So Adam Price forced out as Plaid leader after internal problems. Following the recent chaos in the SNP yet more good news for Unionists
Hi @hyifd. I guess we should settle our local elections bet. My charity is the alzheimer's society as they were great for my mum. Good on you for taking the bet and I have to admit I thought the odds were on your side but I had a gut feeling about it. In particular in the 3 districts around me (Guildford, mole valley and Woking) the LD councils were still popular and the elector still angry with the previous administrations. Give it time and the reverses will happen.
So Adam Price forced out as Plaid leader after internal problems. Following the recent chaos in the SNP yet more good news for Unionists
Hi @hyifd. I guess we should settle our local elections bet. My charity is the alzheimer's society as they were great for my mum. Good on you for taking the bet and I have to admit I thought the odds were on your side but I had a gut feeling about it. In particular in the 3 districts around me (Guildford, mole valley and Woking) the LD councils were still popular and the elector still angry with the previous administrations. Give it time and the reverses will happen.
Yes, will make the donation to the alzheimer's society and obviously you have had a good experience of their work for your mum. A few areas like North Norfolk and Torbay did see Tory net gains from the LDs but given the national picture you were correct and the LDs made gains overall from the Tories still
I doubt the average Daily Mail reader gets too hung up over 'People Smugglers'. If the boat people were all legitimate asylum seekers without a gang master in sight, they'd still want them torpedoed.
At this point, isn't it time to bring the entire railway system back into public ownership and have it run like an actual system, as a proper StateCo like DB or SNF?
The ideological move to "nationalise" but actually not do anything useful is classic Tory failure.
If Labour don't get a handle on this they'll lose big time.
Both SNCF and DB have their own issues. SNCF is struggling under a mahoosive debt burden, and the German government are considering further splitting up / reorganising DB; and delays are not exactly uncommon on either network.
In fact, according to the 2018 European passenger survey, passengers are much more satisfied with rail travel in the UK than they are in France or Germany: (See table c1b in the summary PDf at https://europa.eu/eurobarometer/surveys/detail/2172 )
What is surprising is that none of the anti-immigration papers are saying anything about the fact that LEGAL immigration is probably higher now than before we left the EU. All they seem to be worried about are the few, relatively, who have been, perhaps, badly advised and seek to come here by dinghy, most whom, AIUI, qualify as immigrants anyway.
In other news, our nest-box now has two blue-tit chicks and seven eggs, instead of nine eggs!
That's the look butterfly distraction approach - which the Daily Mail knows gets them readers and happy Troy voters and keeps / allows / ensures the real issue ignored / hidden.
An important discussion on Sky this morning on rising interest rates as a result of high inflation and the knock on effect this is having in the property market
For those on long term fixed rate mortgages taken out a while ago they can sit tight, but for those on variable rate and also those coming to the end of their fixed rate then the monthly increases will be eye watering and the dilemma now is whether to fix, knowing payments will not rise, or remain on variable hoping rates fall
Additionally these increases are affecting the buy to let market with many such landlords selling up and as a consequence reducing supply with again ever increasing rents long into the future
I well recall the 15% rates crisis but throughout most of my lifetime rates averaged around 5%
Indeed when I travelled into work in St George's Square, Edinburgh in the 1960's the banks displayed the interest rates in their windows and 5% was the norm
As a country we have become far too complacent about low interests and it seems as things unravel and recover to nearer the norm a lot of home owners and renters are facing a real crisis
As was mentioned yesterday those in rent have an even worse problem as they near retirement as unlike those with mortgages they will face a lifetime of high rents
All this of course plays into the politics and a Labour win in GE24, but changing governing parties does not change the issues and I really do not know the answer, other than negative equity and falling house prices no matter there is an increase in house building
What is surprising is that none of the anti-immigration papers are saying anything about the fact that LEGAL immigration is probably higher now than before we left the EU. All they seem to be worried about are the few, relatively, who have been, perhaps, badly advised and seek to come here by dinghy, most whom, AIUI, qualify as immigrants anyway.
In other news, our nest-box now has two blue-tit chicks and seven eggs, instead of nine eggs!
That's the look butterfly distraction approach - which the Daily Mail knows gets them readers and happy Troy voters and keeps / allows / ensures the real issue ignored / hidden.
From the perspective of the politics, it seems rather idiotic to me that Sunak has put so much energy and publicity behind goals that seem totally impossible to meet?
Why is he giving so much ammunition to the opposition on immigration when it seems like this target will not be met in any way? And they have 13 years of prior failure to speak to as well?
Can anyone explain this strategy?
Explanation: Putting politics and economics together it is essential to have both more and fewer migrants into the UK. Just as it is essential for housing to be both cheaper and more expensive. Just as it is essential to build both more and fewer houses. Just as it is essential to have a net zero carbon aim while encouraging oil based economic growth. Also railways need to be privatised and nationalised, and we need to build more roads while discouraging the use of cars. Interest rates need to be high (pensioners cash in the building society) and low (young house buyers).
Tories should not despair. This will all soon be Sir Keir's problem.
No. I have no idea either.
Edit: PS I forgot. We need to be both in and out of the single market.
So Adam Price forced out as Plaid leader after internal problems. Following the recent chaos in the SNP yet more good news for Unionists
Hi @hyifd. I guess we should settle our local elections bet. My charity is the alzheimer's society as they were great for my mum. Good on you for taking the bet and I have to admit I thought the odds were on your side but I had a gut feeling about it. In particular in the 3 districts around me (Guildford, mole valley and Woking) the LD councils were still popular and the elector still angry with the previous administrations. Give it time and the reverses will happen.
Yes, will make the donation to the alzheimer's society and obviously you have had a good experience of their work for your mum. A few areas like North Norfolk and Torbay did see Tory gains from the LDs but given the national picture you were correct and the LDs made gains overall from the Tories still
Cheers. It could have gone pearshaped for me. When I looked at what was available it looked like thin pickings locally and I didn't know about elsewhere and when I saw the Indies putting up a full slate in Guildford I thought the LDs might lose seats. In fact the Indies did instead. It was actually a decent revival by the Tories in Guildford. The result is a bit misleading because the Tories actually lost 6 seats that I predicted they would lose but actually made very good gains elsewhere in Guildford that I wasn't expecting.
Tories spinning Torbay very well. I even heard one MP say they won it off the LDs which is nonsense. It was good for them that they won it but the LDs actually made gains there as well. You wouldn't believe it from the news. Of course generally when a LD council gets tired or there is a national swing against them the Tories will be back in all these places. I remember Surrey Heath when it was 100% Tory and they will be back.
People still don’t understand why irregular arrivals from France aren’t taken straight to Dover, and put on the next ferry back there.
That's what I'd like to happen, and in exchange we take a proportion of those in France to a quota we agree (and only the most vulnerable) and in exchange we use our navy and border forces to help France secure theirs.
But, it requires Macron's cooperation and is probably politically difficult with Le Pen breathing down his neck.
The Royal Navy can't secure the British border (because no politician has the guts to order tow backs) so why are they going to be able to secure the French border?
Towbacks to Calais should be fine, if the French agree.
Towbacks in the Med would come under French command.
Unless the sum is being transferred directly to the Ukrainian Government, that's simple theft by the US. The UK should studiously avoid following suit. People with large sums of money should understand what will happen when the USA turns against their Government, and locate their money accordingly.
The theft in question is Russia attempting to steal an entire country in broad daylight. Russia is a criminal enterprise. These are the proceeds of crime.
What the Russian Government has done is one thing - the property of private individuals is a totally different thing. Either private property is respected or it isn't. I doubt that you would like your property to be confiscated because of something the British Government did, and nor would I.
What is surprising is that none of the anti-immigration papers are saying anything about the fact that LEGAL immigration is probably higher now than before we left the EU. All they seem to be worried about are the few, relatively, who have been, perhaps, badly advised and seek to come here by dinghy, most whom, AIUI, qualify as immigrants anyway.
In other news, our nest-box now has two blue-tit chicks and seven eggs, instead of nine eggs!
That's the look butterfly distraction approach - which the Daily Mail knows gets them readers and happy Troy voters and keeps / allows / ensures the real issue ignored / hidden.
Absolutely. If you are worried about immigration you should be worried about legal immigration rather than the few who come over on small boats. The right wing press knows this but deliberately misleads its readers
From the perspective of the politics, it seems rather idiotic to me that Sunak has put so much energy and publicity behind goals that seem totally impossible to meet?
Why is he giving so much ammunition to the opposition on immigration when it seems like this target will not be met in any way? And they have 13 years of prior failure to speak to as well?
Can anyone explain this strategy?
Explanation: Putting politics and economics together it is essential to have both more and fewer migrants into the UK. Just as it is essential for housing to be both cheaper and more expensive. Just as it is essential to build both more and fewer houses. Just as it is essential to have a net zero carbon aim while encouraging oil based economic growth. Also railways need to be privatised and nationalised, and we need to build more roads while discouraging the use of cars. Interest rates need to be high (pensioners cash in the building society) and low (young house buyers).
Tories should not despair. This will all soon be Sir Keir's problem.
No. I have no idea either.
Edit: PS I forgot. We need to be both in and out of the single market.
People still don’t understand why irregular arrivals from France aren’t taken straight to Dover, and put on the next ferry back there.
That's what I'd like to happen, and in exchange we take a proportion of those in France to a quota we agree (and only the most vulnerable) and in exchange we use our navy and border forces to help France secure theirs.
But, it requires Macron's cooperation and is probably politically difficult with Le Pen breathing down his neck.
The Royal Navy can't secure the British border (because no politician has the guts to order tow backs) so why are they going to be able to secure the French border?
Towbacks to Calais should be fine, if the French agree.
Towbacks in the Med would come under French command.
Unless the sum is being transferred directly to the Ukrainian Government, that's simple theft by the US. The UK should studiously avoid following suit. People with large sums of money should understand what will happen when the USA turns against their Government, and locate their money accordingly.
The theft in question is Russia attempting to steal an entire country in broad daylight. Russia is a criminal enterprise. These are the proceeds of crime.
What the Russian Government has done is one thing - the property of private individuals is a totally different thing. Either private property is respected or it isn't. I doubt that you would like your property to be confiscated because of something the British Government did, and nor would I.
What is private property and what is state property is more fluid in Russia. The kleptocratic regime of Putin is entangled with these oligarchs.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
People still don’t understand why irregular arrivals from France aren’t taken straight to Dover, and put on the next ferry back there.
That's what I'd like to happen, and in exchange we take a proportion of those in France to a quota we agree (and only the most vulnerable) and in exchange we use our navy and border forces to help France secure theirs.
But, it requires Macron's cooperation and is probably politically difficult with Le Pen breathing down his neck.
The Royal Navy can't secure the British border (because no politician has the guts to order tow backs) so why are they going to be able to secure the French border?
Towbacks to Calais should be fine, if the French agree.
Towbacks in the Med would come under French command.
Unless the sum is being transferred directly to the Ukrainian Government, that's simple theft by the US. The UK should studiously avoid following suit. People with large sums of money should understand what will happen when the USA turns against their Government, and locate their money accordingly.
The theft in question is Russia attempting to steal an entire country in broad daylight. Russia is a criminal enterprise. These are the proceeds of crime.
What the Russian Government has done is one thing - the property of private individuals is a totally different thing. Either private property is respected or it isn't. I doubt that you would like your property to be confiscated because of something the British Government did, and nor would I.
In Russia and China, there’s a somewhat fluid relationship between public and private businesses and individuals.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
So, I presume you are not voting Conservative at the next general election?
Casino_Royale is now just trying to get users banned to make this place even more of an echo chamber than it already is. Sad.
Nothing I posted is even potentially libellous. As Casino knows. What he is objecting to is me pointing to the dripping racism infesting what is left of the Tory Party. Because he's not racist, and he's a Tory, so stop saying Tories are racist.
I am not saying Tories as a group are racist. I am saying that the Tories are openly vying for racist voters by doing things which are explicitly racist or pander to racists.
Why you would vote for the tories if you are a racist beats me. Surely the racists must realise by now with the tories its all performance theatre.
From the perspective of the politics, it seems rather idiotic to me that Sunak has put so much energy and publicity behind goals that seem totally impossible to meet?
Why is he giving so much ammunition to the opposition on immigration when it seems like this target will not be met in any way? And they have 13 years of prior failure to speak to as well?
Can anyone explain this strategy?
Explanation: Putting politics and economics together it is essential to have both more and fewer migrants into the UK. Just as it is essential for housing to be both cheaper and more expensive. Just as it is essential to build both more and fewer houses. Just as it is essential to have a net zero carbon aim while encouraging oil based economic growth. Also railways need to be privatised and nationalised, and we need to build more roads while discouraging the use of cars. Interest rates need to be high (pensioners cash in the building society) and low (young house buyers).
Tories should not despair. This will all soon be Sir Keir's problem.
No. I have no idea either.
Edit: PS I forgot. We need to be both in and out of the single market.
Sir Humphrey Appleby: Bernard, I have served eleven governments in the past thirty years. If I had believed in all their policies, I would have been passionately committed to keeping out of the Common Market, and passionately committed to going into it. I would have been utterly convinced of the rightness of nationalising steel. And of denationalising it and renationalising it. On capital punishment, I'd have been a fervent retentionist and an ardent abolishionist. I would've been a Keynesian and a Friedmanite, a grammar school preserver and destroyer, a nationalisation freak and a privatisation maniac; but above all, I would have been a stark, staring, raving schizophrenic.
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
So, I presume you are not voting Conservative at the next general election?
I will do what I always do, vote for the least bad party/candidate, and almost certainly a candidate that will lose, as I have never voted for a winning candidate in a parliamentary election yet.
Frankly none of the parties deserve a vote, they are all unfit in various ways.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Im not a believer in putting set numbers of migrants as a limit. Immigration has immensely benefited this country over the last 50 years. We now have a more cosmopolitan outward looking population.
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
We are all in really big trouble if Trump wins again, and the 2024 campaign will likely be horrendous no matter what the outcome is.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Looking into figures, how much migration actually helps? Maybe it’s a question of “type” the Conservatives have lost the plot on. For example Tories give out visas to the family of students studying here, meanwhile the building industry is crying out for the skills many Alabanians have.
Visas for the family members of studying students the Tories are doing, something to help the building industry or economy the Tories are not doing citing “country full” “new city size of Birmingham” “you already can’t get a dentist or doctor even before more migrants are let in when labour get in power”
Could part of the problem be, looking at how foreign students can get visas for their families, post Brexit in race for Trade Deals, Truss and Boris promised visas, it’s built into deals, we now need to honour those visas even though it doesn’t contribute much to our economy but somebody else’s?
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
The lady moderator was useless, she was contrastly talking over him, and kept trying to bring the subject back to CNNs favoured talking points that are unpopular with the electorate, rather than the questions asked by the members of the public. She was acting like a cross between a generic Democrat debating him, and an interviewer trying to get soundbites for the social media clips.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Im not a believer in putting set numbers of migrants as a limit. Immigration has immensely benefited this country over the last 50 years. We now have a more cosmopolitan outward looking population.
What if 6 billion people arrived in the U.K. next week?
Everything has limits. Just because the subject makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t make it go away.
I say build a Birmingham each year to cope with the increasing population. Then you hear people whining both about restrictions on immigration *and* wanting the country not to change.
If you want a more “cosmopolitan” population then you are either in favour of more Birminghams or you are an idiot. Pick one.
An important discussion on Sky this morning on rising interest rates as a result of high inflation and the knock on effect this is having in the property market
For those on long term fixed rate mortgages taken out a while ago they can sit tight, but for those on variable rate and also those coming to the end of their fixed rate then the monthly increases will be eye watering and the dilemma now is whether to fix, knowing payments will not rise, or remain on variable hoping rates fall
Additionally these increases are affecting the buy to let market with many such landlords selling up and as a consequence reducing supply with again ever increasing rents long into the future
I well recall the 15% rates crisis but throughout most of my lifetime rates averaged around 5%
Indeed when I travelled into work in St George's Square, Edinburgh in the 1960's the banks displayed the interest rates in their windows and 5% was the norm
As a country we have become far too complacent about low interests and it seems as things unravel and recover to nearer the norm a lot of home owners and renters are facing a real crisis
As was mentioned yesterday those in rent have an even worse problem as they near retirement as unlike those with mortgages they will face a lifetime of high rents
All this of course plays into the politics and a Labour win in GE24, but changing governing parties does not change the issues and I really do not know the answer, other than negative equity and falling house prices no matter there is an increase in house building
Tax unmortgaged property/land?
5%, annually, deductible off a mortgage.
Abolish council tax/stamp duty/cgt.
Would solve a whole load of problems (and create a few)…
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Im not a believer in putting set numbers of migrants as a limit. Immigration has immensely benefited this country over the last 50 years. We now have a more cosmopolitan outward looking population.
That's a generalisation that misses that there are real effects on people, particularly at the bottom of society, from mass migration when little to no effort is made to mitigate the issues.
We could deal with high migration if we had been building enough EVERYTHING for the last 30-40 years, didn't have a UK where the south of England is the focus, had proper controls of our borders, cracked down on illegal employment, and realised we can't build a better economy by simply importing cheap labour as a substitue for investment and planning. As it is we are doing nothing of substance to mitigate the issues, nor is there any sign of other parties being willing to grapple with these problems.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
So, I presume you are not voting Conservative at the next general election?
I will do what I always do, vote for the least bad party/candidate, and almost certainly a candidate that will lose, as I have never voted for a winning candidate in a parliamentary election yet.
Frankly none of the parties deserve a vote, they are all unfit in various ways.
I have never voted for a winning candidate in a parliamentary election yet either. It’s been a long time in local elections too.
Well... they would not have voted Tory anyway (which was probably the point)
The point is that the ID they presented was valid under the new rules.
The point is that introducing confusing rules were some IDs are valid (Oyster for the over 60s) and invalid (Oysters for the under-60s) as well as a long list of things that need to be checked and are not commonly seen by voting staff (PASS cards as an example) was always going to led to this sort of thing.
There was even a header about a few weeks back...
We all know that proven examples of voter fraud have been Postal Ballots and there have been plenty of examples in the news and in the courts and none of these rules address that issue
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
We are all in really big trouble if Trump wins again, and the 2024 campaign will likely be horrendous no matter what the outcome is.
All the tittle tattle stuff round Trump gets lots of media coverage, particularly social media like PB - but are we missing the actual election battle ground? Trumps putting out adverts about the economy. What won him power in 2016 has not gone away - US Brexit states, so called blue wall, ravished for decades by globalisation, want investment, jobs.
I think we underestimate how close Trump is to brushing Biden aside, by the blue wall voters again voting for stronger economy, jobs, income upgrades and investment in their communities.
From the perspective of the politics, it seems rather idiotic to me that Sunak has put so much energy and publicity behind goals that seem totally impossible to meet?
Why is he giving so much ammunition to the opposition on immigration when it seems like this target will not be met in any way? And they have 13 years of prior failure to speak to as well?
Can anyone explain this strategy?
Explanation: Putting politics and economics together it is essential to have both more and fewer migrants into the UK. Just as it is essential for housing to be both cheaper and more expensive. Just as it is essential to build both more and fewer houses. Just as it is essential to have a net zero carbon aim while encouraging oil based economic growth. Also railways need to be privatised and nationalised, and we need to build more roads while discouraging the use of cars. Interest rates need to be high (pensioners cash in the building society) and low (young house buyers).
Tories should not despair. This will all soon be Sir Keir's problem.
No. I have no idea either.
Edit: PS I forgot. We need to be both in and out of the single market.
Sir Humphrey Appleby: Bernard, I have served eleven governments in the past thirty years. If I had believed in all their policies, I would have been passionately committed to keeping out of the Common Market, and passionately committed to going into it. I would have been utterly convinced of the rightness of nationalising steel. And of denationalising it and renationalising it. On capital punishment, I'd have been a fervent retentionist and an ardent abolishionist. I would've been a Keynesian and a Friedmanite, a grammar school preserver and destroyer, a nationalisation freak and a privatisation maniac; but above all, I would have been a stark, staring, raving schizophrenic.
Yes!
1 To govern is to choose.
2 To govern well is to choose rightly.
I think the UK could do with 5-10 years of at least some of both of these.
Until Iraq we had some of (1) from Blair. And we had some of (1) from Mrs T.
I say build a Birmingham each year to cope with the increasing population. Then you hear people whining both about restrictions on immigration *and* wanting the country not to change.
If you want a more “cosmopolitan” population then you are either in favour of more Birminghams or you are an idiot. Pick one.
Pretty much every political party at a national level is sort of pro-migration, and in favour of building more homes and so on. At a local level, or a constituency level, as a rule they are all opposed to building anything, or housing migrants, or seeing new infrastructure in their area.
Essentially everything you hear from party leaders on these issues is BS.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Im not a believer in putting set numbers of migrants as a limit. Immigration has immensely benefited this country over the last 50 years. We now have a more cosmopolitan outward looking population.
What if 6 billion people arrived in the U.K. next week?
Everything has limits. Just because the subject makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t make it go away.
I say build a Birmingham each year to cope with the increasing population. Then you hear people whining both about restrictions on immigration *and* wanting the country not to change.
If you want a more “cosmopolitan” population then you are either in favour of more Birminghams or you are an idiot. Pick one.
I don’t know that I’m favour of the current Birmingham, let alone more of them. There must be a way of accommodating an increasing population without building more Birminghams. Can we build more Milton Keyneses?
Either way, the current high rates of immigration are Conservative Party policy. If people don’t like them, vote out the Conservatives.
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
We are all in really big trouble if Trump wins again, and the 2024 campaign will likely be horrendous no matter what the outcome is.
All the tittle tattle stuff round Trump gets lots of media coverage, particularly social media like PB - but are we missing the actual election battle ground? Trumps putting out adverts about the economy. What won him power in 2016 has not gone away - US Brexit states, so called blue wall, ravished for decades by globalisation, want investment, jobs.
I think we underestimate how close Trump is to brushing Biden aside, by the blue wall voters again voting for stronger economy, jobs, income upgrades and investment in their communities.
“Are you better off today, than you were four years ago” - Ronald Reagan, 1980
Depressing write up on BBC about Trump's town hall event. Basically that he will never stop saying 2020 was rigged, will pardon 6 Jan rioters, will definitely shift policy on Ukraine (though exactly how is unclear, but ending it in 24 hours as he suggests could only occur if he stopped ongoing support), and that the audience was eating out of the palm of his hand.
If they get the chance the party will pick him again and the representatives will fall in line.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Im not a believer in putting set numbers of migrants as a limit. Immigration has immensely benefited this country over the last 50 years. We now have a more cosmopolitan outward looking population.
What if 6 billion people arrived in the U.K. next week?
Everything has limits. Just because the subject makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t make it go away.
I say build a Birmingham each year to cope with the increasing population. Then you hear people whining both about restrictions on immigration *and* wanting the country not to change.
If you want a more “cosmopolitan” population then you are either in favour of more Birminghams or you are an idiot. Pick one.
I don’t know that I’m favour of the current Birmingham, let alone more of them. There must be a way of accommodating an increasing population without building more Birminghams. Can we build more Milton Keyneses?
Either way, the current high rates of immigration are Conservative Party policy. If people don’t like them, vote out the Conservatives.
Population of MK is 250k, so there need to be two more MKs built every year, just to stand still on housing the population increase. Which means in practice three or four new MKs per year, for the next few years.
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
We are all in really big trouble if Trump wins again, and the 2024 campaign will likely be horrendous no matter what the outcome is.
There's no obligation on the part of the media to provide him with hour long free informercials, though.
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
We are all in really big trouble if Trump wins again, and the 2024 campaign will likely be horrendous no matter what the outcome is.
All the tittle tattle stuff round Trump gets lots of media coverage, particularly social media like PB - but are we missing the actual election battle ground? Trumps putting out adverts about the economy. What won him power in 2016 has not gone away - US Brexit states, so called blue wall, ravished for decades by globalisation, want investment, jobs.
I think we underestimate how close Trump is to brushing Biden aside, by the blue wall voters again voting for stronger economy, jobs, income upgrades and investment in their communities.
Maybe a Republican candidate could get elected talking about a stronger economy, jobs, income upgrades and investment in their communities, but I note that Trump doesn’t talk about those things. He talks about how the 2020 election was supposedly a fix and about how there’s a supposed witch-hunt against him. Trump’s self-obsession with Trump and the consequences of his own past behaviour aren’t good vote-winning strategies, I suggest.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Im not a believer in putting set numbers of migrants as a limit. Immigration has immensely benefited this country over the last 50 years. We now have a more cosmopolitan outward looking population.
What if 6 billion people arrived in the U.K. next week?
Everything has limits. Just because the subject makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t make it go away.
I say build a Birmingham each year to cope with the increasing population. Then you hear people whining both about restrictions on immigration *and* wanting the country not to change.
If you want a more “cosmopolitan” population then you are either in favour of more Birminghams or you are an idiot. Pick one.
Oooh.
Not really relevant, but here’s a pointless bit of internet, anyway;
Q. IS IT TRUE THAT THE POPULATION OF THE WORLD COULD FIT ON THE ISLE OF WIGHT?
A: No, but it was probably true up until around 1981, according to my back-of-an-envelope calculations.
Back in 1980, there were about 4.454 billion people on earth (source: Infoplease). The Isle of Wight is about 384 square kilometres, which is 384 000 000 square metres. For simplicity, I've ignored the fact that the Isle of Wight shrunk when most of Blackgang Chine fell into the sea in the 1990s.
So, the Isle of Wight could have hosted a party for the entire planet if you squeezed 11.5 people into each metre square.
We tried this out at a family gathering one Christmas and managed to fit 12 people into a metre square. It was a cosy experience, particularly after a turkey dinner. We couldn't have included a 13th person. Group of people squashed into a small space Our Christmas day experiment managed to fit 12 people in a metre square Nowadays, the earth's population is much greater. There are eight billion people on earth (source: Wikipedia, 2022) which would require almost 21 people to fit into each square metre of the Isle of Wight. There's just no way that you could do it without standing on each other's shoulders.
My best guess is that it ceased to be possible to fit the entire population of the world on the Isle of Wight in around 1981.
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
We are all in really big trouble if Trump wins again, and the 2024 campaign will likely be horrendous no matter what the outcome is.
All the tittle tattle stuff round Trump gets lots of media coverage, particularly social media like PB - but are we missing the actual election battle ground? Trumps putting out adverts about the economy. What won him power in 2016 has not gone away - US Brexit states, so called blue wall, ravished for decades by globalisation, want investment, jobs.
I think we underestimate how close Trump is to brushing Biden aside, by the blue wall voters again voting for stronger economy, jobs, income upgrades and investment in their communities.
It is indeed a trap for Starmer, but 'elephant' is hyperbole.
It would be risky but Starmer could usefully point to the utter disaster of Brexit and the loss of key employees in the entertainment industry (where it is disastrous), the NHS (not much better), and food supplies (ditto).
We NEED workers!!!! And you're not going to get a 55 yr old white collar worker out of early retirement to go and pull up potatoes in a muddy Lincolnshire field on a freezing February morning.
But we have already established that migration is at a record high. That is people who have applied legally for leave to live and work here. Probably 500k in the last 12 months. The idea that we need boat people to meet our labour needs rather than the ones we choose for ourselves is a nonsense.
Similarly, the idea that safe legal routes will somehow put the unsafe illegal routes out of business is really a fantasy and simply deflection from the problem.
I am no fan of the Rwanda scheme. It is immoral, expensive and ultimately unworkable. But the arguments that there is an obvious and more humane alternative are even more spurious than the arguments for the scheme itself and that's saying something.
So neither safe legal routes and Rwanda won't put unsafe illegal routes out of business while the number of asylum cases grows and grows, and no alternative is being offered. Quick, order more accommodation barges!
I have said what my solution is before. We need to withdraw from the UN Convention on Asylum and refuse to accept refugees other than the ones we choose to accept (Ukrainians, Hong Kong Chinese etc). I acknowledge that we cannot do this alone but I think that it is inevitable that this is where the west will end up as the population of Africa explodes over the next couple of decades.
The government's scheme is trying to do this without doing it. The message from the Immigration minister yesterday is that the boats are not a method by which you can get leave to remain in the UK because you will be deported to a safe third country. But its not true. The total capacity of the Rwanda scheme is barely a day's supply of refugees. And we don't have anywhere else at the moment.
The pull factor is the right to claim asylum. If that right is lost then they may stop coming, certainly for economic advantage. Anything else is pretending.
FWIW I agree that in the long run western countries will do this. How this would be achieved and implemented is somewhere between unthinkable and apocalyptic in a liberal society.
The other big unthinkable step is this: The refugee crisis is caused in the end by terrible governance and wicked wars. One day the western world may simply say that millions of people seeking refuge on account of this justifies imperial style intervention.
The great Matthew Parris (after leaving parliament!) has been onto this issue of unsustainability for quite a few years now. Other liberal voices will join him.
Was it not (our) terrible governments that initiated the imperial style interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan which resulted in much of the migrant crises? The auguries are not good.
Please remember Russia's role in generating refugees. The policy of bombing civilians in Syria, partially carried out by its client, Assad, was a deliberate choice to generate refugee outflows. It coincided with a vicious anti-migrant propaganda push on social media, designed to sow fear of migrants in the countries it was hoping the refugees would flee to, notably Germany and the UK.
Similarly, the less successful attempt to harden western attitudes to refugees coming in through Eastern Europe, carried out by its client in Minsk, in the run-up to the further invasion of Ukraine. They were flying migrants and refugees into Belarus and pointing them at the border, advising them of the position of border patrols, and equipping them to break in.
For all the imperialist meddling that the west has done, we shouldn't carry the blame for all of it, when people like Putin have elevated crisis into policy.
I don’t think anyone is excusing Russia’s behaviour or offering it as a model, certainly not me. However since I’m in and off the West, when some sort of neo imperial interventionism is bruited it’s our actions that immediately spring to mind. They’re the ones for which I feel at least some vestigial responsibility.
Who also run LNER which is always full and rather profitable (don't know exactly how much but it's a stick I know they beat Aventi West Coast with all the time).
Hopefully Avanti will be next. Expensive, stinky, crowded and prone to delay and cancellation, on top of running a worse timetable than Virgin did.
A few years back I could reliably board the 7am service at Piccadilly then step off at Euston at 9. No longer.
Indeed. That’s yet another stupid ‘franchise’ that has now been rescued by the public sector: the sixth network by my count. We must be at the point now where most TOCs are nationalised.
I’m reminded of Christian Wolmar’s classic question: “What is franchising for?”
A complete international embarrassment. Nationalise the lot and reinvest now.
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
The lady moderator was useless, she was contrastly talking over him, and kept trying to bring the subject back to CNNs favoured talking points that are unpopular with the electorate, rather than the questions asked by the members of the public. She was acting like a cross between a generic Democrat debating him, and an interviewer trying to get soundbites for the social media clips.
They appear to have learned little since 2016.
And Trump had learned nothing from ‘stolen election’ 2020, so a fine match.
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
The lady moderator was useless, she was contrastly talking over him, and kept trying to bring the subject back to CNNs favoured talking points that are unpopular with the electorate, rather than the questions asked by the members of the public. She was acting like a cross between a generic Democrat debating him, and an interviewer trying to get soundbites for the social media clips.
They appear to have learned little since 2016.
The "members of the public" were Republican voters. The choice of moderator was irrelevant; they shouldn't have held the event.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Im not a believer in putting set numbers of migrants as a limit. Immigration has immensely benefited this country over the last 50 years. We now have a more cosmopolitan outward looking population.
What if 6 billion people arrived in the U.K. next week?
Everything has limits. Just because the subject makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t make it go away.
I say build a Birmingham each year to cope with the increasing population. Then you hear people whining both about restrictions on immigration *and* wanting the country not to change.
If you want a more “cosmopolitan” population then you are either in favour of more Birminghams or you are an idiot. Pick one.
I don’t know that I’m favour of the current Birmingham, let alone more of them. There must be a way of accommodating an increasing population without building more Birminghams. Can we build more Milton Keyneses?
Either way, the current high rates of immigration are Conservative Party policy. If people don’t like them, vote out the Conservatives.
Population of MK is 250k, so there need to be two more MKs built every year, just to stand still on housing the population increase. Which means in practice three or four new MKs per year, for the next few years.
A tweet from earlier today (from a source I would trust to have accurate figures) reckons 700,000 immigrants arrived last year.
So it's 3 Milton Keynes a year and 2 of them probably need to be in the South East.
Plaid have appointed Llyr Grufydd as their interim leader - He is a safe pair of hands but hardly an inspirational leader. Presumably this is just to steady the ship until a full election can be held in the summer. I stand by my earlier prediction that Delyth Jewell will be the new Leader.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Im not a believer in putting set numbers of migrants as a limit. Immigration has immensely benefited this country over the last 50 years. We now have a more cosmopolitan outward looking population.
What if 6 billion people arrived in the U.K. next week?
Everything has limits. Just because the subject makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t make it go away.
I say build a Birmingham each year to cope with the increasing population. Then you hear people whining both about restrictions on immigration *and* wanting the country not to change.
If you want a more “cosmopolitan” population then you are either in favour of more Birminghams or you are an idiot. Pick one.
I don’t know that I’m favour of the current Birmingham, let alone more of them. There must be a way of accommodating an increasing population without building more Birminghams. Can we build more Milton Keyneses?
Either way, the current high rates of immigration are Conservative Party policy. If people don’t like them, vote out the Conservatives.
But surely if this is one of the best countries in the world to live its in everyones benefit to have as many people here as possible. And as for building new towns there is still plenty of space in this country and it will create employment. Now obviously some people will object because they dont like brown people but we can safely dismiss such people.
Keir Starmer has proposed building "new towns". I think this is an excellent idea.
Everyone talks about new towns. They've been talking about new towns for decades.
Everyone is in favour or more new homes, but not near here. We have an area of outstanding natural beauty, or a rare newt, or not enough schools, or insufficient transport links, or the new homes would not fit the character of the area.
You could probably count the MPs who would genuinely support the level of development needed to occur in their area, in order to make up the decades of national decline, using your thumbs alone.
It is indeed a trap for Starmer, but 'elephant' is hyperbole.
It would be risky but Starmer could usefully point to the utter disaster of Brexit and the loss of key employees in the entertainment industry (where it is disastrous), the NHS (not much better), and food supplies (ditto).
We NEED workers!!!! And you're not going to get a 55 yr old white collar worker out of early retirement to go and pull up potatoes in a muddy Lincolnshire field on a freezing February morning.
But we have already established that migration is at a record high. That is people who have applied legally for leave to live and work here. Probably 500k in the last 12 months. The idea that we need boat people to meet our labour needs rather than the ones we choose for ourselves is a nonsense.
Similarly, the idea that safe legal routes will somehow put the unsafe illegal routes out of business is really a fantasy and simply deflection from the problem.
I am no fan of the Rwanda scheme. It is immoral, expensive and ultimately unworkable. But the arguments that there is an obvious and more humane alternative are even more spurious than the arguments for the scheme itself and that's saying something.
So neither safe legal routes and Rwanda won't put unsafe illegal routes out of business while the number of asylum cases grows and grows, and no alternative is being offered. Quick, order more accommodation barges!
I have said what my solution is before. We need to withdraw from the UN Convention on Asylum and refuse to accept refugees other than the ones we choose to accept (Ukrainians, Hong Kong Chinese etc). I acknowledge that we cannot do this alone but I think that it is inevitable that this is where the west will end up as the population of Africa explodes over the next couple of decades.
The government's scheme is trying to do this without doing it. The message from the Immigration minister yesterday is that the boats are not a method by which you can get leave to remain in the UK because you will be deported to a safe third country. But its not true. The total capacity of the Rwanda scheme is barely a day's supply of refugees. And we don't have anywhere else at the moment.
The pull factor is the right to claim asylum. If that right is lost then they may stop coming, certainly for economic advantage. Anything else is pretending.
FWIW I agree that in the long run western countries will do this. How this would be achieved and implemented is somewhere between unthinkable and apocalyptic in a liberal society.
The other big unthinkable step is this: The refugee crisis is caused in the end by terrible governance and wicked wars. One day the western world may simply say that millions of people seeking refuge on account of this justifies imperial style intervention.
The great Matthew Parris (after leaving parliament!) has been onto this issue of unsustainability for quite a few years now. Other liberal voices will join him.
Was it not (our) terrible governments that initiated the imperial style interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan which resulted in much of the migrant crises? The auguries are not good.
Please remember Russia's role in generating refugees. The policy of bombing civilians in Syria, partially carried out by its client, Assad, was a deliberate choice to generate refugee outflows. It coincided with a vicious anti-migrant propaganda push on social media, designed to sow fear of migrants in the countries it was hoping the refugees would flee to, notably Germany and the UK.
Similarly, the less successful attempt to harden western attitudes to refugees coming in through Eastern Europe, carried out by its client in Minsk, in the run-up to the further invasion of Ukraine. They were flying migrants and refugees into Belarus and pointing them at the border, advising them of the position of border patrols, and equipping them to break in.
For all the imperialist meddling that the west has done, we shouldn't carry the blame for all of it, when people like Putin have elevated crisis into policy.
I don’t think anyone is excusing Russia’s behaviour or offering it as a model, certainly not me. However since I’m in and off the West, when some sort of neo imperial interventionism is bruited it’s our actions that immediately spring to mind. They’re the ones for which I feel at least some vestigial responsibility.
Oh it's more than vestigial responsibility. If you vote to re-elect imperialist warmongers then you share in the culpability. If you vote for a party that you can reasonably predict will engage in a war of aggression, you are culpable when they do it.
I just thought the Russia point was a useful addition to what you said because it's a vital part of the picture. I wasn't disagreeing with anything you said.
Depressing write up on BBC about Trump's town hall event. Basically that he will never stop saying 2020 was rigged, will pardon 6 Jan rioters, will definitely shift policy on Ukraine (though exactly how is unclear, but ending it in 24 hours as he suggests could only occur if he stopped ongoing support), and that the audience was eating out of the palm of his hand.
If they get the chance the party will pick him again and the representatives will fall in line.
Yes, not a good read. It's hard to see him winning the presidency back, with things as they are now, but it'd be better if he isn't on the ballot as the GOP candidate. If he gets the Nom he has to have a non-trivial chance just because of 'events', eg a Biden incident, a bank crash, something in Russia/Ukraine etc.
An important discussion on Sky this morning on rising interest rates as a result of high inflation and the knock on effect this is having in the property market
For those on long term fixed rate mortgages taken out a while ago they can sit tight, but for those on variable rate and also those coming to the end of their fixed rate then the monthly increases will be eye watering and the dilemma now is whether to fix, knowing payments will not rise, or remain on variable hoping rates fall
Additionally these increases are affecting the buy to let market with many such landlords selling up and as a consequence reducing supply with again ever increasing rents long into the future
I well recall the 15% rates crisis but throughout most of my lifetime rates averaged around 5%
Indeed when I travelled into work in St George's Square, Edinburgh in the 1960's the banks displayed the interest rates in their windows and 5% was the norm
As a country we have become far too complacent about low interests and it seems as things unravel and recover to nearer the norm a lot of home owners and renters are facing a real crisis
As was mentioned yesterday those in rent have an even worse problem as they near retirement as unlike those with mortgages they will face a lifetime of high rents
All this of course plays into the politics and a Labour win in GE24, but changing governing parties does not change the issues and I really do not know the answer, other than negative equity and falling house prices no matter there is an increase in house building
Tax unmortgaged property/land?
5%, annually, deductible off a mortgage.
Abolish council tax/stamp duty/cgt.
Would solve a whole load of problems (and create a few)…
Nope - just tax property at 1-2% of market value and bin council tax / stamp duty.
Depressing write up on BBC about Trump's town hall event. Basically that he will never stop saying 2020 was rigged, will pardon 6 Jan rioters, will definitely shift policy on Ukraine (though exactly how is unclear, but ending it in 24 hours as he suggests could only occur if he stopped ongoing support), and that the audience was eating out of the palm of his hand.
If they get the chance the party will pick him again and the representatives will fall in line.
Yes, not a good read. It's hard to see him winning the presidency back, with things as they are now, but it'd be better if he isn't on the ballot as the GOP candidate. If he gets the Nom he has to have a non-trivial chance just because of 'events', eg a Biden incident, a bank crash, something in Russia/Ukraine etc.
The nomination is his to lose. Could he become president then? Of course, especially if the economic backdrop worsens, as seems likely.
It's appalling but I'm probably in a minority. Especially my view that with chronic labour shortages across many sectors the answer to get Britain's economy booming is, er, migration.
We have very high net migration right now. Half a million more people, net, for the last year. That means just to meet the needs of migrants we need to build an entire Birmingham sized city, and all associated infrastructure, every couple of years. We are not coming remotely close to that.
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Im not a believer in putting set numbers of migrants as a limit. Immigration has immensely benefited this country over the last 50 years. We now have a more cosmopolitan outward looking population.
What if 6 billion people arrived in the U.K. next week?
Everything has limits. Just because the subject makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t make it go away.
I say build a Birmingham each year to cope with the increasing population. Then you hear people whining both about restrictions on immigration *and* wanting the country not to change.
If you want a more “cosmopolitan” population then you are either in favour of more Birminghams or you are an idiot. Pick one.
I don’t know that I’m favour of the current Birmingham, let alone more of them. There must be a way of accommodating an increasing population without building more Birminghams. Can we build more Milton Keyneses?
Either way, the current high rates of immigration are Conservative Party policy. If people don’t like them, vote out the Conservatives.
Population of MK is 250k, so there need to be two more MKs built every year, just to stand still on housing the population increase. Which means in practice three or four new MKs per year, for the next few years.
A tweet from earlier today (from a source I would trust to have accurate figures) reckons 700,000 immigrants arrived last year.
So it's 3 Milton Keynes a year and 2 of them probably need to be in the South East.
Yes, although 250k are Ukranians, of whom more than 80% are living with families on what’s presumably a temporary basis. There were a couple of hundred thousand from HK as well, which was a one-off but they still need housing. There were also a couple of hundred thousand who left the country last year, so net immigration is closer to 500k.
An important discussion on Sky this morning on rising interest rates as a result of high inflation and the knock on effect this is having in the property market
For those on long term fixed rate mortgages taken out a while ago they can sit tight, but for those on variable rate and also those coming to the end of their fixed rate then the monthly increases will be eye watering and the dilemma now is whether to fix, knowing payments will not rise, or remain on variable hoping rates fall
Additionally these increases are affecting the buy to let market with many such landlords selling up and as a consequence reducing supply with again ever increasing rents long into the future
I well recall the 15% rates crisis but throughout most of my lifetime rates averaged around 5%
Indeed when I travelled into work in St George's Square, Edinburgh in the 1960's the banks displayed the interest rates in their windows and 5% was the norm
As a country we have become far too complacent about low interests and it seems as things unravel and recover to nearer the norm a lot of home owners and renters are facing a real crisis
As was mentioned yesterday those in rent have an even worse problem as they near retirement as unlike those with mortgages they will face a lifetime of high rents
All this of course plays into the politics and a Labour win in GE24, but changing governing parties does not change the issues and I really do not know the answer, other than negative equity and falling house prices no matter there is an increase in house building
Tax unmortgaged property/land?
5%, annually, deductible off a mortgage.
Abolish council tax/stamp duty/cgt.
Would solve a whole load of problems (and create a few)…
Nope - just tax property at 1-2% of market value and bin council tax / stamp duty.
2% would induce the mother of all property crashes.
Someone upthread just used the old trope ' .......City the size of Birmingham'
At your next UKIP meeting why not suggest updating it to 'Four towns the size of Harlepool?
Oh FFS Roger it's not complicated. Net 500k people arrive here each year, means we need a new Birmingham (~1 million people) worth of everything every couple of years. That's the scale of the issue. It's to make it more concrete than the somewhat abstract 0.7% more.
Nobody is saying we literally clone Birmingham every two years. It simply happens to have a conveniently sized population for such discussions.
Keir Starmer has proposed building "new towns". I think this is an excellent idea.
Everyone talks about new towns. They've been talking about new towns for decades.
Everyone is in favour or more new homes, but not near here. We have an area of outstanding natural beauty, or a rare newt, or not enough schools, or insufficient transport links, or the new homes would not fit the character of the area.
You could probably count the MPs who would genuinely support the level of development needed to occur in their area, in order to make up the decades of national decline, using your thumbs alone.
Imagine if the NIMBYs had been in charge in the nineteenth century. I have a novel proposal - anyone who wants zero immigration and no new homes should stop spending money now. Do not leave your house. Don't go out for a meal. Don't go shopping. Don't go for a drive on the public highway. If you all do this then we won't need to fill all these job vacancies.
Franchising must be the biggest waste of time in British railway history.
We need a proper integrated, funded transport system.
Privatisation has produced higher prices, increased subsidies and unreliable and late trains.
Never forget John Major saying privatisation would stop prices increasing at the rate of inflation and would reduce subsidies. Ha!
Yes, it’s been 25 wasted years. An epic failure and an international laughing stock. Is it five or six networks now that have been renationalised? Of those that remain how many are (checks notes) nationalised to governments of foreign countries?
Franchising must be the biggest waste of time in British railway history.
We need a proper integrated, funded transport system.
Privatisation has produced higher prices, increased subsidies and unreliable and late trains.
Never forget John Major saying privatisation would stop prices increasing at the rate of inflation and would reduce subsidies. Ha!
Yes, it’s been 25 wasted years. An epic failure and an international laughing stock. Is it five or six networks now that have been renationalised? Of those that remain how many are (checks notes) nationalised to governments of foreign countries?
And look what's happened to the UK train building industry in the meantime. Privatisation broke the order pipeline and it's never recovered. And no, assembling Japanese trains in the NE isn't the same.
Depressing write up on BBC about Trump's town hall event. Basically that he will never stop saying 2020 was rigged, will pardon 6 Jan rioters, will definitely shift policy on Ukraine (though exactly how is unclear, but ending it in 24 hours as he suggests could only occur if he stopped ongoing support), and that the audience was eating out of the palm of his hand.
If they get the chance the party will pick him again and the representatives will fall in line.
Yes, not a good read. It's hard to see him winning the presidency back, with things as they are now, but it'd be better if he isn't on the ballot as the GOP candidate. If he gets the Nom he has to have a non-trivial chance just because of 'events', eg a Biden incident, a bank crash, something in Russia/Ukraine etc.
The nomination is his to lose. Could he become president then? Of course, especially if the economic backdrop worsens, as seems likely.
Very scary on so many levels. Good for all the worst people (eg the MAGA goons and Putin) and bad for everyone else. If it were to happen my Big Short would turn into the worst single betting loss I've ever had and I can honestly hand-on-heart say I don't even think about that aspect. That's how bleak a prospect it is.
People still don’t understand why irregular arrivals from France aren’t taken straight to Dover, and put on the next ferry back there.
That's what I'd like to happen, and in exchange we take a proportion of those in France to a quota we agree (and only the most vulnerable) and in exchange we use our navy and border forces to help France secure theirs.
But, it requires Macron's cooperation and is probably politically difficult with Le Pen breathing down his neck.
The Royal Navy can't secure the British border (because no politician has the guts to order tow backs) so why are they going to be able to secure the French border?
Towbacks to Calais should be fine, if the French agree.
Towbacks in the Med would come under French command.
Unless the sum is being transferred directly to the Ukrainian Government, that's simple theft by the US. The UK should studiously avoid following suit. People with large sums of money should understand what will happen when the USA turns against their Government, and locate their money accordingly.
The theft in question is Russia attempting to steal an entire country in broad daylight. Russia is a criminal enterprise. These are the proceeds of crime.
What the Russian Government has done is one thing - the property of private individuals is a totally different thing. Either private property is respected or it isn't. I doubt that you would like your property to be confiscated because of something the British Government did, and nor would I.
In Russia and China, there’s a somewhat fluid relationship between public and private businesses and individuals.
All the more reason for wealthy individuals to get their money out of Russia and put it in London. They certainly won't be putting it in America after this.
The London Underground is and remains publicly owned and in general performs well. I am so glad the Tories did not privatise that.
It’s the most popular network in the country and runs pretty well as you say. Crossrail too is nationalised and is excellent.
Crossrail (Elizabeth line) is most certainly not nationalised.
It isn't "nationalised" but runs far more like London Overground than any of the franchises do.
Personally I cannot see the advantage of that but that's a better solution than franchising.
Well it's a philosophical debate. When is privatisation simply outsourcing?
Concession arrangements work better for metro services than for long distance operators. Ideally, you want the operator to have scope to adjust the business as they see fit, but concessions are a lot simpler to manage.
Someone upthread just used the old trope ' .......City the size of Birmingham'
At your next UKIP meeting why not suggest updating it to 'Four towns the size of Harlepool?
Oh FFS Roger it's not complicated. Net 500k people arrive here each year, means we need a new Birmingham (~1 million people) worth of everything every couple of years. That's the scale of the issue. It's to make it more concrete than the somewhat abstract 0.7% more.
Nobody is saying we literally clone Birmingham every two years. It simply happens to have a conveniently sized population for such discussions.
Instead of painting silly pictures to excite xenophobes why not suggest a maximum of 2 children per family? That should reduce the numbers and would save on the unprodctive school years. We could then say we've cut it to a town the size of Florence
Someone upthread just used the old trope ' .......City the size of Birmingham'
At your next UKIP meeting why not suggest updating it to 'Four towns the size of Harlepool?
Oh FFS Roger it's not complicated. Net 500k people arrive here each year, means we need a new Birmingham (~1 million people) worth of everything every couple of years. That's the scale of the issue. It's to make it more concrete than the somewhat abstract 0.7% more.
Nobody is saying we literally clone Birmingham every two years. It simply happens to have a conveniently sized population for such discussions.
Instead of painting silly pictures to excite xenophobes why not suggest a maximum of 2 children per family? That should reduce the numbers and would save on the unprodctive school years. We could then say we've cut it to a town the size of Florence
Someone upthread just used the old trope ' .......City the size of Birmingham'
At your next UKIP meeting why not suggest updating it to 'Four towns the size of Harlepool?
Oh FFS Roger it's not complicated. Net 500k people arrive here each year, means we need a new Birmingham (~1 million people) worth of everything every couple of years. That's the scale of the issue. It's to make it more concrete than the somewhat abstract 0.7% more.
Nobody is saying we literally clone Birmingham every two years. It simply happens to have a conveniently sized population for such discussions.
Instead of painting silly pictures to excite xenophobes why not suggest a maximum of 2 children per family? That should reduce the numbers and would save on the unprodctive school years. We could then say we've cut it to a town the size of Florence
The London Underground is and remains publicly owned and in general performs well. I am so glad the Tories did not privatise that.
It’s the most popular network in the country and runs pretty well as you say. Crossrail too is nationalised and is excellent.
Crossrail (Elizabeth line) is most certainly not nationalised.
It’s a contractor for TfL. Only “not nationalised” if you consider hospitals privatised because they use private contractors.
Plenty on the left object to that.
I don't think franchises are/were that different to be honest. Ultimately, the railways are owned by the government.
Personally I feel we've tried privatisation and it hasn't worked.
The Government accepts that without subsidies the railways would/do go bust, so what exactly is the point?
Is anyone honestly going to tell me that if all of the "franchises" were run by the government, the service would be any better or worse?
The problem is that we've gutted the expertise and knowledge of the system, which came from over a hundred years of experience. All gone. We no longer own any of the trains, they're all owned and leased by third parties who make a killing.
Nationalisation is not a silver bullet. But at least we could cut out the pointless third party companies and try and build an integrated system that isn't so fragmented.
People still don’t understand why irregular arrivals from France aren’t taken straight to Dover, and put on the next ferry back there.
That's what I'd like to happen, and in exchange we take a proportion of those in France to a quota we agree (and only the most vulnerable) and in exchange we use our navy and border forces to help France secure theirs.
But, it requires Macron's cooperation and is probably politically difficult with Le Pen breathing down his neck.
The Royal Navy can't secure the British border (because no politician has the guts to order tow backs) so why are they going to be able to secure the French border?
Towbacks to Calais should be fine, if the French agree.
Towbacks in the Med would come under French command.
Unless the sum is being transferred directly to the Ukrainian Government, that's simple theft by the US. The UK should studiously avoid following suit. People with large sums of money should understand what will happen when the USA turns against their Government, and locate their money accordingly.
The theft in question is Russia attempting to steal an entire country in broad daylight. Russia is a criminal enterprise. These are the proceeds of crime.
What the Russian Government has done is one thing - the property of private individuals is a totally different thing. Either private property is respected or it isn't. I doubt that you would like your property to be confiscated because of something the British Government did, and nor would I.
In Russia and China, there’s a somewhat fluid relationship between public and private businesses and individuals.
All the more reason for wealthy individuals to get their money out of Russia and put it in London. They certainly won't be putting it in America after this.
They're not just taking any old person's money, you know. These are targeted sanctions. If this puts Putin's cronies off hiding their loot in America, boo hoo, so what.
Depressing write up on BBC about Trump's town hall event. Basically that he will never stop saying 2020 was rigged, will pardon 6 Jan rioters, will definitely shift policy on Ukraine (though exactly how is unclear, but ending it in 24 hours as he suggests could only occur if he stopped ongoing support), and that the audience was eating out of the palm of his hand.
If they get the chance the party will pick him again and the representatives will fall in line.
Yes, not a good read. It's hard to see him winning the presidency back, with things as they are now, but it'd be better if he isn't on the ballot as the GOP candidate. If he gets the Nom he has to have a non-trivial chance just because of 'events', eg a Biden incident, a bank crash, something in Russia/Ukraine etc.
The nomination is his to lose. Could he become president then? Of course, especially if the economic backdrop worsens, as seems likely.
Very scary on so many levels. Good for all the worst people (eg the MAGA goons and Putin) and bad for everyone else. If it were to happen my Big Short would turn into the worst single betting loss I've ever had and I can honestly hand-on-heart say I don't even think about that aspect. That's how bleak a prospect it is.
I'd give Trump about a 40% chance of winning, if he runs against Biden. That is far too close for comfort.
Franchising must be the biggest waste of time in British railway history.
We need a proper integrated, funded transport system.
Privatisation has produced higher prices, increased subsidies and unreliable and late trains.
Never forget John Major saying privatisation would stop prices increasing at the rate of inflation and would reduce subsidies. Ha!
Privatisation has produced a rail system a million times better than it was as British Rail. It is now massively safer and serves far more people (at least it did prior to covid. I would have to look at the post covid numbers). It has also, on a small scale so far, started to reverse the idiotic closures under Beeching (which was of course when it was in public ownership).
There are many things still wrong with the rail network but they are dwarfed by the comprehensive failures of the nationalised system we used to have.
Someone upthread just used the old trope ' .......City the size of Birmingham'
At your next UKIP meeting why not suggest updating it to 'Four towns the size of Harlepool?
Oh FFS Roger it's not complicated. Net 500k people arrive here each year, means we need a new Birmingham (~1 million people) worth of everything every couple of years. That's the scale of the issue. It's to make it more concrete than the somewhat abstract 0.7% more.
Nobody is saying we literally clone Birmingham every two years. It simply happens to have a conveniently sized population for such discussions.
Instead of painting silly pictures to excite xenophobes why not suggest a maximum of 2 children per family? That should reduce the numbers and would save on the unprodctive school years. We could then say we've cut it to a town the size of Florence
That would be very racist, given the effect it would have on mostly ethnic minority communities.
Comments
Plus, with the proper latifundium vibe, we can remake Gone With The Wind
If anyone wants to see the ugly face of xenophobia watch Robert Jenrick's interviews yesterday
Labour is on course for a majority at the general election
Full article here: https://archive.md/4ucb8
In fact, according to the 2018 European passenger survey, passengers are much more satisfied with rail travel in the UK than they are in France or Germany:
(See table c1b in the summary PDf at https://europa.eu/eurobarometer/surveys/detail/2172 )
An important discussion on Sky this morning on rising interest rates as a result of high inflation and the knock on effect this is having in the property market
For those on long term fixed rate mortgages taken out a while ago they can sit tight, but for those on variable rate and also those coming to the end of their fixed rate then the monthly increases will be eye watering and the dilemma now is whether to fix, knowing payments will not rise, or remain on variable hoping rates fall
Additionally these increases are affecting the buy to let market with many such landlords selling up and as a consequence reducing supply with again ever increasing rents long into the future
I well recall the 15% rates crisis but throughout most of my lifetime rates averaged around 5%
Indeed when I travelled into work in St George's Square, Edinburgh in the 1960's the banks displayed the interest rates in their windows and 5% was the norm
As a country we have become far too complacent about low interests and it seems as things unravel and recover to nearer the norm a lot of home owners and renters are facing a real crisis
As was mentioned yesterday those in rent have an even worse problem as they near retirement as unlike those with mortgages they will face a lifetime of high rents
All this of course plays into the politics and a Labour win in GE24, but changing governing parties does not change the issues and I really do not know the answer, other than negative equity and falling house prices no matter there is an increase in house building
Tories should not despair. This will all soon be Sir Keir's problem.
No. I have no idea either.
Edit: PS I forgot. We need to be both in and out of the single market.
Tories spinning Torbay very well. I even heard one MP say they won it off the LDs which is nonsense. It was good for them that they won it but the LDs actually made gains there as well. You wouldn't believe it from the news. Of course generally when a LD council gets tired or there is a national swing against them the Tories will be back in all these places. I remember Surrey Heath when it was 100% Tory and they will be back.
Long live the meadows!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYN0myk6tu4
Is there any number of migrants that you would call too many?
Sir Humphrey Appleby:
Bernard, I have served eleven governments in the past thirty years. If I had believed in all their policies, I would have been passionately committed to keeping out of the Common Market, and passionately committed to going into it. I would have been utterly convinced of the rightness of nationalising steel. And of denationalising it and renationalising it. On capital punishment, I'd have been a fervent retentionist and an ardent abolishionist. I would've been a Keynesian and a Friedmanite, a grammar school preserver and destroyer, a nationalisation freak and a privatisation maniac; but above all, I would have been a stark, staring, raving schizophrenic.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/cnn-failed-america-with-its-trainwreck-of-a-trump-town-hall
...Halfway through the town hall, CNN staffers were acknowledging the event was a disaster for the truth.
“This is so bad,” one of CNN’s on-air personalities told The Daily Beast before the first commercial break. "I was cautiously optimistic despite the criticism... it is awful. It’s a Trump infomercial. We’re going to get crushed.”
“One of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” another CNN staffer told The Daily Beast.
And yet another on-air commentator for CNN was clear this wasn’t a good night for the cable news channel. “I’m floored by this whole evening,” this person said..
It was utterly predictable, and CNN are idiots.
Frankly none of the parties deserve a vote, they are all unfit in various ways.
Visas for the family members of studying students the Tories are doing, something to help the building industry or economy the Tories are not doing citing “country full” “new city size of Birmingham” “you already can’t get a dentist or doctor even before more migrants are let in when labour get in power”
Could part of the problem be, looking at how foreign students can get visas for their families, post Brexit in race for Trade Deals, Truss and Boris promised visas, it’s built into deals, we now need to honour those visas even though it doesn’t contribute much to our economy but somebody else’s?
They appear to have learned little since 2016.
Everything has limits. Just because the subject makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t make it go away.
I say build a Birmingham each year to cope with the increasing population. Then you hear people whining both about restrictions on immigration *and* wanting the country not to change.
If you want a more “cosmopolitan” population then you are either in favour of more Birminghams or you are an idiot. Pick one.
5%, annually, deductible off a mortgage.
Abolish council tax/stamp duty/cgt.
Would solve a whole load of problems (and create a few)…
We could deal with high migration if we had been building enough EVERYTHING for the last 30-40 years, didn't have a UK where the south of England is the focus, had proper controls of our borders, cracked down on illegal employment, and realised we can't build a better economy by simply importing cheap labour as a substitue for investment and planning. As it is we are doing nothing of substance to mitigate the issues, nor is there any sign of other parties being willing to grapple with these problems.
There was even a header about a few weeks back...
We all know that proven examples of voter fraud have been Postal Ballots and there have been plenty of examples in the news and in the courts and none of these rules address that issue
I think we underestimate how close Trump is to brushing Biden aside, by the blue wall voters again voting for stronger economy, jobs, income upgrades and investment in their communities.
1 To govern is to choose.
2 To govern well is to choose rightly.
I think the UK could do with 5-10 years of at least some of both of these.
Until Iraq we had some of (1) from Blair. And we had some of (1) from Mrs T.
You don't really know about (2) till later.
Over 60? Come on in.
Under 60? Fuck off!
Essentially everything you hear from party leaders on these issues is BS.
Either way, the current high rates of immigration are Conservative Party policy. If people don’t like them, vote out the Conservatives.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=loBe0WXtts8
If they get the chance the party will pick him again and the representatives will fall in line.
CNN made idiots of themselves.
Not really relevant, but here’s a pointless bit of internet, anyway;
https://www.isleofwightguru.co.uk/faq.html#:~:text=There are eight billion people,of the Isle of Wight.
Q. IS IT TRUE THAT THE POPULATION OF THE WORLD COULD FIT ON THE ISLE OF WIGHT?
A: No, but it was probably true up until around 1981, according to my back-of-an-envelope calculations.
Back in 1980, there were about 4.454 billion people on earth (source: Infoplease). The Isle of Wight is about 384 square kilometres, which is 384 000 000 square metres. For simplicity, I've ignored the fact that the Isle of Wight shrunk when most of Blackgang Chine fell into the sea in the 1990s.
So, the Isle of Wight could have hosted a party for the entire planet if you squeezed 11.5 people into each metre square.
We tried this out at a family gathering one Christmas and managed to fit 12 people into a metre square. It was a cosy experience, particularly after a turkey dinner. We couldn't have included a 13th person.
Group of people squashed into a small space
Our Christmas day experiment managed to fit 12 people in a metre square
Nowadays, the earth's population is much greater. There are eight billion people on earth (source: Wikipedia, 2022) which would require almost 21 people to fit into each square metre of the Isle of Wight. There's just no way that you could do it without standing on each other's shoulders.
My best guess is that it ceased to be possible to fit the entire population of the world on the Isle of Wight in around 1981.
See Crassus, Spartacus etc.
I’m reminded of Christian Wolmar’s classic question: “What is franchising for?”
A complete international embarrassment. Nationalise the lot and reinvest now.
The choice of moderator was irrelevant; they shouldn't have held the event.
We need a proper integrated, funded transport system.
Privatisation has produced higher prices, increased subsidies and unreliable and late trains.
Never forget John Major saying privatisation would stop prices increasing at the rate of inflation and would reduce subsidies. Ha!
So it's 3 Milton Keynes a year and 2 of them probably need to be in the South East.
You could probably count the MPs who would genuinely support the level of development needed to occur in their area, in order to make up the decades of national decline, using your thumbs alone.
I just thought the Russia point was a useful addition to what you said because it's a vital part of the picture. I wasn't disagreeing with anything you said.
At your next UKIP meeting why not suggest updating it to 'Four towns the size of Harlepool?
• Kilicdaroglu: 49.3%
• Erdogan; 43.7%
• Ogan: 4.8%
• Ince: 2.2%
It was conducted on 6-7 May, with 3480 people
https://twitter.com/ragipsoylu/status/1656588203292237825
That's the equivalent of 11.7 million nationwide.
"He [Sunak] has broken his word. This is very serious in my view. It makes one angry. Were one angry, one wouldn't like one."
Nobody is saying we literally clone Birmingham every two years. It simply happens to have a conveniently sized population for such discussions.
I have a novel proposal - anyone who wants zero immigration and no new homes should stop spending money now. Do not leave your house. Don't go out for a meal. Don't go shopping. Don't go for a drive on the public highway. If you all do this then we won't need to fill all these job vacancies.
Personally I cannot see the advantage of that but that's a better solution than franchising.
Concession arrangements work better for metro services than for long distance operators. Ideally, you want the operator to have scope to adjust the business as they see fit, but concessions are a lot simpler to manage.
I don't think franchises are/were that different to be honest. Ultimately, the railways are owned by the government.
The Government accepts that without subsidies the railways would/do go bust, so what exactly is the point?
Is anyone honestly going to tell me that if all of the "franchises" were run by the government, the service would be any better or worse?
The problem is that we've gutted the expertise and knowledge of the system, which came from over a hundred years of experience. All gone. We no longer own any of the trains, they're all owned and leased by third parties who make a killing.
Nationalisation is not a silver bullet. But at least we could cut out the pointless third party companies and try and build an integrated system that isn't so fragmented.
If this puts Putin's cronies off hiding their loot in America, boo hoo, so what.
There are many things still wrong with the rail network but they are dwarfed by the comprehensive failures of the nationalised system we used to have.