Newsnight - Monday, 19 February, 2007
Well, I got my email. If this is the best the PM and his bright young things could come up with, I’d suggest they stick with the day job. Oh, wait a 'mo...
Here are some questions back (I am holding my breath). I posed them this morning via Breakfast TV to Douglas Alexander, but they ran out of time to ask more than, oo, two from the whole country, before having to worry about one' of their mate's dresses.
Qu: The claim is made that this is not a stealth tax. Without waffle and 'it will be looked into', what % of every £ will go from the tax directly to environmental-related improvements, how much to creating a whole new level of salaried and pensioned administrators, and how much to unspecified other government expenditures. With no guarantee or fair idea on the first we will assume the last two.
Qu: The other night on Newsnight, Stephen Ladyman claimed 2 to 3 methods for charging an individual vehicle traveling, one presumes, from A to B, without needing to track its location. How, exactly, do you monitor and charge something accurately without knowing where it was, is and how it got there?
(I was a tad concerned that the interviewer seemed way out of her depth and frankly allowed anyone come out with any accusation or fact they liked without check (see my last post no. 251 in my personal review of the 'debate' yesterday)
Qu: What substantive consideration will be given to the situation and needs of those in non-urban (the bits outside Westminster, Islington, Fleet Street, Canary Wharf, where the BBC lives and Ken pedals to work) areas that are... fair?
Qu: How does Dr. Ladyman propose to answer questions from 1.6M people in tomorrow's webchat?
Will the questions be vetted to provide the best set of answers to suit an established agenda?
If so, and in the absence one presumes of dissenting sides being able to put their case(s) in the same way as the No 10 email, how is this anything like sensible debate, or simply further propaganda?
Qu: Who put Transport 2000 in charge of representing moderate, practical and fair environmental advocacy?
Such organisations seem to get funded to drive even greater wedges between protagonists rather than bridge them.
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