DO you ever get a sense of deja vu?

I do but none more so than when a high profile politician steps out of the Westminster bubble and visits Worcester Bosch.

I have nothing against Bosch - the company is hugely successful and a massive local employer - but I have been on so many tours of its premises that not only do some of the staff believe I work there, I think I do too.

So it was somewhat refreshing when shadow energy and climate change secretary Caroline Flint came to Worcester on Thursday and went, albeit just around the corner, to Domestic General Insulation instead.

At least I thought it was refreshing until I found out Mrs Flint had originally planned to go to Bosch only for the company to politely turn her away.

Martyn Bridges, director of marketing and technical support at Worcester Bosch Group, said: "We would be delighted for Caroline Flint to visit our facilities. However, at short notice no appropriate directors were on site to host her visit."

  • IN last week’s column I said, at the risk of sounding like a Labour frontbencher, that this Government’s cuts drive is going too deep, too fast which sparked a bit of a debate on Twitter with Mid-Worcestershire MP and defence minister Peter Luff.

I said the Government needed to be more sympathetic about how much pressure it is putting on the public to which Mr Luff, a Conservative, said: “Empathy we have, money we don't.”

The debate went on and we agreed to disagree but then I saw on the news that the Government had doubled the budget for the London 2012 opening and closing ceremonies to more than £80 million.

“£80 million is a lot of money, I agree, but if we've got the Olympics we must do them well,” said Mr Luff.

With the removal of winter fuel allowance top-ups, proposed pension changes and everything else going on I’ll let you decide whether this Government’s got its priorities right.

Do you have a story for David? Call 01905 742248, e-mail dp@worcesternews.co.uk, or follow me on Twitter @DavidPaineW