Liz Truss getting libertarians excited at the London hustings by implying she might consider axing the speed limit on motorways. I can't see it happening though.
As someone who travels 40,000 miles a year and has done so for the last 35 years, that is f*****' nuts. The practicality, particularly on smart motorways, is that the inevitably greater number of accidents from an unlimited speed limit will slow the system down rather than speed it up.
Still, I live in Wales so our maximum motorway speed limit of 20 mph means I only have to worry about Liz's motorway halfwittery for about 6000 miles each year.
She is bonkers!
I'll be pissed off if she makes it legal before I finally crack 200mph on the road.
You are probably significantly safer at 150mph in your 996 than Johnny Teenager is in his stripped out Saxo at 80.
You are bolloxed not by your driving skill but by the Rover 75 driver in a hat who pulls out to pass a truck at 50mph. There will be prone lifeless motorcyclists all over the carriageways if this nonsense sees the light of day.
The woman is mad!
The other issue is the relative fuel consumption per distance travelled - much higher at high speeds. But of course our libertatians want nothing more than to choose to be public pests.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
In a sign of how much this leadership contest has divided the Conservative Party, Michael Gove can’t even say that he’d definitely support a budget brought forward by Liz Truss if (when) she becomes Prime Minister. https://twitter.com/PaulBrandITV/status/1565238903019393025
If you were worried about road safety, determined to reduce injury and death, would you start with motorways (smart of otherwise)?
This is why it is generally best to manage public debate on issues by channelling discussion and debate in to 'reviews' that try and look at the big picture. If you go and look at the history of policy development for the last 12 years, it has been towards swift, decisive action to 'do something' on a range of issues whilst circumventing the process of evidence gathering, public engagement and 'objective' analysis. It has led to a lot of chaotic legislation and knee jerk changes imposing significant expense. Many areas of public policy are incoherent and stumble along without any meaningful direction, particularly post 2019.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
I haven't driven in Germany that much but from memory the autobahns are not free-for-alls. In some places there is no speed limit, but in many others there are very strictly enforced ones. Also, don't they prohibit lorries on them at the weekends or something?
Yes, the urban motorways do have speed limits, and they do enforce them. The more rural autobahn are those without limit.
Here’s a video of an experienced British driver (journalist Harry Metcalfe) taking his car up to 200 the correct way - with attention paid to the car, especially the tyres, and driving cautiously around other traffic. https://youtube.com/watch?v=w1Bfi065bAM There’s obviously plenty more videos out there of idiots not doing it properly, but it’s noted that German drivers are very good at lane discipline and using their mirrors. Even Audis indicate when changing lane.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
It certainly is worth the debate, I for one am troubled by stripping her of statehood and diumping her on Bnagladesh
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
It certainly is worth the debate, I for one am troubled by stripping her of statehood and diumping her on Bnagladesh
If you were worried about road safety, determined to reduce injury and death, would you start with motorways (smart of otherwise)?
Good morning
As far as I am aware German autobahns do not have speed restrictions and certainly when I last drove on one there were no limits
Mind you I really do not see this as a priority though the dangerous Smart motorway do need urgent action
Some bits of the autobahn have limits, others don't. German roads have about 10 different speed limits and they seem to change every 100m in my (limited) experience.
This is the actual definition which concludes 'there's no speed limit'
The Autobahn speed limit is actually 120km/h on many sections, as clearly indicated by signs and overhead gantries. If you see the black-and-white sign that indicates a de-restricted section, the official recommended speed is 130km/h - but many drivers will drive much faster than that, as there's no speed limit.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
There are certainly some very murky elements in this case. Our government seems very keen not to let her into the UK.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
Put £20 on Democrats holding the house last night. Feels possible, oh and £120 on Putin winning the next Russian election at a smidgen under evens which is surely wrong
Hat tip @Quincel for the Putin bet, there's £69 @ 1.96 for anyone who wants to follow me in. If the bet's a loser then tbh you've probably won more than your stake back on your energy bill anyway.
Liz Truss getting libertarians excited at the London hustings by implying she might consider axing the speed limit on motorways. I can't see it happening though.
As someone who travels 40,000 miles a year and has done so for the last 35 years, that is f*****' nuts. The practicality, particularly on smart motorways, is that the inevitably greater number of accidents from an unlimited speed limit will slow the system down rather than speed it up.
Still, I live in Wales so our maximum motorway speed limit of 20 mph means I only have to worry about Liz's motorway halfwittery for about 6000 miles each year.
She is bonkers!
I'll be pissed off if she makes it legal before I finally crack 200mph on the road.
You are probably significantly safer at 150mph in your 996 than Johnny Teenager is in his stripped out Saxo at 80.
You are bolloxed not by your driving skill but by the Rover 75 driver in a hat who pulls out to pass a truck at 50mph. There will be prone lifeless motorcyclists all over the carriageways if this nonsense sees the light of day.
The woman is mad!
I don't know if Truss is mad personally, but she is channelling the id of the Conservative party membership in a completely unrestrained way.
Everything is about the deep urges. Tax cuts, no energy rationing, distrust of France, freedom to drive really fast on proper motorways.
Every single time, it's about ignoring any consequences, ignoring the other players in the game who also have agency rather than having to do what we want.
Take the motorway stuff. The point of smart motorways and locally reduced speed limits is to increase capacity relatively cheaply. They're annoying and maybe compromise on safety. But you can't get rid of them without explaining how you will replace the lost capacity, which will mean spending huge amounts of cash we don't have.
A truly great leader is prepared to take the flack and explain that you can't have your cake and eat it. That includes on the campaign trail. Truss isn't even trying.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
A truly great leader is prepared to take the flack and explain that you can't have your cake and eat it. That includes on the campaign trail. Truss isn't even trying.
Norfolk's third best Boris Johnson tribute act.
When the unstoppable force of reality finally meets the immovable object of Truss's stupidity, the energy released in the explosion might just solve the winter crisis if only we could harness it...
Balconies too. They let the world know whodunnit by their unique m.o. Like a polonium or novichok trail - no other perpetrator can source those materials. The Russian way to "claim responsibility".
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
Liz Truss getting libertarians excited at the London hustings by implying she might consider axing the speed limit on motorways. I can't see it happening though.
As someone who travels 40,000 miles a year and has done so for the last 35 years, that is f*****' nuts. The practicality, particularly on smart motorways, is that the inevitably greater number of accidents from an unlimited speed limit will slow the system down rather than speed it up.
Still, I live in Wales so our maximum motorway speed limit of 20 mph means I only have to worry about Liz's motorway halfwittery for about 6000 miles each year.
She is bonkers!
I'll be pissed off if she makes it legal before I finally crack 200mph on the road.
You are probably significantly safer at 150mph in your 996 than Johnny Teenager is in his stripped out Saxo at 80.
You are bolloxed not by your driving skill but by the Rover 75 driver in a hat who pulls out to pass a truck at 50mph. There will be prone lifeless motorcyclists all over the carriageways if this nonsense sees the light of day.
The woman is mad!
I don't know if Truss is mad personally, but she is channelling the id of the Conservative party membership in a completely unrestrained way.
Everything is about the deep urges. Tax cuts, no energy rationing, distrust of France, freedom to drive really fast on proper motorways.
Every single time, it's about ignoring any consequences, ignoring the other players in the game who also have agency rather than having to do what we want.
Take the motorway stuff. The point of smart motorways and locally reduced speed limits is to increase capacity relatively cheaply. They're annoying and maybe compromise on safety. But you can't get rid of them without explaining how you will replace the lost capacity, which will mean spending huge amounts of cash we don't have.
A truly great leader is prepared to take the flack and explain that you can't have your cake and eat it. That includes on the campaign trail. Truss isn't even trying.
Norfolk's third best Boris Johnson tribute act.
What I can say is politics is not about to become boring
I have said often enough I do not have an opinion on Truss as I really have no idea how she will govern but if you follow this forum I would venture to suggest she can only improve on the upside as the pre premiership attitude on here seems very damning
Put £20 on Democrats holding the house last night. Feels possible, oh and £120 on Putin winning the next Russian election at a smidgen under evens which is surely wrong
Hat tip @Quincel for the Putin bet, there's £69 @ 1.96 for anyone who wants to follow me in. If the bet's a loser then tbh you've probably won more than your stake back on your energy bill anyway.
I laid the Republican House majority at 1.15 a while back. Putin.... Hmmm.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
I have said often enough I do not have an opinion on Truss as I really have no idea how she will govern but if you follow this forum I would venture to suggest she can only improve on the upside as the pre premiership attitude on here seems very damning
As Prime Minister, I will lead us through tough times by going for growth.
With my clear and truly Conservative plan, we will unleash our full potential and forge ahead to our best days yet.
Have found the exact quote: ""I agree with you, I absolutely think we need to review them [smart motorways] and stop them if they are not working as soon as possible". So "stop them" means what exactly? When she goes on to state that Smart Motorways "have not worked" and then Nick Ferrari asks her to clarify that she would "stop them" and gets the one word answer "yes".
Dug herself quite a pit there didn't she. Later - "we've done a review and found that most of them work". "But you were definitive in the campaign that they have not worked - the exact opposite", and "Oh [insert random GBeebies presenter here] you must stop misrepresenting my words."
I have said often enough I do not have an opinion on Truss as I really have no idea how she will govern but if you follow this forum I would venture to suggest she can only improve on the upside as the pre premiership attitude on here seems very damning
As Prime Minister, I will lead us through tough times by going for growth.
With my clear and truly Conservative plan, we will unleash our full potential and forge ahead to our best days yet.
“On speed limits, again, I’d be prepared to look at that. I can’t give you a precise answer on the points but I do believe that the smart motorways experiment hasn’t worked.”
Asked to clarify if she would stop them, Truss replied: “Yes.”
Have found the exact quote: ""I agree with you, I absolutely think we need to review them [smart motorways] and stop them if they are not working as soon as possible". So "stop them" means what exactly? When she goes on to state that Smart Motorways "have not worked" and then Nick Ferrari asks her to clarify that she would "stop them" and gets the one word answer "yes".
Dug herself quite a pit there didn't she. Later - "we've done a review and found that most of them work". "But you were definitive in the campaign that they have not worked - the exact opposite", and "Oh [insert random GBeebies presenter here] you must stop misrepresenting my words."
"if they are not working" carrying a lot of weight there.
And she very clearly states they are not working. Dance on a pinhead all you like, its her words being reported everywhere...
She doesn't, she says "from the evidence I have seen, they are not working" that is leaving it wide open for a review where evidence says that it is working.
You try to remove all doubt, where doubt exists. The caveat of if is carrying a lot of weight.
I have said often enough I do not have an opinion on Truss as I really have no idea how she will govern but if you follow this forum I would venture to suggest she can only improve on the upside as the pre premiership attitude on here seems very damning
As Prime Minister, I will lead us through tough times by going for growth.
With my clear and truly Conservative plan, we will unleash our full potential and forge ahead to our best days yet.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
I have said often enough I do not have an opinion on Truss as I really have no idea how she will govern but if you follow this forum I would venture to suggest she can only improve on the upside as the pre premiership attitude on here seems very damning
As Prime Minister, I will lead us through tough times by going for growth.
With my clear and truly Conservative plan, we will unleash our full potential and forge ahead to our best days yet.
We are drowning in a sea of negativity and doom which if we are not careful will be self defeating
"clear" "truly Conservative" "plan"
I know you are desperate not to have to vote PC, but you need to understand why some people are not as convinced as you are of the existence of blue unicorns.
I have said often enough I do not have an opinion on Truss as I really have no idea how she will govern but if you follow this forum I would venture to suggest she can only improve on the upside as the pre premiership attitude on here seems very damning
As Prime Minister, I will lead us through tough times by going for growth.
With my clear and truly Conservative plan, we will unleash our full potential and forge ahead to our best days yet.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She's not an immigrant, she's British. I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone. She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so. I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to? For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
Have found the exact quote: ""I agree with you, I absolutely think we need to review them [smart motorways] and stop them if they are not working as soon as possible". So "stop them" means what exactly? When she goes on to state that Smart Motorways "have not worked" and then Nick Ferrari asks her to clarify that she would "stop them" and gets the one word answer "yes".
Dug herself quite a pit there didn't she. Later - "we've done a review and found that most of them work". "But you were definitive in the campaign that they have not worked - the exact opposite", and "Oh [insert random GBeebies presenter here] you must stop misrepresenting my words."
"if they are not working" carrying a lot of weight there.
And she very clearly states they are not working. Dance on a pinhead all you like, its her words being reported everywhere...
She doesn't, she says "from the evidence I have seen, they are not working" that is leaving it wide open for a review where evidence says that it is working.
You try to remove all doubt, where doubt exists. The caveat of if is carrying a lot of weight.
Top tip: if you are quoting, always check your refertences. And as Dr Jowett would add, always late the usest edition.
You're citing an obsolete edition of that particular storybook.
She later overrode that statement by 100% categorical statements that they did not work and that she would stop them.
Can't someone put safety bars on these Russian windows ? They seem awfully hazardous.
Watched first episode of Kleo, quite enjoyable and will persevere. As you implied it doesn’t carry the huge amount of up itself baggage of Killing Eve.
The eponymous hero(ine) bears a passing resemblance to a young Angela Merkel which given there’s a bit of disrobing and sexy stuff, is just a teeny bit discomfiting. The Crown was very much not my thing so have only watched about 5 minutes of it, but I imagine if it had ERII skipping about in her panties that it might induce a similar effect.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
They're about to start building the link road to the M54, but I presume that's not what you're talking about.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
Driving down the M1 last week and back up it on Tuesday I can tell you one thing - far fewer cars are doing 80+ than was previously the case.
It's ironic that any desperate plan to win votes by removing the speed limit is being done at the first time I remember seeing fewer people breaking it...
When I started driving about 30 years ago, the average pace of free flowing traffic on a clear motorway was early 80s, now it is mid sixties despite safer and more fuel efficient cars. The limit is rarely enforced below 80 anyway so this seems to be a public choice rather than driven by the limit.
Not sure it works well with her core vote either, they are old, and like to buy cars capable of doing 150mph but drive them at no more than 57mph whatever the road or conditions.
People are definitely driving more slowly than before. Why? Cost of fuel? Speed monitors in the car for insurance? People in less of a hurry? I tend to do about 75-80 on the mway and it feels like suddenly I'm the fastest thing on the road.
I think people are much more safety conscious. I also think of some of the roads where I grew up - broad, but unclassified suburban roads with 30mph limits - 30 years ago, speeds of 50 on these were commonplace, speeds as low as 30 rare unless there was a police car watching. Now, comparatively unusual to see more than a few mph over 30.
Have found the exact quote: ""I agree with you, I absolutely think we need to review them [smart motorways] and stop them if they are not working as soon as possible". So "stop them" means what exactly? When she goes on to state that Smart Motorways "have not worked" and then Nick Ferrari asks her to clarify that she would "stop them" and gets the one word answer "yes".
Dug herself quite a pit there didn't she. Later - "we've done a review and found that most of them work". "But you were definitive in the campaign that they have not worked - the exact opposite", and "Oh [insert random GBeebies presenter here] you must stop misrepresenting my words."
"if they are not working" carrying a lot of weight there.
And she very clearly states they are not working. Dance on a pinhead all you like, its her words being reported everywhere...
She doesn't, she says "from the evidence I have seen, they are not working" that is leaving it wide open for a review where evidence says that it is working.
You try to remove all doubt, where doubt exists. The caveat of if is carrying a lot of weight.
Top tip: if you are quoting, always check your refertences. And as Dr Jowett would add, always late the usest edition.
You're citing an obsolete edition of that particular storybook.
She later overrode that statement by 100% categorical statements that they did not work and that she would stop them.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Have found the exact quote: ""I agree with you, I absolutely think we need to review them [smart motorways] and stop them if they are not working as soon as possible". So "stop them" means what exactly? When she goes on to state that Smart Motorways "have not worked" and then Nick Ferrari asks her to clarify that she would "stop them" and gets the one word answer "yes".
Dug herself quite a pit there didn't she. Later - "we've done a review and found that most of them work". "But you were definitive in the campaign that they have not worked - the exact opposite", and "Oh [insert random GBeebies presenter here] you must stop misrepresenting my words."
"if they are not working" carrying a lot of weight there.
And she very clearly states they are not working. Dance on a pinhead all you like, its her words being reported everywhere...
She doesn't, she says "from the evidence I have seen, they are not working" that is leaving it wide open for a review where evidence says that it is working.
You try to remove all doubt, where doubt exists. The caveat of if is carrying a lot of weight.
Top tip: if you are quoting, always check your refertences. And as Dr Jowett would add, always late the usest edition.
You're citing an obsolete edition of that particular storybook.
She later overrode that statement by 100% categorical statements that they did not work and that she would stop them.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She's not an immigrant, she's British. I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone. She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so. I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to? For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
She's not British, she has no British citizenship.
She wasn't to the best of my knowledge raped either, engaging in consensual sex above the age of consent is not rape.
Have you any evidence Western intelligence knew she was going to be smuggled, before she was?
Yes she made stupid decisions, now she has to live with the consequences of them. Her choice. Let her rebuild her life wherever will take her, she's volunteered not to be our problem anymore.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
Driving down the M1 last week and back up it on Tuesday I can tell you one thing - far fewer cars are doing 80+ than was previously the case.
It's ironic that any desperate plan to win votes by removing the speed limit is being done at the first time I remember seeing fewer people breaking it...
When I started driving about 30 years ago, the average pace of free flowing traffic on a clear motorway was early 80s, now it is mid sixties despite safer and more fuel efficient cars. The limit is rarely enforced below 80 anyway so this seems to be a public choice rather than driven by the limit.
Not sure it works well with her core vote either, they are old, and like to buy cars capable of doing 150mph but drive them at no more than 57mph whatever the road or conditions.
People are definitely driving more slowly than before. Why? Cost of fuel? Speed monitors in the car for insurance? People in less of a hurry? I tend to do about 75-80 on the mway and it feels like suddenly I'm the fastest thing on the road.
I think people are much more safety conscious. I also think of some of the roads where I grew up - broad, but unclassified suburban roads with 30mph limits - 30 years ago, speeds of 50 on these were commonplace, speeds as low as 30 rare unless there was a police car watching. Now, comparatively unusual to see more than a few mph over 30.
Except for the unlicensed scrambler bikes of course.
Can't someone put safety bars on these Russian windows ? They seem awfully hazardous.
Watched first episode of Kleo, quite enjoyable and will persevere. As you implied it doesn’t carry the huge amount of up itself baggage of Killing Eve.
The eponymous hero(ine) bears a passing resemblance to a young Angela Merkel which given there’s a bit of disrobing and sexy stuff, is just a teeny bit discomfiting. The Crown was very much not my thing so have only watched about 5 minutes of it, but I imagine if it had ERII skipping about in her panties that it might induce a similar effect.
Wow. That last bit I did not get when watching it.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
You know what, my opinion of you has gone down a lot with that comment. I've got a daughter who has just turned 16. I can't actually imagine the mentality of someone who would say that.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
They're about to start building the link road to the M54, but I presume that's not what you're talking about.
The original plan was to run a new toll road from the top of the existing M6 Toll, parallel to the M6 all the way up to the Thelwall Viaduct. The second phase was to keep it going all the way to Preston.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Age of consent in this country is 16, in other countries its 18, in Syria its 15.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
As far as I can see the story says she was helped to get from Istanbul to Syria by someone who supplied information to the Canadian Government.
While I don't believe Ms Begum should lose her UK citizenship (because as a country we really should own our messes) I don't think anything revealed changes anything - she still left the UK to travel to Syria. What it does ask is why is the UK Government so desperate that her evidence isn't heard in an open court..
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
It's pretty hard to make a business case for a motorway which replicates an existing route. You can, most of the time, get from Walsall to Wigan at an average of over 60. The time savings from pushing that up to 70 are pretty slim for the investment involved.
I have said often enough I do not have an opinion on Truss as I really have no idea how she will govern but if you follow this forum I would venture to suggest she can only improve on the upside as the pre premiership attitude on here seems very damning
As Prime Minister, I will lead us through tough times by going for growth.
With my clear and truly Conservative plan, we will unleash our full potential and forge ahead to our best days yet.
We are drowning in a sea of negativity and doom which if we are not careful will be self defeating
"clear" "truly Conservative" "plan"
I know you are desperate not to have to vote PC, but you need to understand why some people are not as convinced as you are of the existence of blue unicorns.
It is in fact unpatriotic not to be turning all our doomy negativity onto Germany, France and the EUSSR in general.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Age of consent in this country is 16, in other countries its 18, in Syria its 15.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
They're about to start building the link road to the M54, but I presume that's not what you're talking about.
The original plan was to run a new toll road from the top of the existing M6 Toll, parallel to the M6 all the way up to the Thelwall Viaduct. The second phase was to keep it going all the way to Preston.
The Thelwall Viaduct is a terrible location to terminate a new road. Its far too South.
Preston would be ideal, but if not Preston then at least Wigan would be much better. Anywhere South of Junction 21 is completely illogical.
I'm sure I recall having earnest and bitter debates on here about motorway speed limits in the past, but with everything else that is going on I really can't muster the enthusiasm for another round.
I imagine that whenever this has been mooted in the past a civil servant has presented the minister with an estimate of x hundred extra deaths each year, and they've quailed at the thought of the subsequent Today programme interviews. Perhaps the Truss Ministry will be one who does it anyway.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She's not an immigrant, she's British. I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone. She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so. I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to? For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
Do share a lot of your concern, but I am puzzled by your consistent use of ‘western intelligence’. Is this some supra national organisation I’ve not heard of? We may well act in consort with other nations, such as via five eyes etc, but I was under the impression our intelligence is still national, and the trafficking was by a Canadian double agent. Is that wrong?
I don’t think she should have been stripped of British nationality. The thin pretext of Bangladeshi heritage is stupid. If she had been born there it might have passed the sniff test, but she wasn’t.
She offended the people of this country, for sure, by joining a horrific terrorist organisation, and more recently claimed to be ‘alright’ with the murderous acts committed. But she was 15. We decry the rape of white British 15 year old girls by largely Pakistani men in grooming gangs, but she was just as surely groomed by ISIS. At 15 you are not yet ready to assume full responsibility for your actions, you are too young. Some responsibility, yes, but not full.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
It's pretty hard to make a business case for a motorway which replicates an existing route. You can, most of the time, get from Walsall to Wigan at an average of over 60. The time savings from pushing that up to 70 are pretty slim for the investment involved.
+1 - look at the 20+ year battle to dual carriageway the A66 which is finally being done. The argument used was that the M62 was a good enough diversion...
Likewise dualling the A1 in Northumbria where the existence of the A68 is used to avoid dualling the A1.
Simply put the capacity demands don't exist to justify the costs - hardly surprising when fixing a single roundabout (black cat) has managed to become a £1.2bn project.
Can't someone put safety bars on these Russian windows ? They seem awfully hazardous.
Watched first episode of Kleo, quite enjoyable and will persevere. As you implied it doesn’t carry the huge amount of up itself baggage of Killing Eve.
The eponymous hero(ine) bears a passing resemblance to a young Angela Merkel which given there’s a bit of disrobing and sexy stuff, is just a teeny bit discomfiting. The Crown was very much not my thing so have only watched about 5 minutes of it, but I imagine if it had ERII skipping about in her panties that it might induce a similar effect.
Wow. That last bit I did not get when watching it.
So what changed between July and now that caused Truss to change her plans . It was obvious from then that the energy crisis wasn’t going away. Because she’s boxed herself in she now needs to find money for her NI cut aswell as tax cut and for the extra help she’ll have to deliver.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She's not an immigrant, she's British. I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone. She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so. I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to? For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
She's not British, she has no British citizenship.
She wasn't to the best of my knowledge raped either, engaging in consensual sex above the age of consent is not rape.
Have you any evidence Western intelligence knew she was going to be smuggled, before she was?
Yes she made stupid decisions, now she has to live with the consequences of them. Her choice. Let her rebuild her life wherever will take her, she's volunteered not to be our problem anymore.
She was born a British citizen in Britain. She has been stripped of that without due process at the whim of a politician. She will always be British just as you would still be British if some politician decided to strip you of your citizenship. She made a stupid, bad decision as a child. She should face due legal process for any crimes.
Liz Truss getting libertarians excited at the London hustings by implying she might consider axing the speed limit on motorways. I can't see it happening though.
As someone who travels 40,000 miles a year and has done so for the last 35 years, that is f*****' nuts. The practicality, particularly on smart motorways, is that the inevitably greater number of accidents from an unlimited speed limit will slow the system down rather than speed it up.
Still, I live in Wales so our maximum motorway speed limit of 20 mph means I only have to worry about Liz's motorway halfwittery for about 6000 miles each year.
She is bonkers!
I'll be pissed off if she makes it legal before I finally crack 200mph on the road.
You are probably significantly safer at 150mph in your 996 than Johnny Teenager is in his stripped out Saxo at 80.
You are bolloxed not by your driving skill but by the Rover 75 driver in a hat who pulls out to pass a truck at 50mph. There will be prone lifeless motorcyclists all over the carriageways if this nonsense sees the light of day.
The woman is mad!
I don't know if Truss is mad personally, but she is channelling the id of the Conservative party membership in a completely unrestrained way.
Everything is about the deep urges. Tax cuts, no energy rationing, distrust of France, freedom to drive really fast on proper motorways.
Every single time, it's about ignoring any consequences, ignoring the other players in the game who also have agency rather than having to do what we want.
Take the motorway stuff. The point of smart motorways and locally reduced speed limits is to increase capacity relatively cheaply. They're annoying and maybe compromise on safety. But you can't get rid of them without explaining how you will replace the lost capacity, which will mean spending huge amounts of cash we don't have.
A truly great leader is prepared to take the flack and explain that you can't have your cake and eat it. That includes on the campaign trail. Truss isn't even trying.
Norfolk's third best Boris Johnson tribute act.
What I can say is politics is not about to become boring
I have said often enough I do not have an opinion on Truss as I really have no idea how she will govern but if you follow this forum I would venture to suggest she can only improve on the upside as the pre premiership attitude on here seems very damning
I think that's right, and although Alastair is very readable as always (see below), I think Truss was right to avoid a pre-election interview. She needs to hit the ground running, and she can't do that before she's been elected as it would look presumptuous.
Merely having an active PM who does stuff will cheer people up for a while, after an interminable period of substative inactivity by Boris. If and when what she does proves ineffective or actually undesirable, then her rating will slump. But not at first.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She's not an immigrant, she's British. I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone. She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so. I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to? For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
She's not British, she has no British citizenship.
She wasn't to the best of my knowledge raped either, engaging in consensual sex above the age of consent is not rape.
Have you any evidence Western intelligence knew she was going to be smuggled, before she was?
Yes she made stupid decisions, now she has to live with the consequences of them. Her choice. Let her rebuild her life wherever will take her, she's volunteered not to be our problem anymore.
She was born a British citizen in Britain. She has been stripped of that without due process at the whim of a politician. She will always be British just as you would still be British if some politician decided to strip you of your citizenship. She made a stupid, bad decision as a child. She should face due legal process for any crimes.
She was stripped of that with due process, its been before the courts.
Simply saying she will always be British does not make her so.
Put £20 on Democrats holding the house last night. Feels possible, oh and £120 on Putin winning the next Russian election at a smidgen under evens which is surely wrong
Hat tip @Quincel for the Putin bet, there's £69 @ 1.96 for anyone who wants to follow me in. If the bet's a loser then tbh you've probably won more than your stake back on your energy bill anyway.
Alaska gives another illustration of how important candidate selection is in US elections.
A standard GOP candidate would have won comfortably but Palin had a -10% personal vote.
This does not bode well for GOP chances in the Senate with the Trump endorsed candidates.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
They're about to start building the link road to the M54, but I presume that's not what you're talking about.
The original plan was to run a new toll road from the top of the existing M6 Toll, parallel to the M6 all the way up to the Thelwall Viaduct. The second phase was to keep it going all the way to Preston.
The Thelwall Viaduct is a terrible location to terminate a new road. Its far too South.
Preston would be ideal, but if not Preston then at least Wigan would be much better. Anywhere South of Junction 21 is completely illogical.
Yes, but if you go North of Thelwall, you need to build another mile-long bridge eight lanes wide, which would be something silly like half the cost of the project. The first phase would be relatively easy geographically, but as you suggest would lead to congestion North of the toll - congestion which presumably would aid the business case for the much more expensive second phase through more politically difficult terrain.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
Put £20 on Democrats holding the house last night. Feels possible, oh and £120 on Putin winning the next Russian election at a smidgen under evens which is surely wrong
Hat tip @Quincel for the Putin bet, there's £69 @ 1.96 for anyone who wants to follow me in. If the bet's a loser then tbh you've probably won more than your stake back on your energy bill anyway.
If I had my way there would be GPS-controlled enforcement of 20/30 mph limits and reg plate cameras at all fuel stations - only get served if you have insurance/tax/MOT
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
They're about to start building the link road to the M54, but I presume that's not what you're talking about.
The original plan was to run a new toll road from the top of the existing M6 Toll, parallel to the M6 all the way up to the Thelwall Viaduct. The second phase was to keep it going all the way to Preston.
The Thelwall Viaduct is a terrible location to terminate a new road. Its far too South.
Preston would be ideal, but if not Preston then at least Wigan would be much better. Anywhere South of Junction 21 is completely illogical.
Yes, but if you go North of Thelwall, you need to build another mile-long bridge eight lanes wide, which would be something silly like half the cost of the project. The first phase would be relatively easy geographically, but as you suggest would lead to congestion North of the toll - congestion which presumably would aid the business case for the much more expensive second phase through more politically difficult terrain.
Yes you would need to build another bridge, that's how you get capacity.
Be a far better use of money and add far more capacity to transport than HS2 ever would.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
It is unrealistic to expect the intelligence services to intervene in active operations in this way. There is always going to be a some bigger strategic goal.
But there is a lot of irrationality in these situations. For instance, when you look at the Epstein case, there is no question at all the women involved were victims. But then when you switch to Begum, she is obviously a criminal whose acts were so bad she needs to get her citizenship revoked, even though she was only 15 when she went to Islamic state, the actual circumstances of which are unclear. It looks like she just made a load of bad decisions when she was 15, and you can't rule out some sort of duress.
Essentially, this all can be explained by reversion to a sort of 'primitive / tribal' mode of thinking about a range of issues, even amongst supposedly 'educated/liberal' people. People can't handle the complexity of the world and just like simple explanations, and in doing so turn themselves in to idiots.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
It's pretty hard to make a business case for a motorway which replicates an existing route. You can, most of the time, get from Walsall to Wigan at an average of over 60. The time savings from pushing that up to 70 are pretty slim for the investment involved.
+1 - look at the 20+ year battle to dual carriageway the A66 which is finally being done. The argument used was that the M62 was a good enough diversion...
Likewise dualling the A1 in Northumbria where the existence of the A68 is used to avoid dualling the A1.
Simply put the capacity demands don't exist to justify the costs - hardly surprising when fixing a single roundabout (black cat) has managed to become a £1.2bn project.
How the fuck does improving a roundabout cost 1.2 billion quid. No wonder infrastructure is completely fucked in this country.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She's not an immigrant, she's British. I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone. She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so. I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to? For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
She's not British, she has no British citizenship.
She wasn't to the best of my knowledge raped either, engaging in consensual sex above the age of consent is not rape.
Have you any evidence Western intelligence knew she was going to be smuggled, before she was?
Yes she made stupid decisions, now she has to live with the consequences of them. Her choice. Let her rebuild her life wherever will take her, she's volunteered not to be our problem anymore.
She was born a British citizen in Britain. She has been stripped of that without due process at the whim of a politician. She will always be British just as you would still be British if some politician decided to strip you of your citizenship. She made a stupid, bad decision as a child. She should face due legal process for any crimes.
She was stripped of that with due process, its been before the courts.
Simply saying she will always be British does not make her so.
She was stripped of that on the basis of lies that she had citizenship elsewhere - she doesn't....
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She's not an immigrant, she's British. I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone. She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so. I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to? For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
Do share a lot of your concern, but I am puzzled by your consistent use of ‘western intelligence’. Is this some supra national organisation I’ve not heard of? We may well act in consort with other nations, such as via five eyes etc, but I was under the impression our intelligence is still national, and the trafficking was by a Canadian double agent. Is that wrong?
I don’t think she should have been stripped of British nationality. The thin pretext of Bangladeshi heritage is stupid. If she had been born there it might have passed the sniff test, but she wasn’t.
She offended the people of this country, for sure, by joining a horrific terrorist organisation, and more recently claimed to be ‘alright’ with the murderous acts committed. But she was 15. We decry the rape of white British 15 year old girls by largely Pakistani men in grooming gangs, but she was just as surely groomed by ISIS. At 15 you are not yet ready to assume full responsibility for your actions, you are too young. Some responsibility, yes, but not full.
Under five eyes intelligence would be shared so British intelligence was certainly aware of the Canadian asset's involvement in trafficking her into Syria ex post, judging from the report in the Guardian - but none of this information was shared with Begum or her family or lawyers. Whether British intelligence knew about it in real time I don't know, but the whole point of five eyes is that active intelligence is shared widely.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Age of consent in this country is 16, in other countries its 18, in Syria its 15.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
Of course not, but 15 Yr olds are.
FFS, are you on the spectrum or something? You have no check box in your mind about not upsetting people have you.
It'll be interesting to see what happens to Rishi (the Parliamentary party's clear choice) if Truss convincingly wins (as I think)... my sense is Truss will perceive him to be a threat and so whilst pressure will be there to appoint him to a big office, she may step back from that, Tory MPs should rally to Truss but the Party is badly divided and I dont think Truss can unite it
If Liz Truss has any sense, she will want to have Rishi in her Cabinet. For all the complaints about disloyalty and blue-on-blue attacks, it is mainly Truss who has been criticising governments of which she was a member, whereas Rishi generally has not, even though he has been critical of Truss's proposals.
So a big job for Rishi will help unite a currently torn party, and although it promotes a rival, he can probably be relied on as relatively loyal. Sure, he might be plotting to take over at Number 10 but that would be true on the backbenches as well.
I think Truss will formally offer Health to Sunak, and he will turn it down. It will quickly be known that he turned it down, making the former Chancellor look like the person getting in the way of the party re-unification. She might even offer Cabinet jobs to two or three other Sunakites too, and see what happens.
I think Starmer gives it a fortnight before calling a formal vote of confidence in the government, to see if he can get a couple of defectors to crawl out of the woodwork.
All Sunak has to do is say that he couldn't possibly take such a post because he fundamentally disagrees with her policy on removing £10 billion from the NHS budget at a time when it is under such pressure.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
Driving down the M1 last week and back up it on Tuesday I can tell you one thing - far fewer cars are doing 80+ than was previously the case.
It's ironic that any desperate plan to win votes by removing the speed limit is being done at the first time I remember seeing fewer people breaking it...
When I started driving about 30 years ago, the average pace of free flowing traffic on a clear motorway was early 80s, now it is mid sixties despite safer and more fuel efficient cars. The limit is rarely enforced below 80 anyway so this seems to be a public choice rather than driven by the limit.
Not sure it works well with her core vote either, they are old, and like to buy cars capable of doing 150mph but drive them at no more than 57mph whatever the road or conditions.
People are definitely driving more slowly than before. Why? Cost of fuel? Speed monitors in the car for insurance? People in less of a hurry? I tend to do about 75-80 on the mway and it feels like suddenly I'm the fastest thing on the road.
I think people are much more safety conscious. I also think of some of the roads where I grew up - broad, but unclassified suburban roads with 30mph limits - 30 years ago, speeds of 50 on these were commonplace, speeds as low as 30 rare unless there was a police car watching. Now, comparatively unusual to see more than a few mph over 30.
I agree with that (confession: I used to get speeding points quite regularly), though I think the cases where the limit seems counter-intuitive undermine respect for the law. There is a dual carriageway leading into Croydon with a 20 limit, and that seems just mad. On motorways, a limit of 80 with cameras everywhere would probably be more sensible than a 70 limit that people routinely exceed. My pet dislike is motorbikes, which *all* seem to treat speed limits as a minimum and who weave perilously in and out at 100+ - don't cameras work for them?
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She's not an immigrant, she's British. I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone. She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so. I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to? For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
The whole removing citizenship thing is super shady... and is just pointless populist nonsense. The safest place for terrorists is (obviously) prison. The whole debate should be flipped around to be... why don't you want terrorists in prison as opposed to free?
There are other cases Moazzam Begg talks about on twitter where you have to wonder whether stripping someone of citizenship is just an easy get-out for the authorities who are embarassed about intelligence operations gone wrong.
Put £20 on Democrats holding the house last night. Feels possible, oh and £120 on Putin winning the next Russian election at a smidgen under evens which is surely wrong
Hat tip @Quincel for the Putin bet, there's £69 @ 1.96 for anyone who wants to follow me in. If the bet's a loser then tbh you've probably won more than your stake back on your energy bill anyway.
Alaska gives another illustration of how important candidate selection is in US elections.
A standard GOP candidate would have won comfortably but Palin had a -10% personal vote.
This does not bode well for GOP chances in the Senate with the Trump endorsed candidates.
Final result 51.47% to 48.53% for the dem candidate.
A triumph for AV!
Did not see that coming, thought Palin would have enough transfers to get over the line but she truly was completely toxic.
Would love to dig into what that means for trasnfers vs did not have a trasnfer vote.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Age of consent in this country is 16, in other countries its 18, in Syria its 15.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
Of course not, but 15 Yr olds are.
FFS, are you on the spectrum or something? You have no check box in your mind about not upsetting people have you.
So 16 year olds aren't raped if they have consensual sex in a country with 16 as age of consent, "of course not", but 15 year olds are if they have consensual sex in a country with 15 as age of consent?
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
It's pretty hard to make a business case for a motorway which replicates an existing route. You can, most of the time, get from Walsall to Wigan at an average of over 60. The time savings from pushing that up to 70 are pretty slim for the investment involved.
+1 - look at the 20+ year battle to dual carriageway the A66 which is finally being done. The argument used was that the M62 was a good enough diversion...
Likewise dualling the A1 in Northumbria where the existence of the A68 is used to avoid dualling the A1.
Simply put the capacity demands don't exist to justify the costs - hardly surprising when fixing a single roundabout (black cat) has managed to become a £1.2bn project.
How the fuck does improving a roundabout cost 1.2 billion quid. No wonder infrastructure is completely fucked in this country.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She chose to leave the country, but she was a child (15) when she did so. What is your view on children and choices within libertarianism?
You write, "If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards." OK, but is that the situation under discussion?
(a) It is a matter of debate where we are obliged to let her back into the country. She's been given leave to appeal the decision the remove her UK citizenship; she's just not in a position to contest the case.
(b) She was certainly a vocal supporter of IS. It is unclear whether she tried to kill people. There is one unsubstantiated report that she helped make suicide bomb vests. Most reports do not indicate any actual involvement in acts of terrorism or killing people.
You also seem to imply that Begum was an immigrant. She was born in Britain as a British citizen.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Age of consent in this country is 16, in other countries its 18, in Syria its 15.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
Of course not, but 15 Yr olds are.
FFS, are you on the spectrum or something? You have no check box in your mind about not upsetting people have you.
So 16 year olds aren't raped if they have consensual sex in a country with 16 as age of consent, but 15 year olds are if they have consensual sex in a country with 15 as age of consent?
How do you explain that one?
Because she was groomed and trafficked as a minor.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Age of consent in this country is 16, in other countries its 18, in Syria its 15.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
Of course not, but 15 Yr olds are.
FFS, are you on the spectrum or something? You have no check box in your mind about not upsetting people have you.
So 16 year olds aren't raped if they have consensual sex in a country with 16 as age of consent, but 15 year olds are if they have consensual sex in a country with 15 as age of consent?
How do you explain that one?
Because she was groomed and trafficked as a minor.
She wasn't a minor where she had sex. Unless she did in this country, which hasn't ever been reported, she was above the age of consent there.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
It is unrealistic to expect the intelligence services to intervene in active operations in this way. There is always going to be a some bigger strategic goal.
But there is a lot of irrationality in these situations. For instance, when you look at the Epstein case, there is no question at all the women involved were victims. But then when you switch to Begum, she is obviously a criminal whose acts were so bad she needs to get her citizenship revoked, even though she was only 15 when she went to Islamic state, the actual circumstances of which are unclear. It looks like she just made a load of bad decisions when she was 15, and you can't rule out some sort of duress.
Essentially, this all can be explained by reversion to a sort of 'primitive / tribal' mode of thinking about a range of issues, even amongst supposedly 'educated/liberal' people. People can't handle the complexity of the world and just like simple explanations, and in doing so turn themselves in to idiots.
s'easy. She was 15 = a minor. In the UK she couldn't vote, have sex, join the army, drink in pubs, drive, or get married without her parents' consent. While 10 is the age of criminal responsibility, children (depending on their age - but say 15 for girls) are sent to Secure Training Centres, not prison, because it is accepted that there are different factors at play for children.
But go for your life in describing her as an evil criminal mastermind.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Age of consent in this country is 16, in other countries its 18, in Syria its 15.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
Of course not, but 15 Yr olds are.
FFS, are you on the spectrum or something? You have no check box in your mind about not upsetting people have you.
So 16 year olds aren't raped if they have consensual sex in a country with 16 as age of consent, but 15 year olds are if they have consensual sex in a country with 15 as age of consent?
How do you explain that one?
Because she was groomed and trafficked as a minor.
She wasn't a minor where she had sex. Unless she did in this country, which hasn't ever been reported, she was above the age of consent there.
So by this logic you could kidnap a 10-yr old, groom them continuously for 10 years and then send them out to kill someone and they would bear full criminal responsibility.
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
It's pretty hard to make a business case for a motorway which replicates an existing route. You can, most of the time, get from Walsall to Wigan at an average of over 60. The time savings from pushing that up to 70 are pretty slim for the investment involved.
+1 - look at the 20+ year battle to dual carriageway the A66 which is finally being done. The argument used was that the M62 was a good enough diversion...
Likewise dualling the A1 in Northumbria where the existence of the A68 is used to avoid dualling the A1.
Simply put the capacity demands don't exist to justify the costs - hardly surprising when fixing a single roundabout (black cat) has managed to become a £1.2bn project.
How the fuck does improving a roundabout cost 1.2 billion quid. No wonder infrastructure is completely fucked in this country.
It’s a little more than improving the roundabout, they’re replacing it with a three-level interchange and building a 10-mile dual carriageway as part of the scheme.
Begum was born and raised here. She is our problem. Stick her in prison.
Just like we don’t make people that commit terrible crimes stateless. We present proper justice and process to the world and we take the good with the bad.
At Fishmongers Hall, one of the men who saved countless lives was on day release after committing murders. If we had made him stateless it’s likely a lot more people would have died.
Put £20 on Democrats holding the house last night. Feels possible, oh and £120 on Putin winning the next Russian election at a smidgen under evens which is surely wrong
Hat tip @Quincel for the Putin bet, there's £69 @ 1.96 for anyone who wants to follow me in. If the bet's a loser then tbh you've probably won more than your stake back on your energy bill anyway.
Alaska gives another illustration of how important candidate selection is in US elections.
A standard GOP candidate would have won comfortably but Palin had a -10% personal vote.
This does not bode well for GOP chances in the Senate with the Trump endorsed candidates.
Final result 51.47% to 48.53% for the dem candidate.
A triumph for AV!
Did not see that coming, thought Palin would have enough transfers to get over the line but she truly was completely toxic.
Would love to dig into what that means for trasnfers vs did not have a trasnfer vote.
Top result in Alaska. Sanity returning or just special set of circumstances?
"At 49, Ms. Peltola will become the first Alaska Native to serve in Congress" - NY Times
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
Wow, the conspiracy ranting here by you is off the scale.
The complacency from you is off the scale. An odd position for a self declared libertarian that it's totally fine for the state to be complicit in the trafficking of a 15yo schoolgirl to a war zone where she gets raped, loses three babies and then stripped of all rights, leaving her stateless, while the same state covers up all evidence of its involvement. Next time you start frothing about the overbearing state power evident in local planning decisions I'll bear it in mind.
She chose to leave this country, her decision. Part of libertarianism is taking on the consequences of your own choices. I'm OK with people making their own decisions and owning the consequences, she doesn't want to own the consequences of her own decisions.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
She's not an immigrant, she's British. I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone. She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so. I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to? For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
She's not British, she has no British citizenship.
She wasn't to the best of my knowledge raped either, engaging in consensual sex above the age of consent is not rape.
Have you any evidence Western intelligence knew she was going to be smuggled, before she was?
Yes she made stupid decisions, now she has to live with the consequences of them. Her choice. Let her rebuild her life wherever will take her, she's volunteered not to be our problem anymore.
She was born a British citizen in Britain. She has been stripped of that without due process at the whim of a politician. She will always be British just as you would still be British if some politician decided to strip you of your citizenship. She made a stupid, bad decision as a child. She should face due legal process for any crimes.
She was stripped of that with due process, its been before the courts.
Simply saying she will always be British does not make her so.
The country where supposedly she has citizenship (Bangladesh) has said she is not a Bangladeshi citizen (and I'm assuming they would know). She also had British citizenship so we are the last ones holding the parcel. Sadly for you but them's the breaks.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Age of consent in this country is 16, in other countries its 18, in Syria its 15.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
Of course not, but 15 Yr olds are.
FFS, are you on the spectrum or something? You have no check box in your mind about not upsetting people have you.
So 16 year olds aren't raped if they have consensual sex in a country with 16 as age of consent, but 15 year olds are if they have consensual sex in a country with 15 as age of consent?
How do you explain that one?
Because she was groomed and trafficked as a minor.
She wasn't a minor where she had sex. Unless she did in this country, which hasn't ever been reported, she was above the age of consent there.
So by this logic you could kidnap a 10-yr old, groom them continuously for 10 years and then send them out to kill someone and they would bear full criminal responsibility.
That it?
If they killed someone at 20 they'd be an murderer, yes. Their terrible backstory might be taken into account as mitigation at any sentencing, just as if she's charged where she's chosen to live with any crimes then she ought to be able to plead mitigation there.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
They won’t let her back in because 80% of the country loathes the idea and despises Begum. It would be a truly brave politician to go against that
Its amusing to see the attacks coming primarily from left-wingers because of Truss simply saying she'd look into abolish motorway speed limits (not even that she'd do it).
We should like into doing more things like European countries like Germany do. No, not that!
Personally I wouldn't go faster than 70mph much myself even if it were legal simply due to fuel efficiency, my cars fuel efficiency drops like a rock past 70mph. But I don't think people who do 80mph on the motorway should be criminals breaking the law.
Abolishing the national speed limit for cars on the motorway for the stretches of it where the national speed limit applies is a sensible solution. The speed limit is treated as a speed target by too many rather than a limit, so lifting the limit to 80 would be a bad idea, but nor should those who do 80 be criminalised for doing so.
Its far safer doing 80 on a motorway than 40 in a town.
The more interesting motorway pledge was to abolish smart motorways. Remember that the majority of those built under this government have spent vast sums on endless roadworks to convert the hard shoulder into a running lane.
What they *should* have done - had actual widening not been an option - was have a switchable hard shoulder. But that costs more money in the form of cameras so they did it on the cheap. The sensible thing to do would be to convert these new sections to being switchable.
Abolish them? Crazy. A huge spike in congestion as busy motorway capacity is cut by a quarter. Does she have a clue what she is saying?
Did she actually promise to abolish smart motorways? I thought what she said was that she'd abolish them 'where they're not working' which is just plain sensible. If they're not working, they shouldn't be there, but if they are working then keep them.
But yes the problem is that smart motorways were a fudge to add much needed capacity without actually widening roads or building new ones. Building new motorways would be my ideal alternative solution, certainly much more justification to build new motorways to add extra capacity than there is to build new rail lines.
Trying to get from the M6 Junction 10 to anywhere further North is a lottery. Will the wait follow just one gridlocked accident or ten?
Absolutely.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
We needed the M6 Toll northern extension talked about for a while...
It's pretty hard to make a business case for a motorway which replicates an existing route. You can, most of the time, get from Walsall to Wigan at an average of over 60. The time savings from pushing that up to 70 are pretty slim for the investment involved.
+1 - look at the 20+ year battle to dual carriageway the A66 which is finally being done. The argument used was that the M62 was a good enough diversion...
Likewise dualling the A1 in Northumbria where the existence of the A68 is used to avoid dualling the A1.
Simply put the capacity demands don't exist to justify the costs - hardly surprising when fixing a single roundabout (black cat) has managed to become a £1.2bn project.
How the fuck does improving a roundabout cost 1.2 billion quid. No wonder infrastructure is completely fucked in this country.
Edit - the actual figure does seem to be £950m but I do remember that £1.2bn but don't know where it come from.
Obviously it's gone overbudget - It was 1.4 billion in the BBC report. Mind you that's the case even in the private sector these days with right to pass along surcharges being stuck into every contract. So not the worst of sins.
It'll be interesting to see what happens to Rishi (the Parliamentary party's clear choice) if Truss convincingly wins (as I think)... my sense is Truss will perceive him to be a threat and so whilst pressure will be there to appoint him to a big office, she may step back from that, Tory MPs should rally to Truss but the Party is badly divided and I dont think Truss can unite it
If Liz Truss has any sense, she will want to have Rishi in her Cabinet. For all the complaints about disloyalty and blue-on-blue attacks, it is mainly Truss who has been criticising governments of which she was a member, whereas Rishi generally has not, even though he has been critical of Truss's proposals.
So a big job for Rishi will help unite a currently torn party, and although it promotes a rival, he can probably be relied on as relatively loyal. Sure, he might be plotting to take over at Number 10 but that would be true on the backbenches as well.
I think Truss will formally offer Health to Sunak, and he will turn it down. It will quickly be known that he turned it down, making the former Chancellor look like the person getting in the way of the party re-unification. She might even offer Cabinet jobs to two or three other Sunakites too, and see what happens.
I think Starmer gives it a fortnight before calling a formal vote of confidence in the government, to see if he can get a couple of defectors to crawl out of the woodwork.
All Sunak has to do is say that he couldn't possibly take such a post because he fundamentally disagrees with her policy on removing £10 billion from the NHS budget at a time when it is under such pressure.
This is the £10billion that Truss wants to move to social care?
Believe me - social care system needs money more than the NHS does. It is in total crisis and my family are in the frigging middle of it at the moment, so I am becoming an expert.
Shamima Begum was a 15 year old schoolgirl trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence, a fact that was covered up by British intelligence and the police. And you wonder why the government won't let her back in the country to face trial?
She wasn’t trafficked into Syria by Western intelligence. She was trafficked into Syria by a trafficker, who was also selling information to Western intelligence. There may be problematic issues around that and, more generally, about how the UK government has dealt with Begum, but it seems unhelpful to elide informant with spy.
A western intelligence asset traffics a 15yo British schoolgirl to Islamic state, it gets covered up by the authorities and the girl gets stripped of her citizenship, probably to prevent the intelligence involvement ever coming out in court, and it's the semantics of my comment that bothers you? OK. Imagine if she was one of these white girls from Rotherham that people on here get so worked up about.
It’s about agency. She wasn’t trafficked at the behest of Western intelligence. The Western intelligence asset did not do everything he did under the direction of Western intelligence. It is, thus, wrong to say she was trafficked by Western intelligence.
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Western intelligence could have intervened and said hold onto this girl, she's a vulnerable minor and a British citizen, we will come and get her and bring her home. They chose not to and let her be trafficked to Islamic state, where she got raped. Why? We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
What evidence do you have that she was raped? She chose to get married and was above the age of consent.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
Well, we have an early winner for today’s worst point made.
Age of consent in this country is 16, in other countries its 18, in Syria its 15.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
Bart do you really want to go down the usage of "raped" road?
That way I fear lies big trouble.
"A young girl walking down the road in Rotherham out of her mind on crack with a short skirt was "raped"."
It'll be interesting to see what happens to Rishi (the Parliamentary party's clear choice) if Truss convincingly wins (as I think)... my sense is Truss will perceive him to be a threat and so whilst pressure will be there to appoint him to a big office, she may step back from that, Tory MPs should rally to Truss but the Party is badly divided and I dont think Truss can unite it
If Liz Truss has any sense, she will want to have Rishi in her Cabinet. For all the complaints about disloyalty and blue-on-blue attacks, it is mainly Truss who has been criticising governments of which she was a member, whereas Rishi generally has not, even though he has been critical of Truss's proposals.
So a big job for Rishi will help unite a currently torn party, and although it promotes a rival, he can probably be relied on as relatively loyal. Sure, he might be plotting to take over at Number 10 but that would be true on the backbenches as well.
I think Truss will formally offer Health to Sunak, and he will turn it down. It will quickly be known that he turned it down, making the former Chancellor look like the person getting in the way of the party re-unification. She might even offer Cabinet jobs to two or three other Sunakites too, and see what happens.
I think Starmer gives it a fortnight before calling a formal vote of confidence in the government, to see if he can get a couple of defectors to crawl out of the woodwork.
All Sunak has to do is say that he couldn't possibly take such a post because he fundamentally disagrees with her policy on removing £10 billion from the NHS budget at a time when it is under such pressure.
Which would be rather amusing, because that was exactly what Sunak planned for the money, when he was Chancellor introducing the NI rise for social care. Many of us said at the time, that giving it to the NHS for a couple of years would never work, because he’d never be able to actually re-allocate it later.
Comments
She will meet trade unions and council chiefs separately at St Andrew's House
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/nicola-sturgeon-chair-emergency-summit-27881017
https://twitter.com/spectatorindex/status/1565241549205561344
There is no proof that she was stripped of her citizenship to prevent the intelligence involvement coming out. I can entirely believe she was stripped of her citizenship by a racist government wanting to scapegoat a brown girl while looking Tough on Terrorism.
It is an important case. That is why it is important to get the facts straight.
Here’s a video of an experienced British driver (journalist Harry Metcalfe) taking his car up to 200 the correct way - with attention paid to the car, especially the tyres, and driving cautiously around other traffic. https://youtube.com/watch?v=w1Bfi065bAM There’s obviously plenty more videos out there of idiots not doing it properly, but it’s noted that German drivers are very good at lane discipline and using their mirrors. Even Audis indicate when changing lane.
Also creates havoc for the towns by the motorways, since with no alternative motorways to travel up towns become the only rat run instead.
When there's no accidents then Warrington for instance is well positioned but if there's an accident on any of the M6, M62 or M56 then it creates mayhem for the roads.
If there was an alternative north/south motorway trunk to the M6 through the North West then if there were an accident on the M6 people could re-route onto the alternative trunk instead of having to run through towns instead as the only detour.
The Autobahn speed limit is actually 120km/h on many sections, as clearly indicated by signs and overhead gantries. If you see the black-and-white sign that indicates a de-restricted section, the official recommended speed is 130km/h - but many drivers will drive much faster than that, as there's no speed limit.
And good morning one and all. Autumn is upon us!
https://smarkets.com/event/42623628/politics/europe/2025/01/01/00-00/russia/2024/04/07/12-00/2024-russian-presidential-election
Hat tip @Quincel for the Putin bet, there's £69 @ 1.96 for anyone who wants to follow me in. If the bet's a loser then tbh you've probably won more than your stake back on your energy bill anyway.
Everything is about the deep urges. Tax cuts, no energy rationing, distrust of France, freedom to drive really fast on proper motorways.
Every single time, it's about ignoring any consequences, ignoring the other players in the game who also have agency rather than having to do what we want.
Take the motorway stuff. The point of smart motorways and locally reduced speed limits is to increase capacity relatively cheaply. They're annoying and maybe compromise on safety. But you can't get rid of them without explaining how you will replace the lost capacity, which will mean spending huge amounts of cash we don't have.
A truly great leader is prepared to take the flack and explain that you can't have your cake and eat it. That includes on the campaign trail. Truss isn't even trying.
Norfolk's third best Boris Johnson tribute act.
If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards.
I'm a big fan of immigration but I'd rather we allow people with clean criminal records into the country, than murderous terrorists who'd voluntarily left it.
We only have a few facts, it is true. I am operating on the principle that the more we find out the worse it will look, which is generally the case with these sorts of situations. I may be wrong of course, but I think that anyone who takes the government's word on any of this is naive beyond belief.
I have said often enough I do not have an opinion on Truss as I really have no idea how she will govern but if you follow this forum I would venture to suggest she can only improve on the upside as the pre premiership attitude on here seems very damning
They seem awfully hazardous.
Putin.... Hmmm.
Age of consent in Syria is 15.
With my clear and truly Conservative plan, we will unleash our full potential and forge ahead to our best days yet.
#LizForLeader #ReadyToLead
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/19669984/liz-truss-prime-minister-cost-of-living-crisis/
Fncking bizarre considering what the country is facing this winter.
Asked to clarify if she would stop them, Truss replied: “Yes.”
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/liz-truss-signals-the-end-for-smart-motorways-g08jng6j7
You try to remove all doubt, where doubt exists. The caveat of if is carrying a lot of weight.
We are drowning in a sea of negativity and doom which if we are not careful will be self defeating
Clap for heat, maybe...
"truly Conservative"
"plan"
I know you are desperate not to have to vote PC, but you need to understand why some people are not as convinced as you are of the existence of blue unicorns.
I am not aware of any evidence that she murdered anyone.
She was a vulnerable minor, who was trafficked to Syria with the knowledge of Western Intelligence and was raped. She lost three babies. She made a stupid decision in travelling to Turkey. A bad decision. She may well have a case to answer, and should face due legal process and punishment if so.
I am deeply troubled that a British citizen can be stripped of their citizenship with no proper due process. That is an overreach of state power. I am deeply troubled that almost everyone this has happened to has been a person of colour. That is unequal treatment under the law. I am deeply troubled that all of this happened with the knowledge of Western intelligence, and they never intervened to protect her - a British citizen, a child. Isn't that their job? I am deeply troubled that the involvement of Western intelligence has been covered up. How can they be held to account if we never know what they're up to?
For a libertarian like you to go along with this is surprising.
You're citing an obsolete edition of that particular storybook.
She later overrode that statement by 100% categorical statements that they did not work and that she would stop them.
The eponymous hero(ine) bears a passing resemblance to a young Angela Merkel which given there’s a bit of disrobing and sexy stuff, is just a teeny bit discomfiting. The Crown was very much not my thing so have only watched about 5 minutes of it, but I imagine if it had ERII skipping about in her panties that it might induce a similar effect.
@JohnRentoul
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9m
Truss is hard to read. You don’t get to be PM without being good at politics, but 2 big hostages to fortune last night…
https://nationalhighways.co.uk/our-roads/west-midlands/m54-to-m6-link-road/
Nick Ferrari.
She wasn't to the best of my knowledge raped either, engaging in consensual sex above the age of consent is not rape.
Have you any evidence Western intelligence knew she was going to be smuggled, before she was?
Yes she made stupid decisions, now she has to live with the consequences of them. Her choice. Let her rebuild her life wherever will take her, she's volunteered not to be our problem anymore.
I'm quite happy about that.
If 16 years olds from countries with an 18 age of consent move to this country are they "raped" if they engage in consensual sex?
While I don't believe Ms Begum should lose her UK citizenship (because as a country we really should own our messes) I don't think anything revealed changes anything - she still left the UK to travel to Syria. What it does ask is why is the UK Government so desperate that her evidence isn't heard in an open court..
You can, most of the time, get from Walsall to Wigan at an average of over 60. The time savings from pushing that up to 70 are pretty slim for the investment involved.
It’s been proven that faster speeds don’t get you there faster!
I tried it out once, I drove to work at 60mph vs 70mph, it made no difference in when I arrived.
Preston would be ideal, but if not Preston then at least Wigan would be much better. Anywhere South of Junction 21 is completely illogical.
I imagine that whenever this has been mooted in the past a civil servant has presented the minister with an estimate of x hundred extra deaths each year, and they've quailed at the thought of the subsequent Today programme interviews. Perhaps the Truss Ministry will be one who does it anyway.
I don’t think she should have been stripped of British nationality. The thin pretext of Bangladeshi heritage is stupid. If she had been born there it might have passed the sniff test, but she wasn’t.
She offended the people of this country, for sure, by joining a horrific terrorist organisation, and more recently claimed to be ‘alright’ with the murderous acts committed. But she was 15. We decry the rape of white British 15 year old girls by largely Pakistani men in grooming gangs, but she was just as surely groomed by ISIS. At 15 you are not yet ready to assume full responsibility for your actions, you are too young. Some responsibility, yes, but not full.
Likewise dualling the A1 in Northumbria where the existence of the A68 is used to avoid dualling the A1.
Simply put the capacity demands don't exist to justify the costs - hardly surprising when fixing a single roundabout (black cat) has managed to become a £1.2bn project.
She made a stupid, bad decision as a child. She should face due legal process for any crimes.
https://alastair-meeks.medium.com/lost-in-space-liz-truss-the-weightless-prime-minister-508f1acedbed
Merely having an active PM who does stuff will cheer people up for a while, after an interminable period of substative inactivity by Boris. If and when what she does proves ineffective or actually undesirable, then her rating will slump. But not at first.
Very sad news about Bill Turnbull.
Simply saying she will always be British does not make her so.
A standard GOP candidate would have won comfortably but Palin had a -10% personal vote.
This does not bode well for GOP chances in the Senate with the Trump endorsed candidates.
Be a far better use of money and add far more capacity to transport than HS2 ever would.
There is always going to be a some bigger strategic goal.
But there is a lot of irrationality in these situations.
For instance, when you look at the Epstein case, there is no question at all the women involved were victims.
But then when you switch to Begum, she is obviously a criminal whose acts were so bad she needs to get her citizenship revoked, even though she was only 15 when she went to Islamic state, the actual circumstances of which are unclear.
It looks like she just made a load of bad decisions when she was 15, and you can't rule out some sort of duress.
Essentially, this all can be explained by reversion to a sort of 'primitive / tribal' mode of thinking about a range of issues, even amongst supposedly 'educated/liberal' people.
People can't handle the complexity of the world and just like simple explanations, and in doing so turn themselves in to idiots.
FFS, are you on the spectrum or something? You have no check box in your mind about not upsetting people have you.
The safest place for terrorists is (obviously) prison. The whole debate should be flipped around to be... why don't you want terrorists in prison as opposed to free?
There are other cases Moazzam Begg talks about on twitter where you have to wonder whether stripping someone of citizenship is just an easy get-out for the authorities who are embarassed about intelligence operations gone wrong.
A triumph for AV!
Did not see that coming, thought Palin would have enough transfers to get over the line but she truly was completely toxic.
Would love to dig into what that means for trasnfers vs did not have a trasnfer vote.
How do you explain that one?
Edit - the actual figure does seem to be £950m but I do remember that £1.2bn but don't know where it come from.
You write, "If murderous terrorists whom we're not obliged to let back into the country volunteer to leave the country to try to kill people, then we absolutely have the right to say "goodbye" to them and not let them back into the country afterwards." OK, but is that the situation under discussion?
(a) It is a matter of debate where we are obliged to let her back into the country. She's been given leave to appeal the decision the remove her UK citizenship; she's just not in a position to contest the case.
(b) She was certainly a vocal supporter of IS. It is unclear whether she tried to kill people. There is one unsubstantiated report that she helped make suicide bomb vests. Most reports do not indicate any actual involvement in acts of terrorism or killing people.
You also seem to imply that Begum was an immigrant. She was born in Britain as a British citizen.
Hmm. 🤔
To some extent it’s always been the teams and advisors they have around themselves. The better governments where you appoint talent not cheerleaders.
In this age of populism, cakeism from voters, maybe the old rules don’t apply.
But go for your life in describing her as an evil criminal mastermind.
That it?
https://nationalhighways.co.uk/our-roads/a428-black-cat-to-caxton-gibbet/
Still quite rediculously expensive though, for what it is.
Just like we don’t make people that commit terrible crimes stateless. We present proper justice and process to the world and we take the good with the bad.
At Fishmongers Hall, one of the men who saved countless lives was on day release after committing murders. If we had made him stateless it’s likely a lot more people would have died.
"At 49, Ms. Peltola will become the first Alaska Native to serve in Congress" - NY Times
They won’t let her back in because 80% of the country loathes the idea and despises Begum. It would be a truly brave politician to go against that
Labour wouldn’t do it, either
Believe me - social care system needs money more than the NHS does. It is in total crisis and my family are in the frigging middle of it at the moment, so I am becoming an expert.
That way I fear lies big trouble.
"A young girl walking down the road in Rotherham out of her mind on crack with a short skirt was "raped"."
See how it looks?
You have daughters - get a fucking grip.