In an attempt to stimulate the car market, the Chancellor of the Exchequer has initiated a £2k car scrapping incentive. Now 50% of this will come from the government and 50% will come from the industry itself. Call me stupid or call me old fashioned, but given dealers have always given a sizeable discount when trading in your old car, isn’t that really a £1k car scrapping incentive?
Also, it applies only to cars older than 10 years. If you happen to own a car that’s older than 10 years, you’re hardly likely to be the kind of person who is willing to buy a new car, no matter the incentive. My car is over 10 years old and I’d fully expect to get £1k for it at the very least if sold privately. I would certainly not trade it in for a new car which loses 30% of its value the minute it’s driven out of the showroom.
I’ve never in my life owned a new car – and never will.
You know these zoos and safari parks scattered all over the place? Do they occasionally release the lions into the antelope enclosures, just to add that bit of authenticity and ensure the antelope are sufficiently stressed, like they would be in the wild?
Life! I was mulling on the purpose of life yesterday while taking a lunchtime walk (I’ve started walking for 3 miles at lunchtime in an effort to shed the winter plumage). All animal life sustains itself by consuming other life – be that vegetable or fellow animal life. Vegetable life, with one or two notable exceptions, obtains its sustenance from inanimate matter; we, on the other hand, must destroy life to exist and cannot simply extend a probe into the soil to extract inanimate nutrients. What we eat has to be (or have been) living. Why therefore do we get so precious about taking life when it’s what we’ve evolved to do?
Hillary Clinton has accused Pakistan of abdicating to the Taliban by allowing them to control the Swat Valley, in north-western Pakistan. I suppose that by the same token she should be accusing the British government of abdicating to the devolved assemblies of Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. What actually constitutes a country? Surely it must be a group of people who wish to act together under a single leadership? That therefore eliminates a whole raft of so-called countries from the definition.
Also, it applies only to cars older than 10 years. If you happen to own a car that’s older than 10 years, you’re hardly likely to be the kind of person who is willing to buy a new car, no matter the incentive. My car is over 10 years old and I’d fully expect to get £1k for it at the very least if sold privately. I would certainly not trade it in for a new car which loses 30% of its value the minute it’s driven out of the showroom.
I’ve never in my life owned a new car – and never will.
You know these zoos and safari parks scattered all over the place? Do they occasionally release the lions into the antelope enclosures, just to add that bit of authenticity and ensure the antelope are sufficiently stressed, like they would be in the wild?
Life! I was mulling on the purpose of life yesterday while taking a lunchtime walk (I’ve started walking for 3 miles at lunchtime in an effort to shed the winter plumage). All animal life sustains itself by consuming other life – be that vegetable or fellow animal life. Vegetable life, with one or two notable exceptions, obtains its sustenance from inanimate matter; we, on the other hand, must destroy life to exist and cannot simply extend a probe into the soil to extract inanimate nutrients. What we eat has to be (or have been) living. Why therefore do we get so precious about taking life when it’s what we’ve evolved to do?
Hillary Clinton has accused Pakistan of abdicating to the Taliban by allowing them to control the Swat Valley, in north-western Pakistan. I suppose that by the same token she should be accusing the British government of abdicating to the devolved assemblies of Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. What actually constitutes a country? Surely it must be a group of people who wish to act together under a single leadership? That therefore eliminates a whole raft of so-called countries from the definition.
2 comments:
Is cat among the pigeons equivalent to antelope among the lions, or Bill among the Bloggers? x
Another grumpy old fart day, then ?
Soapbox time : that car incentive thing ? There's a similar one in France. Basically it benefits the car manufacturers, not so much by increasing sales but by having the government pay 50% of the discount they would have given anyway (said manufacturers thereby receiving even more money from the government - talk about a welfare state!) and people rich enough to afford new cars !
As for a country being a group of people who wish to act together, I think you need to add in a geographical element because I don't know that there are many more people where I live who want to tar and feather Paris Hilton....
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