2022 starts at pace with: housebuilding, omicron, online meetings, windfall taxes, celebrity restaurants and archeologically themed badgers. Its good to be in touch again!!!

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Sort out housebuilding obstacles or miss target, Lords warn UK government

We seem never to get this issue right, we seem always to be mired in controversy about the way forward. A new year seems to be bringing very little change to either of my previous statements. This article tells us:

Britain faces a housing crisis in the wake of the pandemic as confusion about planning rules and shortages of staff undermine government targets to build 300,000 homes a year, according to a House of Lords committee.

A retreat from housebuilding by smaller companies must be tackled by ministers to reduce the shortage of homes, the cross-party group of peers said.

“Too many people currently live in expensive, unsuitable and poor-quality homes, and housing supply needs to be increased now to tackle the housing crisis,” the committee said in its report, titled Meeting Housing Demand.

The housing secretary, Michael Gove, is expected to set out the government’s plans to kickstart housebuilding after the industry suffered the twin blows of Brexit, which reduced the amount of skilled labour available, and the upheaval caused by the pandemic.

Gove has indicated he will encourage employment and housing in the regions as part of the government’s levelling up agenda, though this is likely to be a long-term project.

Baroness Neville-Rolfe, chair of the Lords’ built environment committee, said: “The government’s ambitious target of 300,000 new homes a year will only be met if it takes action to remove the barriers for housebuilders, particularly for SMEs, which 35 years ago built 39% of new homes but now build just 10%.”

The committee was critical of a U-turn over proposed reforms to planning rules that would have divided areas into zones, some of which are reserved for conservation and others that have few or no rules holding back developers.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/jan/10/sort-out-housebuilding-obstacles-or-miss-target-lords-warn-uk-government

NHS England strikes private hospitals deal to fight Omicron surge

This article, along with tennis tales from down under, makes me wonder what we might learn from a map showing the rural/urban split in terms of the incidence of people who haven’t had the vaccine…..

Hospitals in England will be able to use private hospitals and staff under a deal with the NHS to maintain services as Omicron cases surge, avoiding delays in treatment for patients with illnesses such as cancer.

The move comes as hospitals have also been told to find extra beds in gyms and education centres owing to rising numbers of Covid patients.

The three-month agreement means private healthcare staff and facilities will be on standby to support the NHS if required and to maintain services for patients who can be referred, including some of those waiting for cancer surgery.

Nightingale hubs are being created in the grounds of some hospitals as part of a move to create up to 4,000 extra beds.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/jan/10/nhs-england-strikes-private-hospitals-deal-to-fight-omicron-surge

Jackie Weaver pleads for return of online council meetings

More power to your elbow Jackie, much easier to turn objectional meeting goers off on line! And easier (broadband allowing) for rural dwellers to get to meetings and for that matter look in on them. This story tells us:

The government’s failure to enable local politicians to meet virtually is hampering councils, worrying older councillors and shutting out new participants, according to Jackie Weaver, who shot to fame thanks to a video clip of an ill-tempered council meeting 10 months ago.

Weaver, who became one of the most unlikely breakout stars of 2021 after footage from the Handforth parish council meeting she was attending went viral, has issued the rallying cry amid fears that current high infection rates could hit participation in local politics hard.

In April the high court ruled that from May council meetings in England must take place in person – after coronavirus restrictions which allowed virtual meetings lapsed.

“It is completely unreasonable that we are having to cancel council meetings or hold them only in emergencies for goodness knows how long. Where is democracy?” said Weaver in an interview conducted, inevitably, over Zoom.

This week Lawyers in Local Governmentthe Association of Democratic Services Officers (ADSO) launched a petition calling for councils to be allowed to meet remotely because “they know best” what type of meetings work in their area.

After a tumultuous 10 months in which Weaver, the chief officer of the Cheshire Association of Local Councils, has played herself in the Archers, opened the Brit awards as “Weaver the Cleaver” and featured on Celebrity Mastermind, she is also calling for legislation that will, once again, allow council meetings to be held online.

The public can only hope that it will lead to more filmed exchanges like the Handforth meeting that gripped the nation in the dark days of last February’s lockdown, when Weaver was commanded by Aled’s iPad to: “Read the standing orders, read them and understand them!”

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/jan/07/jackie-weaver-pleads-for-return-of-online-council-meetings

Calls for windfall tax as North Sea oil and gas profits soar

Here was I thinking changing times had done for the likes of these big oil and gas giants….With more homes off grid in rural settings these rising costs are likely to hit rural dwellers hardest. This article tells us:

Bumper shareholder payouts, soaring profits, booming asset valuations: the oil and gas industry has bounced back from the depths of the pandemic with a vengeance.

After a difficult 2020, when plunging demand led in some cases to negative prices, crude recovered in 2021 and wholesale gas prices have soared in Europe and the UK. Gas has risen as much as tenfold to new all-time highs, due to factors including low storage capacity, strong Chinese demand and low wind generation during the summer.

BP boss Bernard Looney said recently illustrated this bonanza when he said the oil and gas giant has become a “cash machine”. North Sea oil and gas companies are expected to report near-record cashflows of almost $20bn (£14.9bn) for the current financial year, according to industry experts at Wood MacKenzie.

The revival of the industry’s fortunes has spurred calls for a windfall tax on North Sea producers, with the proceeds used to subsidise energy bills for households facing a cost-of-living crisis. The Liberal Democrats first made the call last week, and Labour also took up the call at the weekend. Rachel Reeves, shadow chancellor of the exchequer, said: “There is a global gas price crisis, but 10 years of the Conservatives’ failed energy policy, and dither and delay, has created a price crisis that’s being felt by everyone. We want to stop bills going up.”

The Conservative former energy minister Chris Skidmore has also publicly backed the idea, which has been rejected by the government.

Shell, the world’s largest producer and trader of liquefied natural gas (LNG), said last week that profits would be higher than expected thanks to high prices.

Unlike gas that arrives via pipelines from fields in the North Sea, LNG is shipped across oceans to the highest bidder, meaning companies like Shell benefit from surging global prices.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jan/10/north-sea-oil-gas-companies-cashflows-windfall-tax

Jeremy Clarkson Diddly Squat Farm restaurant refused permission

Money and celebrity can be a curse in some places. I am sure there is more to this story than those two issues but I never fail to be fascinated by the way planning decisions play out in localities.

A planned new restaurant for TV personality Jeremy Clarkson's Oxfordshire farm has been refused permission.

Diddly Squat Farm, in Chadlington, is the site of the former Top Gear host's Amazon Studios series, Clarkson's Farm.

A West Oxfordshire District Council (WODC) planning sub-committee declined the plan on Monday.

Clarkson said it would enhance farming and tourism in the area and the refusal meant a "very bad day for farming".

When asked how frustrated he was, he said: "Very, and so will all the local farmers."

Planning officers said the proposal to renovate a lambing shed into a restaurant was out of keeping with the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB).

The shed was built in 2020 after a new flock of sheep was bought to diversify the farm business.

It has now been merged with another local farmer's flock, the council said.

But council officers said the building has since been used, without planning permission, as a cafe and a bar area.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-59942600

And Finally

Spain: Badger thought to have found Roman treasure

Hinterland regularly features the antics of charismatic mega fauna and this is one of the best yet – whilst badgers may be a source of significant controversy in rural England, in Spain they are moving into archaeology according to this tale, which tells us:

A hungry badger is thought to have unearthed the largest collection of Roman coins ever to have been discovered in northern Spain, reports say.

The treasure trove was discovered close to the den of an animal in the municipality of Grado, Asturias.

The animal is thought to have uncovered the treasure as it desperately searched for food last winter, a harsh one.

Heavy snowfall affected the region when Storm Filomena hit last year.

In a desperate attempt to find some food, it is thought that the animal - which researchers believe could be a badger - inserted its legs into a small crack opening next to its refuge.

But it found no use for the old coins and abandoned some of the pieces in front of its den.

The 209 pieces were then found by two archaeologists when they went to visit the cave of La Cuesta with a local resident, according to a report recently published in an archaeological journal.

The collection of rough coins turned out to be an "exceptional find" dating from between the 3rd and 5th Centuries AD.

The coins are thought to have been forged in places as far away as Constantinople (present day Istanbul, Turkey) and Thessaloniki, Greece, according to one of the researchers who spoke to Spanish newspaper El País.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-59937510