OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
What's a POME?
Guessing you're not a fan of the Ashes? It means Prisoner Of Mother England.
A term ironically originally meant for convicts being deported but it's long since been adopted as the (derogatory/banter) Aussie term for the English.
Typically followed by the term bastard, the English are "POME bastards".
Ok, so I've heard of "pom" before, and I was wondering whether it was the same thing with a different spelling or something different. The CAPITALS made me thing you were using an acronym, which you were. So I was under the impression that pom was something to do with a shortening of "tomato" (pomodoro and similar), but looking it up it seems related to pomegranate (sort of rhymes with immigrant, and they turn red in the sun). But "Prisoner Of Mother England", never heard that before. Cheers.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
It does look as if it is struggling
Neighbours still gets an average 1.2 million viewers a day in the UK.
Not bad for a programme shown only on Channel 5 now at lunchtime and 6pm
It’s still on TV? I thought it died after Kylie Minogue left!
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
I'm not surprised Aussies don't drink Fosters. I'm more surprised that anyone does. When I'm in Thailand and I want a drink that's suitable in the heat, then Singha lager's fine. Don't know what I'd drink in Australia if I ever get back there, although Victoria Bitter's good, or the Gulf, although I doubt I'll ever have more than an hour or so's stopover there.
VB is good, just a shame that it's so rare outside of Walkabout bars in this country. VB is what most Melbournians I knew would drink.
Not sure what those from Sydney drink, but do you know why people from Queensland drink XXXX?
Because they can't spell beer.
NZ beer is decent. Steinlager, or Speights are both better than Aussie beer.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
What's a POME?
Guessing you're not a fan of the Ashes? It means Prisoner Of Mother England.
A term ironically originally meant for convicts being deported but it's long since been adopted as the (derogatory/banter) Aussie term for the English.
Typically followed by the term bastard, the English are "POME bastards".
Well, the way some people on here talk about the weather in England, you'd think that everyone who was still here and hadn't escaped to one of the colonies had to be a prisoner in one way or another.
Even if Johnson is given a fixed penalty he won't resign. I'm not sure his MPs will remove him even then.
He'll dismiss it as no different to a parking ticket. Unfortunate but not part of the bigger picture about how he 'got all the big decisions right', 'had a spectacular vaccine rollout', 'helped unemployment disappear', 'created the fastest growing economy since records began', has a cock bigger than God's etc. etc.
You missed out 'Got Brexit Done'.
Sorted! ooops. How could I miss that?
Though I'm still slightly baffled when people like Leon proudly proclaim it because I've no idea what it means. Must be just me but what exactly is 'got Brexit done'? I was a Remainer and accept we left the EU but, meh, so what? I don't notice anything better. Just heaps more chaos and a country that has become a global laughing stock.
Rhetorical for now ... I'm off out.
And, of course, he only got Brexit done by ceasing to lead the opposition to TMay’s attempts to get Brexit done, once he’d successfully deposed her.
Most shocking news of the morning: HY watches Neighbours!
The late former cricket commentator Brian Johnston was a huge Neighbours fan too
When people are saying a show hasn't been popular or significant for three decades, bringing up someone who died 28 years ago as a comparable fan might not be the defence you think it is.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
I'm not surprised Aussies don't drink Fosters. I'm more surprised that anyone does. When I'm in Thailand and I want a drink that's suitable in the heat, then Singha lager's fine. Don't know what I'd drink in Australia if I ever get back there, although Victoria Bitter's good, or the Gulf, although I doubt I'll ever have more than an hour or so's stopover there.
VB is good, just a shame that it's so rare outside of Walkabout bars in this country. VB is what most Melbournians I knew would drink.
Not sure what those from Sydney drink, but do you know why people from Queensland drink XXXX?
Because they can't spell beer.
The late Sir Terry Pratchett used 'Fourecks' as the name for his pseudo Australia in his Discworld novels.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
I think that the assets are generally quite easy to sort out. Those in Scotland would go to Scotland, those in rUk would go to them. There may be some minor adjustments on things like embassies overseas etc. Liabilities are much more difficult. What share of the national debt will Scotland accept? Unfunded pensions are another one.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
What's a POME?
Guessing you're not a fan of the Ashes? It means Prisoner Of Mother England.
A term ironically originally meant for convicts being deported but it's long since been adopted as the (derogatory/banter) Aussie term for the English.
Typically followed by the term bastard, the English are "POME bastards".
POHM (Prisoner of Her Majesty) is the apocryphal derivation.
Australians of my grandmother's generation used the great euphemism of "government men", used in the snobby context "none of my family were government men".
Now Australians are often proud of a bit of convict heritage, as interesting family colour.
And it's actually quite rare, since most convicts were male, and rarely got the chance to have families, their being at the bottom of the pile for the relatively few women available. Almost all Australians are descended from free settlers.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
As I said Home and Away was always more popular in Australia but in the UK Neighbours has always been more popular than Home and Away
Soap operas in general seem to be in decline. Even staple ones like Eastenders and Coronation St don't seem to register in national conversation in the way they did 3 decades ago.
True, the rise of Netflix, social media and multiple channels has seen to that.
Coronation Street though is still always in the top 10 most watched programmes every week. Eastenders however is facing probably terminal decline
Google reckons there have been 5,180 episodes of Eastenders. At half an hour each that is more than three-and-a-half months of continuous 24 hour a day TV. There's just no way you can binge watch it all as you can with anything else.
It's not just on left/right issues either. I've seen that dedication to clarity in entirely non-partisan issues. I went to a meeting with him on the nasty practice of non-stun slaughter, where the other participants included representatives of halal and shechita producers. He listened politely to all of us, but it was entirely clear that he wanted to find a solution to the controversial issue that non-stun meat (intended by law to be only for religious communities who feel strongly about it) goes unlabelled into general consumption because slaughterhouses can't be bothered with a dual system. I've heard so much waffle about that over the years that the sight of the minister actually wanting to solve the issue was delightful.
(The reason most politicians waffle over it is that if non-stun meat is restricted to religious suppliers, the price to them will go up because of loss of economies of scale. Too bad - if one has a principle, however strange it may seem to others, one shojuld be willing to pay a bit more for it.)
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
It does look as if it is struggling
Neighbours still gets an average 1.2 million viewers a day in the UK.
Not bad for a programme shown only on Channel 5 now at lunchtime and 6pm
It’s still on TV? I thought it died after Kylie Minogue left!
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
What's a POME?
Guessing you're not a fan of the Ashes? It means Prisoner Of Mother England.
A term ironically originally meant for convicts being deported but it's long since been adopted as the (derogatory/banter) Aussie term for the English.
Typically followed by the term bastard, the English are "POME bastards".
POHM (Prisoner of Her Majesty) is the apocryphal derivation.
Australians of my grandmother's generation used the great euphemism of "government men", used in the snobby context "none of my family were government men".
Now Australians are often proud of a bit of convict heritage, as interesting family colour.
I did like the latest bit of sledging against the Aussies after the last 2 years of lockdown.
The problem with the Australians is not that they are descended from the Convicts but that they are descended from the Guards.
It's not just on left/right issues either. I've seen that dedication to clarity in entirely non-partisan issues. I went to a meeting with him on the nasty practice of non-stun slaughter, where the other participants included representatives of halal and shechita producers. He listened politely to all of us, but it was entirely clear that he wanted to find a solution to the controversial issue that non-stun meat (intended by law to be only for religious communities who feel strongly about it) goes unlabelled into general consumption because slaughterhouses can't be bothered with a dual system. I've heard so much waffle about that over the years that the sight of the minister actually wanting to solve the issue was delightful.
(The reason most politicians waffle over it is that if non-stun meat is restricted to religious suppliers, the price to them will go up because of loss of economies of scale. Too bad - if one has a principle, however strange it may seem to others, one shojuld be willing to pay a bit more for it.)
Michael Gove also understands the huge benefits - economic and political - of tidal lagoon power stations. One of the few in Government prepared to be an advocate for them, if they do come about he can take much of the credit.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
But is it more nuanced than that? What is left after Scotland leaves? If it is England, Wales and Northern Ireland, then they will not want to pay Scotland's bills. But if what remains is the United Kingdom (minus the bit on top) then it might be more amenable because the UK will want to retain its position in the United Nations, NATO and various other bodies, and if that means paying ten grand a year to pensioners who have paid the right number of stamps, then that might be a price worth paying.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
I think that the assets are generally quite easy to sort out. Those in Scotland would go to Scotland, those in rUk would go to them. There may be some minor adjustments on things like embassies overseas etc. Liabilities are much more difficult. What share of the national debt will Scotland accept? Unfunded pensions are another one.
It would be interesting to see the breakdown of immovable assets as a share of geographical area, and of population. It seems likely to me that fixed assets in Scotland are probably less valuable per capita than in the rest of the UK, but that's only a gut feeling. Politically, much of this detail would be of little interest to the average person, but I can imagine such figures would be red meat to the nationalist side, and fuel the story that England has enriched itself at a much faster pace than it's allowed Scotland to accumulate wealth. Of course, such a narrative also risks people in poorer parts of England making a legitimate point: "well we don't see the money either". This is a dangerous conversation to start for those who aren't interested in fixing such problems.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
It would be very messy indeed, 100 times worse than the UK leaving the EU was.
There are tens of thousands of people in Scotland who work for the UK government, for a start.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
As I said Home and Away was always more popular in Australia but in the UK Neighbours has always been more popular than Home and Away
Soap operas in general seem to be in decline. Even staple ones like Eastenders and Coronation St don't seem to register in national conversation in the way they did 3 decades ago.
True, the rise of Netflix, social media and multiple channels has seen to that.
Coronation Street though is still always in the top 10 most watched programmes every week. Eastenders however is facing probably terminal decline
Google reckons there have been 5,180 episodes of Eastenders. At half an hour each that is more than three-and-a-half months of continuous 24 hour a day TV. There's just no way you can binge watch it all as you can with anything else.
My wife watches it. She has the show on series link then binges it at the weekend. Sometimes leaves it a few weeks and binges a couple of weeks worth at once.
But I doubt she'd especially miss it if it were gone.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
What's a POME?
Guessing you're not a fan of the Ashes? It means Prisoner Of Mother England.
A term ironically originally meant for convicts being deported but it's long since been adopted as the (derogatory/banter) Aussie term for the English.
Typically followed by the term bastard, the English are "POME bastards".
Ok, so I've heard of "pom" before, and I was wondering whether it was the same thing with a different spelling or something different. The CAPITALS made me thing you were using an acronym, which you were. So I was under the impression that pom was something to do with a shortening of "tomato" (pomodoro and similar), but looking it up it seems related to pomegranate (sort of rhymes with immigrant, and they turn red in the sun). But "Prisoner Of Mother England", never heard that before. Cheers.
Some years ago, touring N. New Zealand ..... would I call it that now....... my wife and I were the only non-Aussies on a sightseeing trip. One of the men approached me at the second stop...... "thought you two were Poms!" "We are" "Can't be..... you're wearing sandals but no socks!"
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
It would be very messy indeed, 100 times worse than the UK leaving the EU was.
There are tens of thousands of people in Scotland who work for the UK government, for a start.
10,000s of jobs available for rUK workers to apply for - a lovely upside for levelling up the midlands and the North.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
But is it more nuanced than that? What is left after Scotland leaves? If it is England, Wales and Northern Ireland, then they will not want to pay Scotland's bills. But if what remains is the United Kingdom (minus the bit on top) then it might be more amenable because the UK will want to retain its position in the United Nations, NATO and various other bodies, and if that means paying ten grand a year to pensioners who have paid the right number of stamps, then that might be a price worth paying.
England or the UK would keep the UN seat either way following the precedence of Russia keeping the USSR's seat.
However Russia doesn't pay the independent former Soviet Republics pension liabilities and nor should it.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
What's a POME?
Guessing you're not a fan of the Ashes? It means Prisoner Of Mother England.
A term ironically originally meant for convicts being deported but it's long since been adopted as the (derogatory/banter) Aussie term for the English.
Typically followed by the term bastard, the English are "POME bastards".
POHM (Prisoner of Her Majesty) is the apocryphal derivation.
Australians of my grandmother's generation used the great euphemism of "government men", used in the snobby context "none of my family were government men".
Now Australians are often proud of a bit of convict heritage, as interesting family colour.
I did like the latest bit of sledging against the Aussies after the last 2 years of lockdown.
The problem with the Australians is not that they are descended from the Convicts but that they are descended from the Guards.
"We came here with backpacks, You with balls and chains"
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
As I said Home and Away was always more popular in Australia but in the UK Neighbours has always been more popular than Home and Away
Soap operas in general seem to be in decline. Even staple ones like Eastenders and Coronation St don't seem to register in national conversation in the way they did 3 decades ago.
Well, the Boris-Dom-Carrie-Rishi No 10 soap opera seems to be on our TV on a daily basis.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
I'm not surprised Aussies don't drink Fosters. I'm more surprised that anyone does. When I'm in Thailand and I want a drink that's suitable in the heat, then Singha lager's fine. Don't know what I'd drink in Australia if I ever get back there, although Victoria Bitter's good, or the Gulf, although I doubt I'll ever have more than an hour or so's stopover there.
VB is good, just a shame that it's so rare outside of Walkabout bars in this country. VB is what most Melbournians I knew would drink.
Not sure what those from Sydney drink, but do you know why people from Queensland drink XXXX?
Because they can't spell beer.
When I lived in Oz I was surprised by their standard draught beer (glass) sizes in bars. No pints available. That was too much for an Aussie. The choice was a 'schooner' (2/3 of a pint) or a 'midi' (less than 1/2). Also low alcohol beers were far more normal and accepted there than here. One of my Aussie mates used to drink midis of low strength beer when we went out, would you believe. You'd need 20 of them just to get a light buzz on and he'd only have 4. Point I'm making is, the big rep of the hard-boozing Aussie bloke was not, in my experience, merited. Not in Sydney anyway.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
I think that the assets are generally quite easy to sort out. Those in Scotland would go to Scotland, those in rUk would go to them. There may be some minor adjustments on things like embassies overseas etc. Liabilities are much more difficult. What share of the national debt will Scotland accept? Unfunded pensions are another one.
It would be interesting to see the breakdown of immovable assets as a share of geographical area, and of population. It seems likely to me that fixed assets in Scotland are probably less valuable per capita than in the rest of the UK, but that's only a gut feeling. Politically, much of this detail would be of little interest to the average person, but I can imagine such figures would be red meat to the nationalist side, and fuel the story that England has enriched itself at a much faster pace than it's allowed Scotland to accumulate wealth. Of course, such a narrative also risks people in poorer parts of England making a legitimate point: "well we don't see the money either". This is a dangerous conversation to start for those who aren't interested in fixing such problems.
I can see nationalists seeking to make the point that the absurd bias in capital spending on London in particular should be reflected in the proportion of the national debt Scotland should take on but the counterargument is that Scotland has for some time now been getting significantly more than its share of current spending.
Most shocking news of the morning: HY watches Neighbours!
The late former cricket commentator Brian Johnston was a huge Neighbours fan too
When people are saying a show hasn't been popular or significant for three decades, bringing up someone who died 28 years ago as a comparable fan might not be the defence you think it is.
Over 1 million viewers every weekday on a minor channel, Channel 5 and even when not shown at primetime is still pretty popular to me
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
I think that the assets are generally quite easy to sort out. Those in Scotland would go to Scotland, those in rUk would go to them. There may be some minor adjustments on things like embassies overseas etc. Liabilities are much more difficult. What share of the national debt will Scotland accept? Unfunded pensions are another one.
It would be interesting to see the breakdown of immovable assets as a share of geographical area, and of population. It seems likely to me that fixed assets in Scotland are probably less valuable per capita than in the rest of the UK, but that's only a gut feeling. Politically, much of this detail would be of little interest to the average person, but I can imagine such figures would be red meat to the nationalist side, and fuel the story that England has enriched itself at a much faster pace than it's allowed Scotland to accumulate wealth. Of course, such a narrative also risks people in poorer parts of England making a legitimate point: "well we don't see the money either". This is a dangerous conversation to start for those who aren't interested in fixing such problems.
I can see nationalists seeking to make the point that the absurd bias in capital spending on London in particular should be reflected in the proportion of the national debt Scotland should take on but the counterargument is that Scotland has for some time now been getting significantly more than its share of current spending.
Yup, it will inevitably descend into different groups of people emphasising different aspects depending on what the perceive as their interests in any such negotiation. As I say, messy.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
I think that the assets are generally quite easy to sort out. Those in Scotland would go to Scotland, those in rUk would go to them. There may be some minor adjustments on things like embassies overseas etc. Liabilities are much more difficult. What share of the national debt will Scotland accept? Unfunded pensions are another one.
It would be interesting to see the breakdown of immovable assets as a share of geographical area, and of population. It seems likely to me that fixed assets in Scotland are probably less valuable per capita than in the rest of the UK, but that's only a gut feeling. Politically, much of this detail would be of little interest to the average person, but I can imagine such figures would be red meat to the nationalist side, and fuel the story that England has enriched itself at a much faster pace than it's allowed Scotland to accumulate wealth. Of course, such a narrative also risks people in poorer parts of England making a legitimate point: "well we don't see the money either". This is a dangerous conversation to start for those who aren't interested in fixing such problems.
I can see nationalists seeking to make the point that the absurd bias in capital spending on London in particular should be reflected in the proportion of the national debt Scotland should take on but the counterargument is that Scotland has for some time now been getting significantly more than its share of current spending.
You think the nationalists will admit that there is a national debt to split?
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
I'm not surprised Aussies don't drink Fosters. I'm more surprised that anyone does. When I'm in Thailand and I want a drink that's suitable in the heat, then Singha lager's fine. Don't know what I'd drink in Australia if I ever get back there, although Victoria Bitter's good, or the Gulf, although I doubt I'll ever have more than an hour or so's stopover there.
VB is good, just a shame that it's so rare outside of Walkabout bars in this country. VB is what most Melbournians I knew would drink.
Not sure what those from Sydney drink, but do you know why people from Queensland drink XXXX?
Because they can't spell beer.
When I lived in Oz I was surprised by their standard draught beer (glass) sizes in bars. No pints available. That was too much for an Aussie. The choice was a 'schooner' (2/3 of a pint) or a 'midi' (less than 1/2). Also low alcohol beers were far more normal and accepted there than here. One of my Aussie mates used to drink midis of low strength beer when we went out, would you believe. You'd need 20 of them just to get a light buzz on and he'd only have 4. Point I'm making is, the big rep of the hard-boozing Aussie bloke was not, in my experience, merited. Not in Sydney anyway.
Big cities seldom are that representative of the rest of the country.
Boris Johnson’s dwindling inner circle greeted his double appointment last night of Steve Barclay as the new chief of staff and Guto Harri as director of communications at No 10 as proof that the prime minister was a man of his word – and one who acted fast.
Conor Burns, one of Johnson’s cheerleaders, tweeted: “He is delivering. @SteveBarclay is a talented and serious Minister and @Guto_Harri is a professional operator. Both great appointments.”
But elsewhere the appointments – made necessary by the resignation of five Johnson aides last week – caused almost universal bafflement.
Yet another Tory appointment of a Bolshevik Broadcasting Corporation hack. It is almost as if they know their claims of lefty bias are mere propaganda.
The other way to read it is that Johnson isn't much of a Tory, whilst Carrie is soft left, exactly like most of the BBC.
Guto Harri was the one that got bulleted from Gammon Bastard News for kneeling.
I know the initials stand for "Gammon Bastard News" but its preferred given name is "GBeebies"
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
I think that the assets are generally quite easy to sort out. Those in Scotland would go to Scotland, those in rUk would go to them. There may be some minor adjustments on things like embassies overseas etc. Liabilities are much more difficult. What share of the national debt will Scotland accept? Unfunded pensions are another one.
It would be interesting to see the breakdown of immovable assets as a share of geographical area, and of population. It seems likely to me that fixed assets in Scotland are probably less valuable per capita than in the rest of the UK, but that's only a gut feeling. Politically, much of this detail would be of little interest to the average person, but I can imagine such figures would be red meat to the nationalist side, and fuel the story that England has enriched itself at a much faster pace than it's allowed Scotland to accumulate wealth. Of course, such a narrative also risks people in poorer parts of England making a legitimate point: "well we don't see the money either". This is a dangerous conversation to start for those who aren't interested in fixing such problems.
I can see nationalists seeking to make the point that the absurd bias in capital spending on London in particular should be reflected in the proportion of the national debt Scotland should take on but the counterargument is that Scotland has for some time now been getting significantly more than its share of current spending.
You think the nationalists will admit that there is a national debt to split?
Their positioning on this has also been somewhat flexible over time. The BoE (and the government by implication) made it clear that rUK would guarantee and pay all UK debt regardless. The attitude of some Nats was, well, we don't have to pay it then.
These debates are divisive which is presumably why the Cameron government didn't really want to have them in 2014 but I do think the chances of Scots having any clear idea of what they are actually voting for or against is minimal. It will be Brexit redux in that respect, as in so many others.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
I think that the assets are generally quite easy to sort out. Those in Scotland would go to Scotland, those in rUk would go to them. There may be some minor adjustments on things like embassies overseas etc. Liabilities are much more difficult. What share of the national debt will Scotland accept? Unfunded pensions are another one.
It would be interesting to see the breakdown of immovable assets as a share of geographical area, and of population. It seems likely to me that fixed assets in Scotland are probably less valuable per capita than in the rest of the UK, but that's only a gut feeling. Politically, much of this detail would be of little interest to the average person, but I can imagine such figures would be red meat to the nationalist side, and fuel the story that England has enriched itself at a much faster pace than it's allowed Scotland to accumulate wealth. Of course, such a narrative also risks people in poorer parts of England making a legitimate point: "well we don't see the money either". This is a dangerous conversation to start for those who aren't interested in fixing such problems.
I can see nationalists seeking to make the point that the absurd bias in capital spending on London in particular should be reflected in the proportion of the national debt Scotland should take on but the counterargument is that Scotland has for some time now been getting significantly more than its share of current spending.
You think the nationalists will admit that there is a national debt to split?
Actually, it's a point that I've seen nationalists raise a few times. The point is sometimes made about the fact that the budget is underpinned by large amounts of borrowing, and the way that borrowing is "allocated" to Scotland is perhaps not always in the interests of making Scotland appear to be as well off as it is. I have no clue at all about whether there's merit in that form of argument, but the deficit is certainly a talking point that both sides engage in to some extent.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
AIUI, and IANAL, the situation varies. If one goes to a country with which Britain has an 'agreement', then one gets one's British pension, updated from time to time. If there's no agreement, then the pension stays the same. In other words someone to emigrated to wherever in 1990, if wherever had no agreement with Britain, then one would be stuck for ever on a 1990 pension.
The Gov UK site says Your State Pension will only increase each year if you live in: the European Economic Area (EEA) Gibraltar Switzerland countries that have a social security agreement with the UK (but you cannot get increases in Canada or New Zealand) You will not get yearly increases if you live outside these countries.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
I think the simplest answer is that an independent Scotland is also a successor state to the UK state. The question is then which part of the former state is responsible for that particular liability.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
Because the British state stops existing in it's present state if / when Scotland goes independent.
So a single Government is split in 2 and 1 of those governments is trying to pass a very large bill on to the other Government.
Which may work for 30 seconds until the British Government witnessed the reaction to British Tax payers giving Scotland money.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
A recall petition followed by a by-election loss is a hypothetical sixth
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
But is it more nuanced than that? What is left after Scotland leaves? If it is England, Wales and Northern Ireland, then they will not want to pay Scotland's bills. But if what remains is the United Kingdom (minus the bit on top) then it might be more amenable because the UK will want to retain its position in the United Nations, NATO and various other bodies, and if that means paying ten grand a year to pensioners who have paid the right number of stamps, then that might be a price worth paying.
I think the rump UK can claim successor state status (and retain the UN Security Council Seat) without retaining liability for the State Pension. In terms of the liabilities that it would need to guarantee in full to claim successor state status, and would have to negotiate with Scotland as to whether and how Scotland took on a share, that would be for things like the National Debt*, and liabilities for civil service pensions**.
The State Pension is a different sort of liability. It's not a legal one. It's an implied political one, based on a contract with the voters. And so, as the voters in Scotland would cease to be voters for the politicians in the rump UK, so the liability to pay their pensions disappears.
* If the UK wanted to be able to sell any more government bonds leading up to an Independence referendum, and in the months after a Yes vote, then the Westminster government would have to guarantee 100% of those bonds, otherwise investors wouldn't know if they were buying a certain percentage of debt issued to a new country with uncertain credit worthiness. You would expect that any rump UK government would be keen to split the national debt, but ultimately this would be a liability a new Scotland could ultimately walk away from if they were willing to become independent with no agreement on a division of assets and liabilities.
** This seems like one of the more complicated ones to sort out, particularly given that many of the civil service jobs based in Scotland do work for the whole UK, and vice versa - e.g. such as the HMRC office at Cumbernauld - and so unpicking which civil servants was a rump UK civil servant and which was a Scottish civil servant would be far more complicated than for the state pension, where there's a nice simple geographical demarcation.
Suppose you have a civil servant who worked for the ONS (in London and Newport) but has retired to Scotland?
As with the state pension, these are paid for out of current contributions, and general government expenditure, but the liability to pay the pension is a legal liability, so it's harder to walk away from. Payments for public sector pensions were £43.3bn in 2018-9 (latest figures that Google links to on the OBR website), so that is still worth ~£3.5bn for a future Scotland and haggling over who pays what.
My guess is that negotiations over who pays for the state pension would take less than 30 seconds, but dividing up the liabilities for public sector pensions would take a lot longer and involve a lot of arguing over the details. I believe that the UK accepted its liability to pay for many EU pensions, so I wouldn't expect Scotland to escape paying for at least some of this, but working it all out would take some doing.
Has Rishi ever told the House of Commons he never attended a party in Downing Street during the lockdown period? Because that is why Boris will have to resign.
Don't think Rishi's every spoken in the House about it. He's mentioned it in interviews, IIRC, saying something anodyne.
Incidentally, we sometimes see pictures of him with a glass of beer in his hand, when we know he's teetotal; I realise it's 'publicity', but surely that's dishonest. Personally, while I do, I have no problem with people who choose not to drink alcoholic drinks. It's a respectable lifestyle choice which is different to mine, that's all.
I understand alcohol-free beer is a thing.
Admittedly, never met anyone who drinks it.....
An acquaintance of mine, a chap who practically lived in the pub, to the extent that he had a reserved seat, once spent a month on alcohol free lager to raise money for a cancer charity, after the death, from cancer of his daughter. All the regulars, and even the not so regulars, like me, said he'd never do it, but he did. Raised £10k IIRC.
And Abbott do something called Ghost Ship which is 0.5% and I find quite acceptable.
If I am driving I drink heineken 0.5% and it is acceptable if chilled. Would not drink normally but not horrible like most.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
Surely 2 should be below 3? It's very unlikely to happen.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
But is it more nuanced than that? What is left after Scotland leaves? If it is England, Wales and Northern Ireland, then they will not want to pay Scotland's bills. But if what remains is the United Kingdom (minus the bit on top) then it might be more amenable because the UK will want to retain its position in the United Nations, NATO and various other bodies, and if that means paying ten grand a year to pensioners who have paid the right number of stamps, then that might be a price worth paying.
Russia lost a lot more in land area and population when the USSR dissolved and kept its seat at the UN. rUK would do the same, with no need for their tax payers to fund the state pensions of a foreign country.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
That is always a good working assumption but it seems to be the latest excuse in this never ending saga.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
6. A suspension from Parliament that is long enough to trigger a recall petition. a) The recall petition is successful resulting in a byelection b) that Boris loses.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
A recall petition followed by a by-election loss is a hypothetical sixth
And he could actually choose to step down as a 7th - not impossible if the cabinet all told him to go either.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
A recall petition followed by a by-election loss is a hypothetical sixth
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
I think the simplest answer is that an independent Scotland is also a successor state to the UK state. The question is then which part of the former state is responsible for that particular liability.
Keep wearing masks. Keep social distance. Keep boosting.
I’ve seen this elsewhere. One reason for supposing we are better placed is that it’s not total % vaccinated that determines how well covered you are against Covid deaths, it’s how well targeted. In the U.K. we have done well on the vulnerable, even if the overall percentage is not the highest. It’s also important to realise that many of these deaths are still in unvaccinated people. We’ve tangled over Covid before. I do not for one moment wish to declare that it’s all over, but currently in the U.K. the situation is hugely encouraging. Covid isn’t going away. We will be dealing with it for a long time. I’m fairly sure we will be seein autumn boosters targeting omicron this year. But I’m also sceptical of posts that highlight stories like this without exploring the full details.
The first set of 'revelations' from the Ashcroft Carrie book appear to be, allegedly:
- she was having an affair with another unnamed married Tory MP (unnamed, although the article isn't without potential clues) before she settled on Johnson;
We all know who it is...
Oh no we don't......
Indeed. I suspect most of us don’t know who it is and probably don’t care a great deal either.
Just another lowlife Tory, you can take your pick hundreds to choose from.
OT Neighbours faces axe after being dropped by Channel 5. This is the real news.
The Australian soap Neighbours, which launched the international careers of countless local stars including Kylie Minogue, Jason Donovan, Margot Robbie and Guy Pearce, has been axed in the UK in a move likely to sound the death knell for the iconic show.
I do like the fact that the BBC uses the same article (and words) and has a picture of Scott and Charlene! From about 1988 if I suspect rightly. It might explain the lack of popularity if you have to use a still from the show from nearly thirty five years ago.
Obviously HYFUD watches it, but does anyone else? I haven't even heard it mentioned by anyone as they watch it for well over a decade.
We visited Melbourne in 2011 and while there went on a neighbour's tour which was interesting
Since returning I have watched neighbour's largely because of this visit, but also my great affection for Melbourne and Victoria
It is rubbish but there we are, and I doubt I will be overcome with regrets once it is gone
I lived in Melbourne for most of the 90s and the attitude then was that Neighbours was "s**t only made for the POMEs".
They had the same attitude about Fosters too. I don't know any Aussies who drink that pisswater and I won't touch it either.
I'm amused anyone still watches it decades later and if its cancelled in the UK it's completely unsurprising that it would be cancelled down under too.
What's a POME?
Guessing you're not a fan of the Ashes? It means Prisoner Of Mother England.
A term ironically originally meant for convicts being deported but it's long since been adopted as the (derogatory/banter) Aussie term for the English.
Typically followed by the term bastard, the English are "POME bastards".
POHM (Prisoner of Her Majesty) is the apocryphal derivation.
Australians of my grandmother's generation used the great euphemism of "government men", used in the snobby context "none of my family were government men".
Now Australians are often proud of a bit of convict heritage, as interesting family colour.
And it's actually quite rare, since most convicts were male, and rarely got the chance to have families, their being at the bottom of the pile for the relatively few women available. Almost all Australians are descended from free settlers.
The exception is Tasmania. About half the transportees went there, and there was much less post war migration. About half of Tassies have convict heritage.
Incidentally very good for genetic studies of disease with massive family trees due to good records and fairly modest inward and outward migration.
Tassies are the butt of jokes as a result, like Newfis in Canada, with a reputation for being inbred.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
A recall petition followed by a by-election loss is a hypothetical sixth
Does he have to be in the commons to remain PM?
Very hard to do the job of the PM if you aren't in the Commons nowadays.
PMQs didn't exist the last time a Lord was the PM.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
Surely 2 should be below 3? It's very unlikely to happen.
Yes. I do admit the probabilities did confuse me, as did the timescale. Are we (for example) looking in the short term (next year or so) or medium term (5 years or so) or long term (25 years or so)?
In the long term, number 5 is pretty much guaranteed to be the final backstop position. I must admit, I'd hate for it to be the only way to get him out of number ten.
Has Rishi ever told the House of Commons he never attended a party in Downing Street during the lockdown period? Because that is why Boris will have to resign.
Don't think Rishi's every spoken in the House about it. He's mentioned it in interviews, IIRC, saying something anodyne.
Incidentally, we sometimes see pictures of him with a glass of beer in his hand, when we know he's teetotal; I realise it's 'publicity', but surely that's dishonest. Personally, while I do, I have no problem with people who choose not to drink alcoholic drinks. It's a respectable lifestyle choice which is different to mine, that's all.
I understand alcohol-free beer is a thing.
Admittedly, never met anyone who drinks it.....
An acquaintance of mine, a chap who practically lived in the pub, to the extent that he had a reserved seat, once spent a month on alcohol free lager to raise money for a cancer charity, after the death, from cancer of his daughter. All the regulars, and even the not so regulars, like me, said he'd never do it, but he did. Raised £10k IIRC.
And Abbott do something called Ghost Ship which is 0.5% and I find quite acceptable.
If I am driving I drink heineken 0.5% and it is acceptable if chilled. Would not drink normally but not horrible like most.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
I don't think there is a legal liability - except to stick to their rules as written. For example, I don't whether this is still the case, but for a long time the UK state pensions paid to people who had moved abroad on retirement were not uprated for inflation. So you would have stories of people who had retired to Australia and seen their UK state pension whittled away by inflation to a pittance.
There are some countries where the UK has a reciprocal pensions agreement, so you can exchange your entitlement to a UK state pension to an Irish state pension if you move to Ireland (but I don't know the details of how this is worked out).
Having a country split into two parts is a bit different to the situation where you move from one country to a foreign country. I'd expect that a future pensioner in an independent Scotland who had lived and worked in England until retiring to Scotland (after independence) would be treated differently to a future pensioner in an independent Scotland who had lived and worked in Scotland until retiring in Scotland (after independence).
Since current pensions are paid by current contributions, then it is logical that current pension payments made to pensioners in Scotland will continue to be paid by current contributions paid by taxpayers in Scotland. Effectively you would have a distinction drawn between whether past NI contributions were accrued with a residency in Scotland or a residency in rump UK.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
6. A suspension from Parliament that is long enough to trigger a recall petition. a) The recall petition is successful resulting in a byelection b) that Boris loses.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
All things being equal, someone of Boris's age has about 1% chance of dying within the next year. I reckon that's significantly higher chance of someone of his age being jailed for a year. Of course, I don't know of any specific health conditions or alleged criminal behaviour that could change these probabilities dramatically, but my instinct is still to put death ahead of jail in the order of likelihood.
Has Rishi ever told the House of Commons he never attended a party in Downing Street during the lockdown period? Because that is why Boris will have to resign.
Don't think Rishi's every spoken in the House about it. He's mentioned it in interviews, IIRC, saying something anodyne.
Incidentally, we sometimes see pictures of him with a glass of beer in his hand, when we know he's teetotal; I realise it's 'publicity', but surely that's dishonest. Personally, while I do, I have no problem with people who choose not to drink alcoholic drinks. It's a respectable lifestyle choice which is different to mine, that's all.
I understand alcohol-free beer is a thing.
Admittedly, never met anyone who drinks it.....
An acquaintance of mine, a chap who practically lived in the pub, to the extent that he had a reserved seat, once spent a month on alcohol free lager to raise money for a cancer charity, after the death, from cancer of his daughter. All the regulars, and even the not so regulars, like me, said he'd never do it, but he did. Raised £10k IIRC.
And Abbott do something called Ghost Ship which is 0.5% and I find quite acceptable.
If I am driving I drink heineken 0.5% and it is acceptable if chilled. Would not drink normally but not horrible like most.
(Oh, and take care. There's a 4.5% Ghost Ship and a 0.5% Ghost Ship.)
Has Rishi ever told the House of Commons he never attended a party in Downing Street during the lockdown period? Because that is why Boris will have to resign.
Don't think Rishi's every spoken in the House about it. He's mentioned it in interviews, IIRC, saying something anodyne.
Incidentally, we sometimes see pictures of him with a glass of beer in his hand, when we know he's teetotal; I realise it's 'publicity', but surely that's dishonest. Personally, while I do, I have no problem with people who choose not to drink alcoholic drinks. It's a respectable lifestyle choice which is different to mine, that's all.
I understand alcohol-free beer is a thing.
Admittedly, never met anyone who drinks it.....
I drink low and alcohol free beer. It’s fine. A nice option to have on a night out if you’re driving or just don’t want booze.
Low alcohol and alcohol free beer has come a long way from the 1990’s when I worked in pubs and only had Kaliber as an option. As others have said there are a few decent ones now, nicely filling the gap between booze and soft drinks. You do have to find what you like. Some taste like watered down beer. Some are plain weird. Ghost ship and nanny state are decent.
Punk AF is good too, and of the lagers Heiniken. Thornbridge do an AF Stout that is quite drinkable too.
Most contain some residual alcohol, so not truly alcohol free, and it is one of the fastest growing sectors of the market, Alcohol free wine is undrinkable though.
These are fine if you are going through a period of not drinking. You can actually adapt to them and give up alcohol completely, as I did for a year. The beers at 0.5% have a more authentic bitterness in my experience than the 0.0% beers, which just taste sweet.
I had an idea yesterday: Mix Punk AF with Punk IPA (or similar). You get a drinkable IPA at about 2.5% alcohol.
There used to be a beer round here called SPA, made I think by Gibbs. It may have been Salisbury Poor Ale but that’s a guess. It packed a hefty 3.0% abv, and my dad used to drink it as a safer option when driving (three pints equivalent to two at 4.5%). There probably is a market for similar beers. Not 0.5% etc, but in the 2 to 3 %.
Tougher in Scotland where limit is lower, dangerous even with one pint nowadays.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
A recall petition followed by a by-election loss is a hypothetical sixth
And he could actually choose to step down as a 7th - not impossible if the cabinet all told him to go either.
Yes, good point - it says a lot about Johnson that the historically 'usual' route of a resignation didn't occur to so many of us.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
A recall petition followed by a by-election loss is a hypothetical sixth
Does he have to be in the commons to remain PM?
Very hard to do the job of the PM if you aren't in the Commons nowadays.
PMQs didn't exist the last time a Lord was the PM.
I think this is false. Home, 1963. PMQs "started" in 1961.
Has Rishi ever told the House of Commons he never attended a party in Downing Street during the lockdown period? Because that is why Boris will have to resign.
Don't think Rishi's every spoken in the House about it. He's mentioned it in interviews, IIRC, saying something anodyne.
Incidentally, we sometimes see pictures of him with a glass of beer in his hand, when we know he's teetotal; I realise it's 'publicity', but surely that's dishonest. Personally, while I do, I have no problem with people who choose not to drink alcoholic drinks. It's a respectable lifestyle choice which is different to mine, that's all.
I understand alcohol-free beer is a thing.
Admittedly, never met anyone who drinks it.....
I drink low and alcohol free beer. It’s fine. A nice option to have on a night out if you’re driving or just don’t want booze.
Low alcohol and alcohol free beer has come a long way from the 1990’s when I worked in pubs and only had Kaliber as an option. As others have said there are a few decent ones now, nicely filling the gap between booze and soft drinks. You do have to find what you like. Some taste like watered down beer. Some are plain weird. Ghost ship and nanny state are decent.
Punk AF is good too, and of the lagers Heiniken. Thornbridge do an AF Stout that is quite drinkable too.
Most contain some residual alcohol, so not truly alcohol free, and it is one of the fastest growing sectors of the market, Alcohol free wine is undrinkable though.
These are fine if you are going through a period of not drinking. You can actually adapt to them and give up alcohol completely, as I did for a year. The beers at 0.5% have a more authentic bitterness in my experience than the 0.0% beers, which just taste sweet.
I had an idea yesterday: Mix Punk AF with Punk IPA (or similar). You get a drinkable IPA at about 2.5% alcohol.
There used to be a beer round here called SPA, made I think by Gibbs. It may have been Salisbury Poor Ale but that’s a guess. It packed a hefty 3.0% abv, and my dad used to drink it as a safer option when driving (three pints equivalent to two at 4.5%). There probably is a market for similar beers. Not 0.5% etc, but in the 2 to 3 %.
Tougher in Scotland where limit is lower, dangerous even with one pint nowadays.
Yes, and I understand the reason being to leave no ambiguity about whether a pint or two is ok. Im generally happy with the England position as I like to have a beer after cricket, but if I have more than one it moves to shandy.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
Moronic Little Englanders for Dummies guidance. Unionists on here sh***ing their pants at the thought that they are not a "real" world power but rather a sad has been desperate not to be left on their own. Only one colony away from banana republic status.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
A recall petition followed by a by-election loss is a hypothetical sixth
And he could actually choose to step down as a 7th - not impossible if the cabinet all told him to go either.
I agree there should be the sixth, but seven ISN'T happening. He'd just replace the lot of them.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
Because you don't cease to be a British citizen. Though it may be time to revisit those rules as well any pensioner who has the means to live overseas probably doesn't need the state pension benefit.
Mr. Roberts, I especially like the Grand Canyon scale of cognitive dissonance from the SNP to believe these two things: 1) the English take too much from Scotland, we contribute far too much, they give us far too little 2) if we leave the UK the English (and Welsh/Northern Irish) will voluntarily become the most generous neighbours in the world by funding the pensions of another country
Amazing the Little Englanders panic on here at the thought that their last colony is going to dump them, same sad group every time, pretty pathetic. Get a life.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
But is it more nuanced than that? What is left after Scotland leaves? If it is England, Wales and Northern Ireland, then they will not want to pay Scotland's bills. But if what remains is the United Kingdom (minus the bit on top) then it might be more amenable because the UK will want to retain its position in the United Nations, NATO and various other bodies, and if that means paying ten grand a year to pensioners who have paid the right number of stamps, then that might be a price worth paying.
Russia lost a lot more in land area and population when the USSR dissolved and kept its seat at the UN. rUK would do the same, with no need for their tax payers to fund the state pensions of a foreign country.
Russia did not lose anything. The USSR ceased to exist. Though Russia did iirc continue to subsidise at least some of the ex-Soviet states.
But all this misses the point, which is that if England (+NI+W) wishes to remain the United Kingdom rather than becoming England (+NI+W) then it might be politic to split on friendly terms which might easily include pension liabilities. If that is politically unpopular, then it is not markedly different from handing over a big sack of cash to Edinburgh to cover existing liabilities.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
Because you don't cease to be a British citizen. Though it may be time to revisit those rules as well any pensioner who has the means to live overseas probably doesn't need the state pension benefit.
The question shifts then to who living in Scotland would become a Scottish citizen upon independence. Doubtless anyone from the UK living in Scotland would be offered a passport, but I'll bet a significant number would choose to retain a UK passport. In those cases, who pays?
Keep wearing masks. Keep social distance. Keep boosting.
I’ve seen this elsewhere. One reason for supposing we are better placed is that it’s not total % vaccinated that determines how well covered you are against Covid deaths, it’s how well targeted. In the U.K. we have done well on the vulnerable, even if the overall percentage is not the highest. It’s also important to realise that many of these deaths are still in unvaccinated people. We’ve tangled over Covid before. I do not for one moment wish to declare that it’s all over, but currently in the U.K. the situation is hugely encouraging. Covid isn’t going away. We will be dealing with it for a long time. I’m fairly sure we will be seein autumn boosters targeting omicron this year. But I’m also sceptical of posts that highlight stories like this without exploring the full details.
The conclusion of the article is basically that vulnerable people should have a fourth jab if their last one was back in August or so. Seems reaonable.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
I think the argument being made is that at the point of independence the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland - which is the official state issuing your pension - would cease to exist. It is not just like you moving to another country or taking a new citizenship. The responsibility for issuing the pension would be split between the two new countries.
Of course this is a rather dangerous argument for the Unionists to propound because they have also previously said that England and Wales would be the successor state to the United Kingdom (rump UK if you like) and would therefore retain all the rights and obligations thereof - seat at the UN, membership of NATO, all the other positions on international bodies. It seems to me that you can't have it both ways. Either they are the successor state (with Scotland splitting off) in which case they would have all the responsibilities as well as the rights of the UK, or the split resulted in two new states in which case both would seem to have equal claim to those rights as well as the responsibilities.
I don't know what the answer to that one is but both sides seem to be wanting to grab the rights (or at least deny them to the other) whilst avoiding the responsibilities.
Mr. Roberts, I especially like the Grand Canyon scale of cognitive dissonance from the SNP to believe these two things: 1) the English take too much from Scotland, we contribute far too much, they give us far too little 2) if we leave the UK the English (and Welsh/Northern Irish) will voluntarily become the most generous neighbours in the world by funding the pensions of another country
Amazing the Little Englanders panic on here at the thought that their last colony is going to dump them, same sad group every time, pretty pathetic. Get a life.
I suspect a lot of people will be happy to let Scotland leave, but we won't be paying your bills for you after you've left.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
Because you don't cease to be a British citizen. Though it may be time to revisit those rules as well any pensioner who has the means to live overseas probably doesn't need the state pension benefit.
The question shifts then to who living in Scotland would become a Scottish citizen upon independence. Doubtless anyone from the UK living in Scotland would be offered a passport, but I'll bet a significant number would choose to retain a UK passport. In those cases, who pays?
I wanted to retain my EU passport after Brexit, but I'm told I can't!
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
I think that the assets are generally quite easy to sort out. Those in Scotland would go to Scotland, those in rUk would go to them. There may be some minor adjustments on things like embassies overseas etc. Liabilities are much more difficult. What share of the national debt will Scotland accept? Unfunded pensions are another one.
We will make a few bod selling our Trident submarines
Keep wearing masks. Keep social distance. Keep boosting.
I’ve seen this elsewhere. One reason for supposing we are better placed is that it’s not total % vaccinated that determines how well covered you are against Covid deaths, it’s how well targeted. In the U.K. we have done well on the vulnerable, even if the overall percentage is not the highest. It’s also important to realise that many of these deaths are still in unvaccinated people. We’ve tangled over Covid before. I do not for one moment wish to declare that it’s all over, but currently in the U.K. the situation is hugely encouraging. Covid isn’t going away. We will be dealing with it for a long time. I’m fairly sure we will be seein autumn boosters targeting omicron this year. But I’m also sceptical of posts that highlight stories like this without exploring the full details.
Israel has a specific issue with vaccine hesitancy among orthodox religions communities. Take-up among over-60s is IIRC around 85%, whereas in the UK it’s over 95%. That’s three times the number of older unvaccinated Israelis, compared to Brits, which is why the pandemic is pretty much over in the UK, but still a significant issue in Israel.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
I think that the assets are generally quite easy to sort out. Those in Scotland would go to Scotland, those in rUk would go to them. There may be some minor adjustments on things like embassies overseas etc. Liabilities are much more difficult. What share of the national debt will Scotland accept? Unfunded pensions are another one.
We will make a few bod selling our Trident submarines
Depends what state the nuclear reactors have been left in.....
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
Because you don't cease to be a British citizen. Though it may be time to revisit those rules as well any pensioner who has the means to live overseas probably doesn't need the state pension benefit.
The question shifts then to who living in Scotland would become a Scottish citizen upon independence. Doubtless anyone from the UK living in Scotland would be offered a passport, but I'll bet a significant number would choose to retain a UK passport. In those cases, who pays?
I wanted to retain my EU passport after Brexit, but I'm told I can't!
Because you don't cease to be a British citizen. Though it may be time to revisit those rules as well any pensioner who has the means to live overseas probably doesn't need the state pension benefit.
I'm no longer a British citizen but the British government is going to pay my state pension if I live to 67 and continues to pay my AFPS75 RN pension.
So we are now at the point when a totally inept and dangerously incompetent Police Chief gets to decide whether our PM stays or goes? Give me strength.
No, because it doesn't matter what she says, he'll try and stay anyway. They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership. 2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government. 3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election. 4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year. 5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
All things being equal, someone of Boris's age has about 1% chance of dying within the next year. I reckon that's significantly higher chance of someone of his age being jailed for a year. Of course, I don't know of any specific health conditions or alleged criminal behaviour that could change these probabilities dramatically, but my instinct is still to put death ahead of jail in the order of likelihood.
Yes. I didn't want to go there, but death or serious incapacity ought to be higher. Not only is he carrying weight, but his lifestyle isn't ideal. Only part of it due to the nature of the job. What's more, a PM has a much greater risk of non peaceful offing than your average 59 year old bloke.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
Because you don't cease to be a British citizen. Though it may be time to revisit those rules as well any pensioner who has the means to live overseas probably doesn't need the state pension benefit.
The question shifts then to who living in Scotland would become a Scottish citizen upon independence. Doubtless anyone from the UK living in Scotland would be offered a passport, but I'll bet a significant number would choose to retain a UK passport. In those cases, who pays?
I wanted to retain my EU passport after Brexit, but I'm told I can't!
No, you can't, because there wasn't ever really an "EU passport" at all. Your passport was a UK one. The passport situation would be very different under Scottish independence. I cannot imagine for a moment that the UK would revoke en masse the passports of English-born residents of Scotland upon independence. They might require people to choose one way or the other, but for those who retain a UK one, it's as near as equivalent as emigration. I think.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
Because you don't cease to be a British citizen. Though it may be time to revisit those rules as well any pensioner who has the means to live overseas probably doesn't need the state pension benefit.
The question shifts then to who living in Scotland would become a Scottish citizen upon independence. Doubtless anyone from the UK living in Scotland would be offered a passport, but I'll bet a significant number would choose to retain a UK passport. In those cases, who pays?
This was a question I was pondering last night. As an advocate of a harmonious and good will split between Scotland and England this is one of those issues that I think could cause more serious problems. How can a new country of 5 million people operate if, for example 1 or 2 million of its population choose to retain citizenship of another country? Can a country effectively operate with up to 40% of its population made up of non-nationals? I know that is probably at the extreme end of the likely number but it was something that got me thinking last night.
Michael Gove, a Scottish fresher in 1985, told Johnson’s biographer Andrew Gimson: “The first time I saw him was in the Union bar . . . He seemed like a kindly, Oxford character, but he was really there like a great basking shark waiting for freshers to swim towards him.” Gove told Gimson: “I was Boris’s stooge. I became a votary of the Boris cult.”
In an essay for The Oxford Myth (1988), a book edited by his sister Rachel, Johnson advised aspiring student politicians to assemble “a disciplined and deluded collection of stooges” to get out the vote. “Lonely girls from the women’s colleges” who “back their largely male candidates with a porky decisiveness” were particularly useful, he wrote. “For these young women, machine politics offers human friction and warmth.” Reading this, you realise why almost all Union presidents who become Tory politicians are men. (Thatcher’s domain was OUCA, where she was president in 1946.)
Johnson added: “The tragedy of the stooge is that . . . he wants so much to believe that his relationship with the candidate is special that he shuts out the truth. The terrible art of the candidate is to coddle the self-deception of the stooge.”
I'm not a Boris hater (really I'm more instinctively against classic Thatcherites), but that is just horrible.
For me, I don't really care about this, but the sad fact is, Boris has failed to cultivate sufficient stooges to run the country efficiently and effectively. He has failed at being Boris. I knew when Boris came to power that he was lazy and would never be a PM in the style of Thatcher, but I felt that his London Mayoral tenure, whilst not perfect, demonstrated that with a good team doing most of the hard work, and him doing the 'charisma' bit on top, he could be a successful and even a loved leader. I saw no reason and I still see no reason why someone like Boris cannot be a good PM - hard yards don't equate to outcome, or May would have been great. My disappointment has been in the fact that almost from day one, he has failed to attract and retain a good team, or get the best out of the team he has.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
But that’s the point! The current incarnation of the SNP aren’t serious about independence. They have a comfortable position in Holyrood for as long as around half the Scottish electorate are in favour of independence. They can’t afford the proportion to increase above 55%, or fall below 45%, in case their voters start voting for other parties. You need to listen to @malcolmg more.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
There are some interesting questions swirling around in this issue, not least the disconnect between the way that some people think pensions work and the way they do in reality. Some people have the impression of pensions being paid into a pot where, should you live to retirement age, you start to dip into. Of course, with state pensions that's far from the truth. But then it does wheel in the question of where and how value is stored in the economy. It's not just a cycle of tax - welfare - retail spend - tax... money also gets sunk into physical, geographically located assets. In the event of part of the UK becoming independent, the location of those assets becomes an important part of the equation. It would certainly be messy to sort out.
It would be very messy indeed, 100 times worse than the UK leaving the EU was.
There are tens of thousands of people in Scotland who work for the UK government, for a start.
There are many more tens of thousands doing Scottish work for the government working in England. It would be a big net bonus by 10's of thousands.
If Scotland chooses to become a foreign country, then working English, Welsh and Northern Irish taxpayers should not pay for a foreign country's pension liabilities. GUY OPPERMAN U.K. Pensions Minister
The SNPs desperation to claim that English taxpayers would be liable for Scottish pensions is truly absurd and means there's not a chance of Scottish independence ever coming about now.
In the campaign it's going to be a case of SNP ministers and campaigners insisting the English will pay the pensions, the English will clearly say "no we won't" and quite right too. At which point pensioners and potential pensioners, will think quite reasonably "this is too risky" and vote No.
If the SNP were serious about independence they'd have serious answers. Not "the English will pay our liabilities for us".
Moronic Little Englanders for Dummies guidance. Unionists on here sh***ing their pants at the thought that they are not a "real" world power but rather a sad has been desperate not to be left on their own. Only one colony away from banana republic status.
That may well be the case.
However, we are talking about what happens in a referendum vote and which way people will vote. You don't have to disagree with the line the English are sh1tting their pants to also thinking that worries about pensions are likely to influence people's votes.
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
I think the argument being made is that at the point of independence the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland - which is the official state issuing your pension - would cease to exist. It is not just like you moving to another country or taking a new citizenship. The responsibility for issuing the pension would be split between the two new countries.
Of course this is a rather dangerous argument for the Unionists to propound because they have also previously said that England and Wales would be the successor state to the United Kingdom (rump UK if you like) and would therefore retain all the rights and obligations thereof - seat at the UN, membership of NATO, all the other positions on international bodies. It seems to me that you can't have it both ways. Either they are the successor state (with Scotland splitting off) in which case they would have all the responsibilities as well as the rights of the UK, or the split resulted in two new states in which case both would seem to have equal claim to those rights as well as the responsibilities.
I don't know what the answer to that one is but both sides seem to be wanting to grab the rights (or at least deny them to the other) whilst avoiding the responsibilities.
So Scotland splits in 2030.
2032 General Election and a party comes along and says we aren't going to pay the State Pension of Scottish Pensioners but will instead knock 2% of Income Tax. That party wins by a landslide, what does Scotland do?
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
Because you don't cease to be a British citizen. Though it may be time to revisit those rules as well any pensioner who has the means to live overseas probably doesn't need the state pension benefit.
The question shifts then to who living in Scotland would become a Scottish citizen upon independence. Doubtless anyone from the UK living in Scotland would be offered a passport, but I'll bet a significant number would choose to retain a UK passport. In those cases, who pays?
I wanted to retain my EU passport after Brexit, but I'm told I can't!
Comments
nerdlegame 18 3/6
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Edit: well THAT doesn't work
Business Secretary and he cannot even get the rise correct. It rises to £9.50
Sorry but it just annoys me he could not quote the correct figure
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/michael-gove-is-the-best-leader-labour-never-had-cjwhjw23v
It's not just on left/right issues either. I've seen that dedication to clarity in entirely non-partisan issues. I went to a meeting with him on the nasty practice of non-stun slaughter, where the other participants included representatives of halal and shechita producers. He listened politely to all of us, but it was entirely clear that he wanted to find a solution to the controversial issue that non-stun meat (intended by law to be only for religious communities who feel strongly about it) goes unlabelled into general consumption because slaughterhouses can't be bothered with a dual system. I've heard so much waffle about that over the years that the sight of the minister actually wanting to solve the issue was delightful.
(The reason most politicians waffle over it is that if non-stun meat is restricted to religious suppliers, the price to them will go up because of loss of economies of scale. Too bad - if one has a principle, however strange it may seem to others, one shojuld be willing to pay a bit more for it.)
lucky, lucky, lucky.
The problem with the Australians is not that they are descended from the Convicts but that they are descended from the Guards.
Of course, such a narrative also risks people in poorer parts of England making a legitimate point: "well we don't see the money either". This is a dangerous conversation to start for those who aren't interested in fixing such problems.
There are tens of thousands of people in Scotland who work for the UK government, for a start.
But I doubt she'd especially miss it if it were gone.
"We are"
"Can't be..... you're wearing sandals but no socks!"
However Russia doesn't pay the independent former Soviet Republics pension liabilities and nor should it.
You with balls and chains"
As a British citizen I get my state pension from the British government. If I move to another country I continue to get my British state pension from the British government.
I assume I'd continue to get it if I changed my nationality to that of the country I was now living in. Yes?
If so, what is the difference to a person with Scottish nationality living in an independent Scotland getting their British pension from the British state?
I'm not seeking to make a point. It's a genuine question.
What is the legal obligation on the British state to pay a state pension to its citizens? Is it based on nationality or residence (we know that's not the case) or what?
These debates are divisive which is presumably why the Cameron government didn't really want to have them in 2014 but I do think the chances of Scots having any clear idea of what they are actually voting for or against is minimal. It will be Brexit redux in that respect, as in so many others.
They move the goalposts. There are only five things that can remove him (Johnson) as Prime Minister:
1. A successful VONC by the Conservative Party against his leadership.
2. A successful VONC in the House of Commons against the Conservative government.
3. Defeat for the Conservative Party in a General Election.
4. A criminal sentence carrying a jail term of more than a year.
5. Death.
I've put them in order of likehood as I see it at the moment.
What Dick says is pretty much irrelevent.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/feb/05/give-me-back-my-200000-major-donor-tells-tories
I have no clue at all about whether there's merit in that form of argument, but the deficit is certainly a talking point that both sides engage in to some extent.
It won't suit those (incl. on here) who try to dismiss covid / omicron but I'm afraid it is not good news
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/israels-rise-covid-deaths-important-lesson-uk-vaccines/
Keep wearing masks. Keep social distance. Keep boosting.
The Gov UK site says
Your State Pension will only increase each year if you live in:
the European Economic Area (EEA)
Gibraltar
Switzerland
countries that have a social security agreement with the UK (but you cannot get increases in Canada or New Zealand)
You will not get yearly increases if you live outside these countries.
So a single Government is split in 2 and 1 of those governments is trying to pass a very large bill on to the other Government.
Which may work for 30 seconds until the British Government witnessed the reaction to British Tax payers giving Scotland money.
The State Pension is a different sort of liability. It's not a legal one. It's an implied political one, based on a contract with the voters. And so, as the voters in Scotland would cease to be voters for the politicians in the rump UK, so the liability to pay their pensions disappears.
* If the UK wanted to be able to sell any more government bonds leading up to an Independence referendum, and in the months after a Yes vote, then the Westminster government would have to guarantee 100% of those bonds, otherwise investors wouldn't know if they were buying a certain percentage of debt issued to a new country with uncertain credit worthiness. You would expect that any rump UK government would be keen to split the national debt, but ultimately this would be a liability a new Scotland could ultimately walk away from if they were willing to become independent with no agreement on a division of assets and liabilities.
** This seems like one of the more complicated ones to sort out, particularly given that many of the civil service jobs based in Scotland do work for the whole UK, and vice versa - e.g. such as the HMRC office at Cumbernauld - and so unpicking which civil servants was a rump UK civil servant and which was a Scottish civil servant would be far more complicated than for the state pension, where there's a nice simple geographical demarcation.
Suppose you have a civil servant who worked for the ONS (in London and Newport) but has retired to Scotland?
As with the state pension, these are paid for out of current contributions, and general government expenditure, but the liability to pay the pension is a legal liability, so it's harder to walk away from. Payments for public sector pensions were £43.3bn in 2018-9 (latest figures that Google links to on the OBR website), so that is still worth ~£3.5bn for a future Scotland and haggling over who pays what.
My guess is that negotiations over who pays for the state pension would take less than 30 seconds, but dividing up the liabilities for public sector pensions would take a lot longer and involve a lot of arguing over the details. I believe that the UK accepted its liability to pay for many EU pensions, so I wouldn't expect Scotland to escape paying for at least some of this, but working it all out would take some doing.
Whilst it's not conclusive it does look like another police fuck up.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-kent-60278013
ETA still if our esteemed Home Secretary had her way, Michael Stone would have been hanged so no-one would care any more.
a) The recall petition is successful resulting in a byelection
b) that Boris loses.
It’s also important to realise that many of these deaths are still in unvaccinated people.
We’ve tangled over Covid before. I do not for one moment wish to declare that it’s all over, but currently in the U.K. the situation is hugely encouraging. Covid isn’t going away. We will be dealing with it for a long time. I’m fairly sure we will be seein autumn boosters targeting omicron this year.
But I’m also sceptical of posts that highlight stories like this without exploring the full details.
Incidentally very good for genetic studies of disease with massive family trees due to good records and fairly modest inward and outward migration.
Tassies are the butt of jokes as a result, like Newfis in Canada, with a reputation for being inbred.
PMQs didn't exist the last time a Lord was the PM.
In the long term, number 5 is pretty much guaranteed to be the final backstop position. I must admit, I'd hate for it to be the only way to get him out of number ten.
Orthodox Jews in particular are often wary of vaccination
There are some countries where the UK has a reciprocal pensions agreement, so you can exchange your entitlement to a UK state pension to an Irish state pension if you move to Ireland (but I don't know the details of how this is worked out).
Having a country split into two parts is a bit different to the situation where you move from one country to a foreign country. I'd expect that a future pensioner in an independent Scotland who had lived and worked in England until retiring to Scotland (after independence) would be treated differently to a future pensioner in an independent Scotland who had lived and worked in Scotland until retiring in Scotland (after independence).
Since current pensions are paid by current contributions, then it is logical that current pension payments made to pensioners in Scotland will continue to be paid by current contributions paid by taxpayers in Scotland. Effectively you would have a distinction drawn between whether past NI contributions were accrued with a residency in Scotland or a residency in rump UK.
Of course, I don't know of any specific health conditions or alleged criminal behaviour that could change these probabilities dramatically, but my instinct is still to put death ahead of jail in the order of likelihood.
Home, 1963. PMQs "started" in 1961.
He'd just replace the lot of them.
But all this misses the point, which is that if England (+NI+W) wishes to remain the United Kingdom rather than becoming England (+NI+W) then it might be politic to split on friendly terms which might easily include pension liabilities. If that is politically unpopular, then it is not markedly different from handing over a big sack of cash to Edinburgh to cover existing liabilities.
Of course this is a rather dangerous argument for the Unionists to propound because they have also previously said that England and Wales would be the successor state to the United Kingdom (rump UK if you like) and would therefore retain all the rights and obligations thereof - seat at the UN, membership of NATO, all the other positions on international bodies. It seems to me that you can't have it both ways. Either they are the successor state (with Scotland splitting off) in which case they would have all the responsibilities as well as the rights of the UK, or the split resulted in two new states in which case both would seem to have equal claim to those rights as well as the responsibilities.
I don't know what the answer to that one is but both sides seem to be wanting to grab the rights (or at least deny them to the other) whilst avoiding the responsibilities.
Or find an Irish relative.
What's more, a PM has a much greater risk of non peaceful offing than your average 59 year old bloke.
The passport situation would be very different under Scottish independence. I cannot imagine for a moment that the UK would revoke en masse the passports of English-born residents of Scotland upon independence. They might require people to choose one way or the other, but for those who retain a UK one, it's as near as equivalent as emigration. I think.
Stone would have been convicted, executed, exonorated and an apology issued. Justice served.
However, we are talking about what happens in a referendum vote and which way people will vote. You don't have to disagree with the line the English are sh1tting their pants to also thinking that worries about pensions are likely to influence people's votes.
2032 General Election and a party comes along and says we aren't going to pay the State Pension of Scottish Pensioners but will instead knock 2% of Income Tax. That party wins by a landslide, what does Scotland do?