Best Of

Why was Jenrick boasting about opening new hotels every month? Because people did not want potentially illegal immigrants wandering the streets or cluttering the doorways of their shops, I suppose. So he found the solution to one problem, more secure accommodation, by creating another.

The absolute failure, however, for which he bore at least some responsibility (no doubt the Treasury and resources did too) was the grinding to a halt of our immigration assessment system, whether in original determinations, dealing with appeals, actually implementing the decisions made and getting people back on planes where they came from. The only success I can think of from the last government in this area was the deal with Albania. It should have been a model, not unique.

The current government has made modest progress in dealing with appeals and deportations but it is a pale shadow of what is needed. In my view the only realistic approach is an amnesty for most of those who have not been removed in 10 years or more and try to focus resources on the new arrivals/overstayers etc.

Isn't the bigger problem that many-to-most asylum applicants turn out to have a perfectly valid case under the established rules and the last government was terrified of acknowledging that? Hence keeping people in limbo, until they could be magicked away to Africa.

Why was Jenrick boasting about opening new hotels every month? Because people did not want potentially illegal immigrants wandering the streets or cluttering the doorways of their shops, I suppose. So he found the solution to one problem, more secure accommodation, by creating another.

The absolute failure, however, for which he bore at least some responsibility (no doubt the Treasury and resources did too) was the grinding to a halt of our immigration assessment system, whether in original determinations, dealing with appeals, actually implementing the decisions made and getting people back on planes where they came from. The only success I can think of from the last government in this area was the deal with Albania. It should have been a model, not unique.

The current government has made modest progress in dealing with appeals and deportations but it is a pale shadow of what is needed. In my view the only realistic approach is an amnesty for most of those who have not been removed in 10 years or more and try to focus resources on the new arrivals/overstayers etc.

Isn't the bigger problem that many-to-most asylum applicants turn out to have a perfectly valid case under the established rules and the last government was terrified of acknowledging that? Hence keeping people in limbo, until they could be magicked away to Africa.

At the heart of the problem is that we - in common with other European governments - have granted a legal right for half the world's population to settle here, provided that they can reach our shores, and claim asylum.

Then, we try to stop them from doing so, because nobody, outside the ranks of Greens, Sultanas, and human rights activists, thinks that this is a good idea.

Matthew Parris has been making this point, since about 2000.

The answer lies in completely rewriting the ECHR, or alternatively, passing primary legislation that disapplies parts of it.

I see Rachel from Accounts is doing everything possible to make sure home owners don't vote Labour at the next election.
Her and her Party's hideous policies hopefully will screw Labour for generations.

Yet the current property taxation system is riddled with inconsistencies. There are people in £8m mansions who pay less than people in £400k semis in other areas.

There needs to be a local element to property taxation (unless the LVT type tax is going to be used to fund social care at a national level). As an example, if I am charged 0.5% of the value of my East London desres, I reckon I'd be about where I am now with Newham's Council Tax so I'm fairly agnostic about it financialy.

So much will depend on where they pitch the valuations of property and how the valuations will be carried out (nice money for some valuers somewhere). If all this can lead to the replacement of Stamp Duty and Council Tax with a single Property Tax, why not?

It is incompetent to fail to revalue property for local taxation purposes for 34 years and continuing. It is also incompetent to run a property tax system which is massively regressive. It is better to tax property properly on an annual liability basis than demand irrational big sums in stamp duty, discouraging a transparent and liquid market.

The fear is that this government in October will further tinker and complicate, and also will do so with IHT, when with IHT what it should do is have a system at a sensible rate (10%?) with more or less universal application to IHT and lifetime gifts.

This is suboptimal for Jenrick. On the other hand he is the only Tory who seems to understand social media - in the same way as Farage

He would be a risk but dying men clutch at risky straws

One alternative is Katie Lam. Telegenic. Firmly right wing. Articulate. And - crucially - so young she has no unhelpful backstory. But also so young she could just be another Badenoch

I had lunch with somebody last week who told me Katie Lam's backstory will stop her becoming leader or getting any traction.

She was a Home Office SPAD (and other jobs) during the last Parliament, she was in favour of a lot of the policies she is now criticising. There's a paper trail.

Isn't this an old one, though? Can people not change their minds when they see it doesn't work or the facts change?

I remember Truss being attacked as a Remainer and Starmer as a Corbynite. And Blair once supported Michael Foot.

Not sure it's a dealbreaker.

FPR

Hmmm. Tesla.

Sales down 60% in the UK in July YOY. Those proved more resilient than elsewhere in Europe.
Leases offered at 40% discount via third parties.
And USA legal actions working through slowly.

That's a Model Y from around £400+ a month, and a Model 3 for £300+ per month. Those numbers look attractive compared to some comparisons.

No, I'm not predicting anything.

https://www.autoblog.com/news/tesla-slashes-uk-lease-prices-after-sales-collapse-could-the-us-be-next

I know he’s not round much now but our resident Tesla expert, @RochdalePioneers, IIRC, said a while back low Tesla sales are partly due to a model change with a new model due soon.

Morning! Its absolutely true that comparing off sale vs on sale in not like for like - which is what much of the media was doing. It's true that sales resumptions do not make for smooth sales numbers - you get an early adopter spike then in drops then it settles.

We're in the post-sale drop. Need to see the rest of the quarter to see how the settle looks.

But sales are down. And were going to be down. I've been commenting on video about it *before the old car went off sale* earlier this year. Was scorned by the usual fanbois for saying Model Y wouldn't be the best selling car in the world this year.

The month on month comparisons for most of this year haven't been LFL. They are valid, but they tell a false story. Handy if you are pushing that false story, less handy if you are interested in reality. I've spent too many decades reporting on sales performance to waste my time trying to defend half-truths and distorted non-LFL comparisons. Because you have to make something up to explain the false narrative and then get stuck with it once it pans out...

That's a lot of words for 'Tesla are fked'

That isn't what I said. If you want to cling to the non-LFL analysis then be my guest. Doesn't make it factual or actual, but hey.

Tesla’s problem is that there are now a lot of good EV options without facist undertones

Since when was competition a problem for anyone? When you are leading edge you gain massive share - but you always lose it as Tesla have. Competition floods the market - and note how many of these new competitors create clones of Tesla.

So it's hardly a shock that more competition means Tesla sell less vehicles in the market squeeze where we have more choices than consumers. Same in any category, any market.

So you go find the next leading edge. That has been range and ease of charging. It has been simplified cabins with Big Screens. It has been efficient design and construction so that you're not being held up by parts your supplier can't make.

We are in the middle of the AI revolution - and Tesla own an AI company which is integrating into the cars. Which leads onto automated driving which cameras + AI make possible. Whilst I and others have been reassured* repeatedly that cameras are crap and it has to be RADAR/LIDAR lead, the competitive surge of development from China is predominantly camera.

We don't understand this very well in the UK because we have Dumb Autopilot whose software goes through phases of being practically dangerous (as mine is now). But put in a software stack designed this decade and the advances are rapid, and with AI continuing to scale will advance exponentially.

Tesla will be on the leading edge of this, and with the best will in the world many of the newer (and older) competitors won't. Until they catch up, and we go onto the New thing whatever that is.

I can’t currently trust an AI to accurately read and summarise multiple legal documents without hallucinating - now I know my opinion of AI may be different to yours but you can’t throw an LLM at driving a car yet that is what Tesla is trying to do

Also I will believe Tesla have got there when they remove the human part of their robotic taxi service

So currently AI is at the approximate intellectual level of an average judge?

Approximate Intellect.