I distinctly remember Tony being booed at some Royal event... possibly Queen Mothers funeral after it was reported he'd been angling for a bigger role?
The way forward on Brexit is truth and reconciliation.
We can't lance the boil until we admit the lies on which it was won.
When NHS waiting times have gone up because there are not enough EU staff, we can't fix that unless we are honest about it.
FoM was a benefit of membership, for everybody.
Both sides told whoppers, as you well know.
Of course they did. That's politics. It is the winners lies that grate though as they are the ones that we live with. Hence the falling support for Brexit.
It's odd that Portugal is taking such a hit when South Africa (where .4/.5 started and are dominant as far as I know) has seen barely a blip.
BA.5 is half of British cases now, though we have a low recorded rate of any covid at present. Worth noting that the vaccination rate in Portugal is 90%.
I imagine (though I don't have stats to back this up) that both South Africa and Portugal must have pretty decent 'natural and/or vaccine' coverage by now. Just idly wondering now if the big wave of omicron that S.A had back in November/December put them in a relatively better spot than Portugal now. I guess it's going to keep PhD students in papers for the next few years if nothing else...
I distinctly remember Tony being booed at some Royal event... possibly Queen Mothers funeral after it was reported he'd been angling for a bigger role?
Plenty of booing for George Osborne at the 2012 Olympics.
I was thinking of voting LibDem in the forthcoming T and H election, as I want Boris out. Reading this thread reminded my why I swore not to do that again.
It is easy enough to find reasons not to vote for any of the parties. The challenge is finding reasons to vote for someone
Well, quite. One of my reasons for voting LibDem rather than Labour is not policy at all, but simply that our local LibDems are basically less infested with idiots than our local Labour party (so much so that I've recently filed a Code of Conduct complaint against a local Labour councillor).
The way forward on Brexit is truth and reconciliation.
We can't lance the boil until we admit the lies on which it was won.
When NHS waiting times have gone up because there are not enough EU staff, we can't fix that unless we are honest about it.
FoM was a benefit of membership, for everybody.
Both sides told whoppers, as you well know.
Of course they did. That's politics. It is the winners lies that grate though as they are the ones that we live with. Hence the falling support for Brexit.
The difference in this case is that we also get to see the losers case in action, as we witness EU bungling over vaccines, twice as high unemployment and incoherence over Ukraine.
I distinctly remember Tony being booed at some Royal event... possibly Queen Mothers funeral after it was reported he'd been angling for a bigger role?
Plenty of booing for George Osborne at the 2012 Olympics. I was there and joined in.
True but Osborne was never ramped as the huge asset on the ground that Johnson is by Dorries, Fabricant & Co.
All PMs get the bird. Johnson's interface with the public is meant to be his trump card, however.
Particularly this crowd of daft twats who actually turned up in person to this nonsense bedecked in the Butcher's Apron. They should be Johnson's Republican Guard.
All PMs get the bird. Johnson's interface with the public is meant to be his trump card, however.
That's a very interesting observation; of course, he didn't work his way up within the party in the usual manner, but relied on his journalistic power base and Jeremy Clarkson type blokey appeal.
All PMs get the bird. Johnson's interface with the public is meant to be his trump card, however.
Particularly this crowd of daft twats who actually turned up in person to this nonsense bedecked in the Butcher's Apron. They should be Johnson's Republican Guard.
I tried making that point earlier on the thread but was defecated on from a great height with the patrician observation that of course lots of normals and republicans would be along for the great spectacle.
It's also very interesting that SKS didn't attract a cheep either way - so the crowd is plainly not full of lefties.
Of course it's populist nonsense in terms of presentation. But there's a but.
The job of regulation is to ensure that there isn't fraud in weights and measures, and that information is given and not kept secret. That is not the same as which systems are allowed.
The best judge of how to measure things is the free market. Supermarkets have nothing to fear. A handful of them control the market and how suppliers shall operate. They also have to listen to customers.
If market traders in Barnsley and Essex want to sell apples in pounds there is decent reason for this to be decriminalised.
NB in my local German owned supermarket I buy their own brand coffee entirely in metric. The bags contain the memorable quantity of 227 grm. (Why, by the way)? Would it really be a crime to call it half a pound or 8 oz, which it is?
Of course it's populist nonsense in terms of presentation. But there's a but.
The job of regulation is to ensure that there isn't fraud in weights and measures, and that information is given and not kept secret. That is not the same as which systems are allowed.
The best judge of how to measure things is the free market. Supermarkets have nothing to fear. A handful of them control the market and how suppliers shall operate. They also have to listen to customers.
If market traders in Barnsley and Essex want to sell apples in pounds there is decent reason for this to be decriminalised.
NB in my local German owned supermarket I buy their own brand coffee entirely in metric. The bags contain the memorable quantity of 227 grm. (Why, by the way)? Would it really be a crime to call it half a pound or 8 oz, which it is?
The buggers are already allowed to sell their apples in pounds, just so long as metric weights are also given.
When NHS waiting times have gone up because there are not enough EU staff, we can't fix that unless we are honest about it.
NHS waiting times are up because of the pandemic.
The majority of foreign NHS staff are, and always have been, from outside the EU.
In any event, per the commons library:
"In June 2016 there were 58,698 staff with recorded EU nationality, and in January there were over 70,660. But to present this as the full story would be misleading, because we know that there are almost 50,000 more staff for whom nationality is known now than in 2016.
It is very likely that there has been an overall increase in the number of NHS staff with EU nationality since 2016, but we can’t be sure about the scale of the change, and it would be misleading to calculate an increase just based on the two numbers above."
Of course it's populist nonsense in terms of presentation. But there's a but.
The job of regulation is to ensure that there isn't fraud in weights and measures, and that information is given and not kept secret. That is not the same as which systems are allowed.
The best judge of how to measure things is the free market. Supermarkets have nothing to fear. A handful of them control the market and how suppliers shall operate. They also have to listen to customers.
If market traders in Barnsley and Essex want to sell apples in pounds there is decent reason for this to be decriminalised.
NB in my local German owned supermarket I buy their own brand coffee entirely in metric. The bags contain the memorable quantity of 227 grm. (Why, by the way)? Would it really be a crime to call it half a pound or 8 oz, which it is?
The buggers are already allowed to sell their apples in pounds, just so long as metric weights are also given.
Head, brick wall. Repeat. Still won't get through.
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
"BuT iT wAs OnLy lIVeRpOoL fAnS" according to our haters
The price to mind your tyres was apparently 40 euros! Not so long ago that was the ticket price.
Another crazy but now plausible allegation:
All these “fake tickets”. Apparently stewards were taking tickets off fans, saying Non, that’s fake, then ducking away to give these real tickets to local friends, or to touts to sell them on
Apparently Stade de France recruits heavily in St Denis, for its stewards, so the potential for this to happen was obvious
All PMs get the bird. Johnson's interface with the public is meant to be his trump card, however.
Particularly this crowd of daft twats who actually turned up in person to this nonsense bedecked in the Butcher's Apron. They should be Johnson's Republican Guard.
May, famously absolutely devoid of the common touch, could have got away with this in a way that Johnson might not be able to.
I distinctly remember Tony being booed at some Royal event... possibly Queen Mothers funeral after it was reported he'd been angling for a bigger role?
Plenty of booing for George Osborne at the 2012 Olympics. I was there and joined in.
True but Osborne was never ramped as the huge asset on the ground that Johnson is by Dorries, Fabricant & Co.
Indeed Osbourne did the background strategy, he never claimed to be loved by the public or some kind of unique politician
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
What's the relevance of this? You know people come in from outside the borough to see stuff.
But your attitude to London is why you're losing here and losing big.
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
It's in the constituency of Cities of London and Westminster apparently. So wall-to-wall sneering Remainers who work in finance and the arts. Do keep up.
Of course it's populist nonsense in terms of presentation. But there's a but.
The job of regulation is to ensure that there isn't fraud in weights and measures, and that information is given and not kept secret. That is not the same as which systems are allowed.
The best judge of how to measure things is the free market. Supermarkets have nothing to fear. A handful of them control the market and how suppliers shall operate. They also have to listen to customers.
If market traders in Barnsley and Essex want to sell apples in pounds there is decent reason for this to be decriminalised.
NB in my local German owned supermarket I buy their own brand coffee entirely in metric. The bags contain the memorable quantity of 227 grm. (Why, by the way)? Would it really be a crime to call it half a pound or 8 oz, which it is?
The buggers are already allowed to sell their apples in pounds, just so long as metric weights are also given.
Yes. The change being suggested is not great, though of course which system is the compulsory one gives a clue as to who is in charge.
And it is the sort of thing which showed a very un-UK like style of enforcement which did huge damage at the tabloid level. Governments, even Labour ones, forgot that popular tabloid readers vote.
A one size fits all approach whether you are selling potatoes to old ladies in Barnsley or doing designs for missile defence systems is not a winner.
I don't want to be a killjoy but if you watch the service this morning from St Paul's Cathedral where the camera moves from one royal to another and then to Johnson in the absence of the Queen there's not a lot for the the average citizen to admire
The queen is doing an epic troll reversing Phillip’s service - whilst Boris and co are there she’s in Downing street getting shitfaced, puking on the Lulu Lyttle wallpaper and using his toothbrush as a bog-brush.
Whoever chose the reading for Johnson knew how to take the piss. QE2 does have a reputation for humour.
As one of the BBC commentators remarked, the Queen pays great attention to detail and nothing ever happens by accident…
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
The City is one of the most Tory rich places in the country, or it should be.
When NHS waiting times have gone up because there are not enough EU staff, we can't fix that unless we are honest about it.
NHS waiting times are up because of the pandemic.
The majority of foreign NHS staff are, and always have been, from outside the EU.
In any event, per the commons library:
"In June 2016 there were 58,698 staff with recorded EU nationality, and in January there were over 70,660. But to present this as the full story would be misleading, because we know that there are almost 50,000 more staff for whom nationality is known now than in 2016.
It is very likely that there has been an overall increase in the number of NHS staff with EU nationality since 2016, but we can’t be sure about the scale of the change, and it would be misleading to calculate an increase just based on the two numbers above."
You don't start truth and reconciliation by telling massive porkies.
Neither do you by not including this paragraph in the link:
"Nurses and health visitors are the only staff group to record a fall in the number of recorded EU nationals since the EU referendum. EU nurses as a percentage of those with a known nationality have fallen from 7.4% of the total to 5.6%."
In my department we have only one of our Portugese or Spanish nurses left, and a Romanian. All the others have gone back, and there have been no new arrivals.
Brexit is part of the reason, but covid was the other big part. Most of the EU nurses travelled back every few months but could not, and job opportunities became availible in Spain. It was a great opprtunity to move back home so they did.
Similarly our Greek doctors (Greece exports a lot of graduates) have mostly gone for similar reasons, to be replaced by Egyptians and South Asians.
Both Nurses and Doctors tended to register for the settlement scheme, even with no intention of returning, and none of them have returned.
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
I don't want to be a killjoy but if you watch the service this morning from St Paul's Cathedral where the camera moves from one royal to another and then to Johnson in the absence of the Queen there's not a lot for the the average citizen to admire
The queen is doing an epic troll reversing Phillip’s service - whilst Boris and co are there she’s in Downing street getting shitfaced, puking on the Lulu Lyttle wallpaper and using his toothbrush as a bog-brush.
Whoever chose the reading for Johnson knew how to take the piss. QE2 does have a reputation for humour.
As one of the BBC commentators remarked, the Queen pays great attention to detail and nothing ever happens by accident…
Blimey, don't mention that to the Diana conspiracists.....
Sees Brexteers returning to their self-pitying vomit on how Remoaners keep calling them thick racists, immediately turns to exploring the intricacies of Virginia defamation law and looking for clips of Johnny Depp on stage with Jeff Beck.
What I picture there, to the strains of Hi Ho Silver Lining, is that Ferry video except it's not Jerry Hall who vamps on halfway through, no, it's Amber (!) with a set of maracas and a steely glint in the eye. She moves purposely across the stage towards Deppo who truncates his rather plodding guitar solo and makes a sharp exit. The crowd boo. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11j5Moz9dYA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9EbR0ckb40
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
Why do you continue to make excuses for the inexcusable? (Johnson of course, not the AB of York)
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
The City is one of the most Tory rich places in the country, or it should be.
But HYUFD is intent on waving goodbye to London
Tories now run Walsall and Dudley councils which should be Labour, just further Brexit realignment
I was thinking of voting LibDem in the forthcoming T and H election, as I want Boris out. Reading this thread reminded my why I swore not to do that again.
Care to elaborate?
EU. The core leadership of the party would throw anything away, even liberalism and democracy, for it. The members used to be a bit more equivocal, and the voters at least in the SW were downright hostile.
I have knocked on literally thousands of doors for the LibDems. I was always bemused when other canvassers would report that Europe never came up, whereas I would receive it loud and clear at 120 decibels. I guess you hear what you want to hear.
I recall the LibDems staging a strop when their demand to get an in/out referendum was turned down. Of course when they (we) did get offered one a few years later they voted against it, duly lost it and used every trick in the Trump book to frustrate its implementation (with the honourable exception of the late great Paddy Ashdown).
Democracy when it suits doesn't work for me so I left the party after 28 years. Since then they seems to have been captured by the worst excesses of student extremism and pretty much reject the Enlightenment never mind about classical liberalism.
I actually think Jeremy Corbyn has a stronger grip on reality than the likes of Layla Moran.
Remainers predicting we will Rejoin by 2040 should, perhaps, consider how the world has changed in the last six years, since Brexit. They are trying to look forward TWELVE years
18 years
And as the one who mentioned 2040...
Events, sure. Though events can push the dial either way. And most events, even big ones, are more transient than we might think. You can see the Vaccine War blip in the Brexit polling (and rightly so- it was a significant mistake by Brussels, albeit one that was swifty corrected), but it was a blip.
And the tectonics- both the age profile of Yay or Nay to Brexit in the UK, the sense that it isn't going well and it's not clear where the big win comes from, and the observation that nobody on the continent is looking at the UK and saying "yes, I'll have a bit of that"- point to a couple of decades.
But it is 18 years
Try and pick an 18 year period since, say, 1900, in which the world has not been transformed
1900-1918. The Great War, the Russian Revolution, the Spanish flu, the end of the Austrian and Ottoman empires, and much more
1918-1936? The Great Depression, the Russian Civil War, the rise of Hitler, Mussolini, Irish indy, the Spanish civil war
1936-1954 I shan’t bother
1954-1974 Space is explored. Man on the moon. Indian independence. End of empires. The sexual revolution. The pill. Nuclear stand off. The EEC is founded, Vietnam
1974-1992 Vietnam War ends. Watergate. Britain collapses. Thatcher, Reagan. Berlin Wall falls. The end of communism. EEC evolves towards EU. The internet begins
1992-2010 History speeds up again. Germany reunited. Collapse of USSR. War across Asia. American hegemony then the end of the American century. China rises. Incredible globalisation. Internet goes mad. 9/11. Terrorism. Smartphones. Iraq.
2010-now transformation of global economy. China becomes biggest trader. Africa turns to Beijing. EU expands. Scottish indy no. Brexit! Mass migration. Climate change. Social media changes humanity. Trump. Global plague. Ukraine
Ergo, predicting there will be a recognisable UK to join a recognisable EU in 18 years time is a fool’s errand. 18 years is an epoch and so much will happen to render this prediction quite fatuous
Indian independence was 1947.
But not until the constitution of 1956 was Pakistan an Islamic democratic country. And there was the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965. And East Pakistan then became Bangladesh in 1971. So a considerable turmoil on the sub-Continent for the 18 year epoch....
Our resident flint-knapper wrongly put Indian independence down in the 1954-1974 period.
When NHS waiting times have gone up because there are not enough EU staff, we can't fix that unless we are honest about it.
NHS waiting times are up because of the pandemic.
The majority of foreign NHS staff are, and always have been, from outside the EU.
In any event, per the commons library:
"In June 2016 there were 58,698 staff with recorded EU nationality, and in January there were over 70,660. But to present this as the full story would be misleading, because we know that there are almost 50,000 more staff for whom nationality is known now than in 2016.
It is very likely that there has been an overall increase in the number of NHS staff with EU nationality since 2016, but we can’t be sure about the scale of the change, and it would be misleading to calculate an increase just based on the two numbers above."
You don't start truth and reconciliation by telling massive porkies.
Neither do you by not including this paragraph in the link:
"Nurses and health visitors are the only staff group to record a fall in the number of recorded EU nationals since the EU referendum. EU nurses as a percentage of those with a known nationality have fallen from 7.4% of the total to 5.6%."
I posted it in full, last night, including that paragraph.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
Height really is the exteme in the measurement discussion though. In Australia they introduced the metric system for everything well over fifty years ago. When I lived there 20 years ago, most people still quoted their height in feet and inches even though all other linear measurements were in m/km/cm/mm and not many know how far 10 miles is. Weight is always given in Kg even in informal conversation.
I'm sure the reason for this is that people numeric height's are quoted and discussed in informal conversation very often (much more often than weight is) and so the old units remain in common usage for a long time.
Also height, unlike weight, effectively doesn't change for an adult.
Once you know your height, as an adult, you quote the same number pretty much for the rest of your life. Quoting a different number would be as alien as changing your date of birth.
Surely you'd soon get used to saying 160 cm instead of 5 foot 3?
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
Er, yes, and? St Paul's is NOT under Labour-held Westminster City Council.
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
Er, yes, and? St Paul's is NOT under Labour-held Westminster City Council.
It will have a Labour MP though given the swing to Labour in Westminster in the local elections, the City of London was 75% Remain and Westminster was 69% Remain, it is Remainer and anti Boris central
@Foxy I looked it up, and according to the commons library, it’s a mixed picture:
Has the number of EU staff in the NHS changed since the referendum?
Because data coverage of NHS nationality data has improved over time, comparisons of the number of EU staff in the NHS over time should be made only with caution. In June 2016 there were 89,546 staff with unknown nationality. That has now decreased to 40,166 (a fall of over half) while the total number of staff employed by the NHS has increased.
This means that some apparent increases in staff numbers for nationalities and nationality groups are likely to be due to improved data coverage rather than genuine increases.
In other words: because a greater proportion of NHS staff now have a nationality recorded, we would expect to see increases in the recorded number of staff with a given nationality, even if there were no genuine changes in the actual number of staff with that nationality. In June 2016 there were 58,698 staff with recorded EU nationality, and in January there were over 70,660. But to present this as the full story would be misleading, because we know that there are almost 50,000 more staff for whom nationality is known now than in 2016.
It is very likely that there has been an overall increase in the number of NHS staff with EU nationality since 2016, but we can’t be sure about the scale of the change, and it would be misleading to calculate an increase just based on the two numbers above.
Claims about changes in the number of EU staff which don’t mention the importance of staff with unknown nationality should be treated sceptically.
Nurses and health visitors are the only staff group to record a fall in the number of recorded EU nationals since the EU referendum. EU nurses as a percentage of those with a known nationality have fallen from 7.4% of the total to 5.6%.
(emphasis mine)
In fact, I bolded the paragraph you cite when posting in response to you last night.
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
The City is one of the most Tory rich places in the country, or it should be.
But HYUFD is intent on waving goodbye to London
Tories now run Walsall and Dudley councils which should be Labour, just further Brexit realignment
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
Height really is the exteme in the measurement discussion though. In Australia they introduced the metric system for everything well over fifty years ago. When I lived there 20 years ago, most people still quoted their height in feet and inches even though all other linear measurements were in m/km/cm/mm and not many know how far 10 miles is. Weight is always given in Kg even in informal conversation.
I'm sure the reason for this is that people numeric height's are quoted and discussed in informal conversation very often (much more often than weight is) and so the old units remain in common usage for a long time.
Also height, unlike weight, effectively doesn't change for an adult.
Once you know your height, as an adult, you quote the same number pretty much for the rest of your life. Quoting a different number would be as alien as changing your date of birth.
Surely you'd soon get used to saying 160 cm instead of 5 foot 3?
I just compare it to my other large object and that works pretty well
For me, like many Leavers, it was the Lisbon Treaty that made me decide to leave once it was clear that no meaningful renegotiation was possible.
Amongst many things that awful treaty did, as a nakedly transparent rehash of the EU Constitution, it gave the EU legal identity so it could sign treaties in its own name, without reference to its member nations, created a president and high commissioner for foreign affairs, drove a huge extension in QMV voting, and enshrined the Charter of Fundamental Rights into EU law. This was one of the most potent drivers for me as it made rights judicable by the ECJ which led to them demanding the UK review its policy of not giving suffrage to prisoners.
This was then exacerbated by the agenda laid down by the new President Juncker who wanted to go even further and laid out a vision of EU social and fiscal union on top. A man who Cameron tried to stop and failed to stop.
No. No No No.
If Cameron had managed to achieve what he'd laid out in his Bloomberg Speech in 2013 it might have been different, but it wasn't.
I won't vote for any party that wants to take the UK back into that.
Believing that the students who looked forward to learning Italian with a bar job in Florence or Rome or doing street photography in Arles or waiting tables in Vienna or doing ski instruction in Insbruch or being allowed free movement to 28 different countries is a sacrifice worth making so that prisoners in the UK don't get the right to vote is barking mad
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
The City is one of the most Tory rich places in the country, or it should be.
But HYUFD is intent on waving goodbye to London
Tories now run Walsall and Dudley councils which should be Labour, just further Brexit realignment
And that Brexit bastion Harrow.....er......
Harrow was only 54% Remain, below the London average of 59% Remain and it had a hopeless Labour council
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
Er, yes, and? St Paul's is NOT under Labour-held Westminster City Council.
It will have a Labour MP though given the swing to Labour in Westminster in the local elections, the City of London was 75% Remain and Westminster was 69% Remain, it is Remainer and anti Boris central
Local Councils are a different tier of government to Parliament. So St Paul's is not under a Labour council. The boundary between the City of London and City of Westminster is nearly a kilometre to the WEST of St Paul's
For me, like many Leavers, it was the Lisbon Treaty that made me decide to leave once it was clear that no meaningful renegotiation was possible.
Amongst many things that awful treaty did, as a nakedly transparent rehash of the EU Constitution, it gave the EU legal identity so it could sign treaties in its own name, without reference to its member nations, created a president and high commissioner for foreign affairs, drove a huge extension in QMV voting, and enshrined the Charter of Fundamental Rights into EU law. This was one of the most potent drivers for me as it made rights judicable by the ECJ which led to them demanding the UK review its policy of not giving suffrage to prisoners.
This was then exacerbated by the agenda laid down by the new President Juncker who wanted to go even further and laid out a vision of EU social and fiscal union on top. A man who Cameron tried to stop and failed to stop.
No. No No No.
If Cameron had managed to achieve what he'd laid out in his Bloomberg Speech in 2013 it might have been different, but it wasn't.
I won't vote for any party that wants to take the UK back into that.
Believing that the students who looked forward to learning Italian with a bar job in Florence or Rome or doing street photography in Arles or waiting tables in Vienna or doing ski instruction in Insbruch or being allowed free movement to 28 different countries is a sacrifice worth making so that prisoners in the UK don't get the right to vote is barking mad
It's so cool that you cherry picked the arguments to try and make the decision to leave look as ridiculous as possible, and after all that I don't even think it's clear cut.
Note for railway enthusiasts: on my way to London and for the first time ever the journey starts at Okehampton not Exeter st David's. Life changing.
I did Exeter to Okehampton as a Sunday special back in 2019.
Sure. But this is a routine, unexciting, scheduled service.
Pity the line hasn't been extended all the way to Plymouth - then it would have the views from the Meldon Viaduct. Stumbled across, or rather under, it unexpectedly when being taken for walkies by a local friend - one of the last of the wrought iron constructions on the railways. Fascinating postindustrial landscape in the valley which it crosses, remains of mining and so on.
PS and this is Sunil. For him any service is exciting - especially on a new line. A commendable sentiment.
Glasses will still have to use legal markings to show it is a pint. And there was nothing preventing pint glasses from having a 'decorative' Crown symbol in addition to these when UK was in the EU... https://twitter.com/ionewells/status/1532616626109030400
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
Er, yes, and? St Paul's is NOT under Labour-held Westminster City Council.
It will have a Labour MP though given the swing to Labour in Westminster in the local elections, the City of London was 75% Remain and Westminster was 69% Remain, it is Remainer and anti Boris central
Local Councils are a different tier of government to Parliament. So St Paul's is not under a Labour council. The boundary between the City of London and City of Westminster is nearly a kilometre to the WEST of St Paul's
HYUFD would argue about how many corners a Zulu kraal had ...
Question - does the UK have a designated survivor for public events like the US does? Seems like an awful lot of the UK's senior people are all in one place right now.
Most are dross and would not be missed, things would almost be guaranteed to run better.
Of course it's populist nonsense in terms of presentation. But there's a but.
The job of regulation is to ensure that there isn't fraud in weights and measures, and that information is given and not kept secret. That is not the same as which systems are allowed.
The best judge of how to measure things is the free market. Supermarkets have nothing to fear. A handful of them control the market and how suppliers shall operate. They also have to listen to customers.
If market traders in Barnsley and Essex want to sell apples in pounds there is decent reason for this to be decriminalised.
NB in my local German owned supermarket I buy their own brand coffee entirely in metric. The bags contain the memorable quantity of 227 grm. (Why, by the way)? Would it really be a crime to call it half a pound or 8 oz, which it is?
The buggers are already allowed to sell their apples in pounds, just so long as metric weights are also given.
Yes. The change being suggested is not great, though of course which system is the compulsory one gives a clue as to who is in charge.
And it is the sort of thing which showed a very un-UK like style of enforcement which did huge damage at the tabloid level. Governments, even Labour ones, forgot that popular tabloid readers vote.
A one size fits all approach whether you are selling potatoes to old ladies in Barnsley or doing designs for missile defence systems is not a winner.
Er, a one size approach is very necessary for missiles, and indeed anything remotely complex. Vide the Mars Climate Orbiter, which relied on a mixture of imperial (US variety) and metric.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
And for now, he's right to do so. Noise and toxicity beat raw numbers.
I stick by my calendar proposed on Brexit Day;
The 2024 rewrite of the TCA (which has to happen) will actually promote trade and co-operation at the expense of the UK giving up some of the more hypothetical freedoms.
2029 will be EEA in all but name.
2040ish will be the UK choosing to be in the room when decisions are taken.
A generation of withered trade and soured relationships. And all so Boomers with 3 O-Levels could get a different coloured passport and a vacuum cleaner that pumps out useless extra heat.
I suppose those with 3 O levels were to be respected previously when they voted the right way?
Well I think if we had a less in-work and pensioner poverty they might not have lashed out in such a self-defeating way. If they voted to not be poorer that's all very nice but it's the passports and vacuum cleaners they'll be getting instead.
If they can afford them.
I'm sure if they gave up their avocado toast they could. Did you know you can eat for 30p a day?
Hmmm.
1 - Don't mention that France 24 is reporting airport chaos across Europe, it will destroy the propaganda. Due to (quote) "staff shortages and passenger increase due to the pandemic", citing Dublin, Schipol and Lisbon.
3 - Who claimed that you could eat for 30p a day? My MP Lee Anderson certainly did not.
Airlines and airports are the same everywhere at the moment. It’s a worldwide problem, they all laid off too many staff - many with specific skills, qualifications and clearances - during the pandemic, and now can’t get enough to come back as normality returns.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
Height really is the exteme in the measurement discussion though. In Australia they introduced the metric system for everything well over fifty years ago. When I lived there 20 years ago, most people still quoted their height in feet and inches even though all other linear measurements were in m/km/cm/mm and not many know how far 10 miles is. Weight is always given in Kg even in informal conversation.
I'm sure the reason for this is that people numeric height's are quoted and discussed in informal conversation very often (much more often than weight is) and so the old units remain in common usage for a long time.
Also height, unlike weight, effectively doesn't change for an adult.
Once you know your height, as an adult, you quote the same number pretty much for the rest of your life. Quoting a different number would be as alien as changing your date of birth.
Surely you'd soon get used to saying 160 cm instead of 5 foot 3?
I just compare it to my other large object and that works pretty well
Never compare! Used to spoil my after-pool changing room experience, that did.
For me, like many Leavers, it was the Lisbon Treaty that made me decide to leave once it was clear that no meaningful renegotiation was possible.
Amongst many things that awful treaty did, as a nakedly transparent rehash of the EU Constitution, it gave the EU legal identity so it could sign treaties in its own name, without reference to its member nations, created a president and high commissioner for foreign affairs, drove a huge extension in QMV voting, and enshrined the Charter of Fundamental Rights into EU law. This was one of the most potent drivers for me as it made rights judicable by the ECJ which led to them demanding the UK review its policy of not giving suffrage to prisoners.
This was then exacerbated by the agenda laid down by the new President Juncker who wanted to go even further and laid out a vision of EU social and fiscal union on top. A man who Cameron tried to stop and failed to stop.
No. No No No.
If Cameron had managed to achieve what he'd laid out in his Bloomberg Speech in 2013 it might have been different, but it wasn't.
I won't vote for any party that wants to take the UK back into that.
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
Er, yes, and? St Paul's is NOT under Labour-held Westminster City Council.
It will have a Labour MP though given the swing to Labour in Westminster in the local elections, the City of London was 75% Remain and Westminster was 69% Remain, it is Remainer and anti Boris central
Are you seriously arguing that a crowd who show up to Royal watch is Remainer central? I guess you are.
When NHS waiting times have gone up because there are not enough EU staff, we can't fix that unless we are honest about it.
NHS waiting times are up because of the pandemic.
The majority of foreign NHS staff are, and always have been, from outside the EU.
In any event, per the commons library:
"In June 2016 there were 58,698 staff with recorded EU nationality, and in January there were over 70,660. But to present this as the full story would be misleading, because we know that there are almost 50,000 more staff for whom nationality is known now than in 2016.
It is very likely that there has been an overall increase in the number of NHS staff with EU nationality since 2016, but we can’t be sure about the scale of the change, and it would be misleading to calculate an increase just based on the two numbers above."
You don't start truth and reconciliation by telling massive porkies.
Neither do you by not including this paragraph in the link:
"Nurses and health visitors are the only staff group to record a fall in the number of recorded EU nationals since the EU referendum. EU nurses as a percentage of those with a known nationality have fallen from 7.4% of the total to 5.6%."
In my department we have only one of our Portugese or Spanish nurses left, and a Romanian. All the others have gone back, and there have been no new arrivals.
Brexit is part of the reason, but covid was the other big part. Most of the EU nurses travelled back every few months but could not, and job opportunities became availible in Spain. It was a great opprtunity to move back home so they did.
Similarly our Greek doctors (Greece exports a lot of graduates) have mostly gone for similar reasons, to be replaced by Egyptians and South Asians.
Both Nurses and Doctors tended to register for the settlement scheme, even with no intention of returning, and none of them have returned.
I was lectured on PB for pointing out that simply signing up to remain in the UK with the appropriate change of status is not evidence of actually staying. But Brexiters know so much better.
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
Er, yes, and? St Paul's is NOT under Labour-held Westminster City Council.
It will have a Labour MP though given the swing to Labour in Westminster in the local elections, the City of London was 75% Remain and Westminster was 69% Remain, it is Remainer and anti Boris central
Are you seriously arguing that a crowd who show up to Royal watch is Remainer central? I guess you are.
He thinks everyone in the crowd travelled all the way to St Paul's Cathedral from... the Cities of London & Westminster constituency!
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
And for now, he's right to do so. Noise and toxicity beat raw numbers.
I stick by my calendar proposed on Brexit Day;
The 2024 rewrite of the TCA (which has to happen) will actually promote trade and co-operation at the expense of the UK giving up some of the more hypothetical freedoms.
2029 will be EEA in all but name.
2040ish will be the UK choosing to be in the room when decisions are taken.
A generation of withered trade and soured relationships. And all so Boomers with 3 O-Levels could get a different coloured passport and a vacuum cleaner that pumps out useless extra heat.
I suppose those with 3 O levels were to be respected previously when they voted the right way?
It's the contempt Remainers can't stop. "Anyone that disagrees with me is old and thick". They are completely unable to have a level headed conversation about it.
And in most discussions they can't even make a single concession in the argument. If you point out the predictions of the Remain campaign all turned out to be flat out lies, they will twist and turn trying to pretend otherwise. At best they will try to say the predictions were from evil Tories, rather ignoring the Labour leader of the Remain campaign repeating them everywhere.
Yes, they exude a fetid stench of sneering and snobbery, the Remainers: they cannot help themselves. The reek always escapes
It’s like Ken Livingstone trying to have a sensible conversation about Jews. Just wait a few minutes. Ah. There it is. Bingo
How long till you are fighting to get us back in EU
I was thinking of voting LibDem in the forthcoming T and H election, as I want Boris out. Reading this thread reminded my why I swore not to do that again.
Care to elaborate?
EU. The core leadership of the party would throw anything away, even liberalism and democracy, for it. The members used to be a bit more equivocal, and the voters at least in the SW were downright hostile.
I have knocked on literally thousands of doors for the LibDems. I was always bemused when other canvassers would report that Europe never came up, whereas I would receive it loud and clear at 120 decibels. I guess you hear what you want to hear.
I recall the LibDems staging a strop when their demand to get an in/out referendum was turned down. Of course when they (we) did get offered one a few years later they voted against it, duly lost it and used every trick in the Trump book to frustrate its implementation (with the honourable exception of the late great Paddy Ashdown).
Democracy when it suits doesn't work for me so I left the party after 28 years. Since then they seems to have been captured by the worst excesses of student extremism and pretty much reject the Enlightenment never mind about classical liberalism.
I actually think Jeremy Corbyn has a stronger grip on reality than the likes of Layla Moran.
I think you and I have travelled a similar path - I also was a long standing member of the party and I quit when it became clear the Party could not or would not accept the decision of the people in the referendum. I'm not in the south west and I never heard Europe mentioned as strongly as you did in all fairness but the attempts to frustrate the June 2016 vote were disgraceful politics opened the door to Boris Johnson. and his 2019 election victory.
I don't accept your characterisation of the current party under Davey. I see clear signs of the party re-adopting the tenets of fiscal probity and offering a viable alternative to the two high tax and spend social democratic parties. To be fair, the Party has always prospered when it has a distinctive message.
The market for "classical liberalism" isn't large in the post-Covid world when we see Sunak dishing out vast amounts of largesse (for which we will all have to pay in time). Going back to the 1950s brand of liberalism would leave us permanently marginalised at 10%.
Let's be honest - many people vote against parties rather than for them. If those who don't want to vote Conservative or Labour decide to support the LDs or Greens, so be it. I doubt Johnson or Starmer are concerned why people support their parties, I don't see why we should be.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
Height really is the exteme in the measurement discussion though. In Australia they introduced the metric system for everything well over fifty years ago. When I lived there 20 years ago, most people still quoted their height in feet and inches even though all other linear measurements were in m/km/cm/mm and not many know how far 10 miles is. Weight is always given in Kg even in informal conversation.
I'm sure the reason for this is that people numeric height's are quoted and discussed in informal conversation very often (much more often than weight is) and so the old units remain in common usage for a long time.
Also height, unlike weight, effectively doesn't change for an adult.
Once you know your height, as an adult, you quote the same number pretty much for the rest of your life. Quoting a different number would be as alien as changing your date of birth.
Surely you'd soon get used to saying 160 cm instead of 5 foot 3?
I just compare it to my other large object and that works pretty well
Never compare! Used to spoil my after-pool changing room experience, that did.
But that's a good point re height. I was last measured, oh, more than half a likely lifetime ago, when they were still working in feet and inches ... have never been measured in metric, though had to convert to metric to work out bmi.
Yeah - the Telegraph just happen to have used a still from about 11 seconds into this clip, when she briefly glances at him with a big grin on her face during the booing, to see him growling like thunder - https://twitter.com/vicderbyshire/status/1532660093489119233
It's not a look of affection when you see it in context.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
True. I don't. But the direction of travel on measurement units should be consolidation not the other way. That's my point really.
Agree there.
I use metric when calculating BMI in my head, but then the calc in Imperial is slightly complex !
What's 5'10" squared, divided by 13 stone 12 lb.? There are limits.
For me, like many Leavers, it was the Lisbon Treaty that made me decide to leave once it was clear that no meaningful renegotiation was possible.
Amongst many things that awful treaty did, as a nakedly transparent rehash of the EU Constitution, it gave the EU legal identity so it could sign treaties in its own name, without reference to its member nations, created a president and high commissioner for foreign affairs, drove a huge extension in QMV voting, and enshrined the Charter of Fundamental Rights into EU law. This was one of the most potent drivers for me as it made rights judicable by the ECJ which led to them demanding the UK review its policy of not giving suffrage to prisoners.
This was then exacerbated by the agenda laid down by the new President Juncker who wanted to go even further and laid out a vision of EU social and fiscal union on top. A man who Cameron tried to stop and failed to stop.
No. No No No.
If Cameron had managed to achieve what he'd laid out in his Bloomberg Speech in 2013 it might have been different, but it wasn't.
I won't vote for any party that wants to take the UK back into that.
Believing that the students who looked forward to learning Italian with a bar job in Florence or Rome or doing street photography in Arles or waiting tables in Vienna or doing ski instruction in Insbruch or being allowed free movement to 28 different countries is a sacrifice worth making so that prisoners in the UK don't get the right to vote is barking mad
Straw man. Wrong comparison. Many Brexit supporters believed, and believe, that the EU had a significant democratic deficit and ambitions that subverted the nature of the UK. The evidence that UK political elites decided to overlook those issues and ignore the people was strong. The failure to hold referendums at points of serious development was palpable.
The point had been reached where no good outcomes were available. The EU are still not open to sensible compromise. I hope SKS etc in due course can do better for us.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
True. I don't. But the direction of travel on measurement units should be consolidation not the other way. That's my point really.
Agree there.
I use metric when calculating BMI in my head, but then the calc in Imperial is slightly complex !
What's 5'10" squared, divided by 13 stone 12 lb.? There are limits.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
Height really is the exteme in the measurement discussion though. In Australia they introduced the metric system for everything well over fifty years ago. When I lived there 20 years ago, most people still quoted their height in feet and inches even though all other linear measurements were in m/km/cm/mm and not many know how far 10 miles is. Weight is always given in Kg even in informal conversation.
I'm sure the reason for this is that people numeric height's are quoted and discussed in informal conversation very often (much more often than weight is) and so the old units remain in common usage for a long time.
Also height, unlike weight, effectively doesn't change for an adult.
Once you know your height, as an adult, you quote the same number pretty much for the rest of your life. Quoting a different number would be as alien as changing your date of birth.
Surely you'd soon get used to saying 160 cm instead of 5 foot 3?
I just compare it to my other large object and that works pretty well
Never compare! Used to spoil my after-pool changing room experience, that did.
But that's a good point re height. I was last measured, oh, more than half a likely lifetime ago, when they were still working in feet and inches ... have never been measured in metric, though had to convert to metric to work out bmi.
I must be unusual in that I don't know what height I am. Because I'm bang average it never comes up. I'm a little shorter than six feet. And over 5 ten. But I couldn't tell you by how much.
Of course it's populist nonsense in terms of presentation. But there's a but.
The job of regulation is to ensure that there isn't fraud in weights and measures, and that information is given and not kept secret. That is not the same as which systems are allowed.
The best judge of how to measure things is the free market. Supermarkets have nothing to fear. A handful of them control the market and how suppliers shall operate. They also have to listen to customers.
If market traders in Barnsley and Essex want to sell apples in pounds there is decent reason for this to be decriminalised.
NB in my local German owned supermarket I buy their own brand coffee entirely in metric. The bags contain the memorable quantity of 227 grm. (Why, by the way)? Would it really be a crime to call it half a pound or 8 oz, which it is?
The buggers are already allowed to sell their apples in pounds, just so long as metric weights are also given.
Yes. The change being suggested is not great, though of course which system is the compulsory one gives a clue as to who is in charge.
And it is the sort of thing which showed a very un-UK like style of enforcement which did huge damage at the tabloid level. Governments, even Labour ones, forgot that popular tabloid readers vote.
A one size fits all approach whether you are selling potatoes to old ladies in Barnsley or doing designs for missile defence systems is not a winner.
Er, a one size approach is very necessary for missiles, and indeed anything remotely complex. Vide the Mars Climate Orbiter, which relied on a mixture of imperial (US variety) and metric.
Agree. I think you misinterpret me. Potatoes and missiles don't require the same system as each other. It is possible, if trivial, to allow Steve in Barnsley a bit of slack on the banana front without destroying the planet.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
And for now, he's right to do so. Noise and toxicity beat raw numbers.
I stick by my calendar proposed on Brexit Day;
The 2024 rewrite of the TCA (which has to happen) will actually promote trade and co-operation at the expense of the UK giving up some of the more hypothetical freedoms.
2029 will be EEA in all but name.
2040ish will be the UK choosing to be in the room when decisions are taken.
A generation of withered trade and soured relationships. And all so Boomers with 3 O-Levels could get a different coloured passport and a vacuum cleaner that pumps out useless extra heat.
I suppose those with 3 O levels were to be respected previously when they voted the right way?
It's the contempt Remainers can't stop. "Anyone that disagrees with me is old and thick". They are completely unable to have a level headed conversation about it.
And in most discussions they can't even make a single concession in the argument. If you point out the predictions of the Remain campaign all turned out to be flat out lies, they will twist and turn trying to pretend otherwise. At best they will try to say the predictions were from evil Tories, rather ignoring the Labour leader of the Remain campaign repeating them everywhere.
Yes, they exude a fetid stench of sneering and snobbery, the Remainers: they cannot help themselves. The reek always escapes
It’s like Ken Livingstone trying to have a sensible conversation about Jews. Just wait a few minutes. Ah. There it is. Bingo
How long till you are fighting to get us back in EU
About five hours, when I am well into my 2nd bottle of Saperavi, and fancy a ruck
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
Er, yes, and? St Paul's is NOT under Labour-held Westminster City Council.
It will have a Labour MP though given the swing to Labour in Westminster in the local elections, the City of London was 75% Remain and Westminster was 69% Remain, it is Remainer and anti Boris central
Are you seriously arguing that a crowd who show up to Royal watch is Remainer central? I guess you are.
Yep that is nonsense isn't. Also those there aren't from Westminster or the City, they will be from all over the South East with many, many from further afield in the UK. I mean yesterday they were interviewing people on the street from Australia, Canada and USA who had come specially.
The City is one of the most Tory rich places in the country, or it should be.
The people who work there - maybe. But speaking as someone who did once live in the Square Mile - the ~9000 voters who live there are maybe not who you think. They're generally very highly educated people without children, who would rather have easy access to the high culture of London rather than a suburban life, generally earning good money out of the City but IME quite a lot have fairly liberal values and generally pretty Remainy. It's certainly not the shoo-in for the Tories that you seem to think.
Voting for the Corporation is a bit strange though as it's dominated by 20+k business votes, controlled by people who mostly don't live in the City itself.
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
Er, yes, and? St Paul's is NOT under Labour-held Westminster City Council.
It will have a Labour MP though given the swing to Labour in Westminster in the local elections, the City of London was 75% Remain and Westminster was 69% Remain, it is Remainer and anti Boris central
Are you seriously arguing that a crowd who show up to Royal watch is Remainer central? I guess you are.
Yep that is nonsense isn't. Also those there aren't from Westminster or the City, they will be from all over the South East with many, many further afield in the UK. I mean yesterday they were interviewing people on the street from Australia, Canada and USA who had come especially.
I suspect many of the royalists still recall the image of HMQ grieving alone while Boris's drunken gang were spraying the walls of Number Ten with vomit.
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 12m It's not exactly Ceausescu on the balcony. But Tory MPs will have noticed the boos for Boris. London crowd yes, but a crowd primarily made up of royal watchers.
It was at St Paul's which is in City of London and Westminster constituency, which now has a Labour council in Westminster.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
St Paul's is in the City of London, NOT the City of Westminster. So it would NOT have a Labour council!
It is in the City of London AND Westminster parliamentary constituency, Westminster council is now Labour controlled.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
Er, yes, and? St Paul's is NOT under Labour-held Westminster City Council.
It will have a Labour MP though given the swing to Labour in Westminster in the local elections, the City of London was 75% Remain and Westminster was 69% Remain, it is Remainer and anti Boris central
Are you seriously arguing that a crowd who show up to Royal watch is Remainer central? I guess you are.
The way forward on Brexit is truth and reconciliation.
We can't lance the boil until we admit the lies on which it was won.
When NHS waiting times have gone up because there are not enough EU staff, we can't fix that unless we are honest about it.
FoM was a benefit of membership, for everybody.
Both sides told whoppers, as you well know.
Of course they did. That's politics. It is the winners lies that grate though as they are the ones that we live with. Hence the falling support for Brexit.
The difference in this case is that we also get to see the losers case in action, as we witness EU bungling over vaccines, twice as high unemployment and incoherence over Ukraine.
There speaks a true Little Englander, utter and unmitigated bollox of the first order from a cretinous half witted excuse for a human being.
Of course it's populist nonsense in terms of presentation. But there's a but.
The job of regulation is to ensure that there isn't fraud in weights and measures, and that information is given and not kept secret. That is not the same as which systems are allowed.
The best judge of how to measure things is the free market. Supermarkets have nothing to fear. A handful of them control the market and how suppliers shall operate. They also have to listen to customers.
If market traders in Barnsley and Essex want to sell apples in pounds there is decent reason for this to be decriminalised.
NB in my local German owned supermarket I buy their own brand coffee entirely in metric. The bags contain the memorable quantity of 227 grm. (Why, by the way)? Would it really be a crime to call it half a pound or 8 oz, which it is?
The buggers are already allowed to sell their apples in pounds, just so long as metric weights are also given.
Yes. The change being suggested is not great, though of course which system is the compulsory one gives a clue as to who is in charge.
And it is the sort of thing which showed a very un-UK like style of enforcement which did huge damage at the tabloid level. Governments, even Labour ones, forgot that popular tabloid readers vote.
A one size fits all approach whether you are selling potatoes to old ladies in Barnsley or doing designs for missile defence systems is not a winner.
Er, a one size approach is very necessary for missiles, and indeed anything remotely complex. Vide the Mars Climate Orbiter, which relied on a mixture of imperial (US variety) and metric.
Agree. I think you misinterpret me. Potatoes and missiles don't require the same system as each other. It is possible, if trivial, to allow Steve in Barnsley a bit of slack on the banana front without destroying the planet.
All PMs get the bird. Johnson's interface with the public is meant to be his trump card, however.
Particularly this crowd of daft twats who actually turned up in person to this nonsense bedecked in the Butcher's Apron. They should be Johnson's Republican Guard.
For me, like many Leavers, it was the Lisbon Treaty that made me decide to leave once it was clear that no meaningful renegotiation was possible.
Amongst many things that awful treaty did, as a nakedly transparent rehash of the EU Constitution, it gave the EU legal identity so it could sign treaties in its own name, without reference to its member nations, created a president and high commissioner for foreign affairs, drove a huge extension in QMV voting, and enshrined the Charter of Fundamental Rights into EU law. This was one of the most potent drivers for me as it made rights judicable by the ECJ which led to them demanding the UK review its policy of not giving suffrage to prisoners.
This was then exacerbated by the agenda laid down by the new President Juncker who wanted to go even further and laid out a vision of EU social and fiscal union on top. A man who Cameron tried to stop and failed to stop.
No. No No No.
If Cameron had managed to achieve what he'd laid out in his Bloomberg Speech in 2013 it might have been different, but it wasn't.
I won't vote for any party that wants to take the UK back into that.
Believing that the students who looked forward to learning Italian with a bar job in Florence or Rome or doing street photography in Arles or waiting tables in Vienna or doing ski instruction in Insbruch or being allowed free movement to 28 different countries is a sacrifice worth making so that prisoners in the UK don't get the right to vote is barking mad
Straw man. Wrong comparison. Many Brexit supporters believed, and believe, that the EU had a significant democratic deficit and ambitions that subverted the nature of the UK. The evidence that UK political elites decided to overlook those issues and ignore the people was strong. The failure to hold referendums at points of serious development was palpable.
The point had been reached where no good outcomes were available. The EU are still not open to sensible compromise. I hope SKS etc in due course can do better for us.
You will be hoping for a long time, will take years to get the skelves out of his arse from all that fence sitting.
I was thinking of voting LibDem in the forthcoming T and H election, as I want Boris out. Reading this thread reminded my why I swore not to do that again.
Care to elaborate?
EU. The core leadership of the party would throw anything away, even liberalism and democracy, for it. The members used to be a bit more equivocal, and the voters at least in the SW were downright hostile.
I have knocked on literally thousands of doors for the LibDems. I was always bemused when other canvassers would report that Europe never came up, whereas I would receive it loud and clear at 120 decibels. I guess you hear what you want to hear.
I recall the LibDems staging a strop when their demand to get an in/out referendum was turned down. Of course when they (we) did get offered one a few years later they voted against it, duly lost it and used every trick in the Trump book to frustrate its implementation (with the honourable exception of the late great Paddy Ashdown).
Democracy when it suits doesn't work for me so I left the party after 28 years. Since then they seems to have been captured by the worst excesses of student extremism and pretty much reject the Enlightenment never mind about classical liberalism.
I actually think Jeremy Corbyn has a stronger grip on reality than the likes of Layla Moran.
A Lib Dem that gets it! Bravo
OK an ex Lib Dem, but still
Yes, the attempts to thwart the 2016 vote were Trumpite, minus the flares and buffalo horns. It was still a shameful bid to subvert democracy
I could actually vote for a really liberal, really democratic Lib Dem party. Socially relaxed, fiscally prudent, friendly to all our neighbours (including the EU), sound on defence and the union, strong on the Enlightenment, not full of Woke lefty idiots or lying greedy Tories. Sadly, I can’t see that in the LDs right now
I was thinking of voting LibDem in the forthcoming T and H election, as I want Boris out. Reading this thread reminded my why I swore not to do that again.
Care to elaborate?
EU. The core leadership of the party would throw anything away, even liberalism and democracy, for it. The members used to be a bit more equivocal, and the voters at least in the SW were downright hostile.
I have knocked on literally thousands of doors for the LibDems. I was always bemused when other canvassers would report that Europe never came up, whereas I would receive it loud and clear at 120 decibels. I guess you hear what you want to hear.
I recall the LibDems staging a strop when their demand to get an in/out referendum was turned down. Of course when they (we) did get offered one a few years later they voted against it, duly lost it and used every trick in the Trump book to frustrate its implementation (with the honourable exception of the late great Paddy Ashdown).
Democracy when it suits doesn't work for me so I left the party after 28 years. Since then they seems to have been captured by the worst excesses of student extremism and pretty much reject the Enlightenment never mind about classical liberalism.
I actually think Jeremy Corbyn has a stronger grip on reality than the likes of Layla Moran.
A Lib Dem that gets it! Bravo
OK an ex Lib Dem, but still
Yes, the attempts to thwart the 2016 vote were Trumpite, minus the flares and buffalo horns. It was still a shameful bid to subvert democracy
I could actually vote for a really liberal, really democratic Lib Dem party. Socially relaxed, fiscally prudent, friendly to all our neighbours (including the EU), sound on defence and the union, strong on the Enlightenment, not full of Woke lefty idiots or lying greedy Tories. Sadly, I can’t see that in the LDs right now
Ed Davey is certainly closer to that though than any LD leader since Clegg
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
Height really is the exteme in the measurement discussion though. In Australia they introduced the metric system for everything well over fifty years ago. When I lived there 20 years ago, most people still quoted their height in feet and inches even though all other linear measurements were in m/km/cm/mm and not many know how far 10 miles is. Weight is always given in Kg even in informal conversation.
I'm sure the reason for this is that people numeric height's are quoted and discussed in informal conversation very often (much more often than weight is) and so the old units remain in common usage for a long time.
Also height, unlike weight, effectively doesn't change for an adult.
Once you know your height, as an adult, you quote the same number pretty much for the rest of your life. Quoting a different number would be as alien as changing your date of birth.
Surely you'd soon get used to saying 160 cm instead of 5 foot 3?
I just compare it to my other large object and that works pretty well
Never compare! Used to spoil my after-pool changing room experience, that did.
But that's a good point re height. I was last measured, oh, more than half a likely lifetime ago, when they were still working in feet and inches ... have never been measured in metric, though had to convert to metric to work out bmi.
Same here. I do happen to know my metric metric but it's not what springs to mind. And, yes, height is different to weight because after a time it doesn't change - other than a touch of shrinkage post 65. But this is compensated for by your ears getting bigger.
My issue with Brexit now is that anyone that raises issues is told they're trying to get us to rejoin.
I have no interest in seeing us back in the EU, we've left, fine. But the current arrangement is not working
There is a reason the leavers don't really want Brexit discussed, they are on the back foot and have been for years. Even at the point we actually left a plurality of voters believed it was wrong to leave. That has never wavered and in fact is increasing according to the last poll I saw - - 12% gap now IIRC. Any criticism is shouted down as people wanting to rejoin. Even that is not really working. The numbers who believe Brexit has been a success continues to decline.
I was thinking of voting LibDem in the forthcoming T and H election, as I want Boris out. Reading this thread reminded my why I swore not to do that again.
Care to elaborate?
EU. The core leadership of the party would throw anything away, even liberalism and democracy, for it. The members used to be a bit more equivocal, and the voters at least in the SW were downright hostile.
I have knocked on literally thousands of doors for the LibDems. I was always bemused when other canvassers would report that Europe never came up, whereas I would receive it loud and clear at 120 decibels. I guess you hear what you want to hear.
I recall the LibDems staging a strop when their demand to get an in/out referendum was turned down. Of course when they (we) did get offered one a few years later they voted against it, duly lost it and used every trick in the Trump book to frustrate its implementation (with the honourable exception of the late great Paddy Ashdown).
Democracy when it suits doesn't work for me so I left the party after 28 years. Since then they seems to have been captured by the worst excesses of student extremism and pretty much reject the Enlightenment never mind about classical liberalism.
I actually think Jeremy Corbyn has a stronger grip on reality than the likes of Layla Moran.
A Lib Dem that gets it! Bravo
OK an ex Lib Dem, but still
Yes, the attempts to thwart the 2016 vote were Trumpite, minus the flares and buffalo horns. It was still a shameful bid to subvert democracy
I could actually vote for a really liberal, really democratic Lib Dem party. Socially relaxed, fiscally prudent, friendly to all our neighbours (including the EU), sound on defence and the union, strong on the Enlightenment, not full of Woke lefty idiots or lying greedy Tories. Sadly, I can’t see that in the LDs right now
Of course it's populist nonsense in terms of presentation. But there's a but.
The job of regulation is to ensure that there isn't fraud in weights and measures, and that information is given and not kept secret. That is not the same as which systems are allowed.
The best judge of how to measure things is the free market. Supermarkets have nothing to fear. A handful of them control the market and how suppliers shall operate. They also have to listen to customers.
If market traders in Barnsley and Essex want to sell apples in pounds there is decent reason for this to be decriminalised.
NB in my local German owned supermarket I buy their own brand coffee entirely in metric. The bags contain the memorable quantity of 227 grm. (Why, by the way)? Would it really be a crime to call it half a pound or 8 oz, which it is?
The buggers are already allowed to sell their apples in pounds, just so long as metric weights are also given.
Yes. The change being suggested is not great, though of course which system is the compulsory one gives a clue as to who is in charge.
And it is the sort of thing which showed a very un-UK like style of enforcement which did huge damage at the tabloid level. Governments, even Labour ones, forgot that popular tabloid readers vote.
A one size fits all approach whether you are selling potatoes to old ladies in Barnsley or doing designs for missile defence systems is not a winner.
Er, a one size approach is very necessary for missiles, and indeed anything remotely complex. Vide the Mars Climate Orbiter, which relied on a mixture of imperial (US variety) and metric.
Agree. I think you misinterpret me. Potatoes and missiles don't require the same system as each other. It is possible, if trivial, to allow Steve in Barnsley a bit of slack on the banana front without destroying the planet.
But he already has that slack!
Anyway, off to finish decluttering the room ...
Which is why the matter is trivial. Steve can sell in pounds under a dual system now, there is a consultation over whether he can also use pound scales and not provide a metric price alternative as well. It is a trivial piece of tabloid retail politics on all sides.
The only not trivial bit is the subtext in prosecuting Steve for minor regulatory offences (metric martyrs and all that). This is an exercise in 'We are the masters now. And we don't want oiks putting two fingers up to our EU ideals'.
I was thinking of voting LibDem in the forthcoming T and H election, as I want Boris out. Reading this thread reminded my why I swore not to do that again.
Care to elaborate?
EU. The core leadership of the party would throw anything away, even liberalism and democracy, for it. The members used to be a bit more equivocal, and the voters at least in the SW were downright hostile.
I have knocked on literally thousands of doors for the LibDems. I was always bemused when other canvassers would report that Europe never came up, whereas I would receive it loud and clear at 120 decibels. I guess you hear what you want to hear.
I recall the LibDems staging a strop when their demand to get an in/out referendum was turned down. Of course when they (we) did get offered one a few years later they voted against it, duly lost it and used every trick in the Trump book to frustrate its implementation (with the honourable exception of the late great Paddy Ashdown).
Democracy when it suits doesn't work for me so I left the party after 28 years. Since then they seems to have been captured by the worst excesses of student extremism and pretty much reject the Enlightenment never mind about classical liberalism.
I actually think Jeremy Corbyn has a stronger grip on reality than the likes of Layla Moran.
A Lib Dem that gets it! Bravo
OK an ex Lib Dem, but still
Yes, the attempts to thwart the 2016 vote were Trumpite, minus the flares and buffalo horns. It was still a shameful bid to subvert democracy
I could actually vote for a really liberal, really democratic Lib Dem party. Socially relaxed, fiscally prudent, friendly to all our neighbours (including the EU), sound on defence and the union, strong on the Enlightenment, not full of Woke lefty idiots or lying greedy Tories. Sadly, I can’t see that in the LDs right now
Note for railway enthusiasts: on my way to London and for the first time ever the journey starts at Okehampton not Exeter st David's. Life changing.
I did Exeter to Okehampton as a Sunday special back in 2019.
Sure. But this is a routine, unexciting, scheduled service.
Pity the line hasn't been extended all the way to Plymouth - then it would have the views from the Meldon Viaduct. Stumbled across, or rather under, it unexpectedly when being taken for walkies by a local friend - one of the last of the wrought iron constructions on the railways. Fascinating postindustrial landscape in the valley which it crosses, remains of mining and so on.
PS and this is Sunil. For him any service is exciting - especially on a new line. A commendable sentiment.
Viaduct won't take trains without a complete rebuild. Also I live close enough to that line that they could use my house to remake the railway children and I don't want express trains in my backyard so I am happy as is, a lift to the station is no longer a 2 hour round trip
I was thinking of voting LibDem in the forthcoming T and H election, as I want Boris out. Reading this thread reminded my why I swore not to do that again.
Care to elaborate?
EU. The core leadership of the party would throw anything away, even liberalism and democracy, for it. The members used to be a bit more equivocal, and the voters at least in the SW were downright hostile.
I have knocked on literally thousands of doors for the LibDems. I was always bemused when other canvassers would report that Europe never came up, whereas I would receive it loud and clear at 120 decibels. I guess you hear what you want to hear.
I recall the LibDems staging a strop when their demand to get an in/out referendum was turned down. Of course when they (we) did get offered one a few years later they voted against it, duly lost it and used every trick in the Trump book to frustrate its implementation (with the honourable exception of the late great Paddy Ashdown).
Democracy when it suits doesn't work for me so I left the party after 28 years. Since then they seems to have been captured by the worst excesses of student extremism and pretty much reject the Enlightenment never mind about classical liberalism.
I actually think Jeremy Corbyn has a stronger grip on reality than the likes of Layla Moran.
A Lib Dem that gets it! Bravo
OK an ex Lib Dem, but still
Yes, the attempts to thwart the 2016 vote were Trumpite, minus the flares and buffalo horns. It was still a shameful bid to subvert democracy
I could actually vote for a really liberal, really democratic Lib Dem party. Socially relaxed, fiscally prudent, friendly to all our neighbours (including the EU), sound on defence and the union, strong on the Enlightenment, not full of Woke lefty idiots or lying greedy Tories. Sadly, I can’t see that in the LDs right now
"strong on the Enlightenment" - lol.
Yeah, you know: Free Speech. No de facto blasphemy laws. That kinda shit
To clarify, NUPES is the Nouvelle Union Populaire, Ecologique et Sociale which is basically Melenchon's party plus the Greens and Socialists. Ensemble is Macron's LREM plus a couple of others. National Rally is the Le Pen party while UDC (Union de droite et centre) is the alliance of centre-right and liberal parties led by Les Republicans. Reconquete is Zemmour's party.
Cluster 17 does tend to inflate the NUPES numbers more than other posters. Pollsters such as Elabe, Harris and Ifop have Ensemble just ahead of NUPES (27 to 25) with National Rally a close third on 21%.
It's of course a two-round poll and I suspect this will help Ensemble who may be able to pick up centre-right votes to overhaul NUPES on June 19th.
Comments
In sane societies the T and R process listens carefully to the history of polemic on all sides rather than starting with its own.
https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/1532683444609859585?t=9g4Ci18l-k2VEJCskYvCHA&s=19
It's also very interesting that SKS didn't attract a cheep either way - so the crowd is plainly not full of lefties.
The job of regulation is to ensure that there isn't fraud in weights and measures, and that information is given and not kept secret. That is not the same as which systems are allowed.
The best judge of how to measure things is the free market. Supermarkets have nothing to fear. A handful of them control the market and how suppliers shall operate. They also have to listen to customers.
If market traders in Barnsley and Essex want to sell apples in pounds there is decent reason for this to be decriminalised.
NB in my local German owned supermarket I buy their own brand coffee entirely in metric. The bags contain the memorable quantity of 227 grm. (Why, by the way)? Would it really be a crime to call it half a pound or 8 oz, which it is?
The majority of foreign NHS staff are, and always have been, from outside the EU.
In any event, per the commons library:
"In June 2016 there were 58,698 staff with recorded EU nationality, and in January there were over 70,660. But to present this as the full story would be misleading, because we know that there are almost 50,000 more staff for whom nationality is known now than in 2016.
It is very likely that there has been an overall increase in the number of NHS staff with EU nationality since 2016, but we can’t be sure about the scale of the change, and it would be misleading to calculate an increase just based on the two numbers above."
(emphasis mine)
Full, interesting, details:
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7783/
You don't start truth and reconciliation by telling massive porkies.
Exellent sermon by Stephen Cottrell, Archbishop of York I thought
All these “fake tickets”. Apparently stewards were taking tickets off fans, saying Non, that’s fake, then ducking away to give these real tickets to local friends, or to touts to sell them on
Apparently Stade de France recruits heavily in St Denis, for its stewards, so the potential for this to happen was obvious
Bit of a debacle for Macron, now
@ThatTimWalker
But your attitude to London is why you're losing here and losing big.
So wall-to-wall sneering Remainers who work in finance and the arts.
Do keep up.
And it is the sort of thing which showed a very un-UK like style of enforcement which did huge damage at the tabloid level. Governments, even Labour ones, forgot that popular tabloid readers vote.
A one size fits all approach whether you are selling potatoes to old ladies in Barnsley or doing designs for missile defence systems is not a winner.
But HYUFD is intent on waving goodbye to London
"Nurses and health visitors are the only staff group to record a fall in the number of recorded EU nationals since the EU referendum. EU nurses as a percentage of those with a known nationality have fallen from 7.4% of the total to 5.6%."
In my department we have only one of our Portugese or Spanish nurses left, and a Romanian. All the others have gone back, and there have been no new arrivals.
Brexit is part of the reason, but covid was the other big part. Most of the EU nurses travelled back every few months but could not, and job opportunities became availible in Spain. It was a great opprtunity to move back home so they did.
Similarly our Greek doctors (Greece exports a lot of graduates) have mostly gone for similar reasons, to be replaced by Egyptians and South Asians.
Both Nurses and Doctors tended to register for the settlement scheme, even with no intention of returning, and none of them have returned.
The City of London corporation candidates only stand as independents
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11j5Moz9dYA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9EbR0ckb40
I have knocked on literally thousands of doors for the LibDems. I was always bemused when other canvassers would report that Europe never came up, whereas I would receive it loud and clear at 120 decibels. I guess you hear what you want to hear.
I recall the LibDems staging a strop when their demand to get an in/out referendum was turned down. Of course when they (we) did get offered one a few years later they voted against it, duly lost it and used every trick in the Trump book to frustrate its implementation (with the honourable exception of the late great Paddy Ashdown).
Democracy when it suits doesn't work for me so I left the party after 28 years. Since then they seems to have been captured by the worst excesses of student extremism and pretty much reject the Enlightenment never mind about classical liberalism.
I actually think Jeremy Corbyn has a stronger grip on reality than the likes of Layla Moran.
PS and this is Sunil. For him any service is exciting - especially on a new line. A commendable sentiment.
Glasses will still have to use legal markings to show it is a pint. And there was nothing preventing pint glasses from having a 'decorative' Crown symbol in addition to these when UK was in the EU... https://twitter.com/ionewells/status/1532616626109030400
I guess you are.
I don't accept your characterisation of the current party under Davey. I see clear signs of the party re-adopting the tenets of fiscal probity and offering a viable alternative to the two high tax and spend social democratic parties. To be fair, the Party has always prospered when it has a distinctive message.
The market for "classical liberalism" isn't large in the post-Covid world when we see Sunak dishing out vast amounts of largesse (for which we will all have to pay in time). Going back to the 1950s brand of liberalism would leave us permanently marginalised at 10%.
Let's be honest - many people vote against parties rather than for them. If those who don't want to vote Conservative or Labour decide to support the LDs or Greens, so be it. I doubt Johnson or Starmer are concerned why people support their parties, I don't see why we should be.
https://twitter.com/vicderbyshire/status/1532660093489119233
It's not a look of affection when you see it in context.
The point had been reached where no good outcomes were available. The EU are still not open to sensible compromise. I hope SKS etc in due course can do better for us.
Voting for the Corporation is a bit strange though as it's dominated by 20+k business votes, controlled by people who mostly don't live in the City itself.
"He brought his own boos."
https://twitter.com/LevellingDown/status/1532667904201719809?t=ha69XzjFFPEoPH5y9X-56g&s=19
Anyway, off to finish decluttering the room ...
https://twitter.com/i/status/1532061580744982528
OK an ex Lib Dem, but still
Yes, the attempts to thwart the 2016 vote were Trumpite, minus the flares and buffalo horns. It was still a shameful bid to subvert democracy
I could actually vote for a really liberal, really democratic Lib Dem party. Socially relaxed, fiscally prudent, friendly to all our neighbours (including the EU), sound on defence and the union, strong on the Enlightenment, not full of Woke lefty idiots or lying greedy Tories. Sadly, I can’t see that in the LDs right now
Incidentally. Are there two less user friendly websites?
The only not trivial bit is the subtext in prosecuting Steve for minor regulatory offences (metric martyrs and all that). This is an exercise in 'We are the masters now. And we don't want oiks putting two fingers up to our EU ideals'.
Tldr meldon is a bridge too far
The latest Cluster 17 poll has the following:
NUPES: 31% (+6)
Ensemble: 27% (-5)
National Rally: 19% (+6)
UDC: 10% (-9)
Reconquete: 5% (new)
To clarify, NUPES is the Nouvelle Union Populaire, Ecologique et Sociale which is basically Melenchon's party plus the Greens and Socialists. Ensemble is Macron's LREM plus a couple of others. National Rally is the Le Pen party while UDC (Union de droite et centre) is the alliance of centre-right and liberal parties led by Les Republicans. Reconquete is Zemmour's party.
Cluster 17 does tend to inflate the NUPES numbers more than other posters. Pollsters such as Elabe, Harris and Ifop have Ensemble just ahead of NUPES (27 to 25) with National Rally a close third on 21%.
It's of course a two-round poll and I suspect this will help Ensemble who may be able to pick up centre-right votes to overhaul NUPES on June 19th.