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Who is this man?

His name is Christopher Grayling. He’s a British Tory Member of Parliament and presently Theresa May’s Secretary of State for Transport. (The title used to be “Minister of Transport”, but Secretary of State sounds grander – it isn’t).

Grayling has served in, or maybe ‘cocked-up’ would be more accurate, a number of ministerial positions, most notable that of Lord Chancellor. Grayling had not one wit of knowledge or qualification to hold this position. The weak-chinned and pathetic apology for a prime minister, David Cameron, put him there. It has always been the prerogative of a senior member of the legal profession to hold the Office, and Grayling was the first non-lawyer in 440 years to do so. He was also the first Lord Chancellor to cause the first ever strike in British history by barristers and solicitors, over his draconian cuts to legal aid payments for the poor.

“Most judges, lawyers, probation staff, prison officers, victims, court staff and people denied access to justice believe that you have been the worst Lord Chancellor since Lord Shaftesbury in 1673,” Chris Grayling was told by his Labour shadow Sadiq Khan, as they faced each other in the Commons for the last time before the election.

Okay, you can expect criticism from someone from the opposition party in Parliament, but how about a leading Queen’s Council, Lord Pannick:

Lord Chancellor Grayling, […] in the words of one QC, Lord Pannick, is “notable only for his attempts to restrict judicial review and human rights, his failure to protect the judiciary against criticism from his colleagues; and the reduction of legal aid to a bare minimum”.^[1]

Prior to this debacle, Grayling was the Minister for Works and Pensions. This put him in charge of all the jobcentres in the country. To cut costs he threw 100,000* jobcentre workers out of their employment, then proceeded to castigate the unemployed and cut benefits in an effort to force people with long term disabilities back to work.

^{(*This figure from Wikipedia cannot be verified, but it was certainly many thousands).}

While Lord Chancellor, he banned prisoners from having books on the grounds they may contain drugs. Between 2012 and 2015 he cut the numbers of prison officers from 23,000 to 18,000 causing the Justice Select Committee, an oversight committee comprised of MPs from various parties, to conclude:

.. “it is not possible to avoid the conclusion” that changes in policy, including efficiency savings and staffing shortages, “have made a significant contribution to the deterioration in safety”…The MPs’ year-long inquiry into prisons concludes…

The MPs warn that there is a “very real danger of unmanageable growth” in the prison population, which at more than 85,000 is already at record levels, unless there are significant changes in both the current “tough rhetoric” and policy on sentencing. ^[2]

For all his ‘good works’, Theresa May made him Secretary of State for Transport, and in the run up to Christmas 2018 Gatwick Airport was forced to close over three days due to drones near the runways. Surely, one would assume, an incident worthy of the attention of Britain’s Secretary of State for Transport?

On December 23rd, The Daily Telegraph published the headline:

DfT [Department for Transport] accused of delaying crack RAF team from taking on Gatwick drone.

According to Wikipedia (somebody had obviously paid the extortionate fees demanded by this Tory rag, to read the Telegraph article):

…Grayling had ignored “numerous warnings” about the threat posed by drones, halting draft legislation due for publication in early 2019 thereby allowing civil servants to be diverted to Brexit related tasks. According to the Daily Telegraph, the RAF offered the assistance of a specialist anti-drone team almost immediately but Grayling’s department – which would have had to pay for the service – was reluctant to accept.^[3]

Graylings latest coup de grace comes today via a headline from the Guardian newspaper:

Grayling defends giving Brexit ferry contract to company with no ships.

In an effort to dilute the serious effects of a ‘no-deal’ Brexit, the UK government is spending hundreds of millions of pounds, 13.8 million of which the esteemed Secretary of State for Transport has handed over to a cross-channel ferry company to increase capacity and get trucks across the English Channel more quickly.

The only drawback to this fine scheme is that the company concerned has no ships.

The local Conservative councillor Paul Messenger was the first to raise concern in public about awarding such a lucrative contract to a firm with no prior experience. “It has no ships and no trading history so how can due diligence be done?” he told the BBC.

He said the company had not moved “a single truck in their entire history … I don’t understand the logic of that”.^[4]

It seems unlikely that anyone else does either – except, of course, Secretary of State for Transport The Right Honorable (can you believe that!) Christopher Grayling, the UK Prime Minister Theresa May who gave him the job, and a number of other ‘Oxbridge’ spew-outs calling themselves ‘right honorables’, and pretending to know how to run a country when in truth they’d be incapable of running a child’s electric train set.

Ineptitude: the hallmark of Britain’s politicians today, with Christopher Grayling at the forefront.

^{[1] “Chris Grayling the worst Lord Chancellor for 342 years? No, worse” The Independent, 17th March 2015}

^{[2] “UK justice minister ‘complacent’ over 38% rise in prison deaths, say MPs” The Guardian, 18th March 2015}

^{[4] “Grayling defends giving Brexit ferry contract to company with no ships” The Guardian, 2nd January 2019}

^{[3] “Wikipedia, Chris Grayling.}

…but what happens when the small fish are all gone?

ANSWER: the big fish begin eating each other, until only one huge monster is left. They call it “MONOPOLY”.

The name is aptly derived from two Ancient Greek words: mónos, meaning “alone, only, sole, or single”, and POLY, from ‘polus’, meaning “many, or much.” The ‘single’ engulfs the ‘many’.

It’s obviously a very bad idea for fish, so why does society not do more to prevent it happening in business? “Ah,” I hear you cry, “but we have the Monopolies and Mergers Commission.”

“And when,” is my response, “did you last hear from them?”

Sparrow Chat has been web-hosted for many years by a company called, ‘IX Web Hosting’, but they’ve recently been taken over by ‘Site5’, who, in turn, are owned by an international conglomerate called EIG (Endurance International Group). EIG has been called ‘the world’s largest web-hosting company you’ve probably never heard of.’ It’s one of those vile monsters that has grown huge by engulfing smaller companies, often at the expense of employees who end up unemployed, and customers who face ever-rising fees.

To date EIG has hoovered up over eighty web-hosting and tech companies.

The concept was to roll up small ISPs into one large national ISP and achieve economies of scale. Endurance is acquiring hosting companies domestically and internationally…the company made four buys in 2014. The largest was a $109.8 million cash and stock deal for the web presence business of Directi from Indian-based Directi Web Technologies. Directi provides services in various countries, including India, the U.S., Turkey, China, Russia and Indonesia.

In March 2015, the company announced an investment in Netherlands-based technology startup AppMachine, acquiring 40% of the company.

In August 2015, EIG announced the acquisition of Site5 and Verio Web Hosting from NTT. It is estimated that EIG gained 86,000+ new subscribers through these acquisitions.

In November 2015, the company acquired Constant Contact, and days later laid off 15% of their workforce.
Also in November 2015, EIG acquired the assets of Ecommerce, LLC for $28 million. This acquisition included a total of 72,000 subscribers from three different hosting brands: IX Web Hosting, Cloud by IX, and Host Excellence.^[1]

It’s yet another tale of hedge funds and investment bankers sweeping up small companies to make themselves even richer. It stinks and Sparrow Chat will not be a part of any money-making game where the majority are impoverished so a few can grow obscenely wealthy. It’s a common practice these days and one accepted by a society rapidly losing all moral fibre in the rush for greed-fuelled riches.

I’m happy to report that EIG is about to lose one customer. Over the the next few days/weeks Sparrow Chat will be moving to a new webhost – ‘A2 Hosting’.^[2]

A2 is an independent and founder-owned company, which categorically states it is not part of EIG, or any other of the monsters out there lurking in the deep, murky, waters of corporate takeover.

Hopefully, ‘A2 Hostings’ will survive that way for a long time. If not, Sparrow Chat may have to move on again.

^{[1] “Wikipedia, Endurance International Group}

^{[2] “A2 Hosting”}

Two years ago, while Barack Obama was still President of the United States, I wrote a short piece in what could loosely be called ‘poetic’ style, as part of my Christmas message to the people of the Earth (hold on, my coronet’s slipping – ah, that’s better). I believe Her Majesty was ill-disposed that year.

The ‘message’ still holds good this Christmas, with a few slight modifications, so with apologies (yet again) to Clement Clarke Moore I present once more my ‘slightly adapted’ version of Moore’s famous ditty.

Assuming we all survive until 2019, may I wish all Sparrow Chat readers a truly wondrous Christmas, and a prosperous, if environmentally-friendly, New Year.

“T’IS THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS”

T’is the night before Christmas, all over the earth
Terrorists are plotting for all they are worth.
The Donald sits musing, which country to strike?
China? Korea? Maybe both could be right?

His hand on the button, surely now is the time,
He thinks, “My life’s truly awful, it’s not worth a dime.
Who thought being Pressy could cause me such strain,
And Melania’s in bed with the butler – again!”

The Arctic is melting, the earth’s growing warm,
Droughts, floods, tornadoes, becoming the norm.
“Don’t blame us,” says the Donald. “It’s not me!” he cried
As New York washed away on a rather high tide.

Donald knows Mueller’s watching, and scheming to get him,
A Pressy in prison would not be a good thing.
He’ll blow up the world, end it all with a bang,
They’ll remember him then, or they all could go hang.

John Bolton had shown him the right way to do it,
But he’s off to bed with the wife of Scott Pruitt.
Donald grabs hold the briefcase with codes and iPad
He’ll nuke them all up, there’ll be no more jihad.

But high in the Heavens Mohammed and Jesus,
Mithras, Athena, and Zeus with his aegis,
Look down on a world they had brought into being
And cannot believe what the hell they are seeing.

They’ll not let a mortal destroy their creation,
They’ll do it themselves and to Hell with salvation,
Donald thinks he’s a god, but he’s sadly mistaken,
A god with such hair! And a mouth so mis-shapen?

They speak not a word, but go straight to their toil,
Call forth the angels, their Godblood a-boil,
Blasting the earth with hot fire from their noses,
They consume it all up – despite firemen’s hoses.

Then summoning chariots of fire with a whistle,
They fly off to heaven like the down of a thistle.
Only one of them speaks, the one they call Mithras
Mutters, “Bloody little shits! They just didn’t deserve Christmas.”