British Nationalisation Refinery Schools EU Meltdown

Such is the state of meltdown in British society that the government is now intending to nationalise failing private schools.

Students have been sold a lie, according to Decca Aitkenhead. Not all universities are the same: quite.

Also in the Guardian: acknowledgement that EU regulations are at the bottom of the trouble at the Lindsey oil refinery and other places (although you have to go to the inside pages to get that).

The BBC main news last night again featured the incredibly important story about an American woman giving birth to eight children. I'm torn between which thing pisses me off the most: the fact that they give primetime coverage to this non-story or that Fiona Bruce insists on saying OCT-tu-plets instead of oct-TOO-plets. and while I'm at it, why doesn't someone at the Beeb tell Huw Edwards that 'programme' is not pronounced 'progrum'?

There's a campaign afoot to get people to cc their emails to Jacqui Smith in protest at the inplementation of the data retention bill: Telegraph. I'm not sure how well this will work given that the date for the campaign has been made public (15th June) thereby giving the Home Office full warning. However, since this government is colossally incompetent, there's no knowing what they'll do.

It needs to said again that the government has no choice but to implement this bad piece of legislation because it is an EU directive (2006/54/EC).