The scandal that is 11,000 empty MOD houses

What a scandal it is that more than 11,000 Ministry of Defence homes across the UK are sitting empty, costing the taxpayer (that’s you and me) more than £25m a year in rent and maintenance?

The MOD says it is doing its best to reduce the numbers but has to budget for thousands of service family house moves every year.

Part of the current situation appears to be the 1996 sale and leaseback deal between the MoD and Annington Property Limited of over 55,000 residential properties.

The MoD agreed to rent homes back from the property company for 200 years. Yes, that’s right, 200 years.

Now I realise the MOD needs some “spares” for when members of the forces and their families have to move in a hurry but surely not 11,000 properties.

The homelessness situation faced by some members of the general public is at crisis point and the government appears to be ignoring a way to help ease that situation.

My reader got in touch with a response to my PETA piece on December 6: “I entirely agree. Every time I put my sprouts into boiling water I ask myself ‘How can I do this to living vegetables?’ When I could be cooking meat that is long dead.”

Pulling the wool (vegan, of course) over our eyes

Animal rights activists have been mocked, correctly in my opinion, for asking the 1,000-year-old village of Wool to change its name to ‘Vegan Wool’.

The Dorset village has faced calls from PETA to change its name in an “animal friendly update” despite the fact the name of derives from the ancient word for well.

The vegan organisation wrote to Wool’s parish council asking for the change to be made.

Elisa Allen, director of PETA, said the change would “put Wool in the spotlight and promote kindness to sheep”.

She said wool “stolen from a sheep” is a “product of extreme cruelty” and if it is done incorrectly it can leave sheep with “large, bloody wounds”.

She wrote: “With a simple name change, your village can take a stand against this cruelty and remind everyone that it’s easy to stay warm and be warm-hearted to sheep by choosing vegan wool and other animal-free materials.”

What a load of absolute tosh. I have the feeling that this was purely and simply a publicity-generating exercise by PETA.

Of course the people behind this organisation, and its supporters, are perfectly entitled to their opinions.

But if they want to be taken seriously they should stick to presenting the facts behind their beliefs and not undertaking ridiculous PR campaigns.

By the way – PETA’s letter was posted by the parish council on Facebook to get feedback from residents and was widely ridiculed.

Mags Snook wrote: “I wonder whether Woolston, a suburb in Southampton has also had this hassle…or Lambeth, or Woolwich.”

In a statement, Dorset County Council said: “We would like to say that we are immensely proud of Dorset's heritage which includes many unusual place names like Shitterton, Scratchy Bottom and Knackers Hole, to name but a few!”

I bet the Parish Council in Ham, Glos. can’t wait for its letter from PETA.