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(not satire unfortunately – it’s the coalition government!)
UPDATE – This government cock-up could cost Tory MP Oliver Letwin his West Dorset seat at the next election!
More than half of the voters in his constituency have signed a petition protesting against the scrapping of the Portland rescue helicopter as part of government plans to cut coastguard and rescue services. See here for more info.
the coalition government’s biggest cock-up yet?
A government ‘mix-up’ over dates means the UK coast will be left inadequately guarded. For up to 2 years.
We know the coalition government has made some huge mistakes in its mad rush to sacrifice public services at the altar of austerity, but this one might just beat them all.
It’s not being very well reported but as part of its austerity measures, the government has just started closing half of all the local Coastguard Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centres around the country. The first centre was closed down just this week.
The coastguard is important. It’s one of the four emergency services along with fire ambulance and police. Coastguard stations protect our coast – they coordinate large-scale and small-scale search and rescue operations, control shipping, deal with maritime and coastal emergencies, protect the environment from oil spills etc and generally stand guard over the 19,491 miles of Britain’s coast.
According to government plans, the 50% of our local coastguard stations which are being closed are to be replaced by a single Coastguard National Maritime Operations Centre based in Fareham, which is supposed to coordinate coastguard operations from a central location.
However, the centre in Fareham isn’t fully functional yet. And it won’t be ready until …..2014.
So for the next 2 years vast parts of our coast will be left virtually unguarded.
That’s like allowing our fire, ambulance or police services to be left without adequate cover for 2 years.
But even more worrying. Could this scandalous state of affairs be all down to a simple mix-up by the government over dates?
It seems some senior members of the cabinet – one David Cameron for example – were under the impression the local coastguard stations were going to be closed not in 2012 but in 2015 – a year after the Fareham national centre is to be fully operational.
Look at this letter from Cameron, sent just last July. In the third paragraph from the end, Cameron states confidently that the closures will be taking place in ….. 2015:
Some mistake surely? Why are the local stations closing in 2012 – two years too early – when according to the PM they should be closing in 2015?
When he was tackled about the letter, Cameron claimed he had made a ‘clerical error’ by typing 2015 instead of 2012.
But read the paragraph again. It doesn’t look like a ‘clerical error’ to me. Cameron clearly says the centres would remain open until 2015 to ensure the planned transitions would maximise ‘the retention of local knowledge’. The sentence would no longer make any sense if 2015 were replaced with 2012.
It looks very much to me as if senior members of the government didn’t realise there would be a 2 year gap in coastguard coverage and are now hoping they’ll get away with it because no-one will notice what a complete cock-up they’ve made of the whole thing.
Maybe we should make sure it is noticed and they don’t get away with it?
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For more information about the Coastguard closures farce – see here:
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Pride's Purge 
A graphologist would have a field day with Cameron’s signature… its incomprehensible ie. someone at ‘ease with hiding himself’, or as we might say ‘at ease with lying’.
You’re right Tom. This is very serious and needs to be widely known!
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Apparently, the life boat charity, the RNLI are saving up for some new boats and will be tattling a can at a supermarket near you. Please generously.
As no trawlermen in their right mind would set off without adequate coast guard cover, perhaps they might like to consider volunteering for the RNLI and do their bit?
As for the inevitable collapse of the British fishing industry, one can only assume we shall have to rely on imported fish and farmed salmon, from baronial land owners such as a number of Tory party donors perhaps?
If you were thinking of catching a ferry ant time soon, remember to take extra warm clothes and a maritime disaster, personal survival kit.
Just in case.
Good luck!
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He was probably listening to “Gone Fishing” when he signed this? – If this wasn’t Cameron I would say Unbelievable !
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Pingback: Argyll News: Forth gone, Clyde on way out but Coastguard closures not meant to happen until 2015 | For Argyll
Thank you for this information. We have published on it and linked to it.
Scotland’s Forth station closed this week and Clyde is already in the close down process and will be gone by the end of this year.
The sea area covered by Clyde stretches from the Mull of Galloway on the Scottish Border to Ardnamurchan Point, the most westerly mainland point on the UK. It is a massive sea area with rugged coastlines, deeply indented sea lochs, a raft of islands.
It includes part of the North Channel with trans Atlantic shipping using the Irish Sea and the shipping route between mainland Europe and the UK via The Minches and the Pentland Firth into the North Sea.
The smaller Befast coastgard is slated to assume the additional responsibility for this massive sea area which will see it cover all of this plus its own existing territory of the entire east and northern coasts of Northern Ireland. It will then also be responsible for the entire North Channel.
With the back up of Fareham not fully functional until 2014, this cock-up adds the dangerous waters, coastlines and shipping lanes of the north to the list of the areas where commercial shipping and leisure sailors will now spend two years at substantial risk.
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I am afraid it is worse than this!
The 1st Coastguard Rescue Station closed yesterday (28/09/2012), Forth MRCC was the first casualty in the Plan. The station was closed because the MCA management failed to maintain staff numbers.
The previous Shipping Minister (Mike Penning) gave SPECIFIC assurance to the House of Commons (Nov 2011 when announcing the plan) “that no stations would close until the MOC fully tested & operational.
The Gov’t/ DfT/ MCA have repeatedly ignored evidence that indicates serious flaws in the plan from experts & public.
In the ‘Modernisation Plan’ not only is there a loss of 50% of Coastguard Maritime Rescue Coordination Centres (MRCCs) along with all their local knowledge, but all MCA Rescue Tugs have been (or will be) scrapped. Any vessel in trouble has to negotiate with Commercial Tugs (see the Union Star/ Penile Lifeboat Disaster)
Also the Maritime Incident Response Group has been axed. So no Maritime Chemical & Firefighting teams in the UK.
Finally all Helicopter Search and Rescue is to be sold off to a private company, ending the involvement of our Royal Navy & RAF SAR units.
So that is the plan to make UK waters and coastline safer…. Oh but it is cheaper…. it saves UK taxpayers 15pence a year.
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I do hope Coastaljoe means the Penlee Lifeboat disaster, I can’t imagine a penile lifeboat
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Sorry the comment above should say PENLEE LIFEBOAT DISASTER…. I can only blame predictive text, failing eyesight and inner rage at the situation.!!
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Not to put too fine a point on it, it also leaves our coasts unpatrolled and therefore potentially undefended against any stray invader. How soon we forget! Correct me if I’ve got the wrong Fareham, by the way, but isn’t that inland? Seems a strange choice for a national coastguard centre, if so.
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Good point Jay. Actually I believe the Fareham centre in question was originally built as a centralised national centre for fire services but was abandoned after it was realised that centralising emergency fire services was a really daft idea.
Centralising coastguard services is an even dafter idea.
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Unbelievable. Thanks for the info. I’m going to have a dig about the privatisation of Helicopter S&R and tug services.
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There will be a roaring trade in rowing boats around Calais and Bologne when this gets out !
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Pingback: What Every Member of the Public Needs to Know « retiredandangry
I’ve just consulted an expert graphologist and she said the graphological features of Cameron’s signature indicate someone who is most probably a bit of a twat.
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Reblogged this on retiredandangry and commented:
This is a must-read blog. It shows the government for what they are – liars, and, yes, it probably is their biggest cock-up yet because there is documentary proof of their lies.
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Never have I known a Government so incompetent and dangerously so.Cameron “not doing detail” is one thing but being so unaware and then compulsively lying when such repeated instances occur is quite another.
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Much more succinct 🙂
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Reblogged this on Goaty's News and commented:
Goaty: Have tried to remain politically unbiased, but in this matter of coastguard closures, it is difficult. Taking this story at face value, it seems an incredible lack of forethought on the part of the current government. This is very worrying – lives will be lost!
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The RNLI is one of the richest charities in the country. Perhaps they could lend the government a bob or two?
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Its not just the Coastguard stations that are going. The coastguard tugs are also going. These aren’t just the little tugs that you see around your harbours and ports. These are huge machines capable of winching an oil tanker off the rocks.
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Reblogged this on Representing the Mambo and commented:
Another important piece from Pride’s Purge, who continue to pick up on big stories that the national media don’t take enough notice of. It’s also weird that in the week that I argued that Labour in Scotland are copying Nicola Murray in The Thick Of It by embracing Tory cuts, we have the issue of coastguards coming up, which of course was one of the issues that Murray haplessly alighted upon to try and highlight the opposition’s ‘credibility’. Once again, life is imitating satire……….
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Firstly Tom I would like to thank you on behalf of the national Coastguard SOS Campaign group for the writing of this blog. It is vital that respected political commentators give consideration to this issue which undoubtedly will affect everyone in the UK, irrespective of whether or not they live in a coastal area.
Your concern over the David Cameron letter farce is evident and is shared by many. His statement was quite clear yet it was contradicted by the Maritime & Coastguard Agency who it has been reported hurried to contact Downing Street to find out why the Prime Minister had made the statement. It appears that Mr Cameron then changed his mind so it makes you wonder who is actually running this country? We don’t believe that it was a “clerical error” from a junior clerk that caused this because after all, the letter was indeed signed by the Prime Minister himself. It seems a convenient excuse is being used to cover up the fact that the PM was obviously undermined by others.
We are now in the 22nd month of a long and often bitter campaign. Bitter because despite overwhelming rejection of this plan by industry experts – namely Coastguard officers, successive transport Ministers and the Prime Minister are refusing to acknowledge their expertise and value. This is disgraceful and it is vital that we continue to campaign so that the public are fully aware of the seriousness of the station closure plan.
LOCAL KNOWLEDGE SAVES LIVES
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But which bit of a twat is he?
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I was going to take your article seriously, then I realised you don;t even know how many emergency services there are.
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You evidently had in mind this latest cock up.
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Will it save money? Probably not.
Still, they had to do something with it as the PFI deal under which it was built is costing truck-loads of money, and it was obviously unsuitable for Air Traffic Control.
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So just think of all the low skilled jobs for unemployable young plebs that the subsequent clean-up operation would generate!
Why do some people always have to be so negative?
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Oh dear.
Did he forget the AA?
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Thanks for the information. And well done for your tireless campaigning. The public should be made more fully aware of the seriousness of what’s going on.
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Oh yes – Alcoholics Anonymous are indeed one of the most important emergency services we have.
😉
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Obviously he’s all of a twat don’t need pro. qualifications to see that.
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Yes – but it’s nice to get his twattishness confirmed by an expert.
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Reblogged this on Vox Political and commented:
Not only does this look like happy days are on their way – for SMUGGLERS – but it also shows up what an irresponsible idiot David Cameron really is. He tried to cover up his mistake by calling it a clerical error when it is clearly nothing of the sort. Please spread this information around – especially in coastal areas!
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Err… and a lone blogger is doing the job of the BBC. I like the consistency of the madness.
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Reblogged this on Stoneofcherry's Blog.
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Having recently walked past the Prawl Point coastguard station in South Devon, I was informed by my local guide that the station was now manned by volunteers. That’s really not good enough, I thought.
Probably the government agree; I expect next time it will be manned by teenage ‘Coastal Protection UK’ (CPUK) ‘volunteers’ on JSA. Then it would have proper volunteers, not amiable old trawler-men who do it because they feel a need to protect fellow sea-persons from peril at sea. And CPUK could make a bit of money out of the venture…
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This centre in fareham you mention has been built and left empty at taxpayers expence for a few years now and was orininally built as a central fire service operations centre but was not used in the end as it was not feasable yup you could not make it up
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Correct Tom
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Speaking as one of his constituents, I’m sorry to say that Letwin will still get in regardless. His constituency was one of the LibDem targets last time out and they did well, but that was mainly off the back of tactical voting by Labour supporters in an area without enough Labour voters for Labour to win the seat themselves. The tactical LibDem vote will collapse next time, but this won’t be enough for Labour to win. Letwin will be returned with an increased majority, more’s the pity.
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Let me guess , the coastguard will be replaced by G4S or ATOS SERCO VIRGIN or TESCO.
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How can a charity be rich , by definition they are a charity, the only rich charity i think of is Eton
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Do you?
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‘The Gov’t/ DfT/ MCA have repeatedly ignored evidence that indicates serious flaws in the plan from experts & public.’
The Government ignoring expert evidence even when it comes directly from their own experts and given in answer to the Governments requests for it will come to be a hallmark of this Government of hoorah Henry’s driven by ideology rather than the principle of whats best for the country.
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The govt dont know the country, never met them, not their type, not ‘one of us’
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Pingback: The 12 Biggest Coalition Cockups of 2012 « Pride's Purge
why is tom allowing this spam onto his blogs
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Charity commission website is an interesting read if you click on top 10. RNLI ranks 25 on income with £174m. Long term investments of over £250m.
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You might be thinking of Farnham as Fareham has Royal Navy links. Don’t know much about these things but guess it wouldn’t matter if inland. The air traffic control centre (Swanwick) isn’t at an airport for example.
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