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Sunday, 13 March 2011

UKIP: Nikki Sinclaire & Mike Nattrass in the Press



Free from the fascist EFD and Farage's control freakery, Nikki and Mike continue to gain fantastic publicity for the Euro-realist cause.

"How dare you leave the EFD! I demand that you come back and worship me as the one and only true Messiah!"

From The Telegraph:

European Parliament spends £600,000 on body scanners that have never been used

The European Parliament spent £600,000 on six body scanners that were never used because MEPs argued it would be an infringement of privacy.

The body scanners, bought in 2005 at a cost of £100,000 each, are "rotting" in the basement of the building in Brussels and have never been used.

When the scanners, which create an image of a person's nude body, were eventually delivered to the Parliament in the autumn of 2005 MEPs objected to them being used in the building on privacy grounds.

Nikki Sinclaire, a British independent MEP, said the Parliament tried to sell the machines but failed to do so.

They are now so old that they are considered to be technically out of date and may be scrapped altogether.

"These machines have been left to rot on pallets in a disused garage in the depths of the parliament building," she said. "They were ordered in haste and now the Parliament doesn't know what to do with them.

"This is another example of the waste and mismanagement in the European Union, indeed, taxpayer subsidised bureaucracy. This is only a small portion of the £50 million a day the UK gives the EU but it is endemic of how the EU is fundamentally flawed. It beggars belief that these unelected bureaucrats purchased the most expensive machines available at the time. They seem impervious to economic realities."

MEPs led the campaign to stop the use of the scanners in the Parliament yet they are in use in 70 airports across Europe, including Manchester and London Heathrow.

Security in the Parliament is currently a cause for concern following three robberies in a many years and after a French journalist recently managed to smuggle in a toy gun and stand yards away from Prince Charles on his recent visit.

Access to the building is currently controlled by airport-style X-ray machines although there have been calls for improved security measures.

A Parliament spokesman said, "We do not comment on security issues."

End of article. To see the original: LINK

From the Mail On Sunday:

EU's Mr Lightbulb does bit to save energy by leaving on the lamps outside his luxury home day and night for weeks on end

He is the man behind the European Union’s ban on the traditional lightbulb that has caused anger and confusion in the UK’s shops and households.

But it appears that for Latvian Andris Piebalgs energy saving doesn’t start at home.


For Mr Piebalgs, the former European Commissioner for Energy, has left the outside lights burning day and night on his £1.25 million luxury home despite neighbours claiming he has not been seen there for weeks.

Now former communist Mr Piebalgs has been accused of double standards. In 2005 he told this newspaper in an interview that ‘we can all do our bit’ to save electricity.


Nikki Sinclaire, the independent MEP for the West Midlands, said: ‘This is a classic example of hypocrisy. Here you have someone championing environment law and then disregarding it himself.’

Mr Piebalgs, 53, earned £1.4 million in salary and perks as the EU Energy Commissioner during his six-year tenure in the job which ended last year as he became EU Development Commissioner.

A Mail on Sunday survey has revealed UK shoppers are bewildered by the vast array of replacement low-energy bulbs of different shapes and sizes, power and prices as a result of Mr Piebalgs’s diktat.

The problems for consumers include many of the low-energy alternatives being far too large to fit into a traditional reading lamp.

And toxic mercury contained in the most common version means councils will not pick them up from the doorstep because of their concerns over the health risk to binmen.

Mr Piebalgs’s modern home is a short distance from the capital Riga in a pleasant village which was a former Soviet summer playground and is now the preserve of Latvia’s wealthy set.

Two hours before dusk yesterday, six lamps were alight on the external walls of the property.

One neighbour said: ‘The half- dozen or so external lights are on day and night.’

Another said: ‘There hasn’t been anyone living there for several weeks.’

According to Mr Piebalgs’s official diary, he has spent the past two weeks 7,000 miles away from his home approving future EU development programmes in the Pacific Islands of New Caledonia, Vanuatu and East Timor.

He was scheduled to return from the trip last Friday. On his official European Commission CV Mr Piebalgs does not mention his Communist Party membership.

At the time he may well have seen it as advantageous to advance his career as a head teacher and education administrator when Latvia was under the Soviet yoke.

Accounts vary over how long he belonged to a party now seen as the main vehicle of oppression of the Baltic country, but one local source said it was ‘at least six years’ in the Eighties.

But his Red past did not stop his career flourishing in the post-Soviet era when he went from being education and finance minister to an eventual senior post in the Riga Foreign Ministry.

He then took a job as a senior bureaucrat in Brussels before becoming Energy Commissioner in 2004 after his tiny state joined the EU.

He was not Latvia’s first choice and his emergence was greeted by some with disapproval.

Even Latvians are angered by his ban on the traditional bulbs, which will not be on sale from next year.

The manager of one electrical shop said the old-fashioned 60W bulb had sold out in Latvia because of frustrations with the new bulbs.

The supply and importation of pearl bulbs used in the UK was banned two years ago. A spokesman for Mr Piebalgs declined to comment.

However, it is understood the lights are a security measure.

End of article. To see the original: LINK

This is Lichfield:

Protesters welcome Whitehall HS2 inquiry

CAMPAIGNERS against the controversial proposed high-speed rail link have welcomed a forthcoming inquiry into its merits by an influential Parliamentary committee.

The House of Commons Transport Select Committee has agreed to hold hearings in public into the economic arguments for and against HS2.

A spokesman for campaign group Stop HS2 said the organisation is "pleased" the committee will be investigating the project and "looks orward to collaborating with experts when submitting evidence".

The group also passed comment on the Transport Select Committee's report on the completed inquiry into Transport and the Economy, for which Stop HS2 provided both written and oral evidence.

"The government talks about HS2 being transformational, and having the "potential to enhance economic growth"," said Stop HS2 director Penny Gaines.

"However, as the TSC report points out, the Government has not provided the evidence of how they expect HS2 to achieve this growth.

"When he was giving evidence to the Transport Select Committee, Professor Henry Overman said that many projects are promoted on the grounds that they will be transformational but, in actuality, many of these claims do not materialise.

"Stop HS2 does not believe that HS2 will be transformational or that it will provide enough economic benefits to the north to justify the £34 billion price tag.

"Instead it is likely that areas away from the few high speed stations will lose out significantly and that London will benefit disproportionately."

Although not binding on Government, the Secretary of State is obliged to comment – in writing – on the findings of a select committee.

Transcripts of the forthcoming hearings will be available on the Parliamentary website.

Meanwhile, fears have been raised that taxpayers could be required to help foot the £17 billion bill for HS2.

West Midlands MEP Mike Nattrass was among those pointing out that the public consultation document published by the Government last week states:


"Significant numbers of individuals and organisations would stand to benefit from the construction of new high speed rail lines.

"The government expects that such parties would therefore make a contribution to the cost of those links."

Lichfield District Council has already officially declared its total objection to HS2.

This week, Lichfield MP Michael Fabricant said: "As far as I know, there are not, nor ever were, any plans for local councils to fund HS2.

"But just in case someone down in London now gets a bright idea about this as this story is running, let me be clear: I will totally oppose it.

"Local residents cannot be expected to make any contribution to HS2 – especially as it won't even stop in Staffordshire."

As well as linking Birmingham with London, the line boasts a spur which carries on north of the country's second city, cutting into Lichfield district from the direction of Hints.

After slicing through Whittington Heath Golf Club it crosses the A38 on the outskirts of Streethay, eventually joining the West Coast Main Line.

Construction could begin in 2018, with the first high speed trains then planned to run in 2025.


End of article. To see the original: LINK


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