Dissidents hid cameras at MI5 base

The army have uncovered a sophisticated spying operation on the secret service by the dissident republican group, Oglaigh na Heireann. According to the Belfast Telegraph, members of the organisation planted digital cameras in woodland bordering MI5’s base in Northern Ireland, Palace Barracks.

Osborne’s VAT increase: regressive and avoidable

George Osborne’s decision to raise VAT to 20 per cent from January 2011 has been widely described as regressive, including by the new Head of the Office of Budget Responsibility Robert Chote. Mr Chote has also emphasised the extent to which raising VAT was not unavoidable, and was in fact a choice made by Mr Osborne.

PI no. 3: Assertion-flagging: for less partisan, prejudiced blogging

Most political bloggers are motivated to fight what they see as bigotry, prejudice, and ill-informed, unjustifiable assertion. This is a fine and noble cause, because the spreading of false beliefs – without the evidence to support them – is bad for all of us, as is the displacement of informed argument by mere rhetoric. All the more so when the perpetrator is powerful or influential.

RDA consultation is a total dog’s breakfast

Last week saw the deadline pass for local authorities and businesses to produce proposals for new, local regeneration bodies to succeed the eight regional development agencies outside London, allegedly replacing the “top-down prescription approach taken previously”.

Five-year fix

Nick Clegg’s proposals for 5-year fixed terms will put Britain at odds with most democratic countries. The proposals were not even Lib Dem policy.

Defeatism or realism in Afghanistan?

Wars, like all violence, tend to pull us towards absolutes. We either win, as in the Second World War, or lose, as in Vietnam or with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The former soldier in me is easily ‘pulled’ into seeing the conflict in Afghanistan as a matter of absolutes, of simple ‘Cause, Effect and Solution’. But the analyst in me sees things differently.