• Here it comes again…

“You’ve been lied to, you’ve been misled, you’ve been extorted, you’ve been cheated, and you’ve been abused. For the last 35 years, you have been subject to nothing more than possibly the greatest organised ripoff perpetrated on the British people, and you have had little in return apart from greed, profiteering, financial engineering, political failure and regulatory incompetency. You’ve been had.”

• Food or fuel?

• The BBC website has an article about whether solar panels are an acceptable use of land if this results in a reduction of agricultural use. It says that “the new Energy Security Secretary, Ed Miliband, has already approved three huge controversial developments, covering 6,200 acres (2,500 hectares) of farmland.”

This seems like a lot: but What the Science Says reports that “the amount of land used for farming is around 18,106,810 hectares or 72.8% of UK land area, slightly more than the amount commonly cited and accepted. This figure is likely to change and fluctuate annually, and has done since DEFRA began recording the Utilised Agricultural Area (UAA) in 1984, but it is likely to remain somewhere between 18 and 19 million hectares.”

Solar panels are possibly only an intermediate technology, rather like fax machines. However, they’re a good way of generating renewable power (if one excuses the social and environmental cost of making them) for perhaps 30 years. After this time, the land can be returned to its previous use. Even during its time as a solar farm, sheep and wildflowers can happily co-exist with the panels.

The real problem is that we eat too much meat. This map points out how much land is used for rearing livestock or the feed they require. Only a small readjustment of our habits, stopping short of full-on vegetarianism, would be required to redress the balance and give plenty of space for solar farms. In any case, the assumption is that these are eating into prime agricultural land. This is at best questionable, not least because protection is already provided by the planning system. The NFU appears to agree, a recent report as covered by Power Technology pointing to the “diversification of income” that solar farms bring to farmers, providing a balance between food security and climate ambitions.

Every situation requires compromise. We’re on the cusp of a number of changes, progress towards a low-carbon economy hopefully being one. If we need to eat a little less meat to help this happen then so be it. If something better can be found than solar panels then the land will return to its original use in a few decades with no-one any the wiser. You certainly can’t say that about an abattoir or a distribution centre.

• Spending power

Council tax is probably the largest singe bill that most people receive each year, the average one for a band D property in England being about £2,200. Councils can raise their bills by up to 2.99% a year (or 4.99% if the extra 2% goes on social care) and most are now doing so as a matter of course.

Business rates, for most the second largest source of funding, are often not retained in full but redistributed by means of a system which many, including a Commons Select Committee, feel is inefficient. Other funding comes from Whitehall, either provided for very specific services or won as a result of bidding in a series of beauty contests for anything from cycle lanes to sports pitches. Councils used to be free to dabble in potentially risky investments but this has now been curtailed, though many retain large property portfolios that, if all goes well, produce some extra revenue, as do charges for services including garden waste, parking and entry to council-owned tourist attractions.

The amount each council gets from these sources as a percentage varies considerably. Despite attempts at re-distribution, some are far better off than others. The standards of management varies considerably as well.

Add all this money up and the sums can seem large. Many, however, argue that it’s not enough. A report by the House of Lords in March 2024 points out that total spending power for local authorities fell by 26% between 2010-11 and 2020-21 and that councils have, unsurprisingly, “responded to funding pressures by redirecting funding towards statutory services, particularly social care, and away from non-statutory ones”. Culture and related areas and planning and development services were two of the biggest losers: in both these areas, spending was cut by over a third in this 10-year period.

Councils provide a large number of services, in many cases acting as the agents of the government. If something needs to be curtailed in order that statutory services are maintained, the government can shrug its shoulders and say that that was the council’s decision: nothing to do with us. When it needs councils, however – such as during the pandemic – Whitehall is quick to try to turn on the charm. Most councils responded far more effectively to the details of the problems than the often fumbling, ill-focused and at times illegal approaches emanating from the top.

The biggest item of expenditure is on social care and education. To pick one example, probably not untypical, West Berkshire Council’s spending on these areas has risen from 58% of its expenditure in 2023-24 to 66% in 2024-25. The Lords noted that “local governments are subject to many increases in costs higher than the rate of general inflation, as well as increasing demand for services”. Both these aspects well describe the social-care system, a long-term reform of which seems as far away as ever.

Another item which has become a serious issue in recent years is special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) funding. In July 2024, The Guardian reported that “rising demand has driven up spending on SEND by English local authorities from £4bn a decade ago to £10.8bn last year, and an estimated £12bn by 2026. Government funding has failed to keep pace, with council SEND deficits, currently at £3.2bn, expected to reach £5bn by 2o26.” These costs are currently in a kind of accounting limbo and being kept off the councils’ books. If they were all to be put back on, it’s been estimated that up to one in five councils could go bust.

Many are hoping that a deal can be cut with the government when the day comes. This might explain in part West Berkshire’s decision to try to claw back some unspent and (as it saw it) uncommitted funding from non-academy schools. This provoked a storm of protest in July and early August and several council statements; the issue has sensibly been parked until September. Part of the motivation might be that West Berkshire wants to show Whitehall that it is trying to solve the problem for itself. The matter is, however, far more serious than any one council can deal with. We can be fairly sure that Rachel Reeves will say that this is yet another example of a time-bomb left by the previous administration. What’s currently less clear is what she’s going to do about it.

• The Brexit dividend

From next summer, UK visitors to the EU will have to pay a €7 visa-waiver charge. The logistics industry is warning that the £10.5m of government funding to help the Port of Dover prepare for the rollout of a new EU digital border system this autumn is not enough to prevent border delays. London’s Mayor claimed earlier this year that London’s economy has contracted as a result of Brexit. Meanwhile, the BBC reports that our PM has said that he wants “a closer relationship with Europe”, although he says that there are no plans to reverse Brexit. As if there could be. Why should they want us back?

Can anyone tell me one single benefit that our withdrawal has produced? The only clear results I can see are the elevation to our supreme office of state of a proven liar, and the election to a seat in our supreme body of legislation of a man concerning whom words fail me. These are the two most successful and eye-catching politicians of the last eight years. History will judge them in whatever way it chooses, but I’ve already made my mind up. Dear oh dear: is this all we got from it all?

• Snagging problems

Every new estate has snagging problems (a polite term for shoddy work) but this new estate in Fordham in Cambridgeshire seems to have rather more than most. This article lists some of the problems residents have encountered: my stand-out was the staircase that collapsed, it being discovered that each stair should have had 14 screws in it but in fact only had one. The length of time it takes for all such issues to appear and be reported is often about the same as time taken by the developers to hand the common parts and the management over to a separate company, which will then charge residents for maintaining things like open spaces and, if they’ve not been adopted, roads. This point has been reached in Fordham with some homeowners refusing to pay their first bills.

Snagging problems, landscaping issues and management-company disputes on a 100-home site all sounds a bit like the saga at Hungerford’s Lancaster Park. The problems with the  buildings themselves seem to be less severe than in Fordham, but the potential costs residents may have to bear as a result of the non-adoption of the roads may prove to be even more expensive.

 • And finally…

• The Guardian reports that the Home Office has been accused by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) of submitting “woeful” budget figures: a projected £100m for border, asylum and visa operations, for instance, compared with an actual spend of £2.6bn. This adds ammunition to Rachel Reeves’ claim that the Conservatives had left the finances in a complete mess: something she, or any incoming Chancellor, would have said anyway, regardless of the real circumstances.

• The Champions League is about to get under way with a new format that will mean more teams, more matches and more money for the big clubs who are the main beneficiaries of any tweak to the competition. This time round, half of the clubs come from only four countries, Spain, England, Italy and Germany. They already dominate the competition, having provided all the winners and all but one of the finalists since 2004 and 55 out of the 69 winners overall. Remote indeed seem the chances of this pattern being broken any time soon.

• I adore tomatoes, but not this much: over 100 tonnes of them are the subject of La Tomatina, a massive food-fight in Buñol in Spain on the last Wednesday of August in which about 22,000 people took part this year. According to the BBC: “Food waste is not a problem, as the tomatoes used as ammunition are not fit for consumption by humans.” Makes me wonder why they were grown in the first place…

• Bryan Berg has recently earned a place in the Guinness World Records for building a 54-level house of cards – more like a skyscraper – in just eight hours. His Wikipedia entry (yes, he has one of those) describes him as “the only known person to make a living building structures with free-standing playing cards”. The more photos of his stuff I see, the more I find his skill and dedication slightly alarming…