Europe 2020 Project Bonds consultation announced

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Read more! It had to come, using bonds to fund the major infrastructure projects that the EU will need over the coming years.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com



The announcement of the consultation is here.

I've been involved in quite a few discussions about this type of infrastructure funding recently, so it will be interesting to see the results of the consult. There is definitely an appetite for more imaginative use of financial vehicles to get the EU back in the fast lane.

Meanwhile, for those with their eyes on smaller scale solutions to funding infrastructure, there is a Cumbria Social Enterprise Partnership event on 16th March in Kendal for anyone wishing to know about community share issue.
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Timms - pleased but..

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Read more! Stephen Timms has been announced as Communications Minister but is the timing crap or what? .........

I've met Timms, followed much of his career because of my involvement from before CBN got off the ground etc, and read much about his engagement with all things 'digital'. I know many people who have worked under him and with him.

But I think there has been a major cock up here.

Someone like Timms, who has experience in the social enterprise sector, who is heftily involved with communities (Newham etc), and who is without a doubt a geek with vision, should have been involved in Digital Britain from the offset. He has a broad mindset for all things 01100100011010010110011101101001011101. Timms is not an industry insider who has now set the gameplan in his report and scarpered. Many of us feel very unsure about the longevity, scope and industry agenda of that report - not just for broadband, but across media, spectrum issues, etc etc, hence the much welcome, grassroots political activity that led to the Unconferences.

I think I feel sorry for Timms. The summer recess is nowhere near over, and when everyone comes back he has 'moments' before the Christmas recess to achieve anything, and as of January, campaigning will start in earnest for the election, with the largest number of new candidates running for election since 1833 - fondly known as the "Class of 2010".

His chances to give us any kind of a #digitalbritain legacy will, whatever the end result of the election, undoubtedly be overturned by all the bloody shenanigans that a general election engenders in the civil service. You try phoning them in the interim...last time, I spent hours trying to track down DTI contacts, only to be told, "No-one is really in charge right now."

All I see, and as ever I am being my normal blunt self, is yet further delays in creating #digitalbritain, a potentially good person who could help the eNdGAme be achieved being shafted by the system because of the timing, and another f*&^ up in working together as a nation to deliver what is required for the eNdGAme.

Right now, I feel far from +ve.

I would welcome other points of view, either via the comments section or in my inbox.

Cheer me up, folks, please. Me crystal ball 'as gorn all cloudy and I think it's tears.

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