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TSE dethreaded me again. I must have said something about Yorkshire.

We have been warned:
Zia Yusuf @ZiaYusufUK
·
7h
Reform will transform the civil service from a bloated, failed organisation hostile to the interests of the British people into a lean, performant machine that makes our country proud. 🇬🇧

On the face of it, this doesn't sound like anything to be worried about. What do you see as problematic with it?

This is obvious by now, surely? It's about 97% likely to be pure BS. Reform are an incompetent policy-free slogan machine, hoping that fools will fall for it. I doubt if they even know what they mean themselves by "Civil Service", never mind what it actually means.

We have this exact cycle from Zia himself in Kent County Council. Lots of "we will save X Y and Z". But LTNs to be cut did not exist. Woke waste to be cut did not exist. "DEI jobs" hardly existed.

It was all public information, but the numpties of Reform, including Zia himself, did not do any homework. So then he rifled through last year's local papers and social media, to find some identified savings he could claim to have "identified". And made a serious of fake claims about it. Cue a public faceplant.

So what happens next? Well, in Derbyshire they cut half the adult education centres. They had time for a proper process, but waited until the last minute and tried to do an emergency decision.

But RefUK are such a fuckwit collective that they had to admit their action was unlawful.

Vote for a clown show, and you get a circus. I don't want a circus in my Council or Government.

Haha - you think the last or the current government are competent?

The last one - incompetent. The current one - too early to tell.

You thing a Farage Farrago would be less incompetent?

How did that work out in County Councils?

Far too early to tell.

Hmmmm.

Four months since the May elections.

Reform officials failure to obey the law and follow the rules, even on a basic level, says imo that we have plenty of evidence, without even getting into their attacks on scrutiny.

Just to take one, when the Chief Executive of Warwickshire refused to obey an attempted instruction by the leader of the minority Reform UK group, the minority Council Leader, to take down a flag and informed him of the correct procedure which required consent of the whole Council, his next step was to accuse her of being deliberate Civil Service obstructionism against his aims.

It was BS, but Farage still used it as an example in his conference speech.

Like Trump, they are trying to destroy checks, balances and scrutiny.

I think the poisonous nature of RefUK is out there in letters a mile high.

I'd prefer not to repeatedly call Reform UK politicians liars, but it is what they are.

If Labour and co want to win the next election they need to call Reform out every time they lie until it finally dawns on Reform supporters that they are being tricked by liars

The second bit might be tricky- persuading people that their understanding of the world isn't right is very difficult. And there will be lots of pain and not many thanks for those who try that persuading.

But someone needs to try.

That was why I said continually calling Reform out - because you are going to have to do it multiple times before people pick up on the fact that everything reform says is based on a lie or multiple lies

But that's rational talk, centrist dad talk. There have already been a couple of sensible posters (and Leon) put up the "all the other parties are just as bad" defence. And used it as an attack line against the Uniparty.

It's not that degrees of badness is that complex a concept to grasp. But "you can't judge me because you're not perfect yourself" has always worked as a defence mechanism. Logically, it shouldn't, but it does.

Your "bad" and other people's "bad" will differ, hence degrees of badness vary dependent on where you stand on the political spectrum.

I was mildly amused as every Labourite on R4 this morning was trying to emphasisie how working class they and the party were. I await Lady Nugee telling us how she flies the English flag and has a whippet to go with her flat cap.

FPT:

The Apple Puzzle
On a tree, half of the apples have holes made by wasps.
• One boy picked 3 apples at random and said “at least one of mine has no holes.”
• Another boy picked 4 apples similarly. He showed me one of them at random, and it had no holes. He put it back.
If you may take just one apple from either boy’s bag, from which boy do you have the better chance of picking an apple without holes?

Let's number the apples physically, so child A has apples numbered 1-3, child B has apples numbered 1-4.

We will designated G as good, B as bad

Child A says, at least one of mine has no holes.

This rules in (at equal probability):
ggg, ggb, GBG, bgg, gbb, bgb, bbg

and rules out:
Bbb

Shifts the probability of picking a good apple from 12/24 to 12/21 by removing the 3 bads option = 57.1%

We have not used the numbers.

Child B removes 1 apple from the bag, at random, and finds it is good. For the sake of argument we'll say apple 1 has been removed, though it works exactly the same if apples 2 or 3 or 4 are found to be good.

This rules in (at equal probability):
Gggg, gggb, ggbg, gbgg, ggbb, gbgb, gbbg, gbbb

and rules out:
Bggg, bggb, bgbg, bbgg, bgbb, bbgb, bbbg, bbbb

(Notice how much more has been ruled out by saying apple #1 of the 4 is good rather than one of the three apples is good)

Shifts the probability of picking a good apple from 32/64 to 20/32 by removing all the bad apple #1 options) = 62.5%

The original wording didnt state that the second apple was chosen at random (may allude to it, but unclear), nor the proportion of good or bad apples. Hence the long and confusing discussion as some will still be answering a different interpretation if they didnt see the updated wording.

"All this talk about polling reminds me of an intriguing puzzle I devised from recent experiences with wasp-damaged apples.
Anyone who is into the difficulties of polling and sampling may find it interesting. Please post your answers but don't spoil the fun by giving any reasoning or explanation yet:
Two children pick apples from the same wasp-busy tree.
Child A picks 3 apples and says: “At least one of mine has no wasp holes.”
Child B picks 4 apples and shows you one that is definitely hole-free, then puts it back in the bag.
You may take one apple from one child’s bag.
From which bag do you have the better chance of getting an apple without holes — A’s or B’s?"