Images of earth from space.
PowerPoint file 1.8MB view as slide show, left click each image, have speakers on.
Images from Hubble Space telescope: link to Hubble website. |
We interrupt this popular page of the SeeRed
website
to encourage you to read about and support The
Prince's Rainforests Project.
Normal service will be resumed when politicians show any sign of coming to their senses.
This may take some time.
The SeeRed page you were looking for may be
found below.
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SeeRed covers a
wide range of topics including computer privacy, consumer protection, libraries, town
planning, road humps, folk festival economics, thuggish behaviour by planning departments
and general local government incompetence.
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It is written by a
scientist and ex-town councillor who finally decided 'enough was enough' when faced with
the incompetence and malevolence of local councils in England. Based in the seaside town
of Sidmouth, the website was first published in February 2003. 'Hits' exceeded 120,000 in
the first year with over 50,000 page views. The current 'hit' level is around 50,000 per
month. Read the site history here. |
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Despots in local
government: public servants would become our masters.
| Decades
ago, local government was an inefficient and overstaffed mess - but at least 'public
servants' knew their place and many tried to do a decent job of work. Nowadays, local
government is characterised by spin, glossy brochures, excessive 'management' salaries and
an increasingly thuggish approach to dealing with the public. From waste collection, through child protection, car parking and
planning, local officials now see themselves as masters rather than servants. Misuse
of delegated authority is a widespread problem, with lazy elected councillors often being
unaware what officials are doing.
Either local councils need stripping of
many of their powers, or new arrangements are needed to ensure that abuse of
authority is curtailed. One option might be to make local officials responsible for
legal costs - just as they can now be held personally responsible for Health and Safety
breaches. |
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Sidmouth
remains famous for its 'folk festival' - one of the largest, most colourful and peaceful
music and dance festivals in the UK. What does the future hold?
 
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For 50
years Sidmouth hosted its International Festival of Folk Arts amidst the scenery of East
Devon. Families travelled from across the UK for their annual 'spiritual renewal'. The future remains uncertain. Read the full story here
- more than you will find anywhere else on the web. 2005 was a
success on a small scale but we may never again be able to experience a festival the
like of 2004. 2006 was a great success - thanks to the weather.
And so was 2007! For 2008 the organisers cut costs to try to
shore up the finances - and the week started with dismal weather. 2009
was also rather wet at times! Lots of photos starting here. |
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Town
Planning and Conservation Areas.
 
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When is
a tree not a tree? When it is both in a supposedly protected Conservation
Area and in the way of proposed development? If you know of similar documented cases, please let me know. Here is an example from Cumbria. The local MP is reported as
having said it is a case of "wanton vandalism" by a property developer. |
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Town
Planning and Flood Plains.
 
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When are
Flood Plain planning policies not applied? When well connected people want to build on the
flood plain? When the wealthy owner
of Sidmouth's Nissan dealership creates a new commercial car park
by dumping hundreds of tons of rubble in a sensitive area and local councils and the
Environment Agency effectively look the other way?
In nearby picturesque Sidbury? More details
later.
Or indeed in Derbyshire where Erewash Borough Council has apparently
behaved in an appalling and unprofessional manner? Householders and insurance companies
have been left to deal with the consequences of what appears to be blatant indifference to
local flood risks. |
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Are
you still buying lottery tickets? Why is there so little analysis of how all the money is
spent?
 
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The largest webpage on SeeRed analyses how £120
million of lottery money was spent on computers in libraries. Arguably, the project
should have cost far less. The Minister, Tessa Jowell MP, refused to answer
my questions perhaps because she couldn't think of any plausible answers. After all,
this is the Blair babe who didn't even know about her own mortgage! She is currently
charged with persuading us that the London Olympics are competently managed! Since publication of SeeRed the number
of gushing press releases about the P.N. scheme fell markedly. No connection, of course!
In Dec 2004 I was invited to send views to the DCMS
Select Committee |
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Paying
too much council tax?
 With thanks
to the derbygripe website for this image. |
An overall theme of this
site is the extent to which government in the UK is incompetent yet has become too
self-serving, powerful and intrusive. Read about identity theft, government snooping,
waste of public money and Lottery funds, town planning, consumer protection, personal data
on computers, privacy in the Internet age, traffic management, and more! Visit the Derby Gripe website for hundreds of examples of
moronic activity by local council officials. How long
will it be before householders say 'enough is enough' and refuse to pay? All it would take
would be a revolt by 0.1% or 20,000 households: the total number of prison places in the
UK is only 80,000 and they are all taken already! |
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Towards a
surveillance society.
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Most
people have little idea of the extent to which their privacy has already been compromised.
Governments will soon be able to build a contact profile for every citizen - an appalling
prospect in many countries. The technology is already being developed and tested. The privacy section of this website outlines a few topics of
current interest. Learn about smart cards, CCTV, encrypted emails
and rfid tagging of anything from cars to clothes. |
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In the new age
of e-government, people who ask awkward questions may simply be deleted!
 
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Details
of a dispute with Devon County Council, as a part of which DCC has blocked my e-mail
address. They also prevented staff at DCC HQ and in libraries reading this website by
making links "unavailable". Later, normal service was resumed - but my email is
still blocked! It is all a manifestation of the culture of fear that dominates DCC. Here
are their old (staid) and new (ever so friendly) MyDevon logos. Nothing else has changed -
except that the culture of fear grows year on year. The dispute itself is in abeyance - I
have more to do at present than deal with these nematodes. |
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The Britain in
Bloom campaign has been criticised for wasting public money on boring displays of garish
flowers. In 2005, it spilled over into abusive comments about the
SeeRed author by Sidmouth Town Council!
 
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For
decades the Britain in Bloom campaign has been synonymous with
garish arrangements of environmentally useless plants. Councillors waste hundreds of
thousands of pounds of public money to create ever more outlandish displays. Few Sidmouth residents take part. Maybe soon we can
put an end to the cult of chequebook gardening? In 2008, Sidmouth in Bloom even had a
competition for the most environmentally friendly garden - and
what a mess they made of the judging criteria!
Serious gardeners (and even one or two
government ministers) recognise we need to divert effort to growing more fruit and
vegetables at home - it may be ten years before the 'bloomers' awake to such a sensible
idea! |
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Internet cafes
in Europe and India.
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In the
UK, libraries have borne the brunt of public internet access. Bureaucracy abounds, and
official policy is to provide little or no privacy despite draft Council of Europe guidelines. Things are
different elsewhere. For example, in India, access is rarely a problem because private
enterprise cafes thrive - as indeed they do in Germany. |
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This is a large site with discrete
sections. If you get lost, return here and start again.
Acknowledgements Search this website Ask a librarian
You can help support
this website by
- emailing details to all your contacts
- providing links to SeeRed from any website
under your control
- encouraging your local Press to take an
interest.
forward to sitelayout.htm
Published in the public interest by Dr
Stephen J Wozniak (small emails and no attachments please).
Copyright © Dr Stephen J Wozniak 2003/4/5/6/7/8/9/10.
Last updated : 28 Jan 2010. |
