I find it extra ordinary that our leaders still pretend that we lead the world, and go on acting like it, trying to right the world at our expense, when the French take over our power supplies, the Dane’s take over our banks, and the Yankee crooks are allowed to cripple us financially? Once upon a time we built a large number of the railways across the world, our ships sailed all the seas, and we were a power to be reckoned with. What has changed all that? I suspect it’s because the other nations woke up to what we were doing. I just wish the politicians would lower their sights just a little, I can no longer afford to be a world leader.
When the scientists proved to me that the gas used in my fridge would be causing global warming when I got rid of the fridge, and all the rest of the science that went with it, I was astounded, as I had done a course in geology years ago. I listened to all the political outpourings about what we were to do to save the world, and tried to do my little bit, which I thought was a total waste of time in the context of what was going on in the whole of the world. Now I see incredible change in the weather, in the conditions of the Earth with its flooding, tsunamis, eruptions, and on and on. I no longer believe all of this is as a result of global warming, on the contrary’ I think if some of the same scientists drilled through the ice, drilled through the rocks, examined fossils, they would find similar periods of unusually fast change in the earth’s history.
Years ago people didn’t talk of initiatives all the time. It seems that this government is obsessed with initiatives, we get them two or three times a week. For example, nine universities are co-operating to ensure that the brighter pupils from poorer homes will take up university degree courses. I got the impression, true or not, that the pupils would have further training to make them acceptable to the universities. What was certain was that there were particular universities, thought to be more advantageous than others, that were grouping together with a system which allowed them, if they were not able to give a place to a deemed bright student, that student would then be recommended to other universities in the system for a place. If the idea is so good why are only nine universities involved instead of all, right across the board? I think that someone somewhere is missing the real point. I have said before as many have, that the educational standards have been steadily dropping, and that many universities, to maintain their attendance roles, have been reducing their acceptance levels, and in consequence having to degrade the degree levels. Retired secondary school teachers, will tell you the same thing. Have the politicians also forgotten the current enormous dropout rate? In the 40s it was probably as low as 2%, but we valued the experience, we didn’t take it as a right. Other people have called the system social engineering; I believe it is a publicity ruse.