The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Absolutely. We have had a baleful conspiracy here between franchises who were not interested in training new drivers and unions who saw that the shortage put another £20k a year on their members already considerable wage packets. It absolutely should have been a requirement of all franchises that they trained at least as many drivers as they lost through wastage and it doesn't seem to have been. But its the Scottish government's problem now.
Whilst Sebastian Fox has announced a sweeping away of the post-privatisation financial sink hole we're still awaiting anything more than a name and a competition by Tory MPs for where its HQ should be.
"Just nationalise them" was not the answer as I kept pointing out. Scotrail is now state owned yet the framework which makes the rail industry economically "difficult" to run is still in place.
I can hardly blame the unions for trying to secure a bucket of cash for their members - that's their job. Especially now with inflation on runaway mode. Nor do the Scottish government have a magic wand they can wave to fix this. It does illustrate though the scale of the mess. Some of the drivers depots work very limited routes yet have seen mega cuts to services due to lack of drivers not working overtime.
This demonstrates how reliant the network was not on contracted hours but on drivers working rest days and overtime. That may work in bus world but never did in train world. Yet decades after the bus companies won the first franchises and the likes of South West Trains simply fired half the drivers to boost profits, we have never been able to get past this basic point - because the privatisation framework doesn't allow enough drivers to be hired because costs because subsidy.
Only when they bonfire all these myriad contracts and remove all the costs associated do we have a chance. And yes, nationalised operators still operate in the privatised framework. And in England are *still* privatised - operated by OLR Rail who are a consortium of private contractors no different to private operators in how they operate...
The thing is a train driver can't just start work tomorrow - they need a year or so of training first..
One thing we seem to have completely forgotten in this country is that there a whole piles of things that you need to keep going (or at the very least ticking over) because unless you continually do it something falls apart later.
Just another thing that got sacrificed in the name of reducing the number of deaths within 28 days of a positive test for a single respiratory virus.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Absolutely. We have had a baleful conspiracy here between franchises who were not interested in training new drivers and unions who saw that the shortage put another £20k a year on their members already considerable wage packets. It absolutely should have been a requirement of all franchises that they trained at least as many drivers as they lost through wastage and it doesn't seem to have been. But its the Scottish government's problem now.
Whilst Sebastian Fox has announced a sweeping away of the post-privatisation financial sink hole we're still awaiting anything more than a name and a competition by Tory MPs for where its HQ should be.
"Just nationalise them" was not the answer as I kept pointing out. Scotrail is now state owned yet the framework which makes the rail industry economically "difficult" to run is still in place.
I can hardly blame the unions for trying to secure a bucket of cash for their members - that's their job. Especially now with inflation on runaway mode. Nor do the Scottish government have a magic wand they can wave to fix this. It does illustrate though the scale of the mess. Some of the drivers depots work very limited routes yet have seen mega cuts to services due to lack of drivers not working overtime.
This demonstrates how reliant the network was not on contracted hours but on drivers working rest days and overtime. That may work in bus world but never did in train world. Yet decades after the bus companies won the first franchises and the likes of South West Trains simply fired half the drivers to boost profits, we have never been able to get past this basic point - because the privatisation framework doesn't allow enough drivers to be hired because costs because subsidy.
Only when they bonfire all these myriad contracts and remove all the costs associated do we have a chance. And yes, nationalised operators still operate in the privatised framework. And in England are *still* privatised - operated by OLR Rail who are a consortium of private contractors no different to private operators in how they operate...
The thing is a train driver can't just start work tomorrow - they need a year or so of training first..
One thing we seem to have completely forgotten in this country is that there a whole piles of things that you need to keep going (or at the very least ticking over) because unless you continually do it something falls apart later.
Just another thing that got sacrificed in the name of reducing the number of deaths within 28 days of a positive test for a single respiratory virus.
The lack of training starts decades ago (probably circa 2000 or so) it's got nothing to do with Covid...
For first time in I don't know how long my supermarket has emailed to say that today's delivery will contain everything I ordered with no substitutions.
Just a one-off or are we seeing the end of the supply chain issues?
Fwiw there were no obvious gaps on the shelves at my local supermarket yesterday. Mask-wearing was down to about 50 per cent btw.
I cannot find ginger beer anywhere - and I need it!!!
Lol, the Tory party should change course nor because they’re corrupt, self serving rsoles but just in case Kommissar Keir takes charge.
It's the Trumpian language that rankles with me. Radical hard left alliance. It's garbage.
But I suppose my reflexive response is a mirror image of those on the right when we on the left say there's an incipient whiff of fascism about the government, its policies and the way it operates.
I find it hard to picture any possible Labour/Lib Dem, and maybe even Green, coalition being radically hard left. Mushily soft left, maybe. And that would suit me down to the ground.
For first time in I don't know how long my supermarket has emailed to say that today's delivery will contain everything I ordered with no substitutions.
Just a one-off or are we seeing the end of the supply chain issues?
Fwiw there were no obvious gaps on the shelves at my local supermarket yesterday. Mask-wearing was down to about 50 per cent btw.
Mask wearing still at 50%, where are you? I see so few I'd almost forgotten it was a thing!
Outer London. Another, possibly more pertinent, question is *when* am I? Midday, midweek, so there are a lot of retired customers.
I'm Outer London too, but mostly shop in the evening when it's workers after work. But I'm close to town and do often quickly nip in for something at lunchtime, but if more than 20% wear masks even then I'd be surprised.
Do we have to rename Captain Hindsight as Captain Foresight for predicting this at last weeks PMQs?
Opetation Reverse Ferret in full swing. Why do the Cabinet Ministers set themselves up for this humiliation so readily?
It's things like Captain Hindsight and Sir Beer Korma that Labour should and does fear with Boris. Most Brits don't take any politicians seriously and one that can make you laugh has a huge advantage. SKS is very much the Ernie Wise of these 2 and they know it.
I think being associated with beer and takeaway curry has actually improved Starmers image. Not so stuffy, and more normal.
Quite a lot of obvious difference to the bacchanalia that was Downing St over lockdown.
I see that the Texas shooter wore dresses is the latest ‘reason’ from the gun nuts.
And Ted Cruz wants to ban doors in schools to solve the problem.
My wife shared something with me she'd seen on TikTok. Apparently some British kids had been shown clear backpacks that American kids take to school and they thought they looked fun. The woman said how sweet it was that in Britain kids wouldn't have any reason to think or realise why the backpacks are clear . . .
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But I suppose my reflexive response is a mirror image of those on the right when we on the left say there's an incipient whiff of fascism about the government, its policies and the way it operates.
I find it hard to picture any possible Labour/Lib Dem, and maybe even Green, coalition being radically hard left. Mushily soft left, maybe. And that would suit me down to the ground.