I thought the announcement yesterday about insulation incentives was great – free or discounted insulation for the old and poor. Throwing money at them to pay for fuel bills each year doesn’t make sense – long term insulation to reduce those bills does.

So I find it more than a touch annoying when people don’t appreciate when they might be stepping over the line of what is acceptable behaviour in these situations. Let’s take BBC news yesterday morning. The government minster gave out a freephone number for those affected to contact where they could get advice on what they could claim and how to get it. Naturally the question from the BBC report was “but why should they have to contact you – what about those people who are too busy to do that”.

Too busy. Too busy. Well, may I humbly suggest that if you’re “too busy” to ring a FREEPHONE number and organise something then maybe.. maybe… you don’t deserve any assistance.

And this morning they were reading out an email from a disabled pensioner “incensed” about the free loft insulation because they won’t come around and clear his loft out first. And then what? Would he want them to put all the stuff neatly away in his drawers or take it away to the tip for him – he is a pensioner after all. Where does it end?

And this morning there’s a new story about a coastal village that’s DEMANDING that the government do something about the fact that their houses are slipping into the sea. Hold on… didn’t you buy these houses knowing they were closed to the sea? Were you never aware of coastal erosion (and even if you wasn’t, how is this fault of the government)? This is along a similar vein to those who buy houses next to airports and then complain about the noise.

You can’t demand everything in life from the governent to smooth things over and make everything perfect. We have to stand up to our mistakes and we can’t complain when people are trying to help – all of which are demonstrated here. As a society we have to stop demanding everything is laid in front of us, get off our arses and do something.

Here ends todays rant.