Friday, November 20, 2015
The not-so Presidential Mr. Cameron
So, the Prime Minister has got his way and acquired his own version of Airforce One. C ue, a spate of films starring Harrison Ford and other Hollywood stars based around the new Cabinet transport.
According to the Independent,the Prime Minister and senior members of the Cabinet are to get an aircraft of their own for official trips:
But the news that an Airbus A330 refuelling aircraft will be refitted for the purpose as a money-saving exercise was met with derision by the commercial airline business.
The aircraft itself is an RAF Voyager – an A330 that was expensively converted into a flying fuel tank only four years ago. The jet (list price £150m) is now to be refitted as a passenger aircraft at a cost of about £10m.
The Government claims that the move will save £750,000 a year compared with the existing practice of using Royal Squadron planes or chartering commercial jets. That assertion relies on some accounting that is spectacularly creative even by Downing Street standards, apportioning many of the fixed and direct costs to other budgets (and has gone down badly given that the spending review is looming next week). It also locks in the Government to a single wide-bodied aircraft, seating up to 285 people, with a correspondingly massive carbon footprint.
This is all very well of course, but how does it fit in with the tactics of the Welsh Conservative Group in the Assembly who have been obsessed in recent months with the Labour Government's fleet of chauffeur-driven cars.
It is funny how the Tories can be so selective in identifying government waste and environmentally-unfriendly behaviour.
According to the Independent,the Prime Minister and senior members of the Cabinet are to get an aircraft of their own for official trips:
But the news that an Airbus A330 refuelling aircraft will be refitted for the purpose as a money-saving exercise was met with derision by the commercial airline business.
The aircraft itself is an RAF Voyager – an A330 that was expensively converted into a flying fuel tank only four years ago. The jet (list price £150m) is now to be refitted as a passenger aircraft at a cost of about £10m.
The Government claims that the move will save £750,000 a year compared with the existing practice of using Royal Squadron planes or chartering commercial jets. That assertion relies on some accounting that is spectacularly creative even by Downing Street standards, apportioning many of the fixed and direct costs to other budgets (and has gone down badly given that the spending review is looming next week). It also locks in the Government to a single wide-bodied aircraft, seating up to 285 people, with a correspondingly massive carbon footprint.
This is all very well of course, but how does it fit in with the tactics of the Welsh Conservative Group in the Assembly who have been obsessed in recent months with the Labour Government's fleet of chauffeur-driven cars.
It is funny how the Tories can be so selective in identifying government waste and environmentally-unfriendly behaviour.
Comments:
<< Home
It is perhaps time that the water supply to Downing Street was checked to assess whether or not some form of chemical or bacterium was present which causes megalomania in Prime Ministers. The condition manifests itself in such ways as a wish to strut upon the world stage, to posture about Britain punching above its weight and to have expensive toys such as a nuclear deterrent and now an unnecessary PM1 aircraft to flit around in. Oh for the days of Gladstone.
Post a Comment
<< Home
