How do bureaucrats save their jobs? They re-invent themselves as green advocates. You can imagine Sir Humphrey explaining to the minister that instead of sacking a few dozen burdens on the taxpayer, he can redeploy them as green advocates. It’ll cost more, but it’ll be green…

When is a quango not a quango? When it is an “Office”. In this case the new Office for Low Emission Vehicles (OLEV), “a cross Whitehall team dedicated to taking forward” green initiatives. So far the only initiative they have come up with is a £50 million taxpayer subsidy to middle and upper-class greens who can get £5,000 off the purchase of an expensive electric car. That £5,000 will end up directly in the profits of foreign electric car manufacturers.

The Foreign Office now has a Climate Change twitterer, no really. We are supposed to be getting small government and a Big Society. We’re actually getting a Big Green Government…