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Well Darlings,

If you live in the UK, did the Earth move for you? The second biggest quake in UK recorded history has certainly been a talking point, hasn't it? And perhaps never more so than for all the appreciative young ladies in the backs of cars in those quaking early hours who believed they had found the virile young man of their dreams, not forgetting all the wives at home who at the same time were questioning just where their husbands had learned to do something like that!

But all this was only a taster. The real Earth-moving experiences may yet be to come as the whole premise of global warming is under threat again. Despite all the spin, it seems the scientific world is still not in any overall agreement as to just how much man is actually responsible for influencing the climate - if at all. In fact at the moment many scientists and "experts" are racing to distance themselves from being associated with the whole idea of global warming.

Recent data has shown there have been record snowfalls worldwide - some in places, like Baghdad and parts of central Asia, for the first time in recorded history; North America has had the most snow cover for 50 years; China has suffered the lowest temperatures in over a century; both icecaps have thickened, with Arctic sea ice forming up to 8' thicker than usual; and all four of the Earth's major temperature tracking services confirm that the planet has cooled by as much as .75'C. Apparently we have experienced the single fastest temperature change ever recorded, either up or down. Dropping from between 0.65C and 0.75C, graphically it is enough to wipe out most of the warming recorded over the past 100 years.

Professor Sorokhtin, of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, dismisses man-made climate change as "a drop in the bucket", and advises people to stock up on warm clothing. He is not alone in believing solar activity and the planet's orbit (it changes from circular to elliptical every so often, so making us more or less prone to the sun's behaviour) is the major influence on our climate. There are many, including Kenneth Tapping of Canada's National Research Council, who hold this belief, but it has not been politically expedient to have them heard lately - it might put people off paying those green taxes.

Followers of the solar theory are convinced we could be in for a long period of severely cold weather if the sun's activity does not pick up soon. The last time it was this inactive we suffered the Little Ice Age, and that lasted for about five centuries, ending in 1850. During that time there were food shortages as crops failed regularly because of severe frosts and drought. Rivers and harbours froze solid, causing trade to cease, and both plague and war became commonplace. It has to be said the evidence for a period of rapid cooling is flimsy, but the scientists argue it is no more flimsy than the evidence used for global warming.

If we study the temperature trend from 1998 to today (over the time we have heard so much about global warming) you may be surprised to learn it is distinctly downward, but taken from 1900 to today there is a noticeable upward trend. However if one goes back further still, say to 500 AD (and that is a mere blink in the age of the planet), the overall trend is unmistakeably seen as cooling again. Earth is much cooler today than it was then.

Irrespective of any involvement man might have, whether or not global warming is a fact and really occurring at any time all depends on where you wish to place your viewpoint. The Earth has no "normal" temperature or climate, it is constantly changing so it will always be seen to be heading off in one direction or another - and there will be nothing we can do to alter that - however if one had to pick a "norm", a mean average temperature, it would certainly be hotter than today. Apparently the ice caps have receded before, completely disappearing many times, temperatures have far exceeded anything wildly predicted by the alarmists today, and even that Gulf Stream has stopped and restarted without the end of the world occurring.

Perhaps man has greatly over-estimated his importance and his ability to significantly influence the destiny of our planet. Deforestation, on the scale it is being carried out today, is perhaps the most relevant damage we are capable of doing - and on that there is a lot of agreement. To remove our lungs (the rainforests) which are critical to our survival in order to grow crops for bio-fuel in some mad hope it will benefit the planet is stupidity in the extreme. Stopping this one thing from happening is likely to be of more benefit to our world than everything else we could do all put together.

Of course, all these recent signs pointing to global warming possibly being nothing more than natural climatic variations that could change at any time into a long cold period is not good news for those of us looking forward to a Mediterranean-style climate in Blackpool. I guess the dreams of scantily clad pool boys serving vodka and cokes to us whilst we soaked up the rays on our lilos might have to remain just that - dreams. Never mind, we are getting quite good at dreaming in Blackpool. We are used to things not coming to fruition here - like the Mega-Casino as good as promised to us, then Storm City, and later the regeneration money as an alternative solution promised by the government. So far this has turned out to be little more than what we already had earmarked, maintenance money, and nothing extra for what we really need - except, that is, for a surplus of useless words again. Ones that have been repeated parrot-fashion by politicians for too many years.

The latest on the plight here is: "Let's talk," says the PM, appearing as headlines in our local newspaper. But there has been more than enough talking - so much talking that we fear for our donkeys' hind legs! It is time for the government to sit down and listen for a change - and then do something more than talk.

Desperate for regeneration funds in order to survive as a holiday resort, we are sickened to have to watch the arguments over the moral rights of MPs allowances after learning that Alan and Ann Keen, both of them Labour MPs, have been claiming a massive '38,515 a year for a second home - far more money than many people here earn - although their constituencies are only a mere nine miles away from the Commons. And they are not alone - it seems that twenty-four MPs with seats in Greater London have claimed an amount totalling almost '400,000 for second homes last year, all of it public money.

We should not forget that (disregarding our EuroMPs) there are nearly 650 MPs eligible for allowances, so the total cost is a vast amount of money. As many reading this will undoubtedly have to travel considerably greater distances than nine miles daily for their employment, and with no allowances whatsoever, I suggest that money could easily be put to much better use. Give it to Blackpool - '88 million would solve quite a few problems here - and then purpose-build an accommodation block close enough to the Commons for all those MPs who have to stay over. By electing these people we employ them to represent us, and for that task they are well paid. We do not elect them to live like royalty, nor to buy second homes at our expense.

The '400 a month an MP is allowed for food, with no receipts needed, is absolutely ridiculous too - would these politicians not be eating if they were at home? That allowance alone is '16 more than sick and disabled people receive to run a home on. Whilst the needy are expected to stay alive and pay all their bills on '96 per week, our MPs are skinning us for '88 million in allowances, making the average cost to the taxpayer of an MP now little short of '200,000. Value for money? Don't make me spit - just look at the state of the country!

Likewise: how can the government justify spending more than '50,000 of taxpayers' money on a series of banquets simply in order to celebrate the formation of the Equality and Human Rights Commission? Equality and Human Rights? For whom - those already on a '400 food allowance? Where was my share of the banquets?

And whilst I am on a run of complaining: why should our MPs be allowed to pay for the new bin tax using taxpayers' money - our money again! - when families who cannot afford to pay it will have to face the bailiff calling on them, or perhaps even go to gaol? Equality and Human Rights? Yes, I think I still remember such things - but which drawer marked "Nostalgia" did we put them in?

It will be a great pity if global warming turns out to be a fallacy. We could do with those scantily clad pool boys to take our minds off all the atrociousness of government!

"The Bitch!" 29/02/08.