Rob Ford brings facts to a prejudice party - fascinating trio of threads sparked by the “Never kissed a Tory” t- shirt:
In the second volume of @sexliesballots I had a look at voters' attitudes to marriage across party lines. 2010 Labour voters were much more likely to be upset at the idea of a close relative marrying a Conservative than 2010 Tories were of a potential Labour in-law.
Same phenomenon noted among Remain vs Leave voters.
I would suggest that this is a result of the dominant media culrure being Labour/Remain. Remainers in deep Remainia might literally never knowingly encounter a Leaver or a Tory first hand. Potentially, their only exposure to them is via their chosen media, which will generally paint Leavers in a negative light. Whereas Leavers in deep Leavistan - even if they personally do not know any Remainers (or Labour voters) will, if they watch any telly at all, be exposed to Remainy/Labour/Centrist Dad views on Remain's own terms. They may not agree with them, but Remain/Labour types will not be the distant and scary stereotypes that Leave/Tory types will be for those in deep Remainia.
Dominant media culture is Remain and Labour? You do know what the most popular newspapers in the UK are, right?
She’s done a lot of newspaper work during the campaign.
The criticism, from those who would criticise her no matter what she did, is the lack of TV interviews - where yes, the culture is very much Blairite and Remain.
That's thecmost pathetic excuse I have ever heard. Thatcher thought the BBC was run by actual Marxists and it didn't stop her doing TV interviews.
Right. If Truss does want to model herself as Thatcher, she's totally lacking in this aspect. Margaret Thatcher used to pop up quite often on normal news programs (Eg. Six O'Clock news) to answer questions from that day's news. I don't remember seeing any PM since doing that.
It's what I like about Borgen - the lovely now-fictitious idea that the PM will rock up to any news programme and happily answer questions free-form with about an hour's notice. Nice for the narrative but not particularly realistic, well certainly not here in the UK.
I loved the original Borgen - but was disappointed with the recent series. It seems a bit thin and odd to me.
On the subject of TV - I'm mourning the loss of Better Call Saul.
Better Caul Saul is brilliant but hovers on the cusp of being too slow (for me at least).
I know what you mean - Seasons 1 to 4 required some dedication but I think this is mainly because they came off the back of the rip-roaring Breaking Bad. I'm watching Better Call Saul from the start again and it doesn't seem as slow as the first time I watched it.
For me Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul are perfect series - beats The Sopranos and The Wire for best TV ever IMO.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
I do not see this massacre of small businesses at all. Yes, their costs are going to rise significantly so their prices will do likewise. That will effect businesses differentially depending on how important energy is for their business, as a generality manufacturing will be hit worse than services.
But we have more more than 10% inflation already. No one is going to be shocked by rising prices. Given wages are not rising as fast there may be some reduction in demand but so far that has not manifested itself.
We need to adjust to this exogenous price shock. Cheap gas and relatively cheap fuel are not coming back anytime soon, if ever. We need to accept as a nation that more of our money will be spent that way and less on other things. We did this with the oil shock in the 1970s. It was deeply unpleasant but we survived. Expecting governments to somehow magic this change away is every bit as fairy tale as the idea that the producers, who are in general well beyond the reach of the Treasury, will somehow be paying a windfall tax to pay for it all.
Has the price of wind gone up then? Or sunshine? The price of electricity generated by free renewables has, and perhaps the government could look into that.
Right now we are getting 47% of our energy from gas and 15% from wind. To free us of a situation where gas is the determinative cost we really need to reverse those figures. When Dogger Bank etc comes on stream we may be close to that on a good day.
When is that likely to happen? There is also the Morocco project. My understanding - though it is vague - is that we could be getting around a quarter of UK electricity from this by the 2030s.
I doubt very much we'll get a quarter of our energy from Morocco.
Between that and Dogger, you could be looking at a total of 20% of UK grid capacity (though of course they won't both be generating anywhere near all of that at any given time... though nor does the UK Grid run at capacity all of the time).
But of course other stuff is being developed at the same time.
The basic problem is the next 5-10 years ... which wouldn't have been anywhere near as bad had we not delayed the nuclear decision for well over a decade, and killed off various tidal projects. Even the decisions on the Morocco and Dogger projects could have been made at least a couple of years earlier.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
Pricing is a rationing solution. It is not a method of avoiding rationing; it is a method of rationing. It rations by income/wealth.
Correct, but most people think that pricing a young family out of the market is fair, but pricing a young family out of being able to heat their house is not fair. This is the whole problem, that price alone is considered by most to be unfair when it comes to basic energy and basic food.
Sweden’s principal centre-right party, the Moderates (remember Fredrik Reinfeldt and Carl Bildt?) is about to get absolutely spanked at the GE on 11 September.
The current leader Ulf Kristersson has made a dreadful error of judgment by cosying up to the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats. Voters had been drifting away from the Moderates, but now it’s a flood.
Today it is clear: the Sweden Democrats have overtaken the once mighty Moderates to be the largest opposition party:
SD 20.6% (+3.1) M 15.8% (-4.0)
Echos of the Tory hard-right completely routing the wet/one-nation wing.
He hasn't when on the latest poll the right of centre Opposition block will be on 48% combined with the Sweden Democrats compared to only 40% for the Opposition Alliance block at the last election without the Sweden Democrats but including the Centre Party who now back the Social Democrats.
Sweden has PR not FPTP so the main thing is the strength of the block not each party
If the Sweden Democrats become the largest Opposition party (and I think they will), the Rightwing bloc will collapse. Kristersson’s sweaty face was a sorry sight when journalists confronted him yesterday. Classic bunny in headlights. He has totally fluffed it and he knows it. Ditto Liberals who are obviously completely embarrassed at landing in the “wrong” bloc. Only the Christian Democrats look pleased.
Jimmie Åkesson and Magdalena Andersson are laughing their heads off.
I am not sure about that.
Berlusconi for example is well prepared to see Forza Italia serve in government with Meloni later next month even though Meloni's Brothers of Italy will win far more seats than Forza Italia.
Italy like Sweden has PR and under PR it is the size of your coalition block that matters not the size of your individual party as it is here with FPTP
Tory support is in the 30+% range, however it has been wiped out on PB (although there is a large reservoir of potential support). @hyufd is right in that PB is no longer representative of Tory support.
Why? What is different about PB? Age?, Political awareness? Intelligence? What?
What is someone who still happily supports the Tories like?
The average Tory voter is now a skilled working class Leave voter or a pensioner who voted Leave.
The average PB poster however is a middle class graduate who voted Remain or at most voted Leave but only to go to EEA
Makes sense, but it is quite dramatic. So it will all be down to how many of each group there are and where they live.
Any reason for limiting it to 'skilled working class leave'. What about 'unskilled leavers'? Or do you think they will be mainly Labour or non voters anyway?
I think there is some generalisation going on. Certainly many of the more active posters who have clear political views fall in to the category of educated/graduate/remain/ labour or 'anti tory'. But proportionately how many of the total number of posters is that?
The conservative government is at the end of its natural life, it is like labour in the late 00's, support fading away. The tories are uniquely directionless and a lot of the stuff that they do, is just embarrassing.
Ever since Johnson arrived on the scene, together with the clowns that surround him following Cummings departure (not all cabinet ministers, but many of them), it has been embarrassing to confess that you vote conservative in educated circles. I'd say it is probably more of a phenomenon whereby conservative voters have gone quiet than anything else.
I may well vote conservative in the next election, but wouldn't advertise this fact. It would be based on the usual 'best of bad options' analysis.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
Rob Ford brings facts to a prejudice party - fascinating trio of threads sparked by the “Never kissed a Tory” t- shirt:
In the second volume of @sexliesballots I had a look at voters' attitudes to marriage across party lines. 2010 Labour voters were much more likely to be upset at the idea of a close relative marrying a Conservative than 2010 Tories were of a potential Labour in-law.
Same phenomenon noted among Remain vs Leave voters.
I would suggest that this is a result of the dominant media culrure being Labour/Remain. Remainers in deep Remainia might literally never knowingly encounter a Leaver or a Tory first hand. Potentially, their only exposure to them is via their chosen media, which will generally paint Leavers in a negative light. Whereas Leavers in deep Leavistan - even if they personally do not know any Remainers (or Labour voters) will, if they watch any telly at all, be exposed to Remainy/Labour/Centrist Dad views on Remain's own terms. They may not agree with them, but Remain/Labour types will not be the distant and scary stereotypes that Leave/Tory types will be for those in deep Remainia.
Dominant media culture is Remain and Labour? You do know what the most popular newspapers in the UK are, right?
She’s done a lot of newspaper work during the campaign.
The criticism, from those who would criticise her no matter what she did, is the lack of TV interviews - where yes, the culture is very much Blairite and Remain.
That's thecmost pathetic excuse I have ever heard. Thatcher thought the BBC was run by actual Marxists and it didn't stop her doing TV interviews.
Right. If Truss does want to model herself as Thatcher, she's totally lacking in this aspect. Margaret Thatcher used to pop up quite often on normal news programs (Eg. Six O'Clock news) to answer questions from that day's news. I don't remember seeing any PM since doing that.
It's what I like about Borgen - the lovely now-fictitious idea that the PM will rock up to any news programme and happily answer questions free-form with about an hour's notice. Nice for the narrative but not particularly realistic, well certainly not here in the UK.
I loved the original Borgen - but was disappointed with the recent series. It seems a bit thin and odd to me.
On the subject of TV - I'm mourning the loss of Better Call Saul.
The last series is probably worth a binge rewatch.
Can recommend the German 'Kleo' on Netflix. Amusing end of Cold War nostalgia trip; great soundtrack.
Rob Ford brings facts to a prejudice party - fascinating trio of threads sparked by the “Never kissed a Tory” t- shirt:
In the second volume of @sexliesballots I had a look at voters' attitudes to marriage across party lines. 2010 Labour voters were much more likely to be upset at the idea of a close relative marrying a Conservative than 2010 Tories were of a potential Labour in-law.
Same phenomenon noted among Remain vs Leave voters.
I would suggest that this is a result of the dominant media culrure being Labour/Remain. Remainers in deep Remainia might literally never knowingly encounter a Leaver or a Tory first hand. Potentially, their only exposure to them is via their chosen media, which will generally paint Leavers in a negative light. Whereas Leavers in deep Leavistan - even if they personally do not know any Remainers (or Labour voters) will, if they watch any telly at all, be exposed to Remainy/Labour/Centrist Dad views on Remain's own terms. They may not agree with them, but Remain/Labour types will not be the distant and scary stereotypes that Leave/Tory types will be for those in deep Remainia.
Dominant media culture is Remain and Labour? You do know what the most popular newspapers in the UK are, right?
She’s done a lot of newspaper work during the campaign.
The criticism, from those who would criticise her no matter what she did, is the lack of TV interviews - where yes, the culture is very much Blairite and Remain.
That's thecmost pathetic excuse I have ever heard. Thatcher thought the BBC was run by actual Marxists and it didn't stop her doing TV interviews.
Right. If Truss does want to model herself as Thatcher, she's totally lacking in this aspect. Margaret Thatcher used to pop up quite often on normal news programs (Eg. Six O'Clock news) to answer questions from that day's news. I don't remember seeing any PM since doing that.
It's what I like about Borgen - the lovely now-fictitious idea that the PM will rock up to any news programme and happily answer questions free-form with about an hour's notice. Nice for the narrative but not particularly realistic, well certainly not here in the UK.
I loved the original Borgen - but was disappointed with the recent series. It seems a bit thin and odd to me.
On the subject of TV - I'm mourning the loss of Better Call Saul.
Thus far I've only got round to watching the first episode of the new Borgen, so I'm reserving judgement still at the moment, but I really liked the first 3 series.
Tory support is in the 30+% range, however it has been wiped out on PB (although there is a large reservoir of potential support). @hyufd is right in that PB is no longer representative of Tory support.
Why? What is different about PB? Age?, Political awareness? Intelligence? What?
What is someone who still happily supports the Tories like?
The average Tory voter is now a skilled working class Leave voter or a pensioner who voted Leave.
The average PB poster however is a middle class graduate who voted Remain or at most voted Leave but only to go to EEA
Makes sense, but it is quite dramatic. So it will all be down to how many of each group there are and where they live.
Any reason for limiting it to 'skilled working class leave'. What about 'unskilled leavers'? Or do you think they will be mainly Labour or non voters anyway?
Unskilled voters, certainly if they live in social housing will still be mainly Labour even if they voted Leave
The big risk for the Tories in changing their demographic is at some time they lose their safe Southern seats to the LDs, but are in a tight fights with Labour in their new joint heartlands.
PS That is just a fantasy on my part and I don't see it happening on any scale that could wipe out the Tories from the South, but wouldn't it be a change to see the LDs with hundreds of safe seats and the Tories and Labour scraping for 2nd place in the previous Labour heartlands and sharing the spoils.
@OliviaUtley After 2 great years at The Telegraph, I’m off to @GBNEWS in October to join the politics team. I hugely admire what GB is doing - and it’s been brilliant watching it go from strength to strength. Very excited to get started 🤩
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
Perhaps AI could eventually make policies like this more realistic? Automate the means testing and establish a baseline position that way. However it would require mass data collection at quite an intrusive level, and public confidence in its effectiveness, which is doubtful. It won't happen in the UK first.
THis would effectively be "smart rationing". I find it interesting that it was fairly easy to implement rationing in the 1940's because almost all payments were done in person and with cash. Today it would be so much harder to implement.
Rob Ford brings facts to a prejudice party - fascinating trio of threads sparked by the “Never kissed a Tory” t- shirt:
In the second volume of @sexliesballots I had a look at voters' attitudes to marriage across party lines. 2010 Labour voters were much more likely to be upset at the idea of a close relative marrying a Conservative than 2010 Tories were of a potential Labour in-law.
Same phenomenon noted among Remain vs Leave voters.
I would suggest that this is a result of the dominant media culrure being Labour/Remain. Remainers in deep Remainia might literally never knowingly encounter a Leaver or a Tory first hand. Potentially, their only exposure to them is via their chosen media, which will generally paint Leavers in a negative light. Whereas Leavers in deep Leavistan - even if they personally do not know any Remainers (or Labour voters) will, if they watch any telly at all, be exposed to Remainy/Labour/Centrist Dad views on Remain's own terms. They may not agree with them, but Remain/Labour types will not be the distant and scary stereotypes that Leave/Tory types will be for those in deep Remainia.
Dominant media culture is Remain and Labour? You do know what the most popular newspapers in the UK are, right?
The people writing the newspapers don't actually believe in the politics of what they write, necessarily. The Sun in a classic example.
Given the number of Daily Mail staff who are first generation immigrants, it seems quite likely to me that there a number of hard core John Redwood fans on the staff at the Guardian.
I see that Leaver paranoia has reached the stage where the Sun is written by a pinko leftist Remainer cabal.
If only they trusted experts a bit more they might have understood that Sunak was the leaver and Truss the remainer too.
There was a rather good documentary on the Sun a while back. The staff there are professionals who sell a designed product. They don't actually believe in it.
Bit like Jeremy Clarkson.
I think that makes it worse, by the way.
The number of non-gammons at the the Daily Mail is extremely funny some ways. But again, I think it makes it worse.
I'm surprised that this is controversial or not more known.
Not read the Sun for a few years (indeed apart from a free one at the tube, very rarely bother with any daily paper) but from memory, unlike the Mail or Express or even the Mirror, I never found it particularly political apart from during election campaigns. Has that changed?
The Sun's political role is to discourage its naturally Labour-inclined readers from taking an interest in politics. And so its "apolitical" stance is unsurprising. Its readers are the least likely to vote of any major newspaper. I have a friend who is a Sun reader (and almost certainly a Leaver) who fits this profile perfectly.
Except for in 1992, when it woz the Sun wot wunnit!
It is a tried, tested and successful strategy for The Sun to wait until the winner can be called and then to back the winner.
I think they have done it with one exception for the past XX years.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
Pricing is a rationing solution. It is not a method of avoiding rationing; it is a method of rationing. It rations by income/wealth.
But it's a horribly inefficient solution when half of energy customers are completely insulated from it by contracts which run into next year or later.
Sweden’s principal centre-right party, the Moderates (remember Fredrik Reinfeldt and Carl Bildt?) is about to get absolutely spanked at the GE on 11 September.
The current leader Ulf Kristersson has made a dreadful error of judgment by cosying up to the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats. Voters had been drifting away from the Moderates, but now it’s a flood.
Today it is clear: the Sweden Democrats have overtaken the once mighty Moderates to be the largest opposition party:
SD 20.6% (+3.1) M 15.8% (-4.0)
Echos of the Tory hard-right completely routing the wet/one-nation wing.
He hasn't when on the latest poll the right of centre Opposition block will be on 48% combined with the Sweden Democrats compared to only 40% for the Opposition Alliance block at the last election without the Sweden Democrats but including the Centre Party who now back the Social Democrats.
Sweden has PR not FPTP so the main thing is the strength of the block not each party
If the Sweden Democrats become the largest Opposition party (and I think they will), the Rightwing bloc will collapse. Kristersson’s sweaty face was a sorry sight when journalists confronted him yesterday. Classic bunny in headlights. He has totally fluffed it and he knows it. Ditto Liberals who are obviously completely embarrassed at landing in the “wrong” bloc. Only the Christian Democrats look pleased.
Jimmie Åkesson and Magdalena Andersson are laughing their heads off.
I am not sure about that.
Berlusconi for example is well prepared to see Forza Italia serve in government with Meloni later next month even though Meloni's Brothers of Italy will win far more seats than Forza Italia.
Italy like Sweden has PR and under PR it is the size of your coalition block that matters not the size of your individual party as it is here with FPTP
The size of an unstable bloc is irrelevant.
Magdalena Andersson can hold together a team. Shaky, but it’ll stand up.
Jimmie Åkesson cannot. Despite his many positive qualities as a leader, he is not a miracle worker. If the Moderates end up behind the Sweden Democrats then the whole project is finished.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
I like the story of Elephant and Castle being named after Le Dauphin Castille.
Supporting evidence for which I can find nowhere.
Wiki
The myth of the infanta
The popular and enduring idea that the inn itself derives its name from an English corruption of the phrase "La Infanta de Castilla", as a reference to Eleanor of Castile, has been debunked by local historian Stephen Humphrey in his 2013 book Elephant and Castle, a History.
After examining how the image of an elephant with a castle on its back has been popular for centuries and throughout Europe (the earliest example predating Queen Eleanor by 1,500 years), and pointing out the fact that the sign only begins to be used in the area about 500 years after Eleanor was alive, he states: "The story of Queen Eleanor in relation to the Elephant and Castle is therefore a myth. It is wildly anachronistic both in respect of the sign in general and in its specific use in Newington, and she has no connection with the sign or with the place."[5]
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
I like the story of Elephant and Castle being named after Le Dauphin Castille.
Supporting evidence for which I can find nowhere.
Wiki
The myth of the infanta
The popular and enduring idea that the inn itself derives its name from an English corruption of the phrase "La Infanta de Castilla", as a reference to Eleanor of Castile, has been debunked by local historian Stephen Humphrey in his 2013 book Elephant and Castle, a History.
After examining how the image of an elephant with a castle on its back has been popular for centuries and throughout Europe (the earliest example predating Queen Eleanor by 1,500 years), and pointing out the fact that the sign only begins to be used in the area about 500 years after Eleanor was alive, he states: "The story of Queen Eleanor in relation to the Elephant and Castle is therefore a myth. It is wildly anachronistic both in respect of the sign in general and in its specific use in Newington, and she has no connection with the sign or with the place."[5]
yeah but it's a nice thought - and yes it was la infanta.
Pubs will be far from the only small businesses facing closure this winter.
Following the pandemic reaction we are in a world where people expect support, and a lot of it, whenever there is an exogenous shock.
No idea if that is a good thing or a bad thing but it is where we are.
The interesting thing of course is that the candidate who provided such support in previous circumstances is a 1/20 shot to win the contest.
The two exogenous shocks under discussion — COVID-19 and then the Russian invasion of Ukraine/energy price rises — are very big exogenous shocks. These are once or twice in a lifetime type shocks. I think it’s grossly unfair to imply that people “expect support” for any exogenous shock. If the Right are going to persist with this narrative that the population are just a bunch of whiners, then they are going to lose election after election after election.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
I do not see this massacre of small businesses at all. Yes, their costs are going to rise significantly so their prices will do likewise. That will effect businesses differentially depending on how important energy is for their business, as a generality manufacturing will be hit worse than services.
But we have more more than 10% inflation already. No one is going to be shocked by rising prices. Given wages are not rising as fast there may be some reduction in demand but so far that has not manifested itself.
We need to adjust to this exogenous price shock. Cheap gas and relatively cheap fuel are not coming back anytime soon, if ever. We need to accept as a nation that more of our money will be spent that way and less on other things. We did this with the oil shock in the 1970s. It was deeply unpleasant but we survived. Expecting governments to somehow magic this change away is every bit as fairy tale as the idea that the producers, who are in general well beyond the reach of the Treasury, will somehow be paying a windfall tax to pay for it all.
Has the price of wind gone up then? Or sunshine? The price of electricity generated by free renewables has, and perhaps the government could look into that.
Right now we are getting 47% of our energy from gas and 15% from wind. To free us of a situation where gas is the determinative cost we really need to reverse those figures. When Dogger Bank etc comes on stream we may be close to that on a good day.
When is that likely to happen? There is also the Morocco project. My understanding - though it is vague - is that we could be getting around a quarter of UK electricity from this by the 2030s.
I doubt very much we'll get a quarter of our energy from Morocco.
Between that and Dogger, you could be looking at a total of 20% of UK grid capacity (though of course they won't both be generating anywhere near all of that at any given time... though nor does the UK Grid run at capacity all of the time).
But of course other stuff is being developed at the same time.
The basic problem is the next 5-10 years ... which wouldn't have been anywhere near as bad had we not delayed the nuclear decision for well over a decade, and killed off various tidal projects. Even the decisions on the Morocco and Dogger projects could have been made at least a couple of years earlier.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
@OliviaUtley After 2 great years at The Telegraph, I’m off to @GBNEWS in October to join the politics team. I hugely admire what GB is doing - and it’s been brilliant watching it go from strength to strength. Very excited to get started 🤩
I've no idea as to its profitability - but those who predicted the immediate demise of GB News were proved wrong. I think that the percieved 'capture' of supposedly neutral media platforms by the 'woke' left - be this the BBC, Sky News, CNN etc; or facebook, twitter etc.... will just lead to a continuing phenomenon whereby those with different political views abandon these platforms and set up their own. GB News was a early starter on this front. It is just a very sad and depressing situation as it increases polarisation, and makes our problems harder to ever solve.
Pubs will be far from the only small businesses facing closure this winter.
Following the pandemic reaction we are in a world where people expect support, and a lot of it, whenever there is an exogenous shock.
No idea if that is a good thing or a bad thing but it is where we are.
The interesting thing of course is that the candidate who provided such support in previous circumstances is a 1/20 shot to win the contest.
The two exogenous shocks under discussion — COVID-19 and then the Russian invasion of Ukraine/energy price rises — are very big exogenous shocks. These are once or twice in a lifetime type shocks. I think it’s grossly unfair to imply that people “expect support” for any exogenous shock. If the Right are going to persist with this narrative that the population are just a bunch of whiners, then they are going to lose election after election after election.
Who is suggesting that the population is a "bunch of whiners"? This is not the same as calling out the fashionable belief that the state can solve everything.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
I do not see this massacre of small businesses at all. Yes, their costs are going to rise significantly so their prices will do likewise. That will effect businesses differentially depending on how important energy is for their business, as a generality manufacturing will be hit worse than services.
But we have more more than 10% inflation already. No one is going to be shocked by rising prices. Given wages are not rising as fast there may be some reduction in demand but so far that has not manifested itself.
We need to adjust to this exogenous price shock. Cheap gas and relatively cheap fuel are not coming back anytime soon, if ever. We need to accept as a nation that more of our money will be spent that way and less on other things. We did this with the oil shock in the 1970s. It was deeply unpleasant but we survived. Expecting governments to somehow magic this change away is every bit as fairy tale as the idea that the producers, who are in general well beyond the reach of the Treasury, will somehow be paying a windfall tax to pay for it all.
Has the price of wind gone up then? Or sunshine? The price of electricity generated by free renewables has, and perhaps the government could look into that.
Right now we are getting 47% of our energy from gas and 15% from wind. To free us of a situation where gas is the determinative cost we really need to reverse those figures. When Dogger Bank etc comes on stream we may be close to that on a good day.
When is that likely to happen? There is also the Morocco project. My understanding - though it is vague - is that we could be getting around a quarter of UK electricity from this by the 2030s.
I doubt very much we'll get a quarter of our energy from Morocco.
Between that and Dogger, you could be looking at a total of 20% of UK grid capacity (though of course they won't both be generating anywhere near all of that at any given time... though nor does the UK Grid run at capacity all of the time).
But of course other stuff is being developed at the same time.
The basic problem is the next 5-10 years ... which wouldn't have been anywhere near as bad had we not delayed the nuclear decision for well over a decade, and killed off various tidal projects. Even the decisions on the Morocco and Dogger projects could have been made at least a couple of years earlier.
How stable/secure is Morocco in the long-term?
The more prosperous, the more stable, probably - so such developments ought to help.
Western aid should be massively prioritising African domestic solar projects, too. It would be both excellent economics, and help reduce future fossil fuel demand.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
No idea if it is true but has a nice ring to it.
In Australia many place names are named after aboriginal words or phrases for that area. I recall a story about one town where the settlers asked the aborigines for the name and the aborigines took the piss out of them and gave a rude phrase which what then adopted as the town's name by the European settlers not realising what they were calling themselves.
Unfortunately I can't remember the town, or what it allegedly meant, and it's possibly apocryphal but it's a fun story.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Wrong way round. Proper old-fashioned mammals do. The UK is the weird one. A country full of mammals that don't lay shelled cleidoic eggs? Really strange innovation.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
It'd be 2,465 kwH of electricity and 10,200 kwH of gas - which Is OK I think. Also bigger houses have more room for solar panels. I'd exempt the disabled too.
Pubs will be far from the only small businesses facing closure this winter.
Following the pandemic reaction we are in a world where people expect support, and a lot of it, whenever there is an exogenous shock.
No idea if that is a good thing or a bad thing but it is where we are.
The interesting thing of course is that the candidate who provided such support in previous circumstances is a 1/20 shot to win the contest.
The two exogenous shocks under discussion — COVID-19 and then the Russian invasion of Ukraine/energy price rises — are very big exogenous shocks. These are once or twice in a lifetime type shocks. I think it’s grossly unfair to imply that people “expect support” for any exogenous shock. If the Right are going to persist with this narrative that the population are just a bunch of whiners, then they are going to lose election after election after election.
Who is suggesting that the population is a "bunch of whiners"? This is not the same as calling out the fashionable belief that the state can solve everything.
@OliviaUtley After 2 great years at The Telegraph, I’m off to @GBNEWS in October to join the politics team. I hugely admire what GB is doing - and it’s been brilliant watching it go from strength to strength. Very excited to get started 🤩
Party constitutions do not overrule the supremacy of parliament. The idea that a particular configuration of government, arising from the confidence of the HoC following an election, can be ruled out in advance is nonsense. It is meaningless and of course unenforceable.
Sweden’s principal centre-right party, the Moderates (remember Fredrik Reinfeldt and Carl Bildt?) is about to get absolutely spanked at the GE on 11 September.
The current leader Ulf Kristersson has made a dreadful error of judgment by cosying up to the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats. Voters had been drifting away from the Moderates, but now it’s a flood.
Today it is clear: the Sweden Democrats have overtaken the once mighty Moderates to be the largest opposition party:
SD 20.6% (+3.1) M 15.8% (-4.0)
Echos of the Tory hard-right completely routing the wet/one-nation wing.
He hasn't when on the latest poll the right of centre Opposition block will be on 48% combined with the Sweden Democrats compared to only 40% for the Opposition Alliance block at the last election without the Sweden Democrats but including the Centre Party who now back the Social Democrats.
Sweden has PR not FPTP so the main thing is the strength of the block not each party
If the Sweden Democrats become the largest Opposition party (and I think they will), the Rightwing bloc will collapse. Kristersson’s sweaty face was a sorry sight when journalists confronted him yesterday. Classic bunny in headlights. He has totally fluffed it and he knows it. Ditto Liberals who are obviously completely embarrassed at landing in the “wrong” bloc. Only the Christian Democrats look pleased.
Jimmie Åkesson and Magdalena Andersson are laughing their heads off.
I am not sure about that.
Berlusconi for example is well prepared to see Forza Italia serve in government with Meloni later next month even though Meloni's Brothers of Italy will win far more seats than Forza Italia.
Italy like Sweden has PR and under PR it is the size of your coalition block that matters not the size of your individual party as it is here with FPTP
The size of an unstable bloc is irrelevant.
Magdalena Andersson can hold together a team. Shaky, but it’ll stand up.
Jimmie Åkesson cannot. Despite his many positive qualities as a leader, he is not a miracle worker. If the Moderates end up behind the Sweden Democrats then the whole project is finished.
Unless the Moderates do a grand coalition deal with the Social Democrats German style or the Sweden Democrats disappear it isn't.
The populist right is not going away. The mainstream right has to decide whether to do deals with it, as the PP has done with Vox in Spain or Berlusconi has done with Meloni in Italy or the Moderates have done with the Sweden Democrats or to refuse to touch it.
However if they refuse to touch it then the only way the centre right is likely to get into government without the populist right in Europe and indeed most western nations now is with a deal with the centre left, as the CDU did with the SPD under Merkel. Or else they get squeezed between the populist right and liberal left, especially in nations without PR like France where Les Republicains now not only trail Macron and Le Pen's parties but even have fallen behind the far left Melenchon's party.
See also Canada from 1993 when the Progressive Conservatives fell behind both the Liberals and the populist right Reform Party until it merged with Reform's successor, the Canadian Alliance, to form today's Conservative Party of Canada in 2003. Or indeed here where May's Tories fell behind both Labour and Farage's Brexit Party in Spring 2019 until Boris took over
Party constitutions do not overrule the supremacy of parliament. The idea that a particular configuration of government, arising from the confidence of the HoC following an election, can be ruled out in advance is nonsense. It is meaningless and of course unenforceable.
Presumably, the point of a constitutional rule like that, would be as a mechanism for the party’s MPs to hold the feet of the leader to the fire during the post-election negotiations? It would give the Lab MPs cover to no-confidence the leader, or vote against an unconstitutional coalition agreement.
Truss's first PMQT is going to be a bloodbath. She simply doesn't have the mental agility to think on her feet, and she knows it. Starmer is going to go into full-on barrister mode - question, pause, wait for his subject to say something slightly off-line and then monster her. It's going to be brutal.
She is not going to enjoy her new job. Having spent her entire life working towards this goal, it is going to be a crushing personal disappointment.
I genuinely feel sorry for her on a personal level. Events are likely to totally overcome her. She has a 1% chance of success.
How do you rate the chances of these events?
- A decisive Ukrainian breakthrough leading to Russia withdrawing to pre-February borders - Gas prices falling as the race to fill European storage capacity ends - Inflation falling as one-off pandemic effects get filtered out
These are good points, and I think some of the inflationary effects of the pandemic and from energy prices will pass in time. (How much, how soon, I don’t know… if I did, I could presumably make a killing on the stock market.)
However, the hit to living standards isn’t going to be reversed. People will still be worse off and feel worse off. Things probably won’t look so bad in 2024, but they’re still going to look significantly worse than the sunny uplands Boris once promised.
Also, people blame bad things on their politicians more than they credit the politicians for the good things. If things get bad and then return to normal, there is a hysteresis.
Lucky for us the membership are about to elect someone more than capable of taking up this nightmare challenge.
Being the FT it's a slightly wordier list of problems than the Sun manages (but the same list) without any hint as what the viable options might be for any of them.
Listing these is getting dull. Carefully considered ranges of choices would be good reading.
The Ukrainian Air Force has released video showing for the first time ever US-supplied AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missiles being fired from their MiG-29 jets.
@OliviaUtley After 2 great years at The Telegraph, I’m off to @GBNEWS in October to join the politics team. I hugely admire what GB is doing - and it’s been brilliant watching it go from strength to strength. Very excited to get started 🤩
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
No idea if it is true but has a nice ring to it.
In Australia many place names are named after aboriginal words or phrases for that area. I recall a story about one town where the settlers asked the aborigines for the name and the aborigines took the piss out of them and gave a rude phrase which what then adopted as the town's name by the European settlers not realising what they were calling themselves.
Unfortunately I can't remember the town, or what it allegedly meant, and it's possibly apocryphal but it's a fun story.
Don't have to go so far, thouhg. One of the Pre-Raphaelites was 'persuaded' to title a poem after the 'wrong' name for a Highland well, which would get him the ban hammer instantly on PB today if OGH spoke the Gaelic.
Truss's first PMQT is going to be a bloodbath. She simply doesn't have the mental agility to think on her feet, and she knows it. Starmer is going to go into full-on barrister mode - question, pause, wait for his subject to say something slightly off-line and then monster her. It's going to be brutal.
She is not going to enjoy her new job. Having spent her entire life working towards this goal, it is going to be a crushing personal disappointment.
I genuinely feel sorry for her on a personal level. Events are likely to totally overcome her. She has a 1% chance of success.
How do you rate the chances of these events?
- A decisive Ukrainian breakthrough leading to Russia withdrawing to pre-February borders - Gas prices falling as the race to fill European storage capacity ends - Inflation falling as one-off pandemic effects get filtered out
These are good points, and I think some of the inflationary effects of the pandemic and from energy prices will pass in time. (How much, how soon, I don’t know… if I did, I could presumably make a killing on the stock market.)
However, the hit to living standards isn’t going to be reversed. People will still be worse off and feel worse off. Things probably won’t look so bad in 2024, but they’re still going to look significantly worse than the sunny uplands Boris once promised.
Also, people blame bad things on their politicians more than they credit the politicians for the good things. If things get bad and then return to normal, there is a hysteresis.
Nice to see that word in use! The rust and heat in the political shock-absorber ...
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
It'd be 2,465 kwH of electricity and 10,200 kwH of gas - which Is OK I think. Also bigger houses have more room for solar panels. I'd exempt the disabled too.
This is also heavily skewed in favour of single people and smaller households who would use less electric/gas; you would probably need to put in some kind of extra allowance per additional family member.
Party constitutions do not overrule the supremacy of parliament. The idea that a particular configuration of government, arising from the confidence of the HoC following an election, can be ruled out in advance is nonsense. It is meaningless and of course unenforceable.
Presumably, the point of a constitutional rule like that, would be as a mechanism for the party’s MPs to hold the feet of the leader to the fire during the post-election negotiations? It would give the Lab MPs cover to no-confidence the leader, or vote against an unconstitutional coalition agreement.
Yes I suppose so. This would be in circumstances in which the Labour leadership feels that the country could do with a change of government, but the labour MPs decide the opposite so that the Conservatives can form a minority government instead. The voters might of course have another view.
Sweden’s principal centre-right party, the Moderates (remember Fredrik Reinfeldt and Carl Bildt?) is about to get absolutely spanked at the GE on 11 September.
The current leader Ulf Kristersson has made a dreadful error of judgment by cosying up to the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats. Voters had been drifting away from the Moderates, but now it’s a flood.
Today it is clear: the Sweden Democrats have overtaken the once mighty Moderates to be the largest opposition party:
SD 20.6% (+3.1) M 15.8% (-4.0)
Echos of the Tory hard-right completely routing the wet/one-nation wing.
He hasn't when on the latest poll the right of centre Opposition block will be on 48% combined with the Sweden Democrats compared to only 40% for the Opposition Alliance block at the last election without the Sweden Democrats but including the Centre Party who now back the Social Democrats.
Sweden has PR not FPTP so the main thing is the strength of the block not each party
If the Sweden Democrats become the largest Opposition party (and I think they will), the Rightwing bloc will collapse. Kristersson’s sweaty face was a sorry sight when journalists confronted him yesterday. Classic bunny in headlights. He has totally fluffed it and he knows it. Ditto Liberals who are obviously completely embarrassed at landing in the “wrong” bloc. Only the Christian Democrats look pleased.
Jimmie Åkesson and Magdalena Andersson are laughing their heads off.
I am not sure about that.
Berlusconi for example is well prepared to see Forza Italia serve in government with Meloni later next month even though Meloni's Brothers of Italy will win far more seats than Forza Italia.
Italy like Sweden has PR and under PR it is the size of your coalition block that matters not the size of your individual party as it is here with FPTP
The size of an unstable bloc is irrelevant.
Magdalena Andersson can hold together a team. Shaky, but it’ll stand up.
Jimmie Åkesson cannot. Despite his many positive qualities as a leader, he is not a miracle worker. If the Moderates end up behind the Sweden Democrats then the whole project is finished.
Unless the Moderates do a grand coalition deal with the Social Democrats German style or the Sweden Democrats disappear it isn't.
The populist right is not going away. The mainstream right has to decide whether to do deals with it, as the PP has done with Vox in Spain or Berlusconi has done with Meloni in Italy or the Moderates have done with the Sweden Democrats or to refuse to touch it.
However if they refuse to touch it then the only way the centre right is likely to get into government without the populist right in Europe and indeed most western nations now is with a deal with the centre left, as the CDU did with the SPD under Merkel. Or else they get squeezed between the populist right and liberal left, especially in nations without PR like France where Les Republicains now not only trail Macron and Le Pen's parties but even have fallen behind the far left Melenchon's party.
See also Canada from 1993 when the Progressive Conservatives fell behind both the Liberals and the populist right Reform Party until it merged with Reform to form today's Conservative Party of Canada in 1993. Or indeed here where May's Tories fell behind both Labour and Farage's Brexit Party in Spring 2019 until Boris took over
It feels odd to talk of Berlusconi as the mainstream right! He was the populist right of his time, but now has to deal with a younger, more populist and more fascistic right in Meloni. It is a worrying trend. Is there anything the mainstream right can do to reclaim their side of the political spectrum from the fantasists?
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
Party constitutions do not overrule the supremacy of parliament. The idea that a particular configuration of government, arising from the confidence of the HoC following an election, can be ruled out in advance is nonsense. It is meaningless and of course unenforceable.
Quite so, but they do constrain internal party politics, and pose the risk that a leader can be overthrown. And Labour made a very big thing of this change last week. Very big, shoot the SNP fox, will not lose one constituency, kill off devolution sort of monolithic statement.
Not coincidentally, it's being argued that Labour is now primarily a Unionist rather than a social democratic party on some views.
David Clark, a former adviser to Labour foreign secretary Robin Cook [...] tweeted: ”It suggests that unionism has now supplanted democratic socialism as Labour’s core belief system. It would certainly be interesting to see this historic shift debated at conference. [...] “The problems with this are obvious. What about Labour’s alliance with the SDLP, which advocates a united Ireland? Will SDLP MPs no longer be able to take the Labour whip?”
Mr Clark added: “This proposal is designed to dispose of a political problem in England, but its most obvious impact will be in Scotland where even those not persuaded of the case for independence will understand that Labour sees their constitutional debate as somehow deviant and unacceptable. [...]
“Voters should therefore be expected to draw the obvious conclusion that defending the Union is now more important to Labour than promoting social justice.
"The effect of this, inevitably, will be to put a low cap on Labour’s ability to recover in Scotland.”
I came across this a few weeks ago https://www.solariskit.com/ - not quite the same thing, but might find a place in the mix. I think they're trying to push into sales in Africa too.
Party constitutions do not overrule the supremacy of parliament. The idea that a particular configuration of government, arising from the confidence of the HoC following an election, can be ruled out in advance is nonsense. It is meaningless and of course unenforceable.
Somebody should have told Starmer that when Brown poured the poison in his ear.
Lucky for us the membership are about to elect someone more than capable of taking up this nightmare challenge.
Missed out a vicious, untrustworthy and incoherent set of party MPs who do not like her that she will have to manage as well. Otherwise an accurate summary of top order problems, before you get to things like the courts and ambulances not working, global distribution and supply chain issues, climate change, funding for the care sector, housing and fixing flats after Grenfell, etc.
Probably best to focus on what pronouns less than <1% of the country prefer to use for themselves along with insulting the Frenchies.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
No idea if it is true but has a nice ring to it.
In Australia many place names are named after aboriginal words or phrases for that area. I recall a story about one town where the settlers asked the aborigines for the name and the aborigines took the piss out of them and gave a rude phrase which what then adopted as the town's name by the European settlers not realising what they were calling themselves.
Unfortunately I can't remember the town, or what it allegedly meant, and it's possibly apocryphal but it's a fun story.
Don't have to go so far, thouhg. One of the Pre-Raphaelites was 'persuaded' to title a poem after the 'wrong' name for a Highland well, which would get him the ban hammer instantly on PB today if OGH spoke the Gaelic.
Although you don't need to be being teased for mistakes to happen. Robert Browning, for example, managed perfectly well by himself:
The Ukrainian Air Force has released video showing for the first time ever US-supplied AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missiles being fired from their MiG-29 jets.
Reportedly, very effective. Ukraine doesn't have many Mig29s, but the US has a crap-tonne* of HARMs.
*technical term for a large number whose precise details I'm in ignorance.
A good tool to suppress enemy air defences, vital in the contested regions. A lot of improvision going on, with regard to the integration of various NATO weapons systems with Soviet-era platforms. A lot of MacGyvers in the Ukranian and NATO militaries, to get this stuff working.
There’s definitely something up in Kherson city today, I think (and hope!) that the invaders are now reteating through the city and towards the river.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
If this is a Thatcher tribute act, Basil Brush is Billy Connolly … quite something to present yourself as the woman to stand up to Putin but she is scared to sit down with @bbcnickrobinson … ps this is part of the continuation of Johnson strategy of avoiding scrutiny 1/2 https://twitter.com/livefrombrexit/status/1564284027758149635
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
What's your billls at the moment ? The only time it might not make sense if is you're living with 3 kids in a terrace or something like that.
💬 It is a tremendous privilege to be a candidate in this election. I will never forget that if elected, I will not only be Prime Minister, but Leader of the @Conservatives Party too.
The Ukrainian Air Force has released video showing for the first time ever US-supplied AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missiles being fired from their MiG-29 jets.
Reportedly, very effective. Ukraine doesn't have many Mig29s, but the US has a crap-tonne* of HARMs.
*technical term for a large number whose precise details I'm in ignorance.
That's "White 09" the UkrAF show pony. It's one of their few Fulcrums that have successfully emerged from the MUL1 program and therefore has the MIL-STD-1553 databus needed to fire the AGM-88.
It has no HARM targeting computer and can only fire it in Target of Opportunity mode where the missile will guide toward any emitter it can find. This technique was used to great SEAD effect in Iraq I but a lot of rounds were fired simultaneously to acheive it.
See you all at the Krasniy Vorota metro station for tea and medals by (Orthodox) Christmas.
Poor interview really. Needed to focus on 3 pts after 4 games incl vs Liverpool, Man City and Arsenal was completely fine and the players need to remember how they comfortably beat Villa rather than dwell on the Liverpool game.
A big mistake to say the players can't compete at the level, even if it is true, which it is, unless he actively wanted a quick sacking, in which case he should have resigned during the close season.
The Ukrainian Air Force has released video showing for the first time ever US-supplied AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missiles being fired from their MiG-29 jets.
Reportedly, very effective. Ukraine doesn't have many Mig29s, but the US has a crap-tonne* of HARMs.
*technical term for a large number whose precise details I'm in ignorance.
There were a lot of 'experts' who, as little as a few weeks ago, were proclaiming it would be impossible to fit HARM onto Ukrainian planes, let alone the MIG 29. Now, the integration might not be perfect, and they might not be able to use all control modes, but if it works and destroys Russian radar systems then it's good.
Too many people are stuck in old ways of thinking about how this war would unfold if it had happened in 1989. All sides are very different from what they were back then, and this war is also very different.
Party constitutions do not overrule the supremacy of parliament. The idea that a particular configuration of government, arising from the confidence of the HoC following an election, can be ruled out in advance is nonsense. It is meaningless and of course unenforceable.
Somebody should have told Starmer that when Brown poured the poison in his ear.
Does it matter, apart from showing Starmer is no Machiavelli? How would the SNP enter a coalition when it refuses to get involved in non-Scottish matters, thus ruling itself out of every Cabinet position bar one?
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
Unless you are doing something very odd with water it should be a dramatic drop in what you pay. When we moved into our latest house we had a meter put in immediately it cost us about a 1/3rd of what the previous owners were paying (I guess because it is a very large house and if not metered based upon rateable value). There were 4 of us. There were only 2 in the previous owner's family and they only lived here part time.
Something many people don't know is if all your rainwater goes to soakaways you can get a reduction in your sewage charge, but you have to claim it.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
It's easier for them in terms of monitoring usage. It also encourages people to save water which makes their lives easier.
If you're not in a very full house, or washing the car with mains water every day, it will also be cheaper for you.
I would have said for an ordinary household a meter is a no-brainer. I've had one for the last 16 years through four addresses and it's saved me a fortune.
That’s awfully harsh. Yes, they went down to a rugby score last weekend, but they only just came up and had some horrible fixtures at the start of their season.
Sweden’s principal centre-right party, the Moderates (remember Fredrik Reinfeldt and Carl Bildt?) is about to get absolutely spanked at the GE on 11 September.
The current leader Ulf Kristersson has made a dreadful error of judgment by cosying up to the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats. Voters had been drifting away from the Moderates, but now it’s a flood.
Today it is clear: the Sweden Democrats have overtaken the once mighty Moderates to be the largest opposition party:
SD 20.6% (+3.1) M 15.8% (-4.0)
Echos of the Tory hard-right completely routing the wet/one-nation wing.
He hasn't when on the latest poll the right of centre Opposition block will be on 48% combined with the Sweden Democrats compared to only 40% for the Opposition Alliance block at the last election without the Sweden Democrats but including the Centre Party who now back the Social Democrats.
Sweden has PR not FPTP so the main thing is the strength of the block not each party
If the Sweden Democrats become the largest Opposition party (and I think they will), the Rightwing bloc will collapse. Kristersson’s sweaty face was a sorry sight when journalists confronted him yesterday. Classic bunny in headlights. He has totally fluffed it and he knows it. Ditto Liberals who are obviously completely embarrassed at landing in the “wrong” bloc. Only the Christian Democrats look pleased.
Jimmie Åkesson and Magdalena Andersson are laughing their heads off.
I am not sure about that.
Berlusconi for example is well prepared to see Forza Italia serve in government with Meloni later next month even though Meloni's Brothers of Italy will win far more seats than Forza Italia.
Italy like Sweden has PR and under PR it is the size of your coalition block that matters not the size of your individual party as it is here with FPTP
The size of an unstable bloc is irrelevant.
Magdalena Andersson can hold together a team. Shaky, but it’ll stand up.
Jimmie Åkesson cannot. Despite his many positive qualities as a leader, he is not a miracle worker. If the Moderates end up behind the Sweden Democrats then the whole project is finished.
Unless the Moderates do a grand coalition deal with the Social Democrats German style or the Sweden Democrats disappear it isn't.
The populist right is not going away. The mainstream right has to decide whether to do deals with it, as the PP has done with Vox in Spain or Berlusconi has done with Meloni in Italy or the Moderates have done with the Sweden Democrats or to refuse to touch it.
However if they refuse to touch it then the only way the centre right is likely to get into government without the populist right in Europe and indeed most western nations now is with a deal with the centre left, as the CDU did with the SPD under Merkel. Or else they get squeezed between the populist right and liberal left, especially in nations without PR like France where Les Republicains now not only trail Macron and Le Pen's parties but even have fallen behind the far left Melenchon's party.
See also Canada from 1993 when the Progressive Conservatives fell behind both the Liberals and the populist right Reform Party until it merged with Reform to form today's Conservative Party of Canada in 1993. Or indeed here where May's Tories fell behind both Labour and Farage's Brexit Party in Spring 2019 until Boris took over
It feels odd to talk of Berlusconi as the mainstream right! He was the populist right of his time, but now has to deal with a younger, more populist and more fascistic right in Meloni. It is a worrying trend. Is there anything the mainstream right can do to reclaim their side of the political spectrum from the fantasists?
Yes. Stop trying to accommodate them. Take them on and defeat them at the ballot box.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
Because it's irreversible other than that, so it's a rare example of long term planning by them.
I'm very glad our water bill is unmetered. Running the kids baths alone would consume a lot of water that would take us past the bill we pay.
An elderly couple who take showers will consume a lot less water than a family will with young kids etc. If grandparents switch to get a better deal on a meter then the water company gets its reward from that if the next occupiers of the home are a family paying considerably more extra than what the grandparents had saved.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
I like the story of Elephant and Castle being named after Le Dauphin Castille.
Supporting evidence for which I can find nowhere.
Isn't it something to do with La Infanta de Castile?
Didn't we just do this? I've always loved the fact that such a pedestrian spot in SE London has such an exotic name. It's not the same now they've demolished the shopping centre, though.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
Exactly.
More -
1) A country created by dumping criminals turned into a socially liberal democracy. Without any planning. 2) Black swans. Yeah, right. 3) An animal that consists of a duck bill sewn onto an otter. Which lays eggs. With poisonous claws....
I've actually "visited" the fake. It's very well done.
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
This site knows nothing of the sort. Sorry but I don't believe in Finland.
Finland denial is for lightweights. Australia is fake. Obviously. A country with mammals that lay eggs?
Even the name is not that imaginative. Someone just inserted two extra letters into the name of a European country and the name stuck.
My favorite story about the naming of a country concerns Canada. Apparently when the local inhabitants were asked by some newly-arrived Europeans what the country was called, the reply was 'I don't understand you', or ca-na-da in the local lingo.
I like the story of Elephant and Castle being named after Le Dauphin Castille.
Supporting evidence for which I can find nowhere.
Isn't it something to do with La Infanta de Castile?
Didn't we just do this? I've always loved the fact that such a pedestrian spot in SE London has such an exotic name. It's not the same now they've demolished the shopping centre, though.
Tory support is in the 30+% range, however it has been wiped out on PB (although there is a large reservoir of potential support). @hyufd is right in that PB is no longer representative of Tory support.
Why? What is different about PB? Age?, Political awareness? Intelligence? What?
What is someone who still happily supports the Tories like?
The average Tory voter is now a skilled working class Leave voter or a pensioner who voted Leave.
The average PB poster however is a middle class graduate who voted Remain or at most voted Leave but only to go to EEA
Makes sense, but it is quite dramatic. So it will all be down to how many of each group there are and where they live.
Any reason for limiting it to 'skilled working class leave'. What about 'unskilled leavers'? Or do you think they will be mainly Labour or non voters anyway?
Unskilled voters, certainly if they live in social housing will still be mainly Labour even if they voted Leave
The big risk for the Tories in changing their demographic is at some time they lose their safe Southern seats to the LDs, but are in a tight fights with Labour in their new joint heartlands.
PS That is just a fantasy on my part and I don't see it happening on any scale that could wipe out the Tories from the South, but wouldn't it be a change to see the LDs with hundreds of safe seats and the Tories and Labour scraping for 2nd place in the previous Labour heartlands and sharing the spoils.
Must stop dreaming now.
It's a very limited part of the South where the Lib Dems would be competitive. They're out of the running in most of the South West, along with Essex, and Kent. They could gain seats down the M3 and M4 corridors.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
Because it's irreversible other than that, so it's a rare example of long term planning by them.
I'm very glad our water bill is unmetered. Running the kids baths alone would consume a lot of water that would take us past the bill we pay.
An elderly couple who take showers will consume a lot less water than a family will with young kids etc. If grandparents switch to get a better deal on a meter then the water company gets its reward from that if the next occupiers of the home are a family paying considerably more extra than what the grandparents had saved.
Have you actually done the numbers Bart? I hear what you are saying, but in our previous house we would have been in the same situation as you (2 youngsters from babies) and it was still cheaper to be metered. It does seem to be biased to get you on the meter.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
Unless you are doing something very odd with water it should be a dramatic drop in what you pay. When we moved into our latest house we had a meter put in immediately it cost us about a 1/3rd of what the previous owners were paying (I guess because it is a very large house and if not metered based upon rateable value). There were 4 of us. There were only 2 in the previous owner's family and they only lived here part time.
Something many people don't know is if all your rainwater goes to soakaways you can get a reduction in your sewage charge, but you have to claim it.
I already get a reduction in sewage charge - does this still apply if I go on a meter?
I use water to top up pond, water allotment and flower beds occasionally, fill hot tub when we hire one (maybe twice a year), clean cars. Four people in house so plenty of showers (though one is about to depart to university).
The massacre of small business is one thing that is coming across very clearly, and will be a significant part of the economic rout that the UK is going to be facing over the course of the next few quarters. Truss has maybe only weeks to establish a clear and stable policy direction (spoiler alert: none of her currently declared economic policies will work). The choices she makes next week for her cabinet will determine the tone, direction and success of her administration. If Redwood and Duncan Smith (and Rees Mogg) really have been raised from the crypt in order to play major roles, then by Halloween the Truss government will already be in a death spiral.
There is also the question of "events", and as this site knows, there is a major scandal already out there. So, I guess I need to order more popcorn (Microwave, obviously, the energy costs of using the stove versus the microwave are too large),
Truss needs to face up to reality, and hiding from the media will just infuriate them.
I do not see this massacre of small businesses at all. Yes, their costs are going to rise significantly so their prices will do likewise. That will effect businesses differentially depending on how important energy is for their business, as a generality manufacturing will be hit worse than services.
But we have more more than 10% inflation already. No one is going to be shocked by rising prices. Given wages are not rising as fast there may be some reduction in demand but so far that has not manifested itself.
We need to adjust to this exogenous price shock. Cheap gas and relatively cheap fuel are not coming back anytime soon, if ever. We need to accept as a nation that more of our money will be spent that way and less on other things. We did this with the oil shock in the 1970s. It was deeply unpleasant but we survived. Expecting governments to somehow magic this change away is every bit as fairy tale as the idea that the producers, who are in general well beyond the reach of the Treasury, will somehow be paying a windfall tax to pay for it all.
Has the price of wind gone up then? Or sunshine? The price of electricity generated by free renewables has, and perhaps the government could look into that.
Right now we are getting 47% of our energy from gas and 15% from wind. To free us of a situation where gas is the determinative cost we really need to reverse those figures. When Dogger Bank etc comes on stream we may be close to that on a good day.
When is that likely to happen? There is also the Morocco project. My understanding - though it is vague - is that we could be getting around a quarter of UK electricity from this by the 2030s.
I doubt very much we'll get a quarter of our energy from Morocco.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
It's easier for them in terms of monitoring usage. It also encourages people to save water which makes their lives easier.
If you're not in a very full house, or washing the car with mains water every day, it will also be cheaper for you.
I would have said for an ordinary household a meter is a no-brainer. I've had one for the last 16 years through four addresses and it's saved me a fortune.
Obvs we must have plenty of water in Scotland - we have to pay for the things to be installed. £135-ish for the survey and several hundred to a K for installation. We'd need to stay for years, decades even, for it to be financially worthwhile. But then I can't remember there ver being any hosepipe ban here, although there is (unusually) some limitation at present on river water abstraction by farmers in the neighbouring watershed I think.
💬 It is a tremendous privilege to be a candidate in this election. I will never forget that if elected, I will not only be Prime Minister, but Leader of the @Conservatives Party too.
Sweden’s principal centre-right party, the Moderates (remember Fredrik Reinfeldt and Carl Bildt?) is about to get absolutely spanked at the GE on 11 September.
The current leader Ulf Kristersson has made a dreadful error of judgment by cosying up to the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats. Voters had been drifting away from the Moderates, but now it’s a flood.
Today it is clear: the Sweden Democrats have overtaken the once mighty Moderates to be the largest opposition party:
SD 20.6% (+3.1) M 15.8% (-4.0)
Echos of the Tory hard-right completely routing the wet/one-nation wing.
He hasn't when on the latest poll the right of centre Opposition block will be on 48% combined with the Sweden Democrats compared to only 40% for the Opposition Alliance block at the last election without the Sweden Democrats but including the Centre Party who now back the Social Democrats.
Sweden has PR not FPTP so the main thing is the strength of the block not each party
If the Sweden Democrats become the largest Opposition party (and I think they will), the Rightwing bloc will collapse. Kristersson’s sweaty face was a sorry sight when journalists confronted him yesterday. Classic bunny in headlights. He has totally fluffed it and he knows it. Ditto Liberals who are obviously completely embarrassed at landing in the “wrong” bloc. Only the Christian Democrats look pleased.
Jimmie Åkesson and Magdalena Andersson are laughing their heads off.
I am not sure about that.
Berlusconi for example is well prepared to see Forza Italia serve in government with Meloni later next month even though Meloni's Brothers of Italy will win far more seats than Forza Italia.
Italy like Sweden has PR and under PR it is the size of your coalition block that matters not the size of your individual party as it is here with FPTP
The size of an unstable bloc is irrelevant.
Magdalena Andersson can hold together a team. Shaky, but it’ll stand up.
Jimmie Åkesson cannot. Despite his many positive qualities as a leader, he is not a miracle worker. If the Moderates end up behind the Sweden Democrats then the whole project is finished.
Unless the Moderates do a grand coalition deal with the Social Democrats German style or the Sweden Democrats disappear it isn't.
The populist right is not going away. The mainstream right has to decide whether to do deals with it, as the PP has done with Vox in Spain or Berlusconi has done with Meloni in Italy or the Moderates have done with the Sweden Democrats or to refuse to touch it.
However if they refuse to touch it then the only way the centre right is likely to get into government without the populist right in Europe and indeed most western nations now is with a deal with the centre left, as the CDU did with the SPD under Merkel. Or else they get squeezed between the populist right and liberal left, especially in nations without PR like France where Les Republicains now not only trail Macron and Le Pen's parties but even have fallen behind the far left Melenchon's party.
See also Canada from 1993 when the Progressive Conservatives fell behind both the Liberals and the populist right Reform Party until it merged with Reform to form today's Conservative Party of Canada in 1993. Or indeed here where May's Tories fell behind both Labour and Farage's Brexit Party in Spring 2019 until Boris took over
It feels odd to talk of Berlusconi as the mainstream right! He was the populist right of his time, but now has to deal with a younger, more populist and more fascistic right in Meloni. It is a worrying trend. Is there anything the mainstream right can do to reclaim their side of the political spectrum from the fantasists?
Yes. Stop trying to accommodate them. Take them on and defeat them at the ballot box.
The problem for the "mainstream" right is they see themselves as the political wing of big business, and that's not where most centre right voters see themselves/
💬 It is a tremendous privilege to be a candidate in this election. I will never forget that if elected, I will not only be Prime Minister, but Leader of the @Conservatives Party too.
The Ukrainian Air Force has released video showing for the first time ever US-supplied AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missiles being fired from their MiG-29 jets.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
Because it's irreversible other than that, so it's a rare example of long term planning by them.
I'm very glad our water bill is unmetered. Running the kids baths alone would consume a lot of water that would take us past the bill we pay.
An elderly couple who take showers will consume a lot less water than a family will with young kids etc. If grandparents switch to get a better deal on a meter then the water company gets its reward from that if the next occupiers of the home are a family paying considerably more extra than what the grandparents had saved.
Have you actually done the numbers Bart? I hear what you are saying, but in our previous house we would have been in the same situation as you (2 youngsters from babies) and it was still cheaper to be metered. It does seem to be biased to get you on the meter.
Turning the question round, what's in it for the water company? They have to pay to install and maintain water meters where there were none before, so what do they get out of it?
Party constitutions do not overrule the supremacy of parliament. The idea that a particular configuration of government, arising from the confidence of the HoC following an election, can be ruled out in advance is nonsense. It is meaningless and of course unenforceable.
Somebody should have told Starmer that when Brown poured the poison in his ear.
Does it matter, apart from showing Starmer is no Machiavelli? How would the SNP enter a coalition when it refuses to get involved in non-Scottish matters, thus ruling itself out of every Cabinet position bar one?
Unsurprisingly, the Westminster Bubble looks at this from a Labour point of view. Nobody every considers how the SNP views the situation. That the SNP would ever want to enter a coalition government in London is profoundly unlikely. So Starmer’s kite was all trappings and no substance. It was very clearly aimed at an English audience, not an Irish, Scottish or Welsh one.
Pubs will be far from the only small businesses facing closure this winter.
Pubs, cafes, restaurants, hotels, hairdressers, nurseries (both for children and plants), lots of retail, cinemas, theatres etc. Unless they are on fixed rate contracts how can they possibly afford or pass onto customers the sorts of increases being asked - 250% or more? And what about the knock on effects on their customers and their staff if they drastically reduce their opening hours etc?
Sweden’s principal centre-right party, the Moderates (remember Fredrik Reinfeldt and Carl Bildt?) is about to get absolutely spanked at the GE on 11 September.
The current leader Ulf Kristersson has made a dreadful error of judgment by cosying up to the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats. Voters had been drifting away from the Moderates, but now it’s a flood.
Today it is clear: the Sweden Democrats have overtaken the once mighty Moderates to be the largest opposition party:
SD 20.6% (+3.1) M 15.8% (-4.0)
Echos of the Tory hard-right completely routing the wet/one-nation wing.
He hasn't when on the latest poll the right of centre Opposition block will be on 48% combined with the Sweden Democrats compared to only 40% for the Opposition Alliance block at the last election without the Sweden Democrats but including the Centre Party who now back the Social Democrats.
Sweden has PR not FPTP so the main thing is the strength of the block not each party
If the Sweden Democrats become the largest Opposition party (and I think they will), the Rightwing bloc will collapse. Kristersson’s sweaty face was a sorry sight when journalists confronted him yesterday. Classic bunny in headlights. He has totally fluffed it and he knows it. Ditto Liberals who are obviously completely embarrassed at landing in the “wrong” bloc. Only the Christian Democrats look pleased.
Jimmie Åkesson and Magdalena Andersson are laughing their heads off.
I am not sure about that.
Berlusconi for example is well prepared to see Forza Italia serve in government with Meloni later next month even though Meloni's Brothers of Italy will win far more seats than Forza Italia.
Italy like Sweden has PR and under PR it is the size of your coalition block that matters not the size of your individual party as it is here with FPTP
The size of an unstable bloc is irrelevant.
Magdalena Andersson can hold together a team. Shaky, but it’ll stand up.
Jimmie Åkesson cannot. Despite his many positive qualities as a leader, he is not a miracle worker. If the Moderates end up behind the Sweden Democrats then the whole project is finished.
Unless the Moderates do a grand coalition deal with the Social Democrats German style or the Sweden Democrats disappear it isn't.
The populist right is not going away. The mainstream right has to decide whether to do deals with it, as the PP has done with Vox in Spain or Berlusconi has done with Meloni in Italy or the Moderates have done with the Sweden Democrats or to refuse to touch it.
However if they refuse to touch it then the only way the centre right is likely to get into government without the populist right in Europe and indeed most western nations now is with a deal with the centre left, as the CDU did with the SPD under Merkel. Or else they get squeezed between the populist right and liberal left, especially in nations without PR like France where Les Republicains now not only trail Macron and Le Pen's parties but even have fallen behind the far left Melenchon's party.
See also Canada from 1993 when the Progressive Conservatives fell behind both the Liberals and the populist right Reform Party until it merged with Reform's successor, the Canadian Alliance, to form today's Conservative Party of Canada in 2003. Or indeed here where May's Tories fell behind both Labour and Farage's Brexit Party in Spring 2019 until Boris took over
On the right, the masses are no longer aligned with the classes.
The Ukrainian Air Force has released video showing for the first time ever US-supplied AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missiles being fired from their MiG-29 jets.
Reportedly, very effective. Ukraine doesn't have many Mig29s, but the US has a crap-tonne* of HARMs.
*technical term for a large number whose precise details I'm in ignorance.
That's "White 09" the UkrAF show pony. It's one of their few Fulcrums that have successfully emerged from the MUL1 program and therefore has the MIL-STD-1553 databus needed to fire the AGM-88.
It has no HARM targeting computer and can only fire it in Target of Opportunity mode where the missile will guide toward any emitter it can find. This technique was used to great SEAD effect in Iraq I but a lot of rounds were fired simultaneously to acheive it.
See you all at the Krasniy Vorota metro station for tea and medals by (Orthodox) Christmas.
Reportedly can also be targeted to specific coordinates, where it then operates in that mode (from quite a long distance, if launched high and fast).
The last bit seems unlikely. But there's unlikely to be a ceasefire while one side or the other is advancing.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
Unless you are doing something very odd with water it should be a dramatic drop in what you pay. When we moved into our latest house we had a meter put in immediately it cost us about a 1/3rd of what the previous owners were paying (I guess because it is a very large house and if not metered based upon rateable value). There were 4 of us. There were only 2 in the previous owner's family and they only lived here part time.
Something many people don't know is if all your rainwater goes to soakaways you can get a reduction in your sewage charge, but you have to claim it.
I already get a reduction in sewage charge - does this still apply if I go on a meter?
I use water to top up pond, water allotment and flower beds occasionally, fill hot tub when we hire one (maybe twice a year), clean cars. Four people in house so plenty of showers (though one is about to depart to university).
Yes you still get it if on a meter. I have had it at my last 2 houses.
OK so you use a lot of water, so you need to do the numbers. The other factor as @Pulpstar points out is the type of house. Your rateable value is key to the calculation.
That’s awfully harsh. Yes, they went down to a rugby score last weekend, but they only just came up and had some horrible fixtures at the start of their season.
Its baffling, they have spent nothing, they have the maximum points that they could have expected and he gets the sack.
A reminder that there will be a shortage over the winter, of 15-20% of gas requirements, whether that be for for direct gas supply or electricity generation.
No matter what the price, the demand needs to drop by that much otherwise there will be rationing.
Calls for government to reduce price, in order that customers don’t need to reduce demand, *will* result in fuel rationing this winter.
Most of the solutions are on the demand side - kicking off football matches at 1pm rather than 3pm, is a good example of this.
What's so BAD about fuel rationing ? It's better for most people than 8 grand energy bills.
The questions are, who gets rationed, and who makes the decision about who gets rationed?
All households should get a below market price for consumption up to the median minus 15% and face a punitive tariff above that. For firms set the threshold at their average for the last 3 years minus 15% with the same dual tarrif structure. Subsidise the cheaper tariff using revenue from the punitive tariff plus a windfall tax on energy firms plus temporary income tax surcharge plus borrowing.
Trouble is that only works if everyone is getting the same sort of energy and living in the same circumstances. So someone who heats their house with oil will inevitably have lower gas/electricity bills than someone doing everything on the grid. And is it right that a family with a couple of kids gets a punitive tariff when someone living on their own does not.
I am not opposed to the idea, I just see the implementation as being completely unworkable.
It's a blunt tool certainly but it's better than just letting the free market work it out. You could adjust it for households with no gas meter. I think it is totally workable even if of course there will be edge cases that will make its application unfair in places.
Loads of suppliers went bust last year, also a lot of people switch every year. Not sure what happened with their data, presumably passed on to whoever took over the supply but not sure we could trust the suppliers to manage it accurately to work out a particular households 3 year average.
Like the concept if it can be done properly.
I would only use the 3 year averages for business users. For domestic users I would apply median household usage minus 15%. The principle behind the household plan is that everyone should be able to achieve minimum standards of heating, have showers etc. People in bigger houses shouldn't get more help. For firms the idea is simply to prevent otherwise viable businesses from going bust and laying people off, so it makes sense for larger or more energy intensive businesses to get more help, and you need to benchmark against their normal usage, but also with a 15% reduction.
These minumum standards should be "rationed" per person. Which means you need each household would need to inform their energy suppliers of how many people there are in that flat/house. I can see there being a lot of opposition to that.
That would be too intrusive and expensive. The measure needs to be simple and inexpensive to implement. People like us - 6 ppl living at our address, big draughty house, would do badly out of it, but that's life.
Good morning
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
I get the occasional email from my water company regarding going on a water meter. I still haven't done it - not sure why really - I guess I'm suspicious there may be a catch. Why would the water company want me to pay less than now? They say I can try a meter and revert back within two years if I want but should I trust this pledge?
I was sceptical at first, but to be honest it is the best thing I have done with water and it does have the effect of making you want to reduce water waste
It is not to do with them wanting you to pay less than now, but all to do with you paying for actual water usage and not based on your rateable value
Comments
For me Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul are perfect series - beats The Sopranos and The Wire for best TV ever IMO.
But of course other stuff is being developed at the same time.
The basic problem is the next 5-10 years ... which wouldn't have been anywhere near as bad had we not delayed the nuclear decision for well over a decade, and killed off various tidal projects.
Even the decisions on the Morocco and Dogger projects could have been made at least a couple of years earlier.
Berlusconi for example is well prepared to see Forza Italia serve in government with Meloni later next month even though Meloni's Brothers of Italy will win far more seats than Forza Italia.
Italy like Sweden has PR and under PR it is the size of your coalition block that matters not the size of your individual party as it is here with FPTP
The conservative government is at the end of its natural life, it is like labour in the late 00's, support fading away. The tories are uniquely directionless and a lot of the stuff that they do, is just embarrassing.
Ever since Johnson arrived on the scene, together with the clowns that surround him following Cummings departure (not all cabinet ministers, but many of them), it has been embarrassing to confess that you vote conservative in educated circles. I'd say it is probably more of a phenomenon whereby conservative voters have gone quiet than anything else.
I may well vote conservative in the next election, but wouldn't advertise this fact. It would be based on the usual 'best of bad options' analysis.
PB Unionists = duds
Supporting evidence for which I can find nowhere.
Far more accuracy than you get in most of my posts.
Can recommend the German 'Kleo' on Netflix.
Amusing end of Cold War nostalgia trip; great soundtrack.
PS That is just a fantasy on my part and I don't see it happening on any scale that could wipe out the Tories from the South, but wouldn't it be a change to see the LDs with hundreds of safe seats and the Tories and Labour scraping for 2nd place in the previous Labour heartlands and sharing the spoils.
Must stop dreaming now.
@OliviaUtley
After 2 great years at The Telegraph, I’m off to @GBNEWS in October to join the politics team. I hugely admire what GB is doing - and it’s been brilliant watching it go from strength to strength. Very excited to get started 🤩
https://twitter.com/oliviautley/status/1564533309681672192
I think they have done it with one exception for the past XX years.
Magdalena Andersson can hold together a team. Shaky, but it’ll stand up.
Jimmie Åkesson cannot. Despite his many positive qualities as a leader, he is not a miracle worker. If the Moderates end up behind the Sweden Democrats then the whole project is finished.
The myth of the infanta
The popular and enduring idea that the inn itself derives its name from an English corruption of the phrase "La Infanta de Castilla", as a reference to Eleanor of Castile, has been debunked by local historian Stephen Humphrey in his 2013 book Elephant and Castle, a History.
After examining how the image of an elephant with a castle on its back has been popular for centuries and throughout Europe (the earliest example predating Queen Eleanor by 1,500 years), and pointing out the fact that the sign only begins to be used in the area about 500 years after Eleanor was alive, he states: "The story of Queen Eleanor in relation to the Elephant and Castle is therefore a myth. It is wildly anachronistic both in respect of the sign in general and in its specific use in Newington, and she has no connection with the sign or with the place."[5]
I think that the percieved 'capture' of supposedly neutral media platforms by the 'woke' left - be this the BBC, Sky News, CNN etc; or facebook, twitter etc.... will just lead to a continuing phenomenon whereby those with different political views abandon these platforms and set up their own. GB News was a early starter on this front.
It is just a very sad and depressing situation as it increases polarisation, and makes our problems harder to ever solve.
@PickardJE
·
3h
it’s hard to imagine a more difficult in-tray facing the next prime minister
Strained public finances
Cost of living crisis
Ukraine
Brexit
NHS crisis
Wave of strikes
Here’s our
@FT
analysis
https://twitter.com/PickardJE/status/1564497598014169090
===
Lucky for us the membership are about to elect someone more than capable of taking up this nightmare challenge.
Western aid should be massively prioritising African domestic solar projects, too. It would be both excellent economics, and help reduce future fossil fuel demand.
Unfortunately I can't remember the town, or what it allegedly meant, and it's possibly apocryphal but it's a fun story.
I'd exempt the disabled too.
I’ll be new to Westminster - so if you’re in politics/policy in any capacity and fancy a coffee/drink, please do get in touch! DMs open
https://twitter.com/OliviaUtley/status/1564533313737564160
Good luck to her but it does not sound like GBNews is paying a fortune for her contact book.
The populist right is not going away. The mainstream right has to decide whether to do deals with it, as the PP has done with Vox in Spain or Berlusconi has done with Meloni in Italy or the Moderates have done with the Sweden Democrats or to refuse to touch it.
However if they refuse to touch it then the only way the centre right is likely to get into government without the populist right in Europe and indeed most western nations now is with a deal with the centre left, as the CDU did with the SPD under Merkel. Or else they get squeezed between the populist right and liberal left, especially in nations without PR like France where Les Republicains now not only trail Macron and Le Pen's parties but even have fallen behind the far left Melenchon's party.
See also Canada from 1993 when the Progressive Conservatives fell behind both the Liberals and the populist right Reform Party until it merged with Reform's successor, the Canadian Alliance, to form today's Conservative Party of Canada in 2003. Or indeed here where May's Tories fell behind both Labour and Farage's Brexit Party in Spring 2019 until Boris took over
Montage of Truss interviews, clue as to her reluctance to do them
NB the extraordinary ironmongery round her neck at 1.09 btw
However, the hit to living standards isn’t going to be reversed. People will still be worse off and feel worse off. Things probably won’t look so bad in 2024, but they’re still going to look significantly worse than the sunny uplands Boris once promised.
Also, people blame bad things on their politicians more than they credit the politicians for the good things. If things get bad and then return to normal, there is a hysteresis.
Listing these is getting dull. Carefully considered ranges of choices would be good reading.
The Ukrainian Air Force has released video showing for the first time ever US-supplied AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missiles being fired from their MiG-29 jets.
They seem to be fired in pairs from the inboard pylons where R-27 AAM would otherwise be carried...
https://twitter.com/UAWeapons/status/1564539358451044353
Reportedly, very effective.
Ukraine doesn't have many Mig29s, but the US has a crap-tonne* of HARMs.
*technical term for a large number whose precise details I'm in ignorance.
If they don't want to be accused of being fascists, maybe they should refrain from sporting fascist symbols on their vehicles.
Or at the very least, remove them when away from Russia.
266,000 cu metres. Expanded 600 times = 159.6 million cubic metres.
UK gas consumption = 41895 cu feet per person * 66727461 * 0.0283168.
Since we import half that's 39581 million cu metres
So we need 248 deliveries - should be achievable as a nation I'd have thought ?
Interesting that our water meter was read this week and Welsh Water sent me the six month account on line
I logged in and they asked for confirmation of the number of people living at our home which I confirmed as 2
We moved to a water meter years ago and it halved our bill
Not coincidentally, it's being argued that Labour is now primarily a Unionist rather than a social democratic party on some views.
https://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/20828495.labour-reject-claims-party-will-change-constitution-ban-coalitions-snp/
David Clark, a former adviser to Labour foreign secretary Robin Cook [...] tweeted: ”It suggests that unionism has now supplanted democratic socialism as Labour’s core belief system. It would certainly be interesting to see this historic shift debated at conference. [...]
“The problems with this are obvious. What about Labour’s alliance with the SDLP, which advocates a united Ireland? Will SDLP MPs no longer be able to take the Labour whip?”
Mr Clark added: “This proposal is designed to dispose of a political problem in England, but its most obvious impact will be in Scotland where even those not persuaded of the case for independence will understand that Labour sees their constitutional debate as somehow deviant and unacceptable. [...]
“Voters should therefore be expected to draw the obvious conclusion that defending the Union is now more important to Labour than promoting social justice.
"The effect of this, inevitably, will be to put a low cap on Labour’s ability to recover in Scotland.”
Probably best to focus on what pronouns less than <1% of the country prefer to use for themselves along with insulting the Frenchies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pippa_Passes#"A_distressing_blunder"
There’s definitely something up in Kherson city today, I think (and hope!) that the invaders are now reteating through the city and towards the river.
They don't hate them quite as much as the Poles or Ukrainians, but that's like saying somebody did better as SoS for Education than Baroness Morgan.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-11159765/Bournemouths-Scott-Parker-Premier-League-boss-axed-August-2004.html
💬 It is a tremendous privilege to be a candidate in this election. I will never forget that if elected, I will not only be Prime Minister, but Leader of the @Conservatives Party too.
👇 My words in @ConHome
https://conservativehome.com/2022/08/30/liz-truss-if-i-am-elected-as-leader-my-priority-will-be-to-reinvigorate-our-grassroots-without-them-we-cannot-keep-winning-elections/
It has no HARM targeting computer and can only fire it in Target of Opportunity mode where the missile will guide toward any emitter it can find. This technique was used to great SEAD effect in Iraq I but a lot of rounds were fired simultaneously to acheive it.
See you all at the Krasniy Vorota metro station for tea and medals by (Orthodox) Christmas.
A big mistake to say the players can't compete at the level, even if it is true, which it is, unless he actively wanted a quick sacking, in which case he should have resigned during the close season.
Too many people are stuck in old ways of thinking about how this war would unfold if it had happened in 1989. All sides are very different from what they were back then, and this war is also very different.
Something many people don't know is if all your rainwater goes to soakaways you can get a reduction in your sewage charge, but you have to claim it.
If you're not in a very full house, or washing the car with mains water every day, it will also be cheaper for you.
I would have said for an ordinary household a meter is a no-brainer. I've had one for the last 16 years through four addresses and it's saved me a fortune.
I'm very glad our water bill is unmetered. Running the kids baths alone would consume a lot of water that would take us past the bill we pay.
An elderly couple who take showers will consume a lot less water than a family will with young kids etc. If grandparents switch to get a better deal on a meter then the water company gets its reward from that if the next occupiers of the home are a family paying considerably more extra than what the grandparents had saved.
I've always loved the fact that such a pedestrian spot in SE London has such an exotic name. It's not the same now they've demolished the shopping centre, though.
More -
1) A country created by dumping criminals turned into a socially liberal democracy. Without any planning.
2) Black swans. Yeah, right.
3) An animal that consists of a duck bill sewn onto an otter. Which lays eggs. With poisonous claws....
I've actually "visited" the fake. It's very well done.
I use water to top up pond, water allotment and flower beds occasionally, fill hot tub when we hire one (maybe twice a year), clean cars. Four people in house so plenty of showers (though one is about to depart to university).
https://www.scottishwater.co.uk/-/media/ScottishWater/Document-Hub/Your-Home/Charges/2022/250322ScheduleOfRatesMeterCharges2022-23.pdf
How many were they expecting?
It's an entirely appropriate comment for anyone seeking to lead a party. If they were in it only to be Prime Minister, that would be a concern.
What about hospitals and schools? And so on.
Chris Giles
@ChrisGiles_
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38m
Very good to see wholesale gas prices plummeting across Europe today - data from
@tEconomics
The last bit seems unlikely.
But there's unlikely to be a ceasefire while one side or the other is advancing.
OK so you use a lot of water, so you need to do the numbers. The other factor as @Pulpstar points out is the type of house. Your rateable value is key to the calculation.
It is not to do with them wanting you to pay less than now, but all to do with you paying for actual water usage and not based on your rateable value