Batteries Included

"Hello, Tony?"

"George! I was just about to .... "

" .... you always say that! Funny, though, how I always seem to end up paying for lengthy trunk calls .... !"

"No, George: elephants went out of fashion about the same time as the Commonwealth."

"Trunk calls .... long distance, you call them!"

"Joke, George: J - O - K - E, joke! You Yanks take everything far too seriously! Anyway: what can I do you for?"

"It's the photo taken by NavSat1 somebody's put on the 'Net. Have you . ?"

" . seen it? You can bet I have, and I've been getting some stick about it already, I can tell you! It looks as if nobody in the whole of Europe OR the Americas could be bothered ..." " ........ turning a light off! My point exactly! And, Tony: you've no idea how powerful the Greens are over here!"

"For the moment I've managed to keep Joe Public thinking of them as a comic turn rather than a serious political threat in the UK, but I'm not going to be able to keep it up much longer - especially if this sort of thing starts appearing on the 'Net, or other places I can't censor it!"

"How's your National Grid coping?"

"Farmed out to different companies, George: they're all fighting each other for customers these days, instead of ganging up to hold the Government to ransom by pulling the plug every Christmas, or whenever the temperature drops! You ought to try it yourself .... !"

"Tony, let me just remind you that we have far better oil reserves than you do .... "

"Is that a threat?"

"Only if you see it as such."

"So what's your point? I mean, unless you just rang to wish me a Happy Christmas: there has to be a reason for this phone call?"

"I'm trying to look a bit further ahead, Tony. Tell me, have you any ... let's call it, contingency plans? For example: suppose demand starts to outstrip supply? I'm talking power shortages, blackouts, you know?"

"George, George, you're panicking! It's not going to happen!"

"Tony, it's starting to happen already! The Greens are starting to organise themselves much better than I thought possible, and the media are giving them a lot of exposure."

"Right: here's what we do! First: we rubbish the photograph - get a geek with a load of alphabetti spaghetti letters after his name to state that the photograph's  a fake, or misleading, or a result of freak weather conditions: maybe that it's been ‘airbrushed' in some way. Deflect attention: suggest that it's deliberate mischiefmaking, political opportunism, something of that nature. People will always believe a story which suggests something underhand!"

"Okay, sounds reasonable. Anything else?"

"Look at alternatives. How far are you dependent on electricity? For example: lots of UK houses have both electricity and gas."

"Difficult. In the boondocks, I suppose there's still the fallback on solid fuel heating and cooking, but that's not going to help a great deal on the national scale ..... "

" ... and you've never had any policy about other alternative energy sources: wind, solar, tidal .... I won't even mention nuclear alternatives .... !"

" .... you just did!"

" .............. you know what I mean! We put up a couple of token reactors when they promised to be a cheap way to conserve fossil fuels, but they're knackered, likely to go the same way as Tchernobl before much longer  - and I'll deny I ever admitted that, so don't think you can quote me!"

" ‘You know that was the last thing on my mind' ..... "

" ......... and you can't sing either, George! Now, I'll remind you that you started off by moaning about paying for this phone call, and it's still on your tab! Have you got anything useful to say, or not!?"

"Just one word, then. Batteries."

"Batteries????????"

"Batteries. Radios, flashlights, radios ....... batteries."

"What about them?"

"Batteries: emergency power if there's a problem with electricity supply."

"Are you serious, George? Can you imagine open-heart surgery by flashlight? Or getting cash from a battery-driven ATM??!"

"No, Tony, that's not my point! Listen: do you still have a manufacturing base for dry-cell batteries?"

"I can tell you now, George, they were ‘outsourced' to ...... that is, the production of batteries .... "

"  .........  got palmed off to cheap labour in the Third World, you mean!"

"         .........  I didn't say that, and you can't ..... !"

"         ................. quote you on that, either! Put a different record on the jukebox, Tony! Look, I'm not even trying to lay blame on anyone's shoulders, I just want to find out what the options are, where we might turn if push comes to shove, you know? I gather you're in the same position as us, using cheap labour for mass produced consumer goods such as batteries?"

"That about says it all, George. So: what do we do about it?"

"We??? Do????!!! Tony, you cannot be serious?!"

"Look, let's get this straight! I've got the Labour party on my back, the voters in my face and the European Parliament breathing down my neck about environmental protection already: the last thing I need right now is a major energy crisis! I mean, how bad is it? This photo's just one nighttime shot, after all ....!"

"Tony, Tony! It might be, as you say, "just one night". But it could have been any night, and we both know it would have shown exactly the same picture. And I'll wager you've done nothing about recycling batteries, either!"

"I'm pretty sure I read a European Directive about it ..... "

" ....... not good enough, and we both know it! What have you done about it?"

"About the same as you - nothing. Cheaper to let someone else do all the spadework and research, then buy into a finished product: that's my experience, anyway!"

"Meanwhile, the manufacturers in every tin-pot dictatorship and banana republic in the Third World are stockpiling stuff they know we're going to have to buy sooner or later.

And: they know we'll have to pay them whatever price they choose to set, or do without! Guess who's suddenly going to become the Third World beggar with a knackered national economy then, Tony? Can you tell me that? Tony?? Hello?? Are you still there?"

"The person you are trying to call has hung up.
Please replace the handset and try again ....."
"The person you are trying to call has hung up.
Please replace the handset and try again ....."
"The person you are trying to call has hung up.
Please replace the handset and try again ....."