£8b of savings looks to me like £350m on the side of a bus. The ingenuous focus their ire on the numbers, implicitly conceding the point about cutting diversity officers etc.
It'll be GPs, nurses, care workers, dustmen, street cleaners, policemen, firemen, ambulance workers, paramedics, teachers, teaching assistants etc which will need to go if those sort of savings are to be made. It is absurd.
There are shortages of all such people at the moment. We need to pay more to attract and retain them.
Those who these sorts of cuts will hurt most are Tory voters - the old. Good luck trying to use the money saved in a tax cut to pay for an ambulance to take you to an overcrowded hospital tens of miles away.
If you need to pay more to attract people in one locale or region then that would justify paying more to attract them in that locale or region. That's precisely why there should be localised pay rates.
Crowding out private sector investment in the regions by ensuring everyone talented does basic public sector work instead of investing in the private sector isn't a successful model that is working.
If there's one thing the Conservative Government doesn't do, it's pay more in the public sector when there's a need to do so to attract people. When has a Tory PM's first reaction to shortages in public sector staffing ever been to increase pay?
If you're going to treat public sector pay the same way as private sector pay, fine, but do so properly. A system that treats pay as a political football rather than as something set by the market has to offer something else instead to compensate.
@ydoethur has been talking about a teacher shortage, especially new teachers, and the government has just increased new teacher pay by more than other national pay rates are changing in response to that.
The problem is though if you're going with national pay rates it will always be far more politicised and sclerotic than it should be. A small business can be affected by local supply and demand and set the pay rate at an individual level but national pay scales are always going to be dominated more by political whims than supply and demand. Only once supply and demand starts affecting politics will it be responsive.
The more localised it gets, the more responsive it can be.
Um, academies are not subject to national pay rates - if they wish to pay more they can (in a way other schools can't)
Yes and no.
A lot of academies stick to the national rates, because it's a recruitment selling point. A lot of people put quite a bit of value on not having to negotiate their pay rise individually, even if it means they are paid less.
More significantly, the funding the school gets doesn't change, so the total budget is still limited. One of the things coming down the track is the gap between the teacher pay rise that was announced recently and the cash schools are getting.
Watch for who the next PM makes EdSec. It will be a rival they want to destroy...
All the more reason for localised, even individualised, pay rates.
If a school has eg a shortage of Maths teachers, but an abundance of applicants to be English teachers, then the logical thing to do would be to increase the pay offered to those qualified to teach maths while freezing the pay of those qualified to teach English.
Central bargaining is the worst possible system for filling vacancies as it leads to a lowest common denominator system where either some roles will be uncompetitive, or some roles will be paid too much and money wasted. Most likely, both at the same time.
You make a reasonable case for the value of local bargaining to fill vacancies, but you realise that the upshot of this will be a notable increase in the public sector wage bill? I'm all for that: I want adequately funded and staffed public services. I just wanted to check you were OK with the consequences too.
I very much doubt that. Unless there's huge swathes of roles going unfilled at the minute, in which case the bill should go up in order to fill them.
There are shortages in NHS staff; these are frequently reported. There are shortages in teaching staff; these are frequently reported. There are shortages in social work staff; these are frequently reported. There are shortages in care staff; these are frequently reported.
There are always 'shortages', that's part of the churn of the labour market. If there weren't, then young people entering the labour market wouldn't be able to be hired, since there'd be no roles available for them to fill.
'Shortages' and 'shortages' can be completely different things. 'Shortages' are not necessarily a reason to increase pay rates.
There are serious and substantial shortages in all the areas I identified, which have been frequently reported. The Government, like all Conservative Governments since time immemorial, refuses to believe that increasing wages will solve these problems in the public sector. Magically, wages are only an incentive in the private sector.
My random discovery today - 1 North West council is so short of planners they are looking for a £90,000 a year consultant to do the job...
I've published ads on here before.
£58 per hour for a bog standard planning officers, and that is outside of IR35. The advertised day rates for interim managers are currently £500-£650 per day. Thats what, £140k+ per year? All over the country.
These are jobs that they try and recruit permanent staff at £30 - £50k per year, the type of area where Liz Truss thought regional pay boards should be cutting pay, for new entrants.
Why is it planning officers in particular? What's special that makes it so difficult to recruit?
Private sector pay has increased over the years - public sector pay isn't much different from 2010 or really 2005...
2 friends of Mrs Eek have just joined at her place for an easy life prior to retirement. Both have gone from £70k+ private sector jobs to £35,000 max but only went there because the Mrs sold it to them...
Yes. But why planning officers in particular? As opposed to any other public sector position. Or is this just an example. Incidentally. I am awaiting my portable DBS for teaching come September. Am pitching for £200 per day in the northeast. Am not being told an outright no, shall we say.
Look at the private sector pay - £70k or so....
Public sector pays £40k max and that's to lead a team. That is probably a junior staff member in the private sector - hence everyone heads towards the private sector asap to earn more money.
And the work is probably way more interesting as well with little stress over 8 week deadlines...
At the top end the private sector pays more, however overall the public sector pays 7.6% more and even 0.9% more considering workers skills and characteristics
So Liz has committed to Northern Powerhouse Rail; Defence Spending at 3%, and now “bringing back” the triple-lock for pensioners.
Northern Powerhouse Rail, or the Integrated Rail Plan that superseded it?
I think it's a variation of the 2 because the plan now appears to be via Bradford but not necessarily the highest speed.
Without knowing what is happening to HS2E however it's impossible to know what needs to be done - with HS2E the service is increased connectivity across the north if HS2E doesn't go to Leeds it also needs to support HS2 trains going to London via Manchester as well
Unless they're mad enough to think the current Midland Main Line can actually take the extra traffic.
Wouldn't put it past them, but it can't.
Oh they think it can - which is where all the stupidity comes from... They see the Victoria line increasing capacity to 30 trains an hour and assuming it can be done everywhere without asking - why hasn't it already occurred.
Really? I assumed they were just making shit up to try and cover up their intention to refuse to improve transport in the north, prior to axing the whole north-eastern leg and HS3 in three years (after the next election).
I mean, they hadn't even bothered to study a map, I thought engineering and pathing systems would be beyond them.
My point is they haven't got as far as a map nor pathing systems. My logic went if 1 line can run 30 trains an hour - they assume all lines can...
Pretty much any line can run getting on for 30 trains an hour AS LONG AS THEY ARE ALL OF THE SAME SPEED. 30 slow trains an hour calling at all stations a la the Victoria Line - brilliant. 30 (well, in practice, probably 22-ish) high speed trains an hour - brilliant. 30 freight trains an hour - great. A mix of slow and freight - can be done.
It's mixing fast and slow trains which kills capacity, along with complex junctions. You need to leave a massive gap after you slow train before you set the fast train off or the slow train gets in the fast train's way.
That's the logic of high speed rail - put the high speed trains on their own track with hardly any junctions and you can do much, much more with the remaining track.
We know that - but the Government doesn't - the entire point of the IRP was that you can throw 22 trains an hour down all routes regardless of the actual speed of the service and the complexity of the junctions.
As otherwise you wouldn't be doing something as daft as getting HS2 trains to travel into Derby and Nottingham city centres...
Mr. Leon, gardening is often a very good thing for people's wellbeing.
Indeed. Probably most people feel the same way and I’m unusual
I like having as little responsibility as possible. A small flat in a nice location that I can lock and leave. Minimal hassle
As you documented during the winter lockdown in 2021 you struggle when you are tired to one location - you have epic wanderlust. Others would much rather be at home. It may be why I found the same experience an absolute breeze.
Yes indeed. I don’t think I will be very good at old age and increasing immobility
I’ll somehow have to escape with my mind. Hmpft
Very considerably reduced mobility and very considerably reduced manual dexterity are very difficult crosses to bear. Fortunately my mind is still coping extremely well with the challenges put to it!
I've seen it in my own father (now 87) - and he's a homebody who rarely adventured, even when he had the chance. Fuck knows how bad I will be, biting the carpet when I am used to skipping around the world
I might simply stock up on heroin
I always felt the trick with drugs was variety, it's quite hard to get addicted to anything you don't do several days in a row.
So a good retirement might look like Acid wednesdays, a sprinkling of ket on thursday, fish'n'heroin fridays, Scotch Saturday, valium is and always has been a sunday drug. Dealer's choice on monday, then maybe a bit of puff on tuesday to deal with the inevitable comedown.
The other people at the old folk's home might complain, mind.
If there has to be a Tory prime minister I'd rather it were one who isn't batsh*t - even if a batsh*t one would be better for Labour in a GE some time in the distant future.
Unless he's sending a secret message, someone should tell Dominic Cummings that he's got the accent in the wrong place on "decadénce".
That said, if Liz Truss becomes PM we can play the game of "hunt the news editor who knows the rules about apostrophes".
"Liz Truss' proposal for raising school standard's" :-)
Surely one can go either way with proper names ending with s?
It’s possible that there is a problem in some areas with crowding out.
Real wages (public and private) outside the the SE and Scotland probably need to fall to East European levels if they are to reflect actual productivity add.
Good luck selling it on the doorstep.
And so the transition from "what a stupid idea" to "a sensible idea, but not politically acceptable" begins.
I am not saying it’s a sensible idea at all. Read mine and eek’s and ratter’s posts.
Read them and understand them.
That's why I said the transition begins. I've read and understood them, I just disagree with them.
But I've said what I have to say and nothing new to add, so not much point in adding more.
This is a good idea, but not politic to be introduced. What a shame. Its the sort of thing that would be better off being introduced by a new government at the start of a Parliament so it has time to bed in and work, it will never win an election. A shame Osborne flunked this issue.
PS I agree completely with Ratters that local would be better than regional and I said the same myself, which is why I called this a small step in the right direction.
You can't do it in the public sector for political reasons.
You can't do it in the private sector because both the minimum wage and the public sector wages preclude it.
Equally the issue isn't the wages - it's the lack of investment in productivity improvements because we as a whole are happy to take profits while Corporation Tax is low rather than invest money to increase productivity long term.
The more I think about it the more it seems most companies have scarily short term views and don't see themselves having long enough futures to warrant investing money in their futures.
How much of that is because the UK has put so many of its eggs in the financial sector basket for so long?
We're also extremely bad at producing scientific talent ... [snip!]
Actually, we are quite at producing but we are extremely bad at putting such talent to good use or keeping it here.
Two talents the UK has by the tonne are a belief that mediocrity is to be admired and a meanness to spend whatever it takes to do something right. Being told to "make do" on a half budget by someone with no understanding of what they are talking about is no way to produce excellence
Not a sarky comment: but do you have evidence of that? I'm mostly looking at it from the front line perspective where engineering roles sit open for months at a time and recruiters barrage anyone with "engineer" in their title with offers on LinkedIn, so from my perspective it looks like we aren't producing enough people with the right skills. I am aware that anecdote isn't data though.
Evidence? Not really, just over 30 years experience of science and engineering were it was a common theme of everyone I ever spoke to plus what I came up against myself both as an employee and an IT consultant. There is even more anecdata going back into the past - John Harrison and marine chronometer, Charles Parsons and the Turbinia, Frank Whittle and the jet engine, the Black Arrow programme, etc, etc. HS2 / HS3 is just another example of trying to trim the project to fit the budget, but it is not unique by any means.
The real problem is the instinct to try and prevent people with domain knowledge run things.
I was told, early in my career, at an oil company that ran itself like the civil service and recruited a lot of ex civil servants, that no-one who was "IT parented" could be considered for a managerial role..... in the IT Dept. Such roles needed to go to people with the right background.
Charles Parsons got an enormous amount of encouragement from the engineering lot in the RN - the story that he was being frozen out wasn't exactly true. The famous Turbina run may have been suggested as a political trick by the *RN head of engineering* at the time. They certainly bought into turbine vessels very quickly, once the technology was demonstrated.
On a more pleasant note than the posts earlier I have been signed off by the physio today and expect the same from my hospital visit on Thursday. One leg is now normal, the other has about 6 months more exercise to be back to normal. I have a lot of catching up to do. The garden is a mess, all 2/3 acre of it. So much work.
I have racing driving lessons booked. I have a flight in a Pitts Special booked. I nearly bought a classic car, but got beaten by someone paying sight unseen and sending a trailer so ship it. Should have been more proactive. Gutted. Lots of stuff to do.
Good to hear.
What was the classic you missed?
Panther Kallista. Don't tell @Dura_Ace , although at least I had moved on from the Lima. It was a beautiful car. It was in your neck of the woods(ish). I was travelling down to Taunton to buy it. As it was bought sight unseen as a present apparently, I'm hoping the new owner can't get in it and I have a second bite of the cherry.
I once came home from school to find a big gap in the garage where the 1936 Wolseley champagne-and-black convertible used to be. I believe it was one of only 8 made, so before the 14/56 Tourer.
Now, a) it wasn't a runner b) was a home to mice and c) I couldn't drive then, but I still felt robbed! Even worse, my stepfather had given it away.... Grrrrr.
It was my own fault. I should have arranged an earlier date and cancelled something else. I get annoyed with myself every time I think of it.
Just checked the market and quite the turnaround! Sunak in from 11 to 4.5. It'll be hilarious if Truss ends up losing. The likes of Wallace, Tugendhat, Zahawi and Morduant will look right plonkers.
Do we know how long the usual member sits on their vote before casting it? I thought, sans evidence, it would be something they would do quite quickly - so if most votes have already been cast, would this snafu even matter?
I thought they could change their vote later?
Yes they can, they can change it online.
What?? That changes everything! So ... a foreign policy screw-up, a bad story, a compromising photograph or audio clip followed by some "I've switched my vote to Rishi" momentum, in the next month and her chances are dead in the water?
If there has to be a Tory prime minister I'd rather it were one who isn't batsh*t - even if a batsh*t one would be better for Labour in a GE some time in the distant future.
Unless he's sending a secret message, someone should tell Dominic Cummings that he's got the accent in the wrong place on "decadénce".
That said, if Liz Truss becomes PM we can play the game of "hunt the news editor who knows the rules about apostrophes".
"Liz Truss' proposal for raising school standard's" :-)
Surely one can go either way with proper names ending with s?
It depends on how you pronounce it. I think people would generally pronounce this with the extra s; "Truss's".
Mr. Leon, gardening is often a very good thing for people's wellbeing.
Indeed. Probably most people feel the same way and I’m unusual
I like having as little responsibility as possible. A small flat in a nice location that I can lock and leave. Minimal hassle
As you documented during the winter lockdown in 2021 you struggle when you are tired to one location - you have epic wanderlust. Others would much rather be at home. It may be why I found the same experience an absolute breeze.
Yes indeed. I don’t think I will be very good at old age and increasing immobility
I’ll somehow have to escape with my mind. Hmpft
Having the funds to pay for a strong young nurse to help you from one sun-drenched verandah to another might be an option that would suit you.
The Truss u turn isnt likely to alter the result any more than no tax cuts, ok massive tax cuts Rishi's will, its just another data point in the 'they are getting fag end 12 year ragged' narrative.
Not so sure. Truss had been working hard to overcome the terrible first debate performance. Now you have to factor in that was the real Liz Truss.
And Rishi Sunak does still appear more like the PM in waiting, as long as you massively reduce his sugar intake to stop him bouncing off the ceiling.
I would've thought physically encountering ceilings is an uncommon experience for Sunak.
In short: Russia is likely screwed in the medium to long term but the rising gas prices in Europe (gas crisis?) could cause Europe to blink this winter.
I think European governments might be tempted to do a deal with Russia. Average annual household fuel bills in the thousands of euros/pounds is brutal. But I don't think Russia will offer what those governments want. Russia's value to Western Europe was in a reliable and relatively cheap source of fuel. Now Russia is using fuel supply as a weapon against the West, that value goes. Customers will need to get used to doing without Russian gas. It's telling that China is enthusiastically signing up for long term US Gas commitments to secure its supply.
Russia needs to understand the business principle that it is not good to try and blackmail your customers for too long. The West needs to reappraise its over-reliance on despotic regimes for all essential commodities with appropriate contingency plans put in place.
The problem with Russia, is that the period that they see as the greatest success - the Cold War - involved dominating their neighbours in the most high handed manner possible. Colonialism, essentially. Complete with putting down the native uprisings - 56 and 68.
This is what Putin really wants, deep down.
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
The Truss u turn isnt likely to alter the result any more than no tax cuts, ok massive tax cuts Rishi's will, its just another data point in the 'they are getting fag end 12 year ragged' narrative.
Not so sure. Truss had been working hard to overcome the terrible first debate performance. Now you have to factor in that was the real Liz Truss.
And Rishi Sunak does still appear more like the PM in waiting, as long as you massively reduce his sugar intake to stop him bouncing off the ceiling.
I would've thought physically encountering ceilings is an uncommon experience for Sunak.
I am sure he must have a dolls house for his daughters.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
Pelosi's Taiwan visit might also dominate the headlines tomorrow.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
FWIW it's the lead on the BBC (and the Guardian, but you might expect that). It's second on the Mail site (with a sarcastic headline - "U-turn in just HOURS".
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
BP won't make 8 billion every quarter, but the valuation of sub 80 billion does seem extraordinarily cheap given the almost certain ongoing global uncertainty in oil prices and the fact they basically arb raining cash with their extraction operations.
£8b of savings looks to me like £350m on the side of a bus. The ingenuous focus their ire on the numbers, implicitly conceding the point about cutting diversity officers etc.
It'll be GPs, nurses, care workers, dustmen, street cleaners, policemen, firemen, ambulance workers, paramedics, teachers, teaching assistants etc which will need to go if those sort of savings are to be made. It is absurd.
There are shortages of all such people at the moment. We need to pay more to attract and retain them.
Those who these sorts of cuts will hurt most are Tory voters - the old. Good luck trying to use the money saved in a tax cut to pay for an ambulance to take you to an overcrowded hospital tens of miles away.
If you need to pay more to attract people in one locale or region then that would justify paying more to attract them in that locale or region. That's precisely why there should be localised pay rates.
Crowding out private sector investment in the regions by ensuring everyone talented does basic public sector work instead of investing in the private sector isn't a successful model that is working.
If there's one thing the Conservative Government doesn't do, it's pay more in the public sector when there's a need to do so to attract people. When has a Tory PM's first reaction to shortages in public sector staffing ever been to increase pay?
If you're going to treat public sector pay the same way as private sector pay, fine, but do so properly. A system that treats pay as a political football rather than as something set by the market has to offer something else instead to compensate.
@ydoethur has been talking about a teacher shortage, especially new teachers, and the government has just increased new teacher pay by more than other national pay rates are changing in response to that.
The problem is though if you're going with national pay rates it will always be far more politicised and sclerotic than it should be. A small business can be affected by local supply and demand and set the pay rate at an individual level but national pay scales are always going to be dominated more by political whims than supply and demand. Only once supply and demand starts affecting politics will it be responsive.
The more localised it gets, the more responsive it can be.
Um, academies are not subject to national pay rates - if they wish to pay more they can (in a way other schools can't)
Yes and no.
A lot of academies stick to the national rates, because it's a recruitment selling point. A lot of people put quite a bit of value on not having to negotiate their pay rise individually, even if it means they are paid less.
More significantly, the funding the school gets doesn't change, so the total budget is still limited. One of the things coming down the track is the gap between the teacher pay rise that was announced recently and the cash schools are getting.
Watch for who the next PM makes EdSec. It will be a rival they want to destroy...
All the more reason for localised, even individualised, pay rates.
If a school has eg a shortage of Maths teachers, but an abundance of applicants to be English teachers, then the logical thing to do would be to increase the pay offered to those qualified to teach maths while freezing the pay of those qualified to teach English.
Central bargaining is the worst possible system for filling vacancies as it leads to a lowest common denominator system where either some roles will be uncompetitive, or some roles will be paid too much and money wasted. Most likely, both at the same time.
You make a reasonable case for the value of local bargaining to fill vacancies, but you realise that the upshot of this will be a notable increase in the public sector wage bill? I'm all for that: I want adequately funded and staffed public services. I just wanted to check you were OK with the consequences too.
I very much doubt that. Unless there's huge swathes of roles going unfilled at the minute, in which case the bill should go up in order to fill them.
There are shortages in NHS staff; these are frequently reported. There are shortages in teaching staff; these are frequently reported. There are shortages in social work staff; these are frequently reported. There are shortages in care staff; these are frequently reported.
There are always 'shortages', that's part of the churn of the labour market. If there weren't, then young people entering the labour market wouldn't be able to be hired, since there'd be no roles available for them to fill.
'Shortages' and 'shortages' can be completely different things. 'Shortages' are not necessarily a reason to increase pay rates.
There are serious and substantial shortages in all the areas I identified, which have been frequently reported. The Government, like all Conservative Governments since time immemorial, refuses to believe that increasing wages will solve these problems in the public sector. Magically, wages are only an incentive in the private sector.
My random discovery today - 1 North West council is so short of planners they are looking for a £90,000 a year consultant to do the job...
I've published ads on here before.
£58 per hour for a bog standard planning officers, and that is outside of IR35. The advertised day rates for interim managers are currently £500-£650 per day. Thats what, £140k+ per year? All over the country.
These are jobs that they try and recruit permanent staff at £30 - £50k per year, the type of area where Liz Truss thought regional pay boards should be cutting pay, for new entrants.
Why is it planning officers in particular? What's special that makes it so difficult to recruit?
Private sector pay has increased over the years - public sector pay isn't much different from 2010 or really 2005...
2 friends of Mrs Eek have just joined at her place for an easy life prior to retirement. Both have gone from £70k+ private sector jobs to £35,000 max but only went there because the Mrs sold it to them...
Yes. But why planning officers in particular? As opposed to any other public sector position. Or is this just an example. Incidentally. I am awaiting my portable DBS for teaching come September. Am pitching for £200 per day in the northeast. Am not being told an outright no, shall we say.
Look at the private sector pay - £70k or so....
Public sector pays £40k max and that's to lead a team. That is probably a junior staff member in the private sector - hence everyone heads towards the private sector asap to earn more money.
And the work is probably way more interesting as well with little stress over 8 week deadlines...
At the top end the private sector pays more, however overall the public sector pays 7.6% more and even 0.9% more considering workers skills and characteristics
The public sector also pays out huge pensions to many. In my view all compensation should be expressed gross to include the value of all benefits including pension. Many people in senior positions in the public sector, particularly doctors, are able to retire on pensions that are far in excess of what many people dream of as full time salary.
Are or were able to? For example, pensions are now based on average earnings not final salary..
I am sure it can be done. Benefits in kind can be calculated by HMRC for anything else. There is a reason why politicians don't grasp this: they have nice big fat gold plated pensions themselves.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
FWIW it's the lead on the BBC (and the Guardian, but you might expect that). It's second on the Mail site (with a sarcastic headline - "U-turn in just HOURS".
Interesting discrepancy.
I wonder which is more representative of Tory members, the Beeb or Sky?
Noticed a Maradona themed pizzeria on my perigrinations round Edinburgh this morning. They’re missing a trick if they don’t do a Shilton’s Tears cocktail.
It’s possible that there is a problem in some areas with crowding out.
Real wages (public and private) outside the the SE and Scotland probably need to fall to East European levels if they are to reflect actual productivity add.
Good luck selling it on the doorstep.
And so the transition from "what a stupid idea" to "a sensible idea, but not politically acceptable" begins.
I am not saying it’s a sensible idea at all. Read mine and eek’s and ratter’s posts.
Read them and understand them.
That's why I said the transition begins. I've read and understood them, I just disagree with them.
But I've said what I have to say and nothing new to add, so not much point in adding more.
This is a good idea, but not politic to be introduced. What a shame. Its the sort of thing that would be better off being introduced by a new government at the start of a Parliament so it has time to bed in and work, it will never win an election. A shame Osborne flunked this issue.
PS I agree completely with Ratters that local would be better than regional and I said the same myself, which is why I called this a small step in the right direction.
You can't do it in the public sector for political reasons.
You can't do it in the private sector because both the minimum wage and the public sector wages preclude it.
Equally the issue isn't the wages - it's the lack of investment in productivity improvements because we as a whole are happy to take profits while Corporation Tax is low rather than invest money to increase productivity long term.
The more I think about it the more it seems most companies have scarily short term views and don't see themselves having long enough futures to warrant investing money in their futures.
How much of that is because the UK has put so many of its eggs in the financial sector basket for so long?
We're also extremely bad at producing scientific talent ... [snip!]
Actually, we are quite at producing but we are extremely bad at putting such talent to good use or keeping it here.
Two talents the UK has by the tonne are a belief that mediocrity is to be admired and a meanness to spend whatever it takes to do something right. Being told to "make do" on a half budget by someone with no understanding of what they are talking about is no way to produce excellence
Not a sarky comment: but do you have evidence of that? I'm mostly looking at it from the front line perspective where engineering roles sit open for months at a time and recruiters barrage anyone with "engineer" in their title with offers on LinkedIn, so from my perspective it looks like we aren't producing enough people with the right skills. I am aware that anecdote isn't data though.
Evidence? Not really, just over 30 years experience of science and engineering were it was a common theme of everyone I ever spoke to plus what I came up against myself both as an employee and an IT consultant. There is even more anecdata going back into the past - John Harrison and marine chronometer, Charles Parsons and the Turbinia, Frank Whittle and the jet engine, the Black Arrow programme, etc, etc. HS2 / HS3 is just another example of trying to trim the project to fit the budget, but it is not unique by any means.
The real problem is the instinct to try and prevent people with domain knowledge run things.
I was told, early in my career, at an oil company that ran itself like the civil service and recruited a lot of ex civil servants, that no-one who was "IT parented" could be considered for a managerial role..... in the IT Dept. Such roles needed to go to people with the right background.
Charles Parsons got an enormous amount of encouragement from the engineering lot in the RN - the story that he was being frozen out wasn't exactly true. The famous Turbina run may have been suggested as a political trick by the *RN head of engineering* at the time. They certainly bought into turbine vessels very quickly, once the technology was demonstrated.
Just checked the market and quite the turnaround! Sunak in from 11 to 4.5. It'll be hilarious if Truss ends up losing. The likes of Wallace, Tugendhat, Zahawi and Morduant will look right plonkers.
Do we know how long the usual member sits on their vote before casting it? I thought, sans evidence, it would be something they would do quite quickly - so if most votes have already been cast, would this snafu even matter?
I thought they could change their vote later?
Yes they can, they can change it online.
What?? That changes everything! So ... a foreign policy screw-up, a bad story, a compromising photograph or audio clip followed by some "I've switched my vote to Rishi" momentum, in the next month and her chances are dead in the water?
I've been assuming that was Rishi's strategy. Get an ok start in the votes, then keep pressing the flesh at meetings up and down the country, let Liz make various cock-ups and have a steady trickle of Liz -> Rishi changes of heart over the next few weeks.
In short: Russia is likely screwed in the medium to long term but the rising gas prices in Europe (gas crisis?) could cause Europe to blink this winter.
I think European governments might be tempted to do a deal with Russia. Average annual household fuel bills in the thousands of euros/pounds is brutal. But I don't think Russia will offer what those governments want. Russia's value to Western Europe was in a reliable and relatively cheap source of fuel. Now Russia is using fuel supply as a weapon against the West, that value goes. Customers will need to get used to doing without Russian gas. It's telling that China is enthusiastically signing up for long term US Gas commitments to secure its supply.
The US and satellites are using trade as a weapon against Russia, and Russia is using it against them. Iron and steel in one direction, gas in the other. Nothing new in economic warfare.
I'd like to know what the effects would be of a drastic fall in the amount of microchips coming from Taiwan. Do microchips get stockpiled?
The microchip industry is massively complex. But AIUI, and to put it very simply, they are not stockpiled by the major users - at least for more than a few months of supply. And if you're not ordering hundreds of thousands or millions of chips a year, supply can be also rather lumpy, as the fab fits your smaller order in around the larger ones.
Getting alternate vendors can be very, very tricky. Mrs J started a new project recently, and the deign they're working on is heavily tied to a specific process at a specific fab plant. If they wanted to move it to a different fab, they'd need to muck about with the layout and metal layer as a minimum. And this chip does not even need the bleeding edge of fabs. So it's time-consuming.
Losing TSMC as a chip fab would be very disruptive to a number of industries. As one example, I think Apple use TSMC for their A15 chip, and losing TSMC would be a major ballache for them. A minor disruption such as the fire at Renesas in Japan last year can have severe knock-on consequences for the rest of the industry.
Also, a lot of military and space tech uses much older styles of processor design as the slower clocks and less dense component density makes the chip more robust. Some of NASA's projects have been based on 25 year old Power PC chips and, as commented on here the other day, the HIMARS are being upgraded from the 1980s designed Z8000 series
It’s possible that there is a problem in some areas with crowding out.
Real wages (public and private) outside the the SE and Scotland probably need to fall to East European levels if they are to reflect actual productivity add.
Good luck selling it on the doorstep.
And so the transition from "what a stupid idea" to "a sensible idea, but not politically acceptable" begins.
I am not saying it’s a sensible idea at all. Read mine and eek’s and ratter’s posts.
Read them and understand them.
That's why I said the transition begins. I've read and understood them, I just disagree with them.
But I've said what I have to say and nothing new to add, so not much point in adding more.
This is a good idea, but not politic to be introduced. What a shame. Its the sort of thing that would be better off being introduced by a new government at the start of a Parliament so it has time to bed in and work, it will never win an election. A shame Osborne flunked this issue.
PS I agree completely with Ratters that local would be better than regional and I said the same myself, which is why I called this a small step in the right direction.
You can't do it in the public sector for political reasons.
You can't do it in the private sector because both the minimum wage and the public sector wages preclude it.
Equally the issue isn't the wages - it's the lack of investment in productivity improvements because we as a whole are happy to take profits while Corporation Tax is low rather than invest money to increase productivity long term.
The more I think about it the more it seems most companies have scarily short term views and don't see themselves having long enough futures to warrant investing money in their futures.
How much of that is because the UK has put so many of its eggs in the financial sector basket for so long?
We're also extremely bad at producing scientific talent ... [snip!]
Actually, we are quite at producing but we are extremely bad at putting such talent to good use or keeping it here.
Two talents the UK has by the tonne are a belief that mediocrity is to be admired and a meanness to spend whatever it takes to do something right. Being told to "make do" on a half budget by someone with no understanding of what they are talking about is no way to produce excellence
Not a sarky comment: but do you have evidence of that? I'm mostly looking at it from the front line perspective where engineering roles sit open for months at a time and recruiters barrage anyone with "engineer" in their title with offers on LinkedIn, so from my perspective it looks like we aren't producing enough people with the right skills. I am aware that anecdote isn't data though.
Evidence? Not really, just over 30 years experience of science and engineering were it was a common theme of everyone I ever spoke to plus what I came up against myself both as an employee and an IT consultant. There is even more anecdata going back into the past - John Harrison and marine chronometer, Charles Parsons and the Turbinia, Frank Whittle and the jet engine, the Black Arrow programme, etc, etc. HS2 / HS3 is just another example of trying to trim the project to fit the budget, but it is not unique by any means.
I haven't been able to follow all the thread, but short-termism is a significant issue. Banks and management seem to *hate* to look more than five years in advance - they want their money to come back before then. It is a British disease.
It is a reason why angel investors can be so useful in the tech sector, as they can have a much wider and long-term vision than traditional investment sources. I daresay RCS could say if my impression is correct.
An anecdote: in the early days of Acorn in the late 1970s or early 1980s, they needed a million pounds to get something into production. They went to their usual bank, who were very hesitant. So they want across the road to a different bank, introduced themselves, and the manager said something like: "Ah, you're fine Cambridge fellows. Here's your money...."
Survivorship bias in that anecdote.
You could rectify the position by starting a fund to invest in such ventures. To distance yourself from this distasteful short term termism call it something like Patient Capital.
Noticed a Maradona themed pizzeria on my perigrinations round Edinburgh this morning. They’re missing a trick if they don’t do a Shilton’s Tears cocktail.
Noticed a Maradona themed pizzeria on my perigrinations round Edinburgh this morning. They’re missing a trick if they don’t do a Shilton’s Tears cocktail.
Fallen over like that, it looks more suited to a more recent Argentinian number 10...
Maths is wonderful. You spend years working on a secure encryption algorithm that is quantum computer-safe, only for a traditional single-core computer to break the encryption in an hour...
An interesting quote from a cryptographer: "In general there is a lot of deep mathematics which has been published in the mathematical literature but which is not well understood by cryptographers. I lump myself into the category of those many researchers who work in cryptography but do not understand as much mathematics as we really should."
£8b of savings looks to me like £350m on the side of a bus. The ingenuous focus their ire on the numbers, implicitly conceding the point about cutting diversity officers etc.
It'll be GPs, nurses, care workers, dustmen, street cleaners, policemen, firemen, ambulance workers, paramedics, teachers, teaching assistants etc which will need to go if those sort of savings are to be made. It is absurd.
There are shortages of all such people at the moment. We need to pay more to attract and retain them.
Those who these sorts of cuts will hurt most are Tory voters - the old. Good luck trying to use the money saved in a tax cut to pay for an ambulance to take you to an overcrowded hospital tens of miles away.
If you need to pay more to attract people in one locale or region then that would justify paying more to attract them in that locale or region. That's precisely why there should be localised pay rates.
Crowding out private sector investment in the regions by ensuring everyone talented does basic public sector work instead of investing in the private sector isn't a successful model that is working.
If there's one thing the Conservative Government doesn't do, it's pay more in the public sector when there's a need to do so to attract people. When has a Tory PM's first reaction to shortages in public sector staffing ever been to increase pay?
If you're going to treat public sector pay the same way as private sector pay, fine, but do so properly. A system that treats pay as a political football rather than as something set by the market has to offer something else instead to compensate.
@ydoethur has been talking about a teacher shortage, especially new teachers, and the government has just increased new teacher pay by more than other national pay rates are changing in response to that.
The problem is though if you're going with national pay rates it will always be far more politicised and sclerotic than it should be. A small business can be affected by local supply and demand and set the pay rate at an individual level but national pay scales are always going to be dominated more by political whims than supply and demand. Only once supply and demand starts affecting politics will it be responsive.
The more localised it gets, the more responsive it can be.
Um, academies are not subject to national pay rates - if they wish to pay more they can (in a way other schools can't)
Yes and no.
A lot of academies stick to the national rates, because it's a recruitment selling point. A lot of people put quite a bit of value on not having to negotiate their pay rise individually, even if it means they are paid less.
More significantly, the funding the school gets doesn't change, so the total budget is still limited. One of the things coming down the track is the gap between the teacher pay rise that was announced recently and the cash schools are getting.
Watch for who the next PM makes EdSec. It will be a rival they want to destroy...
All the more reason for localised, even individualised, pay rates.
If a school has eg a shortage of Maths teachers, but an abundance of applicants to be English teachers, then the logical thing to do would be to increase the pay offered to those qualified to teach maths while freezing the pay of those qualified to teach English.
Central bargaining is the worst possible system for filling vacancies as it leads to a lowest common denominator system where either some roles will be uncompetitive, or some roles will be paid too much and money wasted. Most likely, both at the same time.
You make a reasonable case for the value of local bargaining to fill vacancies, but you realise that the upshot of this will be a notable increase in the public sector wage bill? I'm all for that: I want adequately funded and staffed public services. I just wanted to check you were OK with the consequences too.
I very much doubt that. Unless there's huge swathes of roles going unfilled at the minute, in which case the bill should go up in order to fill them.
There are shortages in NHS staff; these are frequently reported. There are shortages in teaching staff; these are frequently reported. There are shortages in social work staff; these are frequently reported. There are shortages in care staff; these are frequently reported.
There are always 'shortages', that's part of the churn of the labour market. If there weren't, then young people entering the labour market wouldn't be able to be hired, since there'd be no roles available for them to fill.
'Shortages' and 'shortages' can be completely different things. 'Shortages' are not necessarily a reason to increase pay rates.
There are serious and substantial shortages in all the areas I identified, which have been frequently reported. The Government, like all Conservative Governments since time immemorial, refuses to believe that increasing wages will solve these problems in the public sector. Magically, wages are only an incentive in the private sector.
My random discovery today - 1 North West council is so short of planners they are looking for a £90,000 a year consultant to do the job...
I've published ads on here before.
£58 per hour for a bog standard planning officers, and that is outside of IR35. The advertised day rates for interim managers are currently £500-£650 per day. Thats what, £140k+ per year? All over the country.
These are jobs that they try and recruit permanent staff at £30 - £50k per year, the type of area where Liz Truss thought regional pay boards should be cutting pay, for new entrants.
Why is it planning officers in particular? What's special that makes it so difficult to recruit?
Private sector pay has increased over the years - public sector pay isn't much different from 2010 or really 2005...
2 friends of Mrs Eek have just joined at her place for an easy life prior to retirement. Both have gone from £70k+ private sector jobs to £35,000 max but only went there because the Mrs sold it to them...
Yes. But why planning officers in particular? As opposed to any other public sector position. Or is this just an example. Incidentally. I am awaiting my portable DBS for teaching come September. Am pitching for £200 per day in the northeast. Am not being told an outright no, shall we say.
Look at the private sector pay - £70k or so....
Public sector pays £40k max and that's to lead a team. That is probably a junior staff member in the private sector - hence everyone heads towards the private sector asap to earn more money.
And the work is probably way more interesting as well with little stress over 8 week deadlines...
At the top end the private sector pays more, however overall the public sector pays 7.6% more and even 0.9% more considering workers skills and characteristics
The public sector also pays out huge pensions to many. In my view all compensation should be expressed gross to include the value of all benefits including pension. Many people in senior positions in the public sector, particularly doctors, are able to retire on pensions that are far in excess of what many people dream of as full time salary.
Are or were able to? For example, pensions are now based on average earnings not final salary..
I am sure it can be done. Benefits in kind can be calculated by HMRC for anything else. There is a reason why politicians don't grasp this: they have nice big fat gold plated pensions themselves.
On that basis Eek twin A is on something like £42k
£25k basic salary 27% pension contribution day off for degree £9,250 saving on degree as it's paid for by her department...
A Civil Service degree apprenticeship is really the best available option aged 18/19....
It’s possible that there is a problem in some areas with crowding out.
Real wages (public and private) outside the the SE and Scotland probably need to fall to East European levels if they are to reflect actual productivity add.
Good luck selling it on the doorstep.
And so the transition from "what a stupid idea" to "a sensible idea, but not politically acceptable" begins.
I am not saying it’s a sensible idea at all. Read mine and eek’s and ratter’s posts.
Read them and understand them.
That's why I said the transition begins. I've read and understood them, I just disagree with them.
But I've said what I have to say and nothing new to add, so not much point in adding more.
This is a good idea, but not politic to be introduced. What a shame. Its the sort of thing that would be better off being introduced by a new government at the start of a Parliament so it has time to bed in and work, it will never win an election. A shame Osborne flunked this issue.
PS I agree completely with Ratters that local would be better than regional and I said the same myself, which is why I called this a small step in the right direction.
You can't do it in the public sector for political reasons.
You can't do it in the private sector because both the minimum wage and the public sector wages preclude it.
Equally the issue isn't the wages - it's the lack of investment in productivity improvements because we as a whole are happy to take profits while Corporation Tax is low rather than invest money to increase productivity long term.
The more I think about it the more it seems most companies have scarily short term views and don't see themselves having long enough futures to warrant investing money in their futures.
How much of that is because the UK has put so many of its eggs in the financial sector basket for so long?
We're also extremely bad at producing scientific talent ... [snip!]
Actually, we are quite at producing but we are extremely bad at putting such talent to good use or keeping it here.
Two talents the UK has by the tonne are a belief that mediocrity is to be admired and a meanness to spend whatever it takes to do something right. Being told to "make do" on a half budget by someone with no understanding of what they are talking about is no way to produce excellence
Not a sarky comment: but do you have evidence of that? I'm mostly looking at it from the front line perspective where engineering roles sit open for months at a time and recruiters barrage anyone with "engineer" in their title with offers on LinkedIn, so from my perspective it looks like we aren't producing enough people with the right skills. I am aware that anecdote isn't data though.
Evidence? Not really, just over 30 years experience of science and engineering were it was a common theme of everyone I ever spoke to plus what I came up against myself both as an employee and an IT consultant. There is even more anecdata going back into the past - John Harrison and marine chronometer, Charles Parsons and the Turbinia, Frank Whittle and the jet engine, the Black Arrow programme, etc, etc. HS2 / HS3 is just another example of trying to trim the project to fit the budget, but it is not unique by any means.
I haven't been able to follow all the thread, but short-termism is a significant issue. Banks and management seem to *hate* to look more than five years in advance - they want their money to come back before then. It is a British disease.
It is a reason why angel investors can be so useful in the tech sector, as they can have a much wider and long-term vision than traditional investment sources. I daresay RCS could say if my impression is correct.
An anecdote: in the early days of Acorn in the late 1970s or early 1980s, they needed a million pounds to get something into production. They went to their usual bank, who were very hesitant. So they want across the road to a different bank, introduced themselves, and the manager said something like: "Ah, you're fine Cambridge fellows. Here's your money...."
Survivorship bias in that anecdote.
You could rectify the position by starting a fund to invest in such ventures. To distance yourself from this distasteful short term termism call it something like Patient Capital.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
FWIW it's the lead on the BBC (and the Guardian, but you might expect that). It's second on the Mail site (with a sarcastic headline - "U-turn in just HOURS".
Yes but they've all now started to drop the rather hyperbolic and slightly disingenuous 'cutting pay for nurses' line in favour of 'drops plan to link public sector pay to location' which, whilst a stupid policy, is not particularly damaging. The usual few hours of breathless pearl clutching followed by u turn followed by 'bizarre fuss was made'
If they can only bid for one or the other, it's an absolute no brainer which one to choose.
No matter how well a woman does, when the money, recognition or prizes get handed out she usually comes out second best against pricks with pricks
For the FA, hosting a tournament isn't about maximising the chances of England's success.
It's about making money, which they use to fund all levels of the game.
The Women's Euros were a great success, proving that women's football is now in the second echelon of sports in the country (at least, the viewing figures for the final were fairly similar to the 2003 rugby world cup final and the 2019 cricket world cup final, from what I could find out).
"France is to scrap its television licence fee after the Senate approved Emmanuel Macron’s election promise to cut the public broadcasting tax in order to boost households’ spending power."
If there has to be a Tory prime minister I'd rather it were one who isn't batsh*t - even if a batsh*t one would be better for Labour in a GE some time in the distant future.
Unless he's sending a secret message, someone should tell Dominic Cummings that he's got the accent in the wrong place on "decadénce".
That said, if Liz Truss becomes PM we can play the game of "hunt the news editor who knows the rules about apostrophes".
"Liz Truss' proposal for raising school standard's" :-)
Surely one can go either way with proper names ending with s?
It depends on how you pronounce it. I think people would generally pronounce this with the extra s; "Truss's".
The base name is monosyllabic, so Truss' is the right form. As opposed to Boris's, which latter is not monosyllabic.
"France is to scrap its television licence fee after the Senate approved Emmanuel Macron’s election promise to cut the public broadcasting tax in order to boost households’ spending power."
Replaced with a proportion of tax revenue from VAT.
Basically - the TV licence isn't going anywhere - it's just going to be rebranded and collected in a different way.
"France is to scrap its television licence fee after the Senate approved Emmanuel Macron’s election promise to cut the public broadcasting tax in order to boost households’ spending power."
Replaced with a proportion of tax revenue from VAT.
Basically - the TV licence isn't going anywhere - it's just going to be rebranded and collected in a different way.
Funding the BBC from general taxation is a logical idea. Possibly not the best idea, but a logical idea.
Funding the BBC by subscription is a logical idea. Possibly not the best idea, but a logical idea.
Funding the BBC by a compulsory tax levied on anyone who watches any "live" TV even if they only ever watch the BBC's competitors is an illogical idea.
Off topic but I only saw it this morning. Truss saying "just ignore" Sturgeon, immediately doubled down with a patronising "we have to explain to Scotland and NI and Wales all the good we are doing to them".
I expect the support for Yes to increase...
I am very angry about this (stifles snigger)
How dare she? (fails to prevent smirk)
IT’S A DISGRACE! (breaks into triumphant laughter)
Tactically, she's right. Sturgeon, like Stuart Dixon, thrives on poking the bear and eliciting a suitably pompous riposte that can then be used to generate outrage from the peanut gallery. Ignoring that is a start, if not the whole caboodle.
So Rishi’s odds have come in dramatically since this morning!
Anyone who, like Casino and me, backed him at the longer odds now has the opportunity to trade back out and increase the potential profit from a Truss win.
"France is to scrap its television licence fee after the Senate approved Emmanuel Macron’s election promise to cut the public broadcasting tax in order to boost households’ spending power."
Replaced with a proportion of tax revenue from VAT.
Basically - the TV licence isn't going anywhere - it's just going to be rebranded and collected in a different way.
Yes, as much as the TV licence is unpopular on this site, I suspect those hoping its demise would lead to a subscription based BBC will be very disappointed.
The BBC being funded by general taxation/VAT/surcharge on energy bills (probably not the last one at the minute) is much more likely if you look at how other countries have replaced TV licence charges. None have gone subscription based.
'Your last paragraph is not my experience. Nonetheless, let's assume you are right and I am wrong and a handful of council house kids hit the jackpot. Robert has made the excellent point that the 80% who fail the 11 plus could be subsequently lumbered with a sub standard education. That doesn't seem like value for money on anyone's metric.'
I made the same point in an earlier post and @hyufd's reply was that he didn't care. Those 75% of kids whether they go to a Comp or Secondary will end up in the same (presumably dead end) jobs. Very harsh. I also agree with you that it is not my experience that under-privileged kids get through to Grammars in any numbers anyway.
He also takes my success of getting to Uni as proof that Secondary schools work. He doesn't understand that I succeeded despite of it not because of it and there will always be these cases.
Also note the snide comments at the end of his comment to me. 'ego of self professed maths genius to match'. Completely uncalled for in a civilised discussion because I was showing how the 11 plus failed people. I had not been rude to him. It is as if he does not like the fact that someone from a status below him has been successful. @Richard_Tyndall made a comment sometime ago along the lines of him being in awe of power and dismissive of those without it. This certainly rings true. Knock back Catalans and Scots but give way to the IRA; admiration for dictators; admiration for the landed gentry, lawyers and doctors and Oxbridge and Russell Group Unis; dismissive of Secondary school kids and Comprehensives, but admire Grammar schools. The list goes on.
I guess we shouldn't try and aspire to get above our station. Does he really care for those poor kids who he says get into Grammar schools or is it just a cover to keep the plebs down.
Whatevs
You really do set yourself up sometimes @Leon don't you? Remember what you said to me the other day when I replied to a post you made to @kinabalu - You said I'm not talking to you. Well actually you said a lot more than that. Pot and kettle? Of course being an open forum I welcome all responses but a few more words might be useful..
Sometimes it is best to let previous threads die. Otherwise we end up with ongoing feuds, and it is not as if there is much more to say about grammar schools, and even if there is, the subject will recur organically in due course.
And it’s not as if Leon’s being the official site twat should come as news to anyone who has been paying any attention.
On a more pleasant note than the posts earlier I have been signed off by the physio today and expect the same from my hospital visit on Thursday. One leg is now normal, the other has about 6 months more exercise to be back to normal. I have a lot of catching up to do. The garden is a mess, all 2/3 acre of it. So much work.
I have racing driving lessons booked. I have a flight in a Pitts Special booked. I nearly bought a classic car, but got beaten by someone paying sight unseen and sending a trailer so ship it. Should have been more proactive. Gutted. Lots of stuff to do.
Good to hear.
What was the classic you missed?
Panther Kallista. Don't tell @Dura_Ace , although at least I had moved on from the Lima. It was a beautiful car. It was in your neck of the woods(ish). I was travelling down to Taunton to buy it. As it was bought sight unseen as a present apparently, I'm hoping the new owner can't get in it and I have a second bite of the cherry.
I once came home from school to find a big gap in the garage where the 1936 Wolseley champagne-and-black convertible used to be. I believe it was one of only 8 made, so before the 14/56 Tourer.
Now, a) it wasn't a runner b) was a home to mice and c) I couldn't drive then, but I still felt robbed! Even worse, my stepfather had given it away.... Grrrrr.
It was my own fault. I should have arranged an earlier date and cancelled something else. I get annoyed with myself every time I think of it.
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
If they can only bid for one or the other, it's an absolute no brainer which one to choose.
No matter how well a woman does, when the money, recognition or prizes get handed out she usually comes out second best against pricks with pricks
For the FA, hosting a tournament isn't about maximising the chances of England's success.
It's about making money, which they use to fund all levels of the game.
The Women's Euros were a great success, proving that women's football is now in the second echelon of sports in the country (at least, the viewing figures for the final were fairly similar to the 2003 rugby world cup final and the 2019 cricket world cup final, from what I could find out).
To be fair to the FA the bid to host the men’s Euros in 2028 has been in since end of March. Joint bid with Scotland, Wales and the Irelands so a lot of work sunk into it already and less exclusive than an England only tournament which is good for the UK and RoI.
This was done well before anyone had any inkling of how well the women’s Euros would go and international sports organisations aren’t usually favourable to a country monopolising tournaments so a bit unfair if the FA is hammered for this.
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
Did you see that interview I linked to on the previous thread? How can you listen to that and say that he's in any way interested in peace or justice?
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
He wants Ukraine to surrender to avoid bloodshed. Why won't he encourage Palestine to do the same?
Maths is wonderful. You spend years working on a secure encryption algorithm that is quantum computer-safe, only for a traditional single-core computer to break the encryption in an hour...
An interesting quote from a cryptographer: "In general there is a lot of deep mathematics which has been published in the mathematical literature but which is not well understood by cryptographers. I lump myself into the category of those many researchers who work in cryptography but do not understand as much mathematics as we really should."
The last I heard, factoring integers by quantum computers had got as far as factoring 21, but failed at factoring 30, so we may not have to worry just yet
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
FWIW it's the lead on the BBC (and the Guardian, but you might expect that). It's second on the Mail site (with a sarcastic headline - "U-turn in just HOURS".
Yes but they've all now started to drop the rather hyperbolic and slightly disingenuous 'cutting pay for nurses' line in favour of 'drops plan to link public sector pay to location' which, whilst a stupid policy, is not particularly damaging. The usual few hours of breathless pearl clutching followed by u turn followed by 'bizarre fuss was made'
@Big_G_NorthWales glad you had a wonderful holiday on the Caledonian Canal - Loch Oich is definitely a highlight. Sorrty to hear that you contracted the dreaded pox and both feel so ill.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
FWIW it's the lead on the BBC (and the Guardian, but you might expect that). It's second on the Mail site (with a sarcastic headline - "U-turn in just HOURS".
Yes but they've all now started to drop the rather hyperbolic and slightly disingenuous 'cutting pay for nurses' line in favour of 'drops plan to link public sector pay to location' which, whilst a stupid policy, is not particularly damaging. The usual few hours of breathless pearl clutching followed by u turn followed by 'bizarre fuss was made'
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
The thing is Corbyn isn't simply a principled pacifist, because he supports the right of Palestinians to use violence against the Israelis, and he has similarly justified the use of violence by the ANC and IRA.
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
FWIW it's the lead on the BBC (and the Guardian, but you might expect that). It's second on the Mail site (with a sarcastic headline - "U-turn in just HOURS".
Yes but they've all now started to drop the rather hyperbolic and slightly disingenuous 'cutting pay for nurses' line in favour of 'drops plan to link public sector pay to location' which, whilst a stupid policy, is not particularly damaging. The usual few hours of breathless pearl clutching followed by u turn followed by 'bizarre fuss was made'
It’s possible that there is a problem in some areas with crowding out.
Real wages (public and private) outside the the SE and Scotland probably need to fall to East European levels if they are to reflect actual productivity add.
Good luck selling it on the doorstep.
And so the transition from "what a stupid idea" to "a sensible idea, but not politically acceptable" begins.
I am not saying it’s a sensible idea at all. Read mine and eek’s and ratter’s posts.
Read them and understand them.
That's why I said the transition begins. I've read and understood them, I just disagree with them.
But I've said what I have to say and nothing new to add, so not much point in adding more.
This is a good idea, but not politic to be introduced. What a shame. Its the sort of thing that would be better off being introduced by a new government at the start of a Parliament so it has time to bed in and work, it will never win an election. A shame Osborne flunked this issue.
PS I agree completely with Ratters that local would be better than regional and I said the same myself, which is why I called this a small step in the right direction.
You can't do it in the public sector for political reasons.
You can't do it in the private sector because both the minimum wage and the public sector wages preclude it.
Equally the issue isn't the wages - it's the lack of investment in productivity improvements because we as a whole are happy to take profits while Corporation Tax is low rather than invest money to increase productivity long term.
The more I think about it the more it seems most companies have scarily short term views and don't see themselves having long enough futures to warrant investing money in their futures.
How much of that is because the UK has put so many of its eggs in the financial sector basket for so long?
We're also extremely bad at producing scientific talent ... [snip!]
Actually, we are quite at producing but we are extremely bad at putting such talent to good use or keeping it here.
Two talents the UK has by the tonne are a belief that mediocrity is to be admired and a meanness to spend whatever it takes to do something right. Being told to "make do" on a half budget by someone with no understanding of what they are talking about is no way to produce excellence
Not a sarky comment: but do you have evidence of that? I'm mostly looking at it from the front line perspective where engineering roles sit open for months at a time and recruiters barrage anyone with "engineer" in their title with offers on LinkedIn, so from my perspective it looks like we aren't producing enough people with the right skills. I am aware that anecdote isn't data though.
Evidence? Not really, just over 30 years experience of science and engineering were it was a common theme of everyone I ever spoke to plus what I came up against myself both as an employee and an IT consultant. There is even more anecdata going back into the past - John Harrison and marine chronometer, Charles Parsons and the Turbinia, Frank Whittle and the jet engine, the Black Arrow programme, etc, etc. HS2 / HS3 is just another example of trying to trim the project to fit the budget, but it is not unique by any means.
The real problem is the instinct to try and prevent people with domain knowledge run things.
I was told, early in my career, at an oil company that ran itself like the civil service and recruited a lot of ex civil servants, that no-one who was "IT parented" could be considered for a managerial role..... in the IT Dept. Such roles needed to go to people with the right background.
Charles Parsons got an enormous amount of encouragement from the engineering lot in the RN - the story that he was being frozen out wasn't exactly true. The famous Turbina run may have been suggested as a political trick by the *RN head of engineering* at the time. They certainly bought into turbine vessels very quickly, once the technology was demonstrated.
No foreign policy issue passed their 4 percent threshold, unless you consider immigration a foreign policy issue.
(Years ago, I saw an interesting Gallup analysis on abortion and voting. Briefly, at that time it was not an important voting issue for most Americans, but among the minority that did vote on the issue, there were more "pro-life" voters than "pro choice" voters. Something like 5 percent to 3 percent, as I recall.
"France is to scrap its television licence fee after the Senate approved Emmanuel Macron’s election promise to cut the public broadcasting tax in order to boost households’ spending power."
Replaced with a proportion of tax revenue from VAT.
Basically - the TV licence isn't going anywhere - it's just going to be rebranded and collected in a different way.
I'm not sure Nadine would read that far. At least not without getting confused by all the big words.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
FWIW it's the lead on the BBC (and the Guardian, but you might expect that). It's second on the Mail site (with a sarcastic headline - "U-turn in just HOURS".
Yes but they've all now started to drop the rather hyperbolic and slightly disingenuous 'cutting pay for nurses' line in favour of 'drops plan to link public sector pay to location' which, whilst a stupid policy, is not particularly damaging. The usual few hours of breathless pearl clutching followed by u turn followed by 'bizarre fuss was made'
The scare quotes in the headline are an indication that the words between them are a mischaracterisation of the proposal by Truss's opponents.
From that article
(Ben Houchen ) He added: 'Is it a moment - I'm not entirely sure, it might be - we might look back in four or five weeks' time and this could be Liz's ''dementia tax'' moment. It very easily could be, but it's to be seen.'
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
The thing is Corbyn isn't simply a principled pacifist, because he supports the right of Palestinians to use violence against the Israelis, and he has similarly justified the use of violence by the ANC and IRA.
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
Corbyn's deluded followers say Corbyn is interested in peace because Corbyn claims he is interested in peace. They claim he is an anti-imperialist because he claims to be anti-imperalism. They claim he is an anti-racist because he claims to be an anti-racist. They claim he isn't an anti-Semite because he claims not to be an anti-Semite.
Yet in each of these areas, his views seem to be rather more (ahem) nuanced behind a wider anti-western agenda.
Truss is number one on BBC News website, all that momentum and goodbye
In electoral terms this fiasco could do her. After all, look at the Maybot and the "death tax". Anyone outside the south east would look at this and say "so we don't matter then". Scotland? Go away. The north and midlands? Pay cut. Madness.
But - the Tory selectorate is even more mental than she is. They may think "great idea" and hope she will bring it in anyway. So whilst this should help Rshi, it may not.
At least the Tories have a "sensible" electoral system where you can vote as many times you like and only your final vote is counted.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
FWIW it's the lead on the BBC (and the Guardian, but you might expect that). It's second on the Mail site (with a sarcastic headline - "U-turn in just HOURS".
Yes but they've all now started to drop the rather hyperbolic and slightly disingenuous 'cutting pay for nurses' line in favour of 'drops plan to link public sector pay to location' which, whilst a stupid policy, is not particularly damaging. The usual few hours of breathless pearl clutching followed by u turn followed by 'bizarre fuss was made'
Truss is number one on BBC News website, all that momentum and goodbye
In electoral terms this fiasco could do her. After all, look at the Maybot and the "death tax". Anyone outside the south east would look at this and say "so we don't matter then". Scotland? Go away. The north and midlands? Pay cut. Madness.
But - the Tory selectorate is even more mental than she is. They may think "great idea" and hope she will bring it in anyway. So whilst this should help Rshi, it may not.
At least the Tories have a "sensible" electoral system where you can vote as many times you like and only your final vote is counted.
That's what I think too - remember the electorate is the Tory membership. Many probably think she's right and has been the victim of a left wing ambush.
Truss seems to be fortunate that her embarrassing u turn seems to have been relegated to being a minor news story today not the headline story. At least according to Sky it seems to be 4th story of the day behind the killing of Al Zawahri, the court case over Archie and BPs profits.
FWIW it's the lead on the BBC (and the Guardian, but you might expect that). It's second on the Mail site (with a sarcastic headline - "U-turn in just HOURS".
Yes but they've all now started to drop the rather hyperbolic and slightly disingenuous 'cutting pay for nurses' line in favour of 'drops plan to link public sector pay to location' which, whilst a stupid policy, is not particularly damaging. The usual few hours of breathless pearl clutching followed by u turn followed by 'bizarre fuss was made'
The scare quotes in the headline are an indication that the words between them are a mischaracterisation of the proposal by Truss's opponents.
You're explaining.
And we all know what that means in politics.
Yes, it means our politics is in an appalling state because any opponent's lie can't be exposed without people saying "if you're explaining, you're losing".
Surely if you have a brilliant idea - so great that it’s a reason you should be PM - and it gets “misrepresented” then you would sit down with say, Andrew Neil, and explain the idea properly and have it tested and shown right rather than just abandon it altogether…
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
The thing is Corbyn isn't simply a principled pacifist, because he supports the right of Palestinians to use violence against the Israelis, and he has similarly justified the use of violence by the ANC and IRA.
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
It is very wrong to conflate (no doubt for reasons of national pride) British and American 'imperialism'. Our pre-eminence in world affairs ended with WW1 and was decisively demolished with WW2. We are not responsible for the current shitshow, however many British politicians like to be seen 'standing shoulder to shoulder' (the actual posture is somewhat more recumbent) with the US.
Surely if you have a brilliant idea - so great that it’s a reason you should be PM - and it gets “misrepresented” then you would sit down with say, Andrew Neil, and explain the idea properly and have it tested and shown right rather than just abandon it altogether…
Surely if you have a brilliant idea - so great that it’s a reason you should be PM - and it gets “misrepresented” then you would sit down with say, Andrew Neil, and explain the idea properly and have it tested and shown right rather than just abandon it altogether…
Except she issued a press release, the press reported it verbatim, somebody worked out what it meant, screeching u-turn, "it was misinterpreted"...
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
The thing is Corbyn isn't simply a principled pacifist, because he supports the right of Palestinians to use violence against the Israelis, and he has similarly justified the use of violence by the ANC and IRA.
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
It is very wrong to conflate (no doubt for reasons of national pride) British and American 'imperialism'. Our pre-eminence in world affairs ended with WW1 and was decisively demolished with WW2. We are not responsible for the current shitshow, however many British politicians like to be seen 'standing shoulder to shoulder' (the actual posture is somewhat more recumbent) with the US.
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
The thing is Corbyn isn't simply a principled pacifist, because he supports the right of Palestinians to use violence against the Israelis, and he has similarly justified the use of violence by the ANC and IRA.
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
I think there is a difficult tension between the political and the material. I don't necessarily agree with, but can understand and feel we should discuss, the position that NATO expansion may have poked the Russian bear into this action, and there needs to be a political settlement that can allow the Russian state to feel it isn't besieged. But the material reality on the ground is not some ideological war between Russia and NATO, but a war where the Russian state increasingly and loudly proclaims the desire for the end of a Ukrainian people - by taking their land, dispersing their populace and reeducating their children. This, if carried out, would be a genocide. That is the current stated goal of the Russian state.
The second tension is, of course, the pretty reasonable desire to prevent escalation. Should this become a war between NATO and Russia, nobody knows what the fallout (pun intended) would be. We might hope that it wouldn't go nuclear, but it's not impossible.
I think it was a 538 episode that played on the typical metaphor of nuclear war like chess: imagine a chess game where you play and the worse you lose, the worse the outcome. So if you lose but only by one piece, you lose a tenner, whereas if you are completely routed, you and your family are taken out round the woodshed and shot. Now imagine that there is a bomb attached to the board you can use at any time, which would kill you both. If you are losing so badly the likely outcome is the woodshed for you and your family, why wouldn't you use the bomb instead? Russia can lose and not flip the switch, but it can't be a humiliating loss or they may choose to. Ukraine doesn't have that option, so Russia can fight a war to the end if they really want to. So anything that could deter Russia for fighting the war that way would need to come from NATO or the US... which is also worrying...
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
The thing is Corbyn isn't simply a principled pacifist, because he supports the right of Palestinians to use violence against the Israelis, and he has similarly justified the use of violence by the ANC and IRA.
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
It is very wrong to conflate (no doubt for reasons of national pride) British and American 'imperialism'. Our pre-eminence in world affairs ended with WW1 and was decisively demolished with WW2. We are not responsible for the current shitshow, however many British politicians like to be seen 'standing shoulder to shoulder' (the actual posture is somewhat more recumbent) with the US.
And Ukraine is overrun with American rapists
I have no idea what that comment is even supposed to mean.
Surely if you have a brilliant idea - so great that it’s a reason you should be PM - and it gets “misrepresented” then you would sit down with say, Andrew Neil, and explain the idea properly and have it tested and shown right rather than just abandon it altogether…
So that the lie about cutting current staff's pay can get more exposure?
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
The thing is Corbyn isn't simply a principled pacifist, because he supports the right of Palestinians to use violence against the Israelis, and he has similarly justified the use of violence by the ANC and IRA.
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
I think there is a difficult tension between the political and the material. I don't necessarily agree with, but can understand and feel we should discuss, the position that NATO expansion may have poked the Russian bear into this action, and there needs to be a political settlement that can allow the Russian state to feel it isn't besieged. But the material reality on the ground is not some ideological war between Russia and NATO, but a war where the Russian state increasingly and loudly proclaims the desire for the end of a Ukrainian people - by taking their land, dispersing their populace and reeducating their children. This, if carried out, would be a genocide. That is the current stated goal of the Russian state.
The second tension is, of course, the pretty reasonable desire to prevent escalation. Should this become a war between NATO and Russia, nobody knows what the fallout (pun intended) would be. We might hope that it wouldn't go nuclear, but it's not impossible.
(Snip)
The 'NATO expansion poking the Russian bear' is bullshit for a number of reasons. Not only is it factually inaccurate, why should Russia have a say on what bodies its democratic neighbours join?
Also note that Putin and others in his regime have stated that it is not just Ukraine; they want the Baltic states under their influence as well.
And why should states neighbouring Russia have to feel besieged by Russia? Why do only Russia's feelings matter?
Corbyn's position is deeply immoral, and will lead to more pain and suffering, note less.
Mr. Leon, gardening is often a very good thing for people's wellbeing.
Indeed. Probably most people feel the same way and I’m unusual
I like having as little responsibility as possible. A small flat in a nice location that I can lock and leave. Minimal hassle
As you documented during the winter lockdown in 2021 you struggle when you are tired to one location - you have epic wanderlust. Others would much rather be at home. It may be why I found the same experience an absolute breeze.
Yes indeed. I don’t think I will be very good at old age and increasing immobility
I’ll somehow have to escape with my mind. Hmpft
Having the funds to pay for a strong young nurse to help you from one sun-drenched verandah to another might be an option that would suit you.
A friend of mine became quite severely disabled following a stroke, and retired to Malawi, on the lakeshore. Sunshine every day and two full time carers at his beck and call. Limited medical care if a further event, but that suited him too.
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
The thing is Corbyn isn't simply a principled pacifist, because he supports the right of Palestinians to use violence against the Israelis, and he has similarly justified the use of violence by the ANC and IRA.
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
It is very wrong to conflate (no doubt for reasons of national pride) British and American 'imperialism'. Our pre-eminence in world affairs ended with WW1 and was decisively demolished with WW2. We are not responsible for the current shitshow, however many British politicians like to be seen 'standing shoulder to shoulder' (the actual posture is somewhat more recumbent) with the US.
And Ukraine is overrun with American rapists
I have no idea what that comment is even supposed to mean.
You said the current problem was caused by US imperialism
I mocked that by pretending that the murderous rapists currently in Ukraine are US rather than your friends from Russia
The reason I focused on the rape side was because of your continued fuckwittery in believing that all the rape stories were made up by the sacked Ukrainian woman. That level of dangerous idiocy needs to be robustly challenged
And it's really odd that people like Corbyn cannot recognise that. It is exactly the sort of colonialism they pretend to hate.
Just before the invasion, we were discussing China and Russia here. You may recall the pushback that some people had to my point that both China and Russia were (and are) imperial projects. Complete with heavy handed colonialism - smash the natives over the head until they become good little "civilised" people. Or good little dead people. Whichever.
I'm reluctant to keep correcting comments on Corbyn, who is pretty much yesterday's man, but he is vehemently opposed to the invasion for exactly that reason - he sees the invasion as an imperialist project. He's more or less a pacifist, so isn't keen on pouring arms into the conflict, but that doesn't mean he fails to recognise the invasion for the disaster that it is. See e.g. https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-corbyn-interview-russia-cease-fire/31838717.html
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
The thing is Corbyn isn't simply a principled pacifist, because he supports the right of Palestinians to use violence against the Israelis, and he has similarly justified the use of violence by the ANC and IRA.
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
I think there is a difficult tension between the political and the material. I don't necessarily agree with, but can understand and feel we should discuss, the position that NATO expansion may have poked the Russian bear into this action, and there needs to be a political settlement that can allow the Russian state to feel it isn't besieged. But the material reality on the ground is not some ideological war between Russia and NATO, but a war where the Russian state increasingly and loudly proclaims the desire for the end of a Ukrainian people - by taking their land, dispersing their populace and reeducating their children. This, if carried out, would be a genocide. That is the current stated goal of the Russian state.
The second tension is, of course, the pretty reasonable desire to prevent escalation. Should this become a war between NATO and Russia, nobody knows what the fallout (pun intended) would be. We might hope that it wouldn't go nuclear, but it's not impossible.
(Snip)
The 'NATO expansion poking the Russian bear' is bullshit for a number of reasons. Not only is it factually inaccurate, why should Russia have a say on what bodies its democratic neighbours join?
Also note that Putin and others in his regime have stated that it is not just Ukraine; they want the Baltic states under their influence as well.
And why should states neighbouring Russia have to feel besieged by Russia? Why do only Russia's feelings matter?
Corbyn's position is deeply immoral, and will lead to more pain and suffering, note less.
For the first part, I don't disagree, but if the shoe was on the other foot and coalition of China, Russia and Iran (for example) were planning to post troops and missiles in Cuba, the US would almost certainly invade and say it was unacceptable, even if the Cuban people democratically wanted it.
I also want the free democratic determination of the Ukrainian people, as well as those in other Baltic states, I just have no idea how that can materially be secure that given the possibility of nuclear war and escalation.
I also agree that Corbyn is wrong, even if I think he is coming from a place that is understandable and good faith.
"France is to scrap its television licence fee after the Senate approved Emmanuel Macron’s election promise to cut the public broadcasting tax in order to boost households’ spending power."
Replaced with a proportion of tax revenue from VAT.
Basically - the TV licence isn't going anywhere - it's just going to be rebranded and collected in a different way.
In other words, turning perhaps the single most regressive tax in existence, into something much more progressive.
Maths is wonderful. You spend years working on a secure encryption algorithm that is quantum computer-safe, only for a traditional single-core computer to break the encryption in an hour...
An interesting quote from a cryptographer: "In general there is a lot of deep mathematics which has been published in the mathematical literature but which is not well understood by cryptographers. I lump myself into the category of those many researchers who work in cryptography but do not understand as much mathematics as we really should."
The last I heard, factoring integers by quantum computers had got as far as factoring 21, but failed at factoring 30, so we may not have to worry just yet
They can't factor 30?
1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 10, 15, 30
Easy peasy. They should hire me to be a quantum computer.
Mr. Leon, gardening is often a very good thing for people's wellbeing.
Indeed. Probably most people feel the same way and I’m unusual
I like having as little responsibility as possible. A small flat in a nice location that I can lock and leave. Minimal hassle
As you documented during the winter lockdown in 2021 you struggle when you are tired to one location - you have epic wanderlust. Others would much rather be at home. It may be why I found the same experience an absolute breeze.
Yes indeed. I don’t think I will be very good at old age and increasing immobility
I’ll somehow have to escape with my mind. Hmpft
Very considerably reduced mobility and very considerably reduced manual dexterity are very difficult crosses to bear. Fortunately my mind is still coping extremely well with the challenges put to it!
As evidenced by your PB contributions not only is it doing that but you are outpeforming many if not most of the youngsters on here in that department.
Many thanks, Mr T, for your kind comments. Possibly dictating my comments rather than hurriedly typing makes me think about them a bit more!
No, Liz Truss has handled it quite well, abandoning the policy after just a few hours, and for half of those hours, people were asleep. Crucially, Truss ditched the policy before many voters would even have known there was a policy to ditch.
Liz Truss's big mistake was adopting the policy in the first place. Presumably it started life as a newspaper polemic from years gone by, like Boris's bendy banana scare stories, warmed over and punted to Liz by one of her more gullible supporters.
As a policy it fell apart almost immediately because the claimed savings imply a much wider scope than was originally spun, and because of the obvious contradictions with other government policies like levelling up. ETA as previously discussed, the rot at the heart of modern politics is the substitution of slogans for policies, so that Truss and her acolytes had considered how to operationalise this one, or indeed levelling up.
Comments
As otherwise you wouldn't be doing something as daft as getting HS2 trains to travel into Derby and Nottingham city centres...
So a good retirement might look like Acid wednesdays, a sprinkling of ket on thursday, fish'n'heroin fridays, Scotch Saturday, valium is and always has been a sunday drug. Dealer's choice on monday, then maybe a bit of puff on tuesday to deal with the inevitable comedown.
The other people at the old folk's home might complain, mind.
I was told, early in my career, at an oil company that ran itself like the civil service and recruited a lot of ex civil servants, that no-one who was "IT parented" could be considered for a managerial role..... in the IT Dept. Such roles needed to go to people with the right background.
Charles Parsons got an enormous amount of encouragement from the engineering lot in the RN - the story that he was being frozen out wasn't exactly true. The famous Turbina run may have been suggested as a political trick by the *RN head of engineering* at the time. They certainly bought into turbine vessels very quickly, once the technology was demonstrated.
The FA has ruled out a bid to host the Women’s World Cup in 2027 or 2031 — partly because it fears entering the race would damage its hopes of securing the men’s Euros in 2028 https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/fa-rules-out-bid-to-host-the-womens-world-cup-t02dwnfx6?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1659443718
I wonder which is more representative of Tory members, the Beeb or Sky?
Edit: sorry, aspect is all buggered
You could rectify the position by starting a fund to invest in such ventures. To distance yourself from this distasteful short term termism call it something like Patient Capital.
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2022/08/sike-once-a-post-quantum-encryption-contender-is-koed-in-nist-smackdown/
An interesting quote from a cryptographer: "In general there is a lot of deep mathematics which has been published in the mathematical literature but which is not well understood by cryptographers. I lump myself into the category of those many researchers who work in cryptography but do not understand as much mathematics as we really should."
£25k basic salary
27% pension contribution
day off for degree
£9,250 saving on degree as it's paid for by her department...
A Civil Service degree apprenticeship is really the best available option aged 18/19....
The usual few hours of breathless pearl clutching followed by u turn followed by 'bizarre fuss was made'
It's about making money, which they use to fund all levels of the game.
The Women's Euros were a great success, proving that women's football is now in the second echelon of sports in the country (at least, the viewing figures for the final were fairly similar to the 2003 rugby world cup final and the 2019 cricket world cup final, from what I could find out).
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/02/french-senate-agrees-emmanuel-macron-plan-scrap-tv-licence-fee
"France is to scrap its television licence fee after the Senate approved Emmanuel Macron’s election promise to cut the public broadcasting tax in order to boost households’ spending power."
Basically - the TV licence isn't going anywhere - it's just going to be rebranded and collected in a different way.
Funding the BBC by subscription is a logical idea. Possibly not the best idea, but a logical idea.
Funding the BBC by a compulsory tax levied on anyone who watches any "live" TV even if they only ever watch the BBC's competitors is an illogical idea.
Anyone who, like Casino and me, backed him at the longer odds now has the opportunity to trade back out and increase the potential profit from a Truss win.
The BBC being funded by general taxation/VAT/surcharge on energy bills (probably not the last one at the minute) is much more likely if you look at how other countries have replaced TV licence charges. None have gone subscription based.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/downing-street-refuses-release-bombshell-27639697
Here is the car I missed.
I think we tend to have two-dimensional views of people we disagree with. Left-wing pacifism has a very long tradition and it's got its supporters into trouble on a regular basis, notably in WW1 and in the 30s. It's not something I support - I'm willing to back military force where appropriate. But it's a caricature to see it as support for the other side - Corbyn is no more pro-Russian than Lansbury was pro-German. The right-wing equivalent, I suppose, is isolationism - "let other countries sort themselves out, not our business". That too is not necessarily symptomatic of support for the wrong side.
This was done well before anyone had any inkling of how well the women’s Euros would go and international sports organisations aren’t usually favourable to a country monopolising tournaments so a bit unfair if the FA is hammered for this.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11072011/Liz-Truss-wages-war-Whitehall-waste-including-vows-cut-pay-holiday-civil-servants.html
His position is that British and American imperialism, by virtue of being the strongest imperialisms in the world, are therefore the most evil, and so the most urgent to oppose. Consequently British and American foreign policy is always wrong.
I've often found myself on the same side as Corbyn in opposing British and American military adventures abroad, but he's simply wrong on Ukraine. Ukrainians have as much right to self-defence as Palestinians.
And we all know what that means in politics.
No foreign policy issue passed their 4 percent threshold, unless you consider immigration a foreign policy issue.
(Years ago, I saw an interesting Gallup analysis on abortion and voting. Briefly, at that time it was not an important voting issue for most Americans, but among the minority that did vote on the issue, there were more "pro-life" voters than "pro choice" voters. Something like 5 percent to 3 percent, as I recall.
The reverse would be true now, of course.)
(Ben Houchen ) He added: 'Is it a moment - I'm not entirely sure, it might be - we might look back in four or five weeks' time and this could be Liz's ''dementia tax'' moment. It very easily could be, but it's to be seen.'
Yet in each of these areas, his views seem to be rather more (ahem) nuanced behind a wider anti-western agenda.
But - the Tory selectorate is even more mental than she is. They may think "great idea" and hope she will bring it in anyway. So whilst this should help Rshi, it may not.
At least the Tories have a "sensible" electoral system where you can vote as many times you like and only your final vote is counted.
https://free.flightradar24.com/SPAR19/2ce4f83f
What a fucking mess.
The second tension is, of course, the pretty reasonable desire to prevent escalation. Should this become a war between NATO and Russia, nobody knows what the fallout (pun intended) would be. We might hope that it wouldn't go nuclear, but it's not impossible.
I think it was a 538 episode that played on the typical metaphor of nuclear war like chess: imagine a chess game where you play and the worse you lose, the worse the outcome. So if you lose but only by one piece, you lose a tenner, whereas if you are completely routed, you and your family are taken out round the woodshed and shot. Now imagine that there is a bomb attached to the board you can use at any time, which would kill you both. If you are losing so badly the likely outcome is the woodshed for you and your family, why wouldn't you use the bomb instead? Russia can lose and not flip the switch, but it can't be a humiliating loss or they may choose to. Ukraine doesn't have that option, so Russia can fight a war to the end if they really want to. So anything that could deter Russia for fighting the war that way would need to come from NATO or the US... which is also worrying...
Chinese fighter jets are crossing the Taiwan Strait, state-run media reports, without further details
https://twitter.com/BNONews/status/1554474606865547265
Also note that Putin and others in his regime have stated that it is not just Ukraine; they want the Baltic states under their influence as well.
And why should states neighbouring Russia have to feel besieged by Russia? Why do only Russia's feelings matter?
Corbyn's position is deeply immoral, and will lead to more pain and suffering, note less.
I mocked that by pretending that the murderous rapists currently in Ukraine are US rather than your friends from Russia
The reason I focused on the rape side was because of your continued fuckwittery in believing that all the rape stories were made up by the sacked Ukrainian woman. That level of dangerous idiocy needs to be robustly challenged
My piece on Truss’s backtrack on regional public sector pay, across @BBCNews today👇 https://twitter.com/ionewells/status/1554478323316805633/video/1
I also want the free democratic determination of the Ukrainian people, as well as those in other Baltic states, I just have no idea how that can materially be secure that given the possibility of nuclear war and escalation.
I also agree that Corbyn is wrong, even if I think he is coming from a place that is understandable and good faith.
1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 10, 15, 30
Easy peasy. They should hire me to be a quantum computer.
Liz Truss's big mistake was adopting the policy in the first place. Presumably it started life as a newspaper polemic from years gone by, like Boris's bendy banana scare stories, warmed over and punted to Liz by one of her more gullible supporters.
As a policy it fell apart almost immediately because the claimed savings imply a much wider scope than was originally spun, and because of the obvious contradictions with other government policies like levelling up. ETA as previously discussed, the rot at the heart of modern politics is the substitution of slogans for policies, so that Truss and her acolytes had considered how to operationalise this one, or indeed levelling up.
But all in all, Liz handled it well.