Fun Online Polls: New Year's Honours & FirstBuy

The results to last week's Fun Online Poll were as follows:

Who would have been on your New Year's Honours list? Multiple selections allowed.

None of the [below] - 89 votes

Prof Peter Higgs - 58 votes
Kate Bush - 26 votes
Quentin Blake - 22 votes

Ewan McGregor - 12 votes
Seb Coe - 9 votes
Martha Lane Fox - 4 votes
Arlene Phillips - 4 votes
Bernard Hogan-Howe 2 votes
Cherie Blair - 2 votes
Tracey Emin - 2 votes
Stella McCartney - 2 votes
Hector Sants - 1 vote
Margaret Beckett - 1 vote

There was a good turnout, with 161 people taking part (big thanks as ever). More than half voted "None of the above" so if we are doing this by simple majority, then nobody would have been on the List.

Taking a more relaxed view, Higgs, Bush and Blake definitely deserve an "honourable" mention (if you don't know who Quentin Blake is, or if you do know and you don't love his scribbles, then shame on you).
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And lo, Cleggeron have re-announced the FirstBuy scheme for the umpteenth time (the previous Labour government had already announced and re-announced it half a dozen times in their last couple of years):

* The government is to guarantee up to £10 billion to support increased building of both new affordable homes and homes for private rent.
* The FirstBuy equity loan scheme will also be extended to help first-time buyers get a foot on the housing ladder.
* However, developers are to be freed to ignore 'unviable' council targets for affordable homes.
* Further planning reforms will accelerate major housing projects.

For whose benefit is all this?

Vote here or use the widget in the sidebar.

One man has secured his Olympic Legacy

Spotted by Bob E in The Daily Mail:

Lord Coe is set to scoop a multi-million pound windfall from selling his private business to an advertising company that played a major role in the Olympics.

The former Olympic gold medallist and head of the organising committee for the 2012 Games could stand to gain almost £12million over the next four years from the sale of his management consultancy firm, the Complete Leisure Group Limited.

The buyer, Chime Communications, is an advertising and public relations group founded by Margaret Thatcher’s former spin master and 1980s PR mogul Lord Bell.
The agency raked in more than £30million from a number of contracts during the Olympic Games.

Given that former MP Lord Coe owns more than 90 per cent of the shares in the group, he will walk away with millions. Foreign Secretary William Hague is also set to benefit financially, as he is a minority shareholder in the venture.

Warning: Pickpockets operate in this area