Npower blames draughty old homes for rising energy bills

Energy giant Npower has claimed bills in the UK are high because the country’s “old and draughty” houses waste so much gas and electricity.

Npower chief executive Paul Massara said the actual unit prices of gas and electricity in the UK are among the lowest in Europe - but bills are high "because British houses waste so much energy”.

In the supplier's second “Energy Explained” report, Mr Massara said: “If we can increase the efficiency of the UK’s old and draughty housing, we can ensure that annual energy bills are some of the lowest too.”

This is a moronic, albeit ballsy, statement from the boss of an energy company to basically turn round to his customers and say it’s your fault we’ve raised our prices because you all live in old run down houses that allows all the lovely energy we sell you at a ridiculously high price to escape, I may have improvised with that last bit but you get the drift.

You can tell that Mr Massara, Npower and all the other big energy companies are full of s**t when you read that in the UK unit prices of gas and electricity are among the lowest in Europe and yet we have stupidly high bills.

That doesn’t really add up does it, and quite clearly tells us that the energy companies are run by greedy bastards trying their best to rip us off, and who try to justify it by offering up pitiful excuses like the one put forward by Mr Massara. 

M40 pub ‘at odds’ with public views

A new pub being opened at a motorway service station today was "at odds" with public opinion which was firmly against the move, according to road safety campaigners.

Pub chain JD Wetherspoon said its Hope And Champion will be open from 4am to 1am, seven days a week, in the Extra Motorway Service Area at junction 2 of the M40 in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire.

Off course this pub is ‘at odds’ with public views, because opening a pub at a motorway services is a stupid idea, and sends the complete wrong message.

How are they going to advertise this pub, always drink and drive responsibly?

But while this pub maybe there its fate lies in the hands of the motorists so I would urge anyone who stops off at this services regularly, or who lives in the area, to avoid this pub at all costs and discourage everyone you know or meet from going in there as well.

That Wetherspoon's won't be able to afford to keep it open.    

Orange cards proposed by FIFA candidate Jerome Champagne

FIFA presidential candidate Jerome Champagne has suggested introducing orange cards that would allow referees to send players to a sin-bin.

The Frenchman, 55, launched his bid to succeed Sepp Blatter as the world governing body's president on Monday.

He also wants to punish teams when players question officials and hopes football will consider using more technology for key decisions.

Interesting stuff and as Blatter has lied again and said he will run when he said he wouldn’t, there is someone who’s prepared to challenge him.

Or maybe not, when announcing his intention to run Champagne bizarrely said if Blatter does run again, which he will instead of doing the decent thing and standing down and getting as far away from football governance as possible, he had no chance of winning and has admitted if Blatter ran again he would most likely pull out of the race.

What’s the bloody point of that? Why announce you’re going to run and list the ideas and proposals you have to change the game and then say oh by the way if this guy decides to run again, which everyone knows he will, I’m going to pull out of the race and allow him to be re-elected unopposed.

No wonder Champagne has come out with the stupid ideas of orange cards and sin-bins, sounds like he was just making this stuff up on the spot.  

Australian Open medical officer defends heat policy

The chief medical officer at the Australian Open has defended criticism of the competition's "extreme heat policy" after Jamie Murray was treated for heatstroke.

Play was suspended on uncovered courts for more than four hours on Thursday as temperatures breached 40C for a third consecutive day.

But Dr Tim Wood insisted the players' health was not being compromised.

“We evolved on the high plains of Africa chasing antelope for eight hours under these conditions,” he said.

Nice contemporary and relevant point made by the doc there...... we haven’t chased antelope on the African plains for quite a while now.  

That piss poor attempt at an excuse and the fact that play was stopped is basically an admission that the medical team got it WRONG! It’s fairly obvious that play should have been stopped long before today. 

All the players have been saying that it’s almost impossible to play in that kind of heat, one even thought he was going to die and a ball boy collapsed, but despite all this the medical team thought everything was fine and dandy.

Tell you what as a PR stunt to prove their point all the medical team should play at least an hour’s tennis in the middle of the day in 40C+ heat to show clearly to everyone just how ‘safe’ it is.

I know the organisers have a schedule to keep to but it’s amazing just how expendable they think the players are because they’ve almost been forced into calling play off for a bit.

Why is it that we have evolved to the point where it takes people’s lives to be in danger before we can be bothered to do anything about it?  

Spies to be allowed to break speed limit

Spies are to be allowed to speed under changes to the UK motoring laws. Spies are to be allowed to speed under changes to the UK motoring laws.

MI5 and MI6 officers currently have to abide by the rules of the road even if national security is threatened.

But they will be given the same exemptions as police vehicles, ambulances and fire engines by transport minister Robert Goodwill.

I certainly wasn’t aware that even in cases were national security was threatened our spies had to obey the speed limit, thankfully that barmy law has been corrected and now when the country is in danger they can get from A to B as quickly as they can and not sit behind the wheel checking they’re not speeding.

James Bond would be very different if the old law was factored in, the bad guy would speed off and Bond would jump in his car to chase, realise he’s in a built up area and so can’t go more than 30mph, be forced to chug along for miles until he gets to a motorway, by which point the bad guy’s already half way across Europe. I don’t think it would have been anywhere near as successful had this been the case. 

David Moyes says Manchester United ‘having to play referees’

David Moyes claimed Manchester United are “having to play referees” as well as the opposition after seeing his side lose to Sunderland in the first leg of their Capital One Cup semi-final.

The United boss was upset referee Andre Marriner gave the home side a penalty when Adam Johnson tumbled in the area.

Fabio Borini then scored from the spot to give the Black Cats a 2-1 win.

It seems that Moyes has quickly inherited Fergie’s delusional philosophy about the whole world being against United as well as his distinct lack of graciousness in defeat.

Moyes is also looking evermore out of his depth; I said when he was first appointed he would struggle because he simply doesn’t have the experience to manage a team expected to win the biggest prizes, and boy is he. 

For a few years now a lot of ex-players and pundits have been prattling on about giving a British manager a chance at a big club and when Moyes was appointed they were all singing and dancing saying how he was a perfect fit and he’s great manager etc. six months later United are facing an uphill struggle to finish fourth, they’re out of the FA Cup, they’ve just lost to relegation battling Sunderland in the League Cup, and while they will no doubt get through in the Champions League they have no chance of winning it. Hardly the record of a great manager is it, he's also damaging the chances of other British managers being given top jobs. 

Another thing everyone’s going on about is United's squad and how Moyes should be given time to strengthen it, but he had all summer and after passing up signing Ozil and botching the deal for Ander Herrera, he decided to sign Fellaini, who like Moyes is struggling and looks out of his depth at United. If Moyes was a foreign coach the fans would be demanding he be sacked.

When Ferguson retired and he chose Moyes to replace him he knew that Moyes would struggle and it would make him look even better and he’s been proven correct. 

Vince Cable criticises David Cameron’s migration target

David Cameron’s target of cutting net migration to below 100,000 by 2015 is “not helpful” and will almost certainly not be achieved, Vince Cable has said.

The business secretary’s comments come as a survey suggests more than 75% of Britons want to see immigration cut.

And 56% of those quizzed by the British Social Attitudes survey wanted to see a major crackdown on immigration.

I agree with Cable in that I don’t think that cutting net migration to below 100,000 is achievable, but I do so for different reasons.

He seems to be under the impression that it can’t be controlled saying on the subject politicians must be “practical and accept that net migration cannot be controlled.”

With the measures, or lack of measures, currently in place now then yes that 100,000 figure is unattainable but if the government actually act on their rhetoric and commit to some proper controls then maybe just maybe that 100,000 figure could be reached.

After all trying to reduce the net migration figure to a manageable number is surely better than what Cable is suggesting which is to do nothing and hope it all magically works out.  

FIFA President Sepp Blatter critical of Brazil’s World Cup preparations

FIFA president Sepp Blatter has accused Brazil of being badly prepared with five months to go before it hosts this year's World Cup.

Six of the host nation's 12 stadiums have failed to meet FIFA’s 31 December completion deadline.

Three workers have been killed in recent accidents at stadiums in Sao Paulo and Manaus.

“No country has been so far behind in preparations since I have been at FIFA,” Blatter told a Swiss newspaper.

I think this shows just how badly the Brazilians are doing when Sepp Blatter feels the need to step in and criticise, if Blatter is criticising you for your organisational skills then you know you’ve got big, big problems.

Of course Blatter is right and the Brazilians are well behind and deserve some criticism but is he really the one to do it, when reading his comments the phrase those in glass houses.....comes to mind.

The thing is though, no matter what the event, no matter what the sport, in fact scratch that just in general it seems anywhere in the world where there’s a major building project to complete it is almost never completed on time, in this case Brazil has had seven years to prepare and with a little over five months to go to the opening game half the stadiums aren’t finished, how does that happen?

That leads me to FIFA’s selection policy, why do they pick nations to host that have either renovate all of their existing, or build all the new stadiums for the tournament from scratch, you’re asking for trouble if you do that.

Amsterdam alcoholics paid in beer for collecting litter

Alcoholics are being paid in beer to clean the streets of Amsterdam as part of a project partly funded by the Dutch government - the organisers think other countries should abandon "old-fashioned political correctness" and adopt the same approach.

You’ve got to love the Dutch attitude, even if this idea does sound a bit crazy, and it sounds crazy well because it is.

So what the organisers of this project are saying is instead of trying to help alcoholics overcome their addictions, we’re going to pay them in beer to pick up litter, I’m guessing a lot of which is their own beer cans.

What will they do next, pay everyone in Amsterdam who is overweight in burgers and fries instead of money, or will the people of Amsterdam with drug addictions be paid for wandering round the city picking up shiny things?

I’m not exactly sure what the point of this initiative is, but I hope we in the U.K. are not one of the other countries who takes it up. 

George Osborne warns £25bn more cuts needed

A further £25bn of spending cuts will be needed after the next election, Chancellor George Osborne has warned.

He suggested making welfare savings by cutting housing benefit for under-25s and restricting council housing for those earning over £65,000 a year.

His comments about future cuts comes as he warns of a “year of hard truths” in a speech in Birmingham.

Wait what’s going on here I thought that, well the impression I was getting from various politicians before Christmas was that things were on the up the economy was turning the corner and we would start seeing proper growth again, instead of everyone in Westminster arguing over whether the economy grew by 0.1% or not.

But clearly I was mistaken as less than a week into the New Year and boom another round of massive spending cuts; clearly Osborne and co weren’t visited by three ghosts during the holidays.

I distinctly remember that after the last big round of spending cuts reading about how there wasn’t much room for manoeuvre if the government wanted to make more cuts in future, but they’ve managed to wrangle another £25bn so this tells me two things, one the economy isn’t anywhere near where we are being told it is and two there’s plenty more things they can, and will, cut despite the billions and billions already slashed from almost everything.