Best Of

Massive breaking global news story tonight!!

'UNFRIEND IT LIKE BECKHAM Fresh twist in Beckham family feud as David and Victoria unfollow son Brooklyn on Instagram after snub from brothers.
It comes after their sons Romeo, 23, and Cruz, 20, unfollowed their brother and his wife on the app in July.

A source said: “This is the ultimate snub in 2025 – it shows just how deep their rift is.”
https://www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/37697315/brooklyn-beckham-unfollows-david-victoria-instagram-family-feud/

Who cares and it certainly is not massive breaking global news

Epstein, US attacking Syria, and arresting another ship in international waters off Venezuala is

You know, I'm old enough to remember a time Donald Trump said he wouldn't do global adventurism.

He has the not at all nonsensical Fifa Peace Prize now, no need for more peace.

Massive breaking global news story tonight!!

'UNFRIEND IT LIKE BECKHAM Fresh twist in Beckham family feud as David and Victoria unfollow son Brooklyn on Instagram after snub from brothers.
It comes after their sons Romeo, 23, and Cruz, 20, unfollowed their brother and his wife on the app in July.

A source said: “This is the ultimate snub in 2025 – it shows just how deep their rift is.”
https://www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/37697315/brooklyn-beckham-unfollows-david-victoria-instagram-family-feud/

Who cares and it certainly is not massive breaking global news

Epstein, US attacking Syria, and arresting another ship in international waters off Venezuala is

Massive breaking global news story tonight!!

'UNFRIEND IT LIKE BECKHAM Fresh twist in Beckham family feud as David and Victoria unfollow son Brooklyn on Instagram after snub from brothers.
It comes after their sons Romeo, 23, and Cruz, 20, unfollowed their brother and his wife on the app in July.

A source said: “This is the ultimate snub in 2025 – it shows just how deep their rift is.”
https://www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/37697315/brooklyn-beckham-unfollows-david-victoria-instagram-family-feud/

Who cares and it certainly is not massive breaking global news

Epstein, US attacking Syria, and arresting another ship in international waters off Venezuala is

Crown court backlog nears 80,000 in new record
Data published on Thursday showed the open caseload was 79,619 at the end of September, up from 78,329 at the end of June.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/david-lammy-data-moj-deputy-prime-minister-ministry-of-justice-b2887043.html

Bloody juries.

One of the few good things this government has announced is more funds for Crown courts to sit on more days each year. Given the amount of extra tax this government has raised at least a fraction of it is being spent sensibly

There seems to be another good thing around, which is standardisation of recycling materials and bins across England.

(I think that this is both the current and previous Governments, but I picked it up from a Chris Spargo video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuwaOiTHl7U )

https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/uk-world-news/major-recycling-overhaul-coming-2026-10716308

Oh FFS. Dump the lot in one bin and let the recyclers sort it out, rather than continue with silly games and fines for putting red litter in the green bin, if we really need the same rules in Carshalton as Carlisle, which tbh is not immediately clear.

ETA what Alphabet_Soup said.

One of the reasons for fines and over-enforcement is horribly complex and different rules for different places, and for different types of recycling.

I think standardisation will be far better.

Unfortunately there isn't an English Government to do that

There is, tbf, it's called the one in Downing St. They just devolve the non-English bits. They even have a dept for overseeing local government in the rest and all (I forget what it's called these days, I can never keep up). But historically it used to oversee local gmt in Scotland and Wales as well, before the administrative devolutions a century and a quarter ago in the panic over Irish demands for independence and what would the nearer locals think?

It's about time we had a proper Federal system.

In most federations, "territories" ie the bits directly ruled by the Federal government, are marginal and underpopulated places.

In the UK it is England with maybe 85% of the population.

The current local government reorganisation is a complete dog's breakfast, and unlike the Scots, Norm Irish and Welsh, we are not allowed to say how to do it ourselves and have to be directed by the Imperial parliament at Westminster

Indeed. Labours attempt failed over trying to draw too many regions. Let’s not mess about - everyone knows England consists of the South, the Midlands, and the North, with London on one side. Or Wessex, Mercia and Northumbria, as once was. Carve the country outside London into three chunks, and just get on with it.

West Country
Wessex
Thames Valley & Estuary
East Anglia & the Levels
West Midlands & the Marches
East Midlands (Five Boroughs)
Lancashire & Cheshire (Counties Palatine?)
Yorkshire
Northumbria
Cumbria

The West Country and Wessex are the same surely?

I was thinking of Wessex as Hampshire, Wiltshire and Dorset; and West Country as Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, and Greater Bristol.

(Gloucestershire I put into the West Mids, which obviously wouldn’t be popular, but that region is in my view unfairly truncated away from its Severn outlet).

Hardy knew:

Cricket fielding positions

Silly point

More of a slip.

Ah, a third man has entered the debate.

Crown court backlog nears 80,000 in new record
Data published on Thursday showed the open caseload was 79,619 at the end of September, up from 78,329 at the end of June.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/david-lammy-data-moj-deputy-prime-minister-ministry-of-justice-b2887043.html

Bloody juries.

One of the few good things this government has announced is more funds for Crown courts to sit on more days each year. Given the amount of extra tax this government has raised at least a fraction of it is being spent sensibly

There seems to be another good thing around, which is standardisation of recycling materials and bins across England.

(I think that this is both the current and previous Governments, but I picked it up from a Chris Spargo video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuwaOiTHl7U )

https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/uk-world-news/major-recycling-overhaul-coming-2026-10716308

Oh FFS. Dump the lot in one bin and let the recyclers sort it out, rather than continue with silly games and fines for putting red litter in the green bin, if we really need the same rules in Carshalton as Carlisle, which tbh is not immediately clear.

ETA what Alphabet_Soup said.

One of the reasons for fines and over-enforcement is horribly complex and different rules for different places, and for different types of recycling.

I think standardisation will be far better.

Unfortunately there isn't an English Government to do that

There is, tbf, it's called the one in Downing St. They just devolve the non-English bits. They even have a dept for overseeing local government in the rest and all (I forget what it's called these days, I can never keep up). But historically it used to oversee local gmt in Scotland and Wales as well, before the administrative devolutions a century and a quarter ago in the panic over Irish demands for independence and what would the nearer locals think?

It's about time we had a proper Federal system.

In most federations, "territories" ie the bits directly ruled by the Federal government, are marginal and underpopulated places.

In the UK it is England with maybe 85% of the population.

The current local government reorganisation is a complete dog's breakfast, and unlike the Scots, Norm Irish and Welsh, we are not allowed to say how to do it ourselves and have to be directed by the Imperial parliament at Westminster

Indeed. Labours attempt failed over trying to draw too many regions. Let’s not mess about - everyone knows England consists of the South, the Midlands, and the North, with London on one side. Or Wessex, Mercia and Northumbria, as once was. Carve the country outside London into three chunks, and just get on with it.

West Country
Wessex
Thames Valley & Estuary
East Anglia & the Levels
West Midlands & the Marches
East Midlands (Five Boroughs)
Lancashire & Cheshire (Counties Palatine?)
Yorkshire
Northumbria
Cumbria

The West Country and Wessex are the same surely?

I was thinking of Wessex as Hampshire, Wiltshire and Dorset; and West Country as Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, and Greater Bristol.

(Gloucestershire I put into the West Mids, which obviously wouldn’t be popular, but that region is in my view unfairly truncated away from its Severn outlet).

Hardy knew:

Cricket fielding positions

Silly point

More of a slip.

Ah, a third man has entered the debate.

Swindon is silly mid wessex.