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37 years ago today since the Piper Alpha disaster. My Dad was working off shore in the North Sea at the time but he was away on a short holiday with my Mum and my sister and I were both at home house/cat and dog sitting for them. We had neither the radio or the TV on that day, but I always remember the phone started ringing as old friends of my Dad who didn't realise which rig he worked on or that he was on shore started phoning to check in with him and their relief when they discovered he was away on holiday. I think it was about the third random phonecall from an old friend of his when I said right what is going on and why is everyone suddenly phoning to check in on my Dad today.

I had moved from Aberdeen the year before to take up a nursing job in Edinburgh, but one of my best friends was on duty at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary when the news came in and the hospital went into emergency mode in preparation for a large amount of incoming casualties and she still talks about the utter shock and sadness that overwhelmed the staff on duty there that day when those casualties didn't materialise as the enormity of the tragedy unfolded.

I had my interview for my first job offshore on the day after Piper Alpha.

60 were due to be interviewed. 12 of us turned up.

We all got jobs

I had been with Chevron about a week. An horrific introduction to the North Sea oil and gas industry.

I have spent my whole career in the shadow of that night. It was utterly transformative for the oil industry around the world.... except the USA.

It may be little consolation to the relatives of those who died but it is undoubtedly the case that many times that number have worked in safety because of the changes wrought by Piper Alpha.

37 years ago today since the Piper Alpha disaster. My Dad was working off shore in the North Sea at the time but he was away on a short holiday with my Mum and my sister and I were both at home house/cat and dog sitting for them. We had neither the radio or the TV on that day, but I always remember the phone started ringing as old friends of my Dad who didn't realise which rig he worked on or that he was on shore started phoning to check in with him and their relief when they discovered he was away on holiday. I think it was about the third random phonecall from an old friend of his when I said right what is going on and why is everyone suddenly phoning to check in on my Dad today.

I had moved from Aberdeen the year before to take up a nursing job in Edinburgh, but one of my best friends was on duty at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary when the news came in and the hospital went into emergency mode in preparation for a large amount of incoming casualties and she still talks about the utter shock and sadness that overwhelmed the staff on duty there that day when those casualties didn't materialise as the enormity of the tragedy unfolded.

I had my interview for my first job offshore on the day after Piper Alpha.

60 were due to be interviewed. 12 of us turned up.

We all got jobs

On topic, TSE says: "Labour’s problem is self inflicted, for fourteen years Labour kept on saying austerity was a choice, this week’s vote was when those chickens came home to roost."

The thing about this is, it *was* a choice. The economy was understimulated, you kind of could print money and spend it and nothing bad would happen, there would just be more useful work happening in the economy. Now there's inflation, and any money you spend on one thing has to come from somewhere else.

The problem here is that political messages have a time lag on reality ranging from 5 to 40 years. This is why Osborne applied the lessons from the 1970s and early 1980s to post-Lehman-shock Britain, and it's also why Starmer is now lumbered with a party full of people who don't realize that if you spend money on one thing you can't spend it on another thing.

37 years ago today since the Piper Alpha disaster. My Dad was working off shore in the North Sea at the time but he was away on a short holiday with my Mum and my sister and I were both at home house/cat and dog sitting for them. We had neither the radio or the TV on that day, but I always remember the phone started ringing as old friends of my Dad who didn't realise which rig he worked on or that he was on shore started phoning to check in with him and their relief when they discovered he was away on holiday. I think it was about the third random phonecall from an old friend of his when I said right what is going on and why is everyone suddenly phoning to check in on my Dad today.

I had moved from Aberdeen the year before to take up a nursing job in Edinburgh, but one of my best friends was on duty at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary when the news came in and the hospital went into emergency mode in preparation for a large amount of incoming casualties and she still talks about the utter shock and sadness that overwhelmed the staff on duty there that day when those casualties didn't materialise as the enormity of the tragedy unfolded.

It is not to defend HYUFD's stance, which I disagree with, but two 20ish girls I spoke to recently were furious with 'Emily Pankhurst' for forcing women into the workplace 'How dare she make that decision for everyone else?'.

There's no conflict between feminism and women choosing not to work and look after their kids: the point is that it has to be a choice and not forced. But being beholden to a partner for money can also make them subservient to the partner if the partner is so inclined. Which again is fine if it is a free choice; but also somewhat goes against some feminist thinking.

However, it is interesting to see people say that women should be able to choose not to work, and those who want to ban the hijab, niqab or burqa as they are 'forced' on women.

If a woman can choose to be subservient to a partner in a relationship, why can another woman not choose to wear such headgear?

The issue with the hijab, niquab and burqua....I agree with you if they choose it. However some dont choose that life and have it forced on them. I give an example my son had been dating a girl for a couple of years and they were getting on for two years when they were getting towards two years, she had been round the house lots eaten with us, she was bright. They were getting serious so had to ask her do your parents know, did talk it over with my son first about what might happen. Yes her parents objected 1 month later she had been to pakistan and was married to a cousin she had never met. Now personally I think that might have been forced and now instead of the bright friendly intelligent girl I remember next time I saw her was traipsing along 2m behind her new husband eyes downcast and ignoring all her old friends from school

Indeed. But it's the same with women not working and having to look after loads of babies: some don't choose that life and have it forced upon them.

In fact, that was probably the norm just a few decades ago.

And that's where @HYUFD wants us to return to. And like the burqa etc, it is because of a particular religious interpretation.

It is not just the very religious, as already stated young men across the western world are increasingly voting for far right and populist right parties in part because they back their support for a return to more traditional gender roles

Lets cull young men then it will sort the issue

Or they could cull the likes of you

I however am not the problem young men are expecting stuff they cant have

Yes having a committed relationship with a woman and the prospect of fatherhood as every generation of men before them has had is something they are no longer entitled to in your view.

Hence they will vote ever more far right and populist right

Nobody is "entitled" to a relationship.

If you want a relationship, work on pleasing the other person more than you try to please yourself.

That also requires women to play ball
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-11878629/Why-time-ditch-alpha-male-addiction-bag-beta.html

Sorry why should they play ball, they know what they want if men cant meet that then the fault is on the men

So apparently the 90% of men who are not rich and good looking Alpha males have to be lifelong single and celibate because most women are chasing an unattainable for most 10% of men!

That statistic is clearly bollocks. The vast majority of non-alpha* males have long term successful relationships, including both you** and me.

*I don't accept the entire classification. We are not baboons and are social relationships are much more complicated.

** this is a compliment. I have never encountered anyone who self describes as "alpha male" who wasn't an arrogant arsehole.

This is clearly wrong because I’m a self-confessed alpha male, to the extent I am known in my neighbourhood as “THE FALCON”, and the idea I’m arrogant is obvious nonsense

An alpha male by some accounts previously identifying as LadyG.?

I'm not commenting on Ladyboy G .

More generally on alpha males, I think an important point is that "Alpha Males" are not alpha males. They are sad pricks in constant need of reassurance, including from themselves by affected dominance, and behave badly towards others (bullying, deprecation, abuse, sometimes violence) because they are insecure in their own skins.

They have a need to grow up and look in the mirror at what they really are, then they can relax a little and be amenable human beings.

I'll give you my regular spiel on the matter. It goes like this:

* Free speech does not exist, and never has existed
* There is merely things it is fashionable to say, and things which will get you arrested for saying, and the boundary is ever shifting.
* The only task of the statistician is to track it and note the moving boundary.
* As technology has expanded, the opportunity to note speech and arrest people for it has expanded.
* Consequently, free speech has contracted in the UK, and I don't see this stopping.
* I hate this.

If free speech has never existed, then how can it be contracting ?

It's zero. But it's a smaller zero than before. It's a much smaller amount of nothing than the absolutely ginormous nothing it was before.

"The Lib Dems are not just empty. They are a void within a vacuum surrounded by a vast inanition." - Boris, 2003

And he would know better than most.

Why oh why isn't Rachel Reeves introducing a mansion tax/property tax on homes worth over, say £2m?
Would raise a fortune and be in keeping with Labour values. Also very hard to avoid.

Starmer is opposed and will block it apparently

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/07/04/starmer-poised-block-wealth-taxes/

He may not have much choice. The fiscal rules are going to require tax rises.

The right ones yes, but we simply cannot go on borrowing and spending and taxing

If we tax more we will borrow less.
A mansion tax or similar will bring us in line with rest of the world, encourage downsizing and splitting of properties to help our housing crisis

Most nations don't have a massive mansion tax

Most nations do have land taxes. Even America does.

So do we, stamp duty

That's not a land tax, its a tax on sales. Completely different.

Stamp duty should be abolished and replaced with an annual land tax, like capitalist America has.

We also have council tax

Yes but stamp duty is a block on people moving and downsizing - it really shouldn't exist on primary properties if you want to move for work or downsize when they retire.

The ideal solution would be to remove stamp duty and increase council tax so that it (as a minimum) collects what was previously collected by stamp duty...

And again increasing council tax would encourage people in larger houses to move as they no longer needed a property of that size.

Absolutely.

There are a record number of empty bedrooms in the UK, at a time there are serious housing shortages. Why? Because the tax system diascourages people from moving to smaller properties.

Complete madness.

For primary residences, let's cut stamp duty to 0% - yes, really - and replace it with a 1% tax on property value. (And make it 3% for homes that are lived in less than 180 days a year.)

It would have exactly the effect you suggest. It would discourage people from havig second home and/or living in houses that are too big for them, and it would make trading down "free".

As an aside, I suspect if you created a scatter chart with propotion of the population who are young men on one axis, and number of rapes on the other, then you would see a remarkable degree of correlation. Young men commit most of the rapes, and therefore the more young men there are, the higher the incidence of rape.

Of course, the people most likely to emigrate are young men, and therefore the more immigration you have, then the more young men, and also an imbalance between the number of young men and young women, which almost certainly increases the number of rapes.

If you wanted to lower the incidence of rape, the simplest way would probably be to import lots of young women. If there are lots more women than men, then even low status men are able to get girlfriends and wives, and therefore are less likely to commit rape.

Sorry disagree. Rape is not usually about sex but power

It is not to defend HYUFD's stance, which I disagree with, but two 20ish girls I spoke to recently were furious with 'Emily Pankhurst' for forcing women into the workplace 'How dare she make that decision for everyone else?'.

There's no conflict between feminism and women choosing not to work and look after their kids: the point is that it has to be a choice and not forced. But being beholden to a partner for money can also make them subservient to the partner if the partner is so inclined. Which again is fine if it is a free choice; but also somewhat goes against some feminist thinking.

However, it is interesting to see people say that women should be able to choose not to work, and those who want to ban the hijab, niqab or burqa as they are 'forced' on women.

If a woman can choose to be subservient to a partner in a relationship, why can another woman not choose to wear such headgear?

The issue with the hijab, niquab and burqua....I agree with you if they choose it. However some dont choose that life and have it forced on them. I give an example my son had been dating a girl for a couple of years and they were getting on for two years when they were getting towards two years, she had been round the house lots eaten with us, she was bright. They were getting serious so had to ask her do your parents know, did talk it over with my son first about what might happen. Yes her parents objected 1 month later she had been to pakistan and was married to a cousin she had never met. Now personally I think that might have been forced and now instead of the bright friendly intelligent girl I remember next time I saw her was traipsing along 2m behind her new husband eyes downcast and ignoring all her old friends from school

Indeed. But it's the same with women not working and having to look after loads of babies: some don't choose that life and have it forced upon them.

In fact, that was probably the norm just a few decades ago.

And that's where @HYUFD wants us to return to. And like the burqa etc, it is because of a particular religious interpretation.

It is not just the very religious, as already stated young men across the western world are increasingly voting for far right and populist right parties in part because they back their support for a return to more traditional gender roles

Lets cull young men then it will sort the issue

Or they could cull the likes of you

I however am not the problem young men are expecting stuff they cant have

Yes having a committed relationship with a woman and the prospect of fatherhood as every generation of men before them has had is something they are no longer entitled to in your view.

Hence they will vote ever more far right and populist right

Nobody is "entitled" to a relationship.

If you want a relationship, work on pleasing the other person more than you try to please yourself.

That also requires women to play ball
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-11878629/Why-time-ditch-alpha-male-addiction-bag-beta.html

Sorry why should they play ball, they know what they want if men cant meet that then the fault is on the men

So apparently the 90% of men who are not rich and good looking Alpha males have to be lifelong single and celibate because most women are chasing an unattainable for most 10% of men!

You're mistaking what people say they want for what they ultimately do. If you'd asked me when I was single I would have said I wanted a ripped blond husband with tonnes of money. The man I married is (with no insult intended) none of those things. As soon as I met him none of that mattered because I was completely in love. He's told me that I was a foot shorter than his ideal but we celebrated our tenth anniversary this year.

It is not to defend HYUFD's stance, which I disagree with, but two 20ish girls I spoke to recently were furious with 'Emily Pankhurst' for forcing women into the workplace 'How dare she make that decision for everyone else?'.

There's no conflict between feminism and women choosing not to work and look after their kids: the point is that it has to be a choice and not forced. But being beholden to a partner for money can also make them subservient to the partner if the partner is so inclined. Which again is fine if it is a free choice; but also somewhat goes against some feminist thinking.

However, it is interesting to see people say that women should be able to choose not to work, and those who want to ban the hijab, niqab or burqa as they are 'forced' on women.

If a woman can choose to be subservient to a partner in a relationship, why can another woman not choose to wear such headgear?

The issue with the hijab, niquab and burqua....I agree with you if they choose it. However some dont choose that life and have it forced on them. I give an example my son had been dating a girl for a couple of years and they were getting on for two years when they were getting towards two years, she had been round the house lots eaten with us, she was bright. They were getting serious so had to ask her do your parents know, did talk it over with my son first about what might happen. Yes her parents objected 1 month later she had been to pakistan and was married to a cousin she had never met. Now personally I think that might have been forced and now instead of the bright friendly intelligent girl I remember next time I saw her was traipsing along 2m behind her new husband eyes downcast and ignoring all her old friends from school

Indeed. But it's the same with women not working and having to look after loads of babies: some don't choose that life and have it forced upon them.

In fact, that was probably the norm just a few decades ago.

And that's where @HYUFD wants us to return to. And like the burqa etc, it is because of a particular religious interpretation.

It is not just the very religious, as already stated young men across the western world are increasingly voting for far right and populist right parties in part because they back their support for a return to more traditional gender roles

Lets cull young men then it will sort the issue

Young women seem to be doing a good job on their own at not hooking up with such troglodytes.

Indeed it takes two to tango.

There's pretty good survey evidence that most women want more children than the TFR, so clearly there is a lack of suitable men at the right age. In large part that's because it is common for men to be either unable or unwilling to sustain a long term relationship. Commitment-phobes in the dating parlance.

One thing that we should embrace as a culture is the joys of fatherhood, particularly in long term relationships. I have done many interesting things in my life, travel, successful career and other material pleasures, but none compare with the pleasures of family life. I've recently got back from a holiday with both boys and their partners to mark Mrs Foxys 60th. It was a real delight to be all together, and an experience that we will all treasure until the end of our days.