone call, to encapsulate the 'overcharge your customer' approach beautifully.

I was a Scottish Power customer until I realised that next year I would potentially be paying a small fortune for my gas and electricity. I have been with them for a number of years now with no problem and was with them when I lived in Edinburgh. I would even be happy to recommend them. But these days its about saving money wherever you can. So I took my annual consumption statement over to uSwitch and discovered alleged savings of £480 with someone else. £40 a month in my pocket rather than a power company's was too appealing. I signed up fully expecting to have a problem at some point. (Not quite my usual cynicism you understand but a pragmatic approach borne of experience. I switched supplier a number of years ago and ended up with my gas bills knackered. The leccy switch went fine but, despite my taking dual fuel from the new supplier as well, the gas went Pete Tong. I imagine that something similar will probably occur here. Big companies, for all their talk of customer care and 'our commitment to you', see you as one of millions: nothing special.)

And so it was that I received a 'phone call from a lovely Glaswegian lady from Scottish Power (paraphrased).

"Its ****** from Scottish Power. I understand your thinking of leaving us?"
"Yes. Actually the electricity should have switched yesterday."
"OK. Well we don't want to lose you as a customer so can I ask why it is your going?"
"Its the price basically. I've found a cheaper deal."
"Well I can offer you a tariff based on our prices at this time last year which will be guaranteed until next December. That should save about £200 off your bill."
"I understand I am going to save £480 on dual fuel by moving so your not really close."
"£480?"
"Yes."
"Was that from the company or a price comparison website?"
"A website.
"Well you might find that your direct debits are higher than you think. ... "

A kind of to-and-fro continued for a minute or two more before I decided I had had enough and said, "I'm not having this discussion. Thanks for your call. Bye." I was mildly annoyed.

Why? The key part for me is the offer of last years prices guaranteed for a year.

It is obvious that Scottish Power would not have been in touch to make this offer where it not for the fact that I have switched so their promise of "a straightforward discount on your energy costs" is empty. They would have been delighted to have had me as a customer sat on the higher rate for as long as they could. Of course they didn't want to lose me - I've been paying over the odds! Not only that, what they are really saying is that even if they did switch me to last year's prices they are still not going to do that at a loss so how many of their millions of other customers are they silently ripping off to the tune of hundreds of pounds? Millions of passive customers times hundreds of pounds equals big profits. I am not a gambling man but I would stick money on a bet that the company has not got in touch with all those customers they care so much about to offer them last year's prices.

Of course the right-wingers would argue that I, as an individual, have taken advantage of the market to save myself some money so, in that sense, the system works wonderfully. But that would be to completely miss the point I made in the first sentence and to condone profiteering.

Zig Zag Jun 1984 - Spear Of Destiny

Impartial Media Reporting

It has emerged today that an unarmed police baton was seriously injured in the student protests against higher tuition fees on Thursday 9th December.

On the day when parliament voted to raise university tuition fees to a very fair £9k a year, rabid student-anarchist-revolutionaries took to the streets of London intent on only one thing: wholesale destruction.

PC Copper was at the demonstration trying his utmost to keep the real students safe from the student-anarchist-revolutionaries who always spoil these sorts of things. He said, "I was at the demonstration trying my utmost to keep the real students safe from the student-anarchist-revolutionaries who always spoil these sorts of things."

"I was fully kitted out in riot gear - shield, baton, helmet, body armour - for the safety of the real students obviously and was peacefully forcing some student-anarchist-revolutionaries into a kettle when one of them ran straight at my baton and assaulted it. With his head. Repeatedly."

"At first I couldn't believe it. That a student-anarchist-revolutionary's disdain for law and order could stoop so low as to attack an unarmed police baton. But then I realised that the baton was in serious danger so I had to act."

With tears in his eyes, he continued the story, "I managed to get the baton away from the attacker's head - not before he had managed to give it one last massive crack with his skull though - and back into the lines. I cradled it in my arms as I staggered through my colleagues, London's finest, and rushed it to a waiting ambulance."

"Once inside the ambulance the medics were first rate. They removed all the blood and hair that this guy had forced onto the shiny, black surface and gave it a thorough clean down. They dressed the scratches along the length and even applied some electrical tape to the handle (it was coming away a bit) before rushing it to Chelsea and Westminster hospital."

On arriving at the hospital, PC Copper says the carnage was unbelievable. There were ripped high vis jackets, helmets with paint on, damaged bits of body armour and even some other injured batons like his own. "It was like something out of Dante's Inferno, whatever that is." he added.

However the situation came to a head when one of the student-anarchist-revolutionaries who, it is understood, had been planting bombs along The Mall, arrived at the hospital requesting treatment for a minor graze on his shin. Alfie Meadows had been causing trouble at the demonstration with other student-anarchist-revolutionaries, including his own mother would you believe, when he fell down a long imaginary flight of stairs in front of police lines which resulted in the cut on his leg.

Policemen already at the hospital tending to their injured body armour and batons were appalled and tried to force hospital staff to move Alfie to somewhere more suitable but an ambulance man with obvious anarchist-revolutionary leanings insisted he stay. "I'm not driving him to another hospital. It's my tea break." said the working-class oik.

PC Copper was understandably upset but managed to compose himself and act in the dignified manner to which we have become accustomed from our constabulary, "You fucking uppity student. I'm gonna kill you." he was heard to shout as Alfie was rushed into emergency surgery.

But rest easy. The baton came through unscathed and now both PC Copper and his trusty truncheon are back on duty, none the worse for wear.

Show Me The Money

It isn't money that makes the world go round. At least, not in Britain anyway. It's debt. And the accumulation of it.

Where is the sense in it? Children in England, my daughter included, now face the prospect of even bigger debts on leaving university. Average student debt, for those starting this year, was expected to reach £25000. Now factor in the additional tuition fees. The country is awash with debt. It's how we got here in the first fucking place. Who wants to start their working life already saddled with, what, £30k, £40k, £50k of debt?

We know that wages aren't keeping up with inflation. We also know that this ConDem bollocks about not paying until you earn £21k doesn't kick in 'til 2016 so won't be a big difference from the current £15k threshold, again, given inflation. So all these graduate high fliers who will, of course, march straight into all those readily available well-paid jobs will still be repaying their loans.

The Depart for Business, Innovation and Skills trumpets, "Graduates ... can expect to earn at least £100,000, net of tax, more than non-graduates across their working lives." Wow! On an average forty years working life, that's £2500 a year more! A massive £208 a month EXTRA! All because you have £40k of debt. But remember that you will be living and working longer.

What if you want to buy a house? The days of 100% loans are long gone my student friend. And don't even think of trying to self-certificate your earnings. So you'd better start saving for a hefty deposit. Oh, that's right - you're studying. And working part-time already to keep on top of your debts. I'll put the savings book away then shall I?

And don't forget your pension. You'll need to start a pension as soon as you start working to have even a vague chance of a pittance of an income when you retire. At 73. Because that's where retirement age will be. All the risks of the defined contribution pension scheme will be yours to endure as the stock market ridicules your life of wage slavery.

Debt interwoven with debt overlaid with debt. At an individual level. At an institutional level. At a state level. At a global level. It's becoming meaningless.

It's madness.

Judgement And Courage

@MarkReckons Yes.

@cactusmouth Have you actually read the piece?

RT @MarkReckons: Nick Clegg is a man of judgment and courage – Peter Oborne http://bit.ly/gFSyre << Yes, PISS POOR judgement and NO courage


Mark (Reckons) Thompson tweeted a link to this article by Peter Oborne titled, "Britain’s most hated politician – Nick Clegg – is a man of judgment and courage". Which I retweeted with the addition, "Yes, PISS POOR judgement and NO courage".

First off, I don't hate Nick Clegg. I can't be bothered to work myself up into that much of a state about him as a person. I may well hate the system he is an integral part of, a ruling class comprised of similarly wealthy, similarly educated and similarly connected capitalists whose money is inherited, obtained from property/land or business, but that doesn't mean I hate him. And that is an important distinction.

I said that Nick Clegg had piss poor judgement for one reason: the coalition partners he chose are, in many ways, ideologically opposed to his own party members views. The Tories might be to Nick's taste but I think the Lib Dems spectacular popularity decline has reflected how many ordinary supporters now feel about their party and the bedfellows chosen for them. And possibly about Nick and Vince's role in the government - they look a lot like Tory policy fall-guys to me. Maybe they're role as constant election third-placers has been negated by their right-wing coalition and UK politics has, as a result, coalesced into the kind of clear left/right split not seen for quite a while and former supporters are jumping ship to Labour. Who knows? But I do think the ConDem policy program is scaring a lot of Lib Dem supporters away and that's down to Nick as leader.

As for his courage, I don't think anyone who breaks a promise and then uses the situation he has chosen for himself as an excuse to break that promise is really demonstrating their bravery. The article linked to has the following paragraph:

"The first and least important element concerns that pledge to abolish tuition fees. The charge made by critics that Clegg broke his word is wrong – it would only be valid if the Lib Dems had won the general election. But they came third, meaning that they were forced to enter a coalition government with the Conservatives."

That is entirely disingenuous. We need to draw a line between Lib Dem policy and personal commitment.

The Lib Dems were never going to win the election. To then say that because they didn't win the election all manifesto promises are off is ridiculous. Politicians stand for very little these days but when they so publicly jettison their pre-election pledges it reduces already pitifully low expectations further. That said, I will grant you that Lib Dem policy had to be amended to form the coalition. Clearly that is a fact. But it would have been possible for Clegg to form the coalition and still remain true to his, very public, commitment not to raise tuition fees.

I am willing to judge Clegg as an individual - not as some coalition entity driven by the need to maintain 'stable government' - and, as an individual, he made a promise to vote against tuition fee rises. He didn't make that promise based on this or that type of government being in power, he made it because, I suspect, he believed it was the right thing to do (it still is, btw, to vote against tuition fee rises).

But now he is trying to sell his party the idea that raising tuition fees is a good thing and it is tearing his party apart.

Courage would have seen him form the coalition whilst keeping his promises. The Tory policies he has managed to water-down and the Lib Dems policies he has managed to retain aren't the ones bringing people out onto the streets of Britain to protest.

Zig Zag Jun 1984 - Party Day, The Cabinet, Bourgie Bourgie, The Cure, Mercenary Skank & Geschlecht Akt