Jeremy Hunt has offered one of Britain’s biggest car manufacturers half a billion pounds in government subsidies not to go abroad to build a new electric battery “giga-factory”.
Amid growing concerns in government about the threat facing the UK car industry as it transforms towards electric vehicles, the Treasury has drawn up a package of incentives to pursue Jaguar Land Rover to invest in the UK.
The company, owned by the Indian conglomerate Tata, is weighing up whether to site a planned new giga-factory production facility for future electric vehicles in the UK or Spain.
Not sure what your point is. Spain is already offering up to 837 million euros in subsidies to draw battery manufacturers to the country. This is just how things are done these days.
Promising to build a battery factory, and then pocketing the subsidies is probably the easiest way to become a billionaire these days.
Sounds like you might be about to announce a new venture?
Invest now in EasyVolt - you'll still end up with no batteries, but at half the price of other failed ventures. EasyVolt - it's so good it's a steal.
I agree but Scotland need to change their system as it has been counterproductive.
I spend a lot of time wandering across land looking at rocks, wildflowers, insects and all manner of stuff. A couple of summers ago I had to spend a couple of months in Scotland and was looking forward to spending lots of time wandering about the Aberdeenshire countryside. The trouble is that now that the Right to Roam has been introduced (which I very much welcome) the OS maps no longer show rights of way. They supposedly show footpaths but since these no longer have a statutory meaning (and many rights of way are not formal footpaths) as they do in England it is very difficult to plan a route in advance and often you turn up and find there are fences or walls making access to land petty much impossible.
A much saner system would be to continue to mark formal rights of way and continue to ensure that the the landowner has a legal responsibility to keep them clear whiclt everyone also understands that there is no law against wandering off those routes when desired.
Sounds...unpopular with landowners - they have to maintain paths, but also get no incentive to do so (without punishment) because people can just go anywhere they like.
I like the idea, but I can see why it might have ended up the way you describe instead.
AI is going to put many people out of work and will cause huge damage to society. Shareholders get bigger dividends and the companies rake in bigger profits but at what cost to humanity .
We have enjoyed those new technologies over the last few decades and to a point they have enriched life but I fear we’re reaching a fork in the road .
Two private energy ‘companies’ caught conning customers.
Various private water ‘companies’ charging taxpayers for cleaning up the shit they have been shovelling into the sea.
Nothing to see here.
Oh no, oh no siree.
….
Nationalise them.
When people bring up nationalising rail companies we get a chorus of comments about how bad things used to be vs how they are now, and the benefits that those of us too young to remember the old way do not get.
It might be a mental block, but I cannot really recall reading about what advantages ostensibly exist with the way the water companies work at present.
So a genuinely open question - what are the hidden downsides from nationalising them?
Sunak out, I guess the man who uses helicopters all the time doesn't appreciate what us working class Northerners have to endure with the trains.
Ministers have quietly scrapped plans for the biggest shake-up of the railways since privatisation, The Times has learnt.
Plans for the creation of Great British Railways (GBR), put forward by Boris Johnson as a way to fix Britain’s rail network, have been watered down by No 10.
Officials at the Department for Transport (DfT) working on the new body, which was due to take over the running of the entire network, have been told it is not a priority for the government and will not be brought forward in the King’s Speech.
“Those working on it have been told it’s now unlikely to get a legislative slot,” a source said. “Without it they won’t be able to fully create the body, as it requires primary legislation.”
It is understood there is a battle between the DfT and Downing Street over its creation. Transport ministers are pushing for it to be given parliamentary time but there is pushback from Rishi Sunak, the prime minister, who does not consider the railways a priority for the final session of parliament before the general election.
A source said: “The simple fact is Sunak doesn’t see the railways as a priority. He was in the Treasury during Covid when all he saw was the railways costing eye-watering amounts of money. He’d ask why so much was being spent to ‘ship fresh air’ around the country.”
I wonder what will be a priority - another immigration bill and another police powers bill? I'm guessing there will be a "Labour are on the side of layabouts and shirkers" bill, and perhaps there will be an anodyne "only Tories want to build houses - but definitely not near any of our voters" bill.
Am I being too cynical, or has any legislation been passed in the last couple of years that wasn't a complete waste of space?
There's not been much of anything really; the 2019 manifesto was skimpy to the point of near indecency.
Strange to think that a government that must be able to feel the Grim Reaper's breath on its neck is apparently so apathetic. It has the potential to be a long 17 months.
They won’t go to January 2024 because it means election campaign and Christmas at same time by decree of government - the voter anger delivers Tory MPs in single digits. The smartest thing I heard is TSE saying 2023 locals day, as the locals shellacking will leave Sunak and government weak and wobbling throughout summer, with more channel boats using halshion weather pushing their polling lower. The Tories get their best 2024 general election result next May, possibly 200+ seats - anything later than next May or June and the likelihood is sub 200 seats.
Hi Heathener.
Behave 😠
One minute I’m called Tory Rabbit, the next Heathener Rabbit. If I can get the two piles balanced right it will confirm my status as the sites most balanced psephologist.
It wasn’t even that controversial a post Taz? If Tories inflict both Christmas and an election campaign at the same time they have to expect a bad result? My agreement with TSE a good day for GE is same time as next years locals - the results this year had knocked stuffing and authority out them did it not? And an autumn election after halcyon summer of boat crossings?
Halcyon days is named after a Greek bird that nests in cliffs during nicer weather of summer.
We will not see Heathener until Leon returns to somewhere with electricity.
The rest of us are confirmed as real people 🤗
I’m not sure though, Heathener is a very early bird, the sort of time of day Leon surely has energy crashed into an addled sleep.
Can’t he show them how to make electricity out of mud? 🤭
Jeremy Hunt has offered one of Britain’s biggest car manufacturers half a billion pounds in government subsidies not to go abroad to build a new electric battery “giga-factory”.
Amid growing concerns in government about the threat facing the UK car industry as it transforms towards electric vehicles, the Treasury has drawn up a package of incentives to pursue Jaguar Land Rover to invest in the UK.
The company, owned by the Indian conglomerate Tata, is weighing up whether to site a planned new giga-factory production facility for future electric vehicles in the UK or Spain.
Not sure what your point is. Spain is already offering up to 837 million euros in subsidies to draw battery manufacturers to the country. This is just how things are done these days.
Promising to build a battery factory, and then pocketing the subsidies is probably the easiest way to become a billionaire these days.
How much do you think I could pocket before anyone finds out that my solid-state battery doesn't work?
Don't be such a DOOMSTER.
Follow @Luckyguy1983's example and just BELIEVE. If you BELIEVE strongly enough, your solid state batteries will just work and you'll be rich beyond your wildest dreams.
Jeremy Hunt has offered one of Britain’s biggest car manufacturers half a billion pounds in government subsidies not to go abroad to build a new electric battery “giga-factory”.
Amid growing concerns in government about the threat facing the UK car industry as it transforms towards electric vehicles, the Treasury has drawn up a package of incentives to pursue Jaguar Land Rover to invest in the UK.
The company, owned by the Indian conglomerate Tata, is weighing up whether to site a planned new giga-factory production facility for future electric vehicles in the UK or Spain.
In fairness, I can't imagine Hunt being much of an enthusiast for the Wilsonite policy of picking winnings. Nevertheless we were warned - but some devout Leavers in fact - that in the post-Brexit world the British car industry would be the first domino to fall. So I can see why Hunt is desperate to avoid that horrible optic being associated for ever with the Tories. The symbolism is massive here.
Didn't Thatcher offer subsidies to the Japanese car companies in the 1980s?
Of course: the Regional Development Agencies were pretty good at spraying money around.
It seems to me as if Sunak is, bit by bit, seeking to alienate different groups of voters, as promise after promise is broken:
Railways? No thanks. Housebuilding? Not near me, thanks. Sewage in the sea and rivers? Not really our problem - blame our friends and donors in the water industry. Tax cuts? No, freeze the thresholds. End leaseholds? No, changed our mind (and people who live in flats are mainly urban Labour voters, so they can do one). Cut immigration to the tens of thousands? No, let's aim for a million.
Soon, the only Tory voters left will be rural or suburban car-driving, outright house-owning, retired or rich folk who don't go swimming.
It is a curious strategy. It's not committing to one ideological approach, but it's not really pragmatic either as half of these are reactionary gimmicks to stave off criticism from a particular side, which doesn't even work because they have something else to complain about.
This story is a perfect encapsulation of the social polarisation in the US. A pregnant nurse coming out of work activated a rental bike and then had it taken off her by a group of kids. One of them was filming it and she was portrayed as the villain of the piece in a viral video that was seen over 40 million times, leading to an avalanche of vitriolic comments accusing her of being a racist "Karen". Her employer was even forced to place her on leave. Even though the original accusation was an obvious fabrication, millions of people took sides against her.
Jeremy Hunt has offered one of Britain’s biggest car manufacturers half a billion pounds in government subsidies not to go abroad to build a new electric battery “giga-factory”.
Amid growing concerns in government about the threat facing the UK car industry as it transforms towards electric vehicles, the Treasury has drawn up a package of incentives to pursue Jaguar Land Rover to invest in the UK.
The company, owned by the Indian conglomerate Tata, is weighing up whether to site a planned new giga-factory production facility for future electric vehicles in the UK or Spain.
Not sure what your point is. Spain is already offering up to 837 million euros in subsidies to draw battery manufacturers to the country. This is just how things are done these days.
Promising to build a battery factory, and then pocketing the subsidies is probably the easiest way to become a billionaire these days.
How much do you think I could pocket before anyone finds out that my solid-state battery doesn't work?
Don't be such a DOOMSTER.
Follow @Luckyguy1983's example and just BELIEVE. If you BELIEVE strongly enough, your solid state batteries will just work and you'll be rich beyond your wildest dreams.
The key is that if things collapse before they even really get off the ground, it's then unfair to criticise it since it never had a chance to be properly tried.
Jeremy Hunt has offered one of Britain’s biggest car manufacturers half a billion pounds in government subsidies not to go abroad to build a new electric battery “giga-factory”.
Amid growing concerns in government about the threat facing the UK car industry as it transforms towards electric vehicles, the Treasury has drawn up a package of incentives to pursue Jaguar Land Rover to invest in the UK.
The company, owned by the Indian conglomerate Tata, is weighing up whether to site a planned new giga-factory production facility for future electric vehicles in the UK or Spain.
In fairness, I can't imagine Hunt being much of an enthusiast for the Wilsonite policy of picking winnings. Nevertheless we were warned - but some devout Leavers in fact - that in the post-Brexit world the British car industry would be the first domino to fall. So I can see why Hunt is desperate to avoid that horrible optic being associated for ever with the Tories. The symbolism is massive here.
Didn't Thatcher offer subsidies to the Japanese car companies in the 1980s?
Of course: the Regional Development Agencies were pretty good at spraying money around.
I once dealt with a company who were going through their RDA. They were asking about funds to buy a £1500 camera (at the time quite high end). RDA said 'nah, not interested'. Re-specced for a £40,000 camera and the RDA were 'Sure! Brilliant!'.
Then the said company had to use the camera on a low-spec setting to get the data they wanted.
Two private energy ‘companies’ caught conning customers.
Various private water ‘companies’ charging taxpayers for cleaning up the shit they have been shovelling into the sea.
Nothing to see here.
Oh no, oh no siree.
….
Nationalise them.
When people bring up nationalising rail companies we get a chorus of comments about how bad things used to be vs how they are now, and the benefits that those of us too young to remember the old way do not get.
It might be a mental block, but I cannot really recall reading about what advantages ostensibly exist with the way the water companies work at present.
So a genuinely open question - what are the hidden downsides from nationalising them?
Here you go:
Lack of private investment.
4 state apples plus 4 private investment apples is 8 apples. 4 state apples is 4 state apples.
The point here isn’t state v privatised, it’s the MODEL of privatisation. Is the current UK model of privatised water, rail, energy etc exactly the same where state and private work together on these same things around the world in other countries?
We know now the Water companies promise to spend £10bn to sort out the sewage problem - and we know now it’s us the bill payers who are forking out the £10bn.
So there is a report out that a US Air Force source claims Ukrainians could be trained on F16s within 4 months. Given what the likes of Michael Clarke and Phillips O'Brien have been saying that seems at the lengthy end of the spectrum which is usually guesstimated between 6 weeks to 3 months.
The mystery is why the previous Pentagon briefing stated it would take up to 18 months, a remark they must have known to be a de facto lie. So why tell it?
Up to doesn't exclude it being a lot less than that. They were probably just quoting the length of time it would typically take to train someone when there isn't any urgency.
There's a big difference between training someone from scratch, and training a pilot with more combat experience than most (all?) USAF pilots, albeit in a different fighter jet.
Interesting to note that we're almost exactly four months after the British decision to send Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine. If the decision to train Ukrainian pilots on F-16s had been taken then, the first pilots could be about ready for combat now.
Tough questions? Not as far as I can tell. They're easy, even for a 7 year old.
I don't know how I would judge what is a hard question for a 10 year old, but in at least one of the examples the concern appears to have been unwarranted as the mark scheme allowed for more than one answer, should it have been seen as ambiguous. So there might be some stress but they should score ok.
And in another I don't even understand the criticism of another one, unless there's something I'm missing in its write up, the one about Austin.
Find and copy one word that is closest in meaning to "eat".
Relevant extract: It's actually very appropriate that you call it a "hotspot". The gaps underneath the bridge are a perfect place for mother bats to raise their young. Baby bats are born hairless and have only a few months to develop before travelling south in autumn. They need somewhere warm and safe and the gaps under the bridge are just the right width to trap warmth nicely. These bat pups need to spend their energy on growth, not on keeping themselves warm.
Texas in general is a paradise for bats because of all its tasty insects. A mother bat will go out hunting every evening and consume about two-thirds of her body weight in insects every single night to meet her energy need. The feeding frenzy can last all night.
Answer: The teacher was concerned that the answer was "consume" but many children would have written "feeding". According to the mark scheme, both answers were acceptable.
Look at the first two paragraphs.
In which American state is the Congress Avenue Bridge found?
Relevant extract: By day the Congress Avenue Bridge in the city of Austin could hardly look more normal: a grey, dreary city-centre road bridge. By night, it plays host to one of the most amazing shows nature has to offer. The underside of the bridge is home to more than a million bats, and every evening in summer they all come swarming out at once, rising up into the city sky like a tornado before spreading out in all directions like plumes of smoke. Standing on the bridge, you might even feel the wind from their wings as they pass by.
Austin is the capital city of the state of Texas in the USA, but it is also the bat capital of North America. The bats under the bridge attract thousands of visitors every year, and every August lovers celebrate Bat Fest on the bridge in their honour. Answer: The answer is Texas but the teacher told us it was likely children would not be familiar enough with American geography to know that Austin is not a state.
So there is a report out that a US Air Force source claims Ukrainians could be trained on F16s within 4 months. Given what the likes of Michael Clarke and Phillips O'Brien have been saying that seems at the lengthy end of the spectrum which is usually guesstimated between 6 weeks to 3 months.
The mystery is why the previous Pentagon briefing stated it would take up to 18 months, a remark they must have known to be a de facto lie. So why tell it?
Up to doesn't exclude it being a lot less than that. They were probably just quoting the length of time it would typically take to train someone when there isn't any urgency.
Sorry but I don't buy it. It's a form of words that means they are not technically lying but the intent to mislead seems fairly clear.
So there is a report out that a US Air Force source claims Ukrainians could be trained on F16s within 4 months. Given what the likes of Michael Clarke and Phillips O'Brien have been saying that seems at the lengthy end of the spectrum which is usually guesstimated between 6 weeks to 3 months.
The mystery is why the previous Pentagon briefing stated it would take up to 18 months, a remark they must have known to be a de facto lie. So why tell it?
Up to doesn't exclude it being a lot less than that. They were probably just quoting the length of time it would typically take to train someone when there isn't any urgency.
There's a big difference between training someone from scratch, and training a pilot with more combat experience than most (all?) USAF pilots, albeit in a different fighter jet.
Interesting to note that we're almost exactly four months after the British decision to send Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine. If the decision to train Ukrainian pilots on F-16s had been taken then, the first pilots could be about ready for combat now.
It would be a nice surprise if the decision was taken then, and this is just to offput the Russians when they very swiftly have to face it.
So there is a report out that a US Air Force source claims Ukrainians could be trained on F16s within 4 months. Given what the likes of Michael Clarke and Phillips O'Brien have been saying that seems at the lengthy end of the spectrum which is usually guesstimated between 6 weeks to 3 months.
The mystery is why the previous Pentagon briefing stated it would take up to 18 months, a remark they must have known to be a de facto lie. So why tell it?
Up to doesn't exclude it being a lot less than that. They were probably just quoting the length of time it would typically take to train someone when there isn't any urgency.
Sorry but I don't buy it. It's a form of words that means they are not technically lying but the intent to mislead seems fairly clear.
I don’t disagree but the specific phrase “up to” is used so commonly to mislead in precisely that way that any sophisticated audience should understand what’s going on.
Tough questions? Not as far as I can tell. They're easy, even for a 7 year old.
The last qu is a bit odd. Why are English primary school kids being tested on American political geography?
The answer to the question is obvious to you, me and everyone on PB, but we’re weirdos.
Replace it with a British political geography question, I recon.
Not fair to mark them down on the question, as it is.
Is there something wrong if the majority of children don't know the answer to a question? And aren't these tests fundamentally about forming a judgment on the schools not the kids? Do they even get the results?
Two private energy ‘companies’ caught conning customers.
Various private water ‘companies’ charging taxpayers for cleaning up the shit they have been shovelling into the sea.
Nothing to see here.
Oh no, oh no siree.
….
Nationalise them.
When people bring up nationalising rail companies we get a chorus of comments about how bad things used to be vs how they are now, and the benefits that those of us too young to remember the old way do not get.
It might be a mental block, but I cannot really recall reading about what advantages ostensibly exist with the way the water companies work at present.
So a genuinely open question - what are the hidden downsides from nationalising them?
Here you go:
Lack of private investment.
4 state apples plus 4 private investment apples is 8 apples. 4 state apples is 4 state apples.
The point here isn’t state v privatised, it’s the MODEL of privatisation. Is the current UK model of privatised water, rail, energy etc exactly the same where state and private work together on these same things around the world in other countries?
We know now the Water companies promise to spend £10bn to sort out the sewage problem - and we know now it’s us the bill payers who are forking out the £10bn.
Meanwhile
Ofwat is concerned by the lack of transparency in the byzantine structures.
Desert also concerned by lack of rain.
Is there a surer sign of a, somehow, legal grift than overly complex corporate structuring? It doesn't appear likely to make running a corporation easier.
So there is a report out that a US Air Force source claims Ukrainians could be trained on F16s within 4 months. Given what the likes of Michael Clarke and Phillips O'Brien have been saying that seems at the lengthy end of the spectrum which is usually guesstimated between 6 weeks to 3 months.
The mystery is why the previous Pentagon briefing stated it would take up to 18 months, a remark they must have known to be a de facto lie. So why tell it?
Up to doesn't exclude it being a lot less than that. They were probably just quoting the length of time it would typically take to train someone when there isn't any urgency.
Sorry but I don't buy it. It's a form of words that means they are not technically lying but the intent to mislead seems fairly clear.
I don’t disagree but the specific phrase “up to” is used so commonly to mislead in precisely that way that any sophisticated audience should understand what’s going on.
Yes but why do they want to mislead? Because they want an excuse not to send F 16s? Okay, well why is that.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Well, this is interesting. Might explain why Russia have been throwing so many missiles at Kyiv, in an attempt to take out the Patriot battery there.
Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 @bayraktar_1love /1. From the CNN article, it is possible to assume that Patriot was involved in recent string of air crashes in the Bryansk region. “Defense officials and congressional staffers told that 🇺🇦 has in recent weeks used Patriot to shoot down at least one faraway Russian fighter” -CNN
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
More substantial than the 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK is the 16% of 2019 voters voting Labour. It’s a bigger switcheroo than 97.
Tough questions? Not as far as I can tell. They're easy, even for a 7 year old.
The last qu is a bit odd. Why are English primary school kids being tested on American political geography?
The answer to the question is obvious to you, me and everyone on PB, but we’re weirdos.
Replace it with a British political geography question, I recon.
Not fair to mark them down on the question, as it is.
But is it a test of political geography? On another BBC page it explains that some questions it is simply a case of finding the relevant sentence in a long passage of text* and repeating that information, so reading comprehension, which is purpose of the paper. The text as presented on the previously linked page includes the answer, so no knowledge of whether Austin is a state or not was needed.
That's why I don't get the criticism that children may not be familiar enough to know Austin is not a state - whether they even know Texas is a state, or the USA a country, is irrelevant, surely, when the text states 'Austin is the capital city of the state of Texas in the USA'?
Is that a hard question for a 10 year old? As I say I have no idea, and was a strong reader from a fairly young age so hard for me to judge, but it doesn't seem fair to criticise the question for unfairly testing geographic knowledge when it was not doing so as far as I can see.
Two private energy ‘companies’ caught conning customers.
Various private water ‘companies’ charging taxpayers for cleaning up the shit they have been shovelling into the sea.
Nothing to see here.
Oh no, oh no siree.
….
Nationalise them.
When people bring up nationalising rail companies we get a chorus of comments about how bad things used to be vs how they are now, and the benefits that those of us too young to remember the old way do not get.
It might be a mental block, but I cannot really recall reading about what advantages ostensibly exist with the way the water companies work at present.
So a genuinely open question - what are the hidden downsides from nationalising them?
Here you go:
Lack of private investment.
4 state apples plus 4 private investment apples is 8 apples. 4 state apples is 4 state apples.
The point here isn’t state v privatised, it’s the MODEL of privatisation. Is the current UK model of privatised water, rail, energy etc exactly the same where state and private work together on these same things around the world in other countries?
We know now the Water companies promise to spend £10bn to sort out the sewage problem - and we know now it’s us the bill payers who are forking out the £10bn.
Meanwhile
Ofwat is concerned by the lack of transparency in the byzantine structures.
Desert also concerned by lack of rain.
Is there a surer sign of a, somehow, legal grift than overly complex corporate structuring? It doesn't appear likely to make running a corporation easier.
The point of privatisation is to serve the customer, consumer, not create monopoly or cartels.
If you want the 8 apples not just 4, look again at the type of privatisation/public private partnerships.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Two private energy ‘companies’ caught conning customers.
Various private water ‘companies’ charging taxpayers for cleaning up the shit they have been shovelling into the sea.
Nothing to see here.
Oh no, oh no siree.
….
Nationalise them.
When people bring up nationalising rail companies we get a chorus of comments about how bad things used to be vs how they are now, and the benefits that those of us too young to remember the old way do not get.
It might be a mental block, but I cannot really recall reading about what advantages ostensibly exist with the way the water companies work at present.
So a genuinely open question - what are the hidden downsides from nationalising them?
Here you go:
Lack of private investment.
4 state apples plus 4 private investment apples is 8 apples. 4 state apples is 4 state apples.
The point here isn’t state v privatised, it’s the MODEL of privatisation. Is the current UK model of privatised water, rail, energy etc exactly the same where state and private work together on these same things around the world in other countries?
We know now the Water companies promise to spend £10bn to sort out the sewage problem - and we know now it’s us the bill payers who are forking out the £10bn.
Meanwhile
Ofwat is concerned by the lack of transparency in the byzantine structures.
Desert also concerned by lack of rain.
Is there a surer sign of a, somehow, legal grift than overly complex corporate structuring? It doesn't appear likely to make running a corporation easier.
I wish we did have some Byzantine structures in water management. The Basilica Cistern in Constantinople was seriously impressive.
Two private energy ‘companies’ caught conning customers.
Various private water ‘companies’ charging taxpayers for cleaning up the shit they have been shovelling into the sea.
Nothing to see here.
Oh no, oh no siree.
….
Nationalise them.
When people bring up nationalising rail companies we get a chorus of comments about how bad things used to be vs how they are now, and the benefits that those of us too young to remember the old way do not get.
It might be a mental block, but I cannot really recall reading about what advantages ostensibly exist with the way the water companies work at present.
So a genuinely open question - what are the hidden downsides from nationalising them?
Here you go:
Lack of private investment.
4 state apples plus 4 private investment apples is 8 apples. 4 state apples is 4 state apples.
The point here isn’t state v privatised, it’s the MODEL of privatisation. Is the current UK model of privatised water, rail, energy etc exactly the same where state and private work together on these same things around the world in other countries?
We know now the Water companies promise to spend £10bn to sort out the sewage problem - and we know now it’s us the bill payers who are forking out the £10bn.
Meanwhile
Ofwat is concerned by the lack of transparency in the byzantine structures.
Desert also concerned by lack of rain.
Is there a surer sign of a, somehow, legal grift than overly complex corporate structuring? It doesn't appear likely to make running a corporation easier.
I wish we did have some Byzantine structures in water management. The Basilica Cistern in Constantinople was seriously impressive.
I could use a historian to weigh in on how byzantine the Byzantines really were (yes, I know they didn;t call themselves that).
Two private energy ‘companies’ caught conning customers.
Various private water ‘companies’ charging taxpayers for cleaning up the shit they have been shovelling into the sea.
Nothing to see here.
Oh no, oh no siree.
….
Nationalise them.
When people bring up nationalising rail companies we get a chorus of comments about how bad things used to be vs how they are now, and the benefits that those of us too young to remember the old way do not get.
It might be a mental block, but I cannot really recall reading about what advantages ostensibly exist with the way the water companies work at present.
So a genuinely open question - what are the hidden downsides from nationalising them?
Here you go:
Lack of private investment.
4 state apples plus 4 private investment apples is 8 apples. 4 state apples is 4 state apples.
The point here isn’t state v privatised, it’s the MODEL of privatisation. Is the current UK model of privatised water, rail, energy etc exactly the same where state and private work together on these same things around the world in other countries?
We know now the Water companies promise to spend £10bn to sort out the sewage problem - and we know now it’s us the bill payers who are forking out the £10bn.
Meanwhile
Ofwat is concerned by the lack of transparency in the byzantine structures.
Desert also concerned by lack of rain.
Is there a surer sign of a, somehow, legal grift than overly complex corporate structuring? It doesn't appear likely to make running a corporation easier.
The point of privatisation is to serve the customer, consumer, not create monopoly or cartels.
So there is a report out that a US Air Force source claims Ukrainians could be trained on F16s within 4 months. Given what the likes of Michael Clarke and Phillips O'Brien have been saying that seems at the lengthy end of the spectrum which is usually guesstimated between 6 weeks to 3 months.
The mystery is why the previous Pentagon briefing stated it would take up to 18 months, a remark they must have known to be a de facto lie. So why tell it?
Up to doesn't exclude it being a lot less than that. They were probably just quoting the length of time it would typically take to train someone when there isn't any urgency.
Sorry but I don't buy it. It's a form of words that means they are not technically lying but the intent to mislead seems fairly clear.
I don’t disagree but the specific phrase “up to” is used so commonly to mislead in precisely that way that any sophisticated audience should understand what’s going on.
Yes but why do they want to mislead? Because they want an excuse not to send F 16s? Okay, well why is that.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
Both R&W and YouGov currently have 15% of 2019 Conservatives defecting to Reform, compared to just 1% of 2019 Labour. Their support is currently made up almost entirely of defecting 2019 Conservatives added to a much smaller number of 2019 Brexit Party voters.
So given where Reform's current support overwhelmingly came from, it's telling that even in the absence of a Reform candidate at a future General Election, there would be almost no net benefit to the Conservatives. That is, if Reform could count on say 6% support broadly in line with their national polling, then the absence of a Reform candidate would only give back a net 0.6% margin to the Conservatives over Labour (i.e. 25% back to Con, 15% back to Lab, so net 10% of the 6% is 0.6%.)
Reality though is that this time Reform intend to stand in every Conservative constituency as well. If they average even 5% in 2019 Conservative constituencies, which is below their current national polling by and large, then that's 5% more than they got in 2019. So there's the potential for a particularly big swing against the Conservatives in the sort of seats which the Conservatives need to hold to stop Labour getting close to a majority.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
More substantial than the 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK is the 16% of 2019 voters voting Labour. It’s a bigger switcheroo than 97.
Actually only 12% of 2019 Tory voters now back Labour including DKs with today's Yougov (in 1997 it was 15% of 1992 Tory voters voting New Labour).
A bigger 20% of 2019 Tory voters are DK and 11%, almost the same, are now RefUK
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Who do you think the top three would be in a post-GE leadership election?
Tough questions? Not as far as I can tell. They're easy, even for a 7 year old.
I don't know how I would judge what is a hard question for a 10 year old, but in at least one of the examples the concern appears to have been unwarranted as the mark scheme allowed for more than one answer, should it have been seen as ambiguous. So there might be some stress but they should score ok. [ Texas bats question snipped ]
While it is very nice that either of two almost-equivalent answers were deemed acceptable, the children did not know that. It might be that children were unduly stressed at having to choose between them based on very thin evidence. Ironically, this would probably affect the brighter children more than their peers who did not notice that two answers could possibly fit.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Would she not? A much reduced parliamentary party looking for easy answers and reacting against perceived centrists Rishi and Hunt?
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Would she not? A much reduced parliamentary party looking for easy answers and reacting against perceived centrists Rishi and Hunt?
She got just 32 MPs backing her last year, even in a 1997 size Tory party of 165 MPs that would be less than 20%. Plus some of her biggest MP backers like Steve Baker are in marginal seats and will likely lose those seats.
Tugendhat, Mordaunt and probably Badenoch too would easily beat her again in the MPs rounds as they did last year while Barclay picks up most of Sunak's support if Rishi resigned post election defeat
Tough questions? Not as far as I can tell. They're easy, even for a 7 year old.
I don't know how I would judge what is a hard question for a 10 year old, but in at least one of the examples the concern appears to have been unwarranted as the mark scheme allowed for more than one answer, should it have been seen as ambiguous. So there might be some stress but they should score ok. [ Texas bats question snipped ]
While it is very nice that either of two almost-equivalent answers were deemed acceptable, the children did not know that. It might be that children were unduly stressed at having to choose between them based on very thin evidence. Ironically, this would probably affect the brighter children more than their peers who did not notice that two answers could possibly fit.
I definitely recall facing some anxiety in a test with similar feeling that more than one answer might apply, I'd have felt the same about that particular quesiton. It's annoying.
But it feels like making mountains out of a molehill. What's 'unduly stressed' versus 'duly' stressed in this situation? I mean, surely unless everyone gets 100% they will be facing uncertainty about what the right answer is in every question of every test that is ever taken? It's unfair that some people got stressed over that but not those who might have stressed over 'easier' questions because they are not as strong readers to begin with?
The issue is can they reasonably be expected to figure out the correct answer, and the apparent worst example the story could find is one where some people were stressing about an ambiguity but still will have gotten it right.
That is the example the story led with, which given the tenor of the piece was sympathetic was probably the hardest question they could find in the whole paper. I don't want children stressing more than they have to when taking tests, but if that is the most ambiguous example they found it wasn't as bad as some we've probably all seen.
I agree but Scotland need to change their system as it has been counterproductive.
I spend a lot of time wandering across land looking at rocks, wildflowers, insects and all manner of stuff. A couple of summers ago I had to spend a couple of months in Scotland and was looking forward to spending lots of time wandering about the Aberdeenshire countryside. The trouble is that now that the Right to Roam has been introduced (which I very much welcome) the OS maps no longer show rights of way. They supposedly show footpaths but since these no longer have a statutory meaning (and many rights of way are not formal footpaths) as they do in England it is very difficult to plan a route in advance and often you turn up and find there are fences or walls making access to land petty much impossible.
A much saner system would be to continue to mark formal rights of way and continue to ensure that the the landowner has a legal responsibility to keep them clear whiclt everyone also understands that there is no law against wandering off those routes when desired.
Where was this? It's not something that happens often in my experience and I live in Aberdeenshire. FWIW I find Open Street Map a really good resource if you don't mind using a smartphone for navigation.
I bought the standard OS 1:25000 Explorer map which in England shows all public rights of way. Of course there are no formal rights of way in Scotland now apart from things like the old railway which is now the National Trail leading out past Culter. I came across it often, a lot in the Dee valley beyond Culter and also when tracking down stone circles in other parts of Aberdeenshire (which has one of the highest concentrations of the things in the British Isles)
The lack of marked foorpaths is a real pain.
Yes, loads of stone circles round here... never quite worked out why
No one is quite sure. There are lots of different theories but it is most likely that it is to do with differences in post-Nolithic preservation rather than differences in original distribution. Basically it is probable that most of the lowland British Isles had cricles of stone or wood of a similar concentration to Aberdeenshire but that differences in later land usage meant that they were destroyed elsewhere but preserved in Aberdeenshire.
Also, changes in sea level would have simply submerged older settlements (theoretical I admit) that would have been on dry land thousands of years prior to Stonehenge, Carnac, etc.
Such settlements - which would be Mesolithic if they were affected by rising sea levels - would only have been in the form of seasonaly occupied camps in the North Sea area/Britihs Isles although the Neolithic in Turkey/Syria starts around 6000 years earlier. .
Tough questions? Not as far as I can tell. They're easy, even for a 7 year old.
I don't know how I would judge what is a hard question for a 10 year old, but in at least one of the examples the concern appears to have been unwarranted as the mark scheme allowed for more than one answer, should it have been seen as ambiguous. So there might be some stress but they should score ok. [ Texas bats question snipped ]
While it is very nice that either of two almost-equivalent answers were deemed acceptable, the children did not know that. It might be that children were unduly stressed at having to choose between them based on very thin evidence. Ironically, this would probably affect the brighter children more than their peers who did not notice that two answers could possibly fit.
I definitely recall facing some anxiety in a test with similar feeling that more than one answer might apply, I'd have felt the same about that particular quesiton. It's annoying.
But it feels like making mountains out of a molehill. What's 'unduly stressed' versus 'duly' stressed in this situation? I mean, surely unless everyone gets 100% they will be facing uncertainty about what the right answer is in every question of every test that is ever taken?
The issue is can they reasonably be expected to figure out the correct answer, and the apparent worst example the story could find is one where some people were stressing about an ambiguity but still will have gotten it right.
That is the example the story led with, which given the tenor of the piece was sympathetic was probably the hardest question they could find in the whole paper. I don't want children stressing more than they have to when taking tests, but if that is the most ambiguous example they found it wasn't as bad as some we've probably all seen.
Given there has been a lot of fuss about this particular paper, with reports of children in tears, it quite likely did cause more stress than its equivalents in recent years.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Would she not? A much reduced parliamentary party looking for easy answers and reacting against perceived centrists Rishi and Hunt?
She got just 32 MPs backing her last year, even in a 1997 size Tory party of 165 MPs that would be less than 20%. Plus some of her biggest MP backers like Steve Baker are in marginal seats and will likely lose those seats.
Tugendhat, Mordaunt and probably Badenoch too would easily beat her again in the MPs rounds as they did last year while Barclay picks up most of Sunak's support if Rishi resigned post election defeat
Boris got no MPs backing him in 2017 because he chickened out as he would not get enough to back him if he did stand. 2 years later some of his supporters were still worried he would not get enough as they were whinging about the process possibly excluding him from the final two. Yet he won easily with MPs.
Not saying she will actually win such a contest, I think it's so dependent on just how bad the loss is and so who remains, and of course your insider view may well be correct, but I think you might be writing her off too soon based on her performance last time. She was not as big a figure then as she is now (she'd only been Attorny General), and may have a 'resigned in protest as Rishi would not let me stop the boats/leave the ECHR' moment to win people over.
Tough questions? Not as far as I can tell. They're easy, even for a 7 year old.
I don't know how I would judge what is a hard question for a 10 year old, but in at least one of the examples the concern appears to have been unwarranted as the mark scheme allowed for more than one answer, should it have been seen as ambiguous. So there might be some stress but they should score ok.
And in another I don't even understand the criticism of another one, unless there's something I'm missing in its write up, the one about Austin.
Find and copy one word that is closest in meaning to "eat".
Relevant extract: It's actually very appropriate that you call it a "hotspot". The gaps underneath the bridge are a perfect place for mother bats to raise their young. Baby bats are born hairless and have only a few months to develop before travelling south in autumn. They need somewhere warm and safe and the gaps under the bridge are just the right width to trap warmth nicely. These bat pups need to spend their energy on growth, not on keeping themselves warm.
Texas in general is a paradise for bats because of all its tasty insects. A mother bat will go out hunting every evening and consume about two-thirds of her body weight in insects every single night to meet her energy need. The feeding frenzy can last all night.
Answer: The teacher was concerned that the answer was "consume" but many children would have written "feeding". According to the mark scheme, both answers were acceptable.
Look at the first two paragraphs.
In which American state is the Congress Avenue Bridge found?
Relevant extract: By day the Congress Avenue Bridge in the city of Austin could hardly look more normal: a grey, dreary city-centre road bridge. By night, it plays host to one of the most amazing shows nature has to offer. The underside of the bridge is home to more than a million bats, and every evening in summer they all come swarming out at once, rising up into the city sky like a tornado before spreading out in all directions like plumes of smoke. Standing on the bridge, you might even feel the wind from their wings as they pass by.
Austin is the capital city of the state of Texas in the USA, but it is also the bat capital of North America. The bats under the bridge attract thousands of visitors every year, and every August lovers celebrate Bat Fest on the bridge in their honour. Answer: The answer is Texas but the teacher told us it was likely children would not be familiar enough with American geography to know that Austin is not a state.
First one: my ten year old self would see feeding, but be confused that it doesn't match the part of speech (the infinitive) given in the question. Would then spot "consume" which does. I would have been nervous about there being two answers which both match closely. How do you say which matches "closest"?
Second one: text literally says "state of texas" so the criticism is bollocks.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Would she not? A much reduced parliamentary party looking for easy answers and reacting against perceived centrists Rishi and Hunt?
She got just 32 MPs backing her last year, even in a 1997 size Tory party of 165 MPs that would be less than 20%. Plus some of her biggest MP backers like Steve Baker are in marginal seats and will likely lose those seats.
Tugendhat, Mordaunt and probably Badenoch too would easily beat her again in the MPs rounds as they did last year while Barclay picks up most of Sunak's support if Rishi resigned post election defeat
Boris got no MPs backing him in 2017 because he chickened out as he would not get enough to back him if he did stand. 2 years later some of his supporters were still worried he would not get enough as they were whinging about the process possibly excluding him from the final two. Yet he won easily with MPs.
Not saying she will actually win such a contest, I think it's so dependent on just how bad the loss is and so who remains, and of course your insider view may well be correct, but I think you might be writing her off too soon based on her performance last time. She was not as big a figure then as she is now (she'd only been Attorny General), and may have a 'resigned in protest as Rishi would not let me stop the boats/leave the ECHR' moment to win people over.
If the Tories want someone who will actually get their fires going as Corbyn did for Labour they will elect Jacob Rees Mogg leader (and I think Jacob may well become Tory leader if they suffer 2 consecutive defeats).
Braveman will never be leader, she is not establishment enough to take the leadership post losing power like Barclay, in terms of doing a William Hague or Ed Miliband role.
Nor does she inspire the right and base as much as The Mogg does.
Ten year olds don't have very well developed exam technique. If they get scared by one ambiguous question, it can ruin the whole test. A fifteen year old will briefly panic, put aside the badly-set question, do the other ones and return to it at the end.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Would she not? A much reduced parliamentary party looking for easy answers and reacting against perceived centrists Rishi and Hunt?
She got just 32 MPs backing her last year, even in a 1997 size Tory party of 165 MPs that would be less than 20%. Plus some of her biggest MP backers like Steve Baker are in marginal seats and will likely lose those seats.
Tugendhat, Mordaunt and probably Badenoch too would easily beat her again in the MPs rounds as they did last year while Barclay picks up most of Sunak's support if Rishi resigned post election defeat
Boris got no MPs backing him in 2017 because he chickened out as he would not get enough to back him if he did stand. 2 years later some of his supporters were still worried he would not get enough as they were whinging about the process possibly excluding him from the final two. Yet he won easily with MPs.
Not saying she will actually win such a contest, I think it's so dependent on just how bad the loss is and so who remains, and of course your insider view may well be correct, but I think you might be writing her off too soon based on her performance last time. She was not as big a figure then as she is now (she'd only been Attorny General), and may have a 'resigned in protest as Rishi would not let me stop the boats/leave the ECHR' moment to win people over.
If the Tories want someone who will actually get their fires going as Corbyn did for the left of Labour they will elect Jacob Rees Mogg leader (and I think Jacob may well become Tory leader if they suffer 2 consecutive defeats).
Braveman will never be leader, she is not establishment enough to take the leadership post losing power like Barclay, in terms of doing a William Hague or Ed Miliband role.
Nor does she inspire the right and base as much as The Mogg does.
Mogg makes Corbyn look effortlessly electable. If Barclay enters an empty room, it feels emptier.
Tough questions? Not as far as I can tell. They're easy, even for a 7 year old.
I don't know how I would judge what is a hard question for a 10 year old, but in at least one of the examples the concern appears to have been unwarranted as the mark scheme allowed for more than one answer, should it have been seen as ambiguous. So there might be some stress but they should score ok. [ Texas bats question snipped ]
While it is very nice that either of two almost-equivalent answers were deemed acceptable, the children did not know that. It might be that children were unduly stressed at having to choose between them based on very thin evidence. Ironically, this would probably affect the brighter children more than their peers who did not notice that two answers could possibly fit.
I definitely recall facing some anxiety in a test with similar feeling that more than one answer might apply, I'd have felt the same about that particular quesiton. It's annoying.
But it feels like making mountains out of a molehill. What's 'unduly stressed' versus 'duly' stressed in this situation? I mean, surely unless everyone gets 100% they will be facing uncertainty about what the right answer is in every question of every test that is ever taken?
The issue is can they reasonably be expected to figure out the correct answer, and the apparent worst example the story could find is one where some people were stressing about an ambiguity but still will have gotten it right.
That is the example the story led with, which given the tenor of the piece was sympathetic was probably the hardest question they could find in the whole paper. I don't want children stressing more than they have to when taking tests, but if that is the most ambiguous example they found it wasn't as bad as some we've probably all seen.
Given there has been a lot of fuss about this particular paper, with reports of children in tears, it quite likely did cause more stress than its equivalents in recent years.
Well, I will confess to be a stony hearted bastard on this one.
I do think the premise it must have been worse than preivous years because it has caused more reports this time is fundamentally flawed, as that is the nature of virality sometimes, when even mundane occurences can flare up and get attention despite not even being unusual. A 5 second google reveals stories about SAT tests in some previous years which reportedly left children in tears. Those years also may have been a bit unfair, but it could also be 'some kids are in tears over tests' is a cyclical story.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Would she not? A much reduced parliamentary party looking for easy answers and reacting against perceived centrists Rishi and Hunt?
She got just 32 MPs backing her last year, even in a 1997 size Tory party of 165 MPs that would be less than 20%. Plus some of her biggest MP backers like Steve Baker are in marginal seats and will likely lose those seats.
Tugendhat, Mordaunt and probably Badenoch too would easily beat her again in the MPs rounds as they did last year while Barclay picks up most of Sunak's support if Rishi resigned post election defeat
Boris got no MPs backing him in 2017 because he chickened out as he would not get enough to back him if he did stand. 2 years later some of his supporters were still worried he would not get enough as they were whinging about the process possibly excluding him from the final two. Yet he won easily with MPs.
Not saying she will actually win such a contest, I think it's so dependent on just how bad the loss is and so who remains, and of course your insider view may well be correct, but I think you might be writing her off too soon based on her performance last time. She was not as big a figure then as she is now (she'd only been Attorny General), and may have a 'resigned in protest as Rishi would not let me stop the boats/leave the ECHR' moment to win people over.
If the Tories want someone who will actually get their fires going as Corbyn did for Labour they will elect Jacob Rees Mogg leader (and I think Jacob may well become Tory leader if they suffer 2 consecutive defeats).
Braveman will never be leader, she is not establishment enough to take the leadership post losing power like Barclay, in terms of doing a William Hague or Ed Miliband role.
Nor does she inspire the right and base as much as The Mogg does.
That does surprise me. He seems a bit languid, a little lacking in genuine passion to get the pulses racing, even though they like what he says.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Would she not? A much reduced parliamentary party looking for easy answers and reacting against perceived centrists Rishi and Hunt?
She got just 32 MPs backing her last year, even in a 1997 size Tory party of 165 MPs that would be less than 20%. Plus some of her biggest MP backers like Steve Baker are in marginal seats and will likely lose those seats.
Tugendhat, Mordaunt and probably Badenoch too would easily beat her again in the MPs rounds as they did last year while Barclay picks up most of Sunak's support if Rishi resigned post election defeat
Boris got no MPs backing him in 2017 because he chickened out as he would not get enough to back him if he did stand. 2 years later some of his supporters were still worried he would not get enough as they were whinging about the process possibly excluding him from the final two. Yet he won easily with MPs.
Not saying she will actually win such a contest, I think it's so dependent on just how bad the loss is and so who remains, and of course your insider view may well be correct, but I think you might be writing her off too soon based on her performance last time. She was not as big a figure then as she is now (she'd only been Attorny General), and may have a 'resigned in protest as Rishi would not let me stop the boats/leave the ECHR' moment to win people over.
If the Tories want someone who will actually get their fires going as Corbyn did for Labour they will elect Jacob Rees Mogg leader (and I think Jacob may well become Tory leader if they suffer 2 consecutive defeats).
Braveman will never be leader, she is not establishment enough to take the leadership post losing power like Barclay, in terms of doing a William Hague or Ed Miliband role.
Nor does she inspire the right and base as much as The Mogg does.
That does surprise me. He seems a bit languid, a little lacking in genuine passion to get the pulses racing, even though they like what he says.
He is brighter than Braverman, more articulate than Braverman, overall more rightwing than Braverman (and sad to say for a minority he is a white male unlike her)
Jacob Rees-Mogg as Tory leader would be a superb and optimal outcome for the Labour Party, I would say. Penny Mordaunt, not quite so much.
Tories thought the same about Corbyn but he actually got a higher voteshare than Brown and Ed Miliband in both the general elections he fought as leader and in 2017 nearly became PM, even if he was heavily defeated in 2019.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
More substantial than the 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK is the 16% of 2019 voters voting Labour. It’s a bigger switcheroo than 97.
Actually only 12% of 2019 Tory voters now back Labour including DKs with today's Yougov (in 1997 it was 15% of 1992 Tory voters voting New Labour).
A bigger 20% of 2019 Tory voters are DK and 11%, almost the same, are now RefUK
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Would she not? A much reduced parliamentary party looking for easy answers and reacting against perceived centrists Rishi and Hunt?
She got just 32 MPs backing her last year, even in a 1997 size Tory party of 165 MPs that would be less than 20%. Plus some of her biggest MP backers like Steve Baker are in marginal seats and will likely lose those seats.
Tugendhat, Mordaunt and probably Badenoch too would easily beat her again in the MPs rounds as they did last year while Barclay picks up most of Sunak's support if Rishi resigned post election defeat
Boris got no MPs backing him in 2017 because he chickened out as he would not get enough to back him if he did stand. 2 years later some of his supporters were still worried he would not get enough as they were whinging about the process possibly excluding him from the final two. Yet he won easily with MPs.
Not saying she will actually win such a contest, I think it's so dependent on just how bad the loss is and so who remains, and of course your insider view may well be correct, but I think you might be writing her off too soon based on her performance last time. She was not as big a figure then as she is now (she'd only been Attorny General), and may have a 'resigned in protest as Rishi would not let me stop the boats/leave the ECHR' moment to win people over.
If the Tories want someone who will actually get their fires going as Corbyn did for Labour they will elect Jacob Rees Mogg leader (and I think Jacob may well become Tory leader if they suffer 2 consecutive defeats).
Braveman will never be leader, she is not establishment enough to take the leadership post losing power like Barclay, in terms of doing a William Hague or Ed Miliband role.
Nor does she inspire the right and base as much as The Mogg does.
That does surprise me. He seems a bit languid, a little lacking in genuine passion to get the pulses racing, even though they like what he says.
He is brighter than Braverman, more articulate than Braverman, overall more rightwing than Braverman (and sad to say for a minority he is a white male unlike her)
He has a sort of cult following on youtube, I notice, with various rightwing channels, and quite a strong base of young fans, idealising almost his every intervention.
Then I remember what one of my relatives said about him at Oxford during the '80s ; the comedy and absurdity turn whose eccentricites all the other students would gigglingly marvel at, and enjoy as comedy spectacle and talking point whenever they saw him around town.
Jacob Rees-Mogg as Tory leader would be a superb and optimal outcome for the Labour Party, I would say. Penny Mordaunt, not quite so much.
Tories thought the same about Corbyn but he actually got a higher voteshare than Brown and Ed Miliband in both the general elections he fought as leader and in 2017 nearly became PM, even if he was heavily defeated in 2019.
Mordaunt is too woke to be Tory leader now
You make a good point there, but could get JRM get out the voters to the same extent.
There's some of the cult following and hero worship among young tories already mentioned, but a heavy percentage of the new Tory base is also working-class, and Rees-Mogg is more different from them than Corbyn was from his followers. Ergo it would only work, for him if he's the sort of politician that can exercise the kind of obvious, one-off stardust with these voters that Bozo could. I'm not sure about that, speaking personally. Plus he's heavily associated with Hard Brexit, which is unpopular.
Just to add when Redfield & Wilton asked Reform supporters how they would vote if there were no Reform candidate in their constituency, just a quarter said they would vote Conservative, 15% would back Labour and the majority (52%) wouldn't vote so this notion the "true" centre-right figure is Conservative plus Reform is nonsense.
So more would vote Conservative than Labour then (and in the same way not all Green voters would vote Labour either).
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Good luck getting what’s left of your vote out at the General Election May 2nd next year. Less than 12 months to go now to Starmer in Downing Street.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
Braverman won't even make the last 3 with MPs, let alone become leader
Would she not? A much reduced parliamentary party looking for easy answers and reacting against perceived centrists Rishi and Hunt?
She got just 32 MPs backing her last year, even in a 1997 size Tory party of 165 MPs that would be less than 20%. Plus some of her biggest MP backers like Steve Baker are in marginal seats and will likely lose those seats.
Tugendhat, Mordaunt and probably Badenoch too would easily beat her again in the MPs rounds as they did last year while Barclay picks up most of Sunak's support if Rishi resigned post election defeat
Boris got no MPs backing him in 2017 because he chickened out as he would not get enough to back him if he did stand. 2 years later some of his supporters were still worried he would not get enough as they were whinging about the process possibly excluding him from the final two. Yet he won easily with MPs.
Not saying she will actually win such a contest, I think it's so dependent on just how bad the loss is and so who remains, and of course your insider view may well be correct, but I think you might be writing her off too soon based on her performance last time. She was not as big a figure then as she is now (she'd only been Attorny General), and may have a 'resigned in protest as Rishi would not let me stop the boats/leave the ECHR' moment to win people over.
If the Tories want someone who will actually get their fires going as Corbyn did for Labour they will elect Jacob Rees Mogg leader (and I think Jacob may well become Tory leader if they suffer 2 consecutive defeats).
Braveman will never be leader, she is not establishment enough to take the leadership post losing power like Barclay, in terms of doing a William Hague or Ed Miliband role.
Nor does she inspire the right and base as much as The Mogg does.
That does surprise me. He seems a bit languid, a little lacking in genuine passion to get the pulses racing, even though they like what he says.
If Mogg survives the coming cull, he’s as busted a flush as Boris is now. Things have not gone well for him or his political share price in the last 5 years.
You are spot on KLE, it’s bizarre HY thinks the next Tory Leadership election goes the way of the last - like no stock had fallen or risen in the meantime. It’s so bizarre I don’t think he is being honest with us, given us his want, not his suspicion. Which says a lot about his suspicion if Voldemort trips easier off the tongue than Braverman.
We will take HY at face value - he’s being honest but wrong - exactly where he is wrong, and this is a political betting site, share prices do go up and down between elections, which share prices do we feel have gone up and down since Truss got into last two and comfortably beat Sunak? If the Tory leadership election was today, who do we think the sun, mail, express, telegraph, times would row in behind? They would support Tugendhat ahead of Braverman? Penny ahead of Braverman? All come out for Barclay ahead of Braverman?
It goes back to last nights question from Mike, betting against Trump - I posted the link from Barr pointing out that when push comes to shove, an electorate will be drawn not just to policies, but who comes across as best being able to deliver those policies. It’s exactly that toughness, chutzpah and game face that’s moved Braverman so far ahead of the other candidates at the moment.
Looks like the Germans are also worried about rules of origin for EVs:
Sadly, Vanilla has scaled the image down. Summary: europe's battery industry is too small; continental manufacturers, as well as UK ones, want to be able to import batteries from Asia in the meantime; rules of origin scupper this.
Looks like the Germans are also worried about rules of origin for EVs:
Sadly, Vanilla has scaled the image down. Summary: europe's battery industry is too small; continental manufacturers, as well as UK ones, want to be able to import batteries from Asia in the meantime; rules of origin scupper this.
Should we all be buying shares in battery manufacture?
Meanwhile, not a remainer anti-Brexit story, but maybe a don’t let your country down when you sign trade deals for your short term political benefit, scandal brewing.
A billion-pound industry employing thousands of workers in Leave-voting areas is at risk of being wiped out by part of a post-Brexit trade deal being discussed with India, it is also predicted to raise consumer food prices and break UK limits on pesticides.
Looks like the Germans are also worried about rules of origin for EVs:
Sadly, Vanilla has scaled the image down. Summary: europe's battery industry is too small; continental manufacturers, as well as UK ones, want to be able to import batteries from Asia in the meantime; rules of origin scupper this.
Should we all be buying shares in battery manufacture?
Meanwhile, not a remainer anti-Brexit story, but maybe a don’t let your country down when you sign trade deals for your short term political benefit, scandal brewing.
A billion-pound industry employing thousands of workers in Leave-voting areas is at risk of being wiped out by part of a post-Brexit trade deal being discussed with India, it is also predicted to raise consumer food prices and break UK limits on pesticides.
Looks like the Germans are also worried about rules of origin for EVs:
Sadly, Vanilla has scaled the image down. Summary: europe's battery industry is too small; continental manufacturers, as well as UK ones, want to be able to import batteries from Asia in the meantime; rules of origin scupper this.
Should we all be buying shares in battery manufacture?
Meanwhile, not a remainer anti-Brexit story, but maybe a don’t let your country down when you sign trade deals for your short term political benefit, scandal brewing.
A billion-pound industry employing thousands of workers in Leave-voting areas is at risk of being wiped out by part of a post-Brexit trade deal being discussed with India, it is also predicted to raise consumer food prices and break UK limits on pesticides.
Having tariffs on rice (milled or unmilled) when we can't grow it is nuts, full stop.
(Also, thelondoneconomic is trash)
I come from farming family. Farming industry knows if you cut tarrifs you are actually cutting farming incomes, is the truth.
Correct me where wrong - which I doubt you can because your post was embarrassingly ignorant - but in this report there’s a billion dollar UK industry at stake, and levelling up jobs to protect, and that’s the main purpose for applying tariffs in the first place isn’t it - protect our industries and our workers and their incomes? And are pesticides limits and control not important too?
Whose side are you on, it doesn’t sound like our side, the UK?
But this isn’t really a tariff discussion, but the damage being done to UK everyday through incompetent decision making with the FTA’s the Tory government are negotiating and signing.
You can of course call PoliticsHome trash as well, here they are clearly calling out Business and Trade under this Tory government as being an utter shambles -
fears for firms at risk from cheap imports, that worker protections and economic security are being neglected, that wider opportunities to improve trade performance are being missed, the ‘net zero’ climate promise undermined, also, that the government is weakening its own hand in negotiations.
AI is going to put many people out of work and will cause huge damage to society. Shareholders get bigger dividends and the companies rake in bigger profits but at what cost to humanity .
We have enjoyed those new technologies over the last few decades and to a point they have enriched life but I fear we’re reaching a fork in the road .
I truly believe AI is a threat to humanity .
I don't think it is the effect on employment that makes AI a threat to humanity. It is AI's ability to spin convincing stories that put QAnon in the shade.
Humanity is the greatest threat to humanity, egged on by AI.
We beat France on GDP per capita too(marginally) and everyone beats Japan which has has tumbled down the league tables catastrophically.
On median household income though, ie how much money each family gets to spend on nice stuff every year, France is almost 50% higher than us. And Japan is even lower.
Sunak out, I guess the man who uses helicopters all the time doesn't appreciate what us working class Northerners have to endure with the trains.
Ministers have quietly scrapped plans for the biggest shake-up of the railways since privatisation, The Times has learnt.
Plans for the creation of Great British Railways (GBR), put forward by Boris Johnson as a way to fix Britain’s rail network, have been watered down by No 10.
Officials at the Department for Transport (DfT) working on the new body, which was due to take over the running of the entire network, have been told it is not a priority for the government and will not be brought forward in the King’s Speech.
“Those working on it have been told it’s now unlikely to get a legislative slot,” a source said. “Without it they won’t be able to fully create the body, as it requires primary legislation.”
It is understood there is a battle between the DfT and Downing Street over its creation. Transport ministers are pushing for it to be given parliamentary time but there is pushback from Rishi Sunak, the prime minister, who does not consider the railways a priority for the final session of parliament before the general election.
A source said: “The simple fact is Sunak doesn’t see the railways as a priority. He was in the Treasury during Covid when all he saw was the railways costing eye-watering amounts of money. He’d ask why so much was being spent to ‘ship fresh air’ around the country.”
Plus the arse will never have had to use a train. Would mean him mixing with the great unwashed. He prefers to use private helicopters.
I am somewhat torn on this, because I am not a Sunak fan, but frankly the new 'Great British Rail' organisation sounds like a useless new quango that will fail to achieve things that Network Rail is failing to achieve already. All they've done is attach a 'Boris' style name to it that evokes 'Great Western Railway', but is unlikely to have any similarities beyond the name.
Yes agree, almost certain they will have chums running it and trousering huge sums whilst being thick dullards unable to run a bath.
AI is going to put many people out of work and will cause huge damage to society. Shareholders get bigger dividends and the companies rake in bigger profits but at what cost to humanity .
We have enjoyed those new technologies over the last few decades and to a point they have enriched life but I fear we’re reaching a fork in the road .
I truly believe AI is a threat to humanity .
I don't think it is the effect on employment that makes AI a threat to humanity. It is AI's ability to spin convincing stories that put QAnon in the shade.
Humanity is the greatest threat to humanity, egged on by AI.
A four year old can come up with more convincing stories than QAnon. But point taken.
Sunak out, I guess the man who uses helicopters all the time doesn't appreciate what us working class Northerners have to endure with the trains.
Ministers have quietly scrapped plans for the biggest shake-up of the railways since privatisation, The Times has learnt.
Plans for the creation of Great British Railways (GBR), put forward by Boris Johnson as a way to fix Britain’s rail network, have been watered down by No 10.
Officials at the Department for Transport (DfT) working on the new body, which was due to take over the running of the entire network, have been told it is not a priority for the government and will not be brought forward in the King’s Speech.
“Those working on it have been told it’s now unlikely to get a legislative slot,” a source said. “Without it they won’t be able to fully create the body, as it requires primary legislation.”
It is understood there is a battle between the DfT and Downing Street over its creation. Transport ministers are pushing for it to be given parliamentary time but there is pushback from Rishi Sunak, the prime minister, who does not consider the railways a priority for the final session of parliament before the general election.
A source said: “The simple fact is Sunak doesn’t see the railways as a priority. He was in the Treasury during Covid when all he saw was the railways costing eye-watering amounts of money. He’d ask why so much was being spent to ‘ship fresh air’ around the country.”
Plus the arse will never have had to use a train. Would mean him mixing with the great unwashed. He prefers to use private helicopters.
I am somewhat torn on this, because I am not a Sunak fan, but frankly the new 'Great British Rail' organisation sounds like a useless new quango that will fail to achieve things that Network Rail is failing to achieve already. All they've done is attach a 'Boris' style name to it that evokes 'Great Western Railway', but is unlikely to have any similarities beyond the name.
Yes agree, almost certain they will have chums running it and trousering huge sums whilst being thick dullards unable to run a bath.
We beat France on GDP per capita too(marginally) and everyone beats Japan which has has tumbled down the league tables catastrophically.
On median household income though, ie how much money each family gets to spend on nice stuff every year, France is almost 50% higher than us. And Japan is even lower.
The big difference being the extent to which housing costs, particularly for the young, sucks up a significant proportion of income.
Comments
Invest now in EasyVolt - you'll still end up with no batteries, but at half the price of other failed ventures. EasyVolt - it's so good it's a steal.
I like the idea, but I can see why it might have ended up the way you describe instead.
AI is going to put many people out of work and will cause huge damage to society. Shareholders get bigger dividends and the companies rake in bigger profits but at what cost to humanity .
We have enjoyed those new technologies over the last few decades and to a point they have enriched life but I fear we’re reaching a fork in the road .
I truly believe AI is a threat to humanity .
I’m not sure though, Heathener is a very early bird, the sort of time of day Leon surely has energy crashed into an addled sleep.
Can’t he show them how to make electricity out of mud? 🤭
Follow @Luckyguy1983's example and just BELIEVE. If you BELIEVE strongly enough, your solid state batteries will just work and you'll be rich beyond your wildest dreams.
https://twitter.com/Imposter_Edits/status/1657581292681064451
https://nypost.com/2023/05/18/nyc-hospital-karen-paid-for-citi-bike-at-center-of-fight-with-black-man/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-65624697
Tough questions? Not as far as I can tell. They're easy, even for a 7 year old.
Then the said company had to use the camera on a low-spec setting to get the data they wanted.
God bless the taxpayer...
4 state apples plus 4 private investment apples is 8 apples. 4 state apples is 4 state apples.
The point here isn’t state v privatised, it’s the MODEL of privatisation. Is the current UK model of privatised water, rail, energy etc exactly the same where state and private work together on these same things around the world in other countries?
We know now the Water companies promise to spend £10bn to sort out the sewage problem - and we know now it’s us the bill payers who are forking out the £10bn.
Meanwhile
Interesting to note that we're almost exactly four months after the British decision to send Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine. If the decision to train Ukrainian pilots on F-16s had been taken then, the first pilots could be about ready for combat now.
And in another I don't even understand the criticism of another one, unless there's something I'm missing in its write up, the one about Austin.
Find and copy one word that is closest in meaning to "eat".
Relevant extract: It's actually very appropriate that you call it a "hotspot". The gaps underneath the bridge are a perfect place for mother bats to raise their young. Baby bats are born hairless and have only a few months to develop before travelling south in autumn. They need somewhere warm and safe and the gaps under the bridge are just the right width to trap warmth nicely. These bat pups need to spend their energy on growth, not on keeping themselves warm.
Texas in general is a paradise for bats because of all its tasty insects. A mother bat will go out hunting every evening and consume about two-thirds of her body weight in insects every single night to meet her energy need. The feeding frenzy can last all night.
Answer: The teacher was concerned that the answer was "consume" but many children would have written "feeding". According to the mark scheme, both answers were acceptable.
Look at the first two paragraphs.
In which American state is the Congress Avenue Bridge found?
Relevant extract: By day the Congress Avenue Bridge in the city of Austin could hardly look more normal: a grey, dreary city-centre road bridge. By night, it plays host to one of the most amazing shows nature has to offer. The underside of the bridge is home to more than a million bats, and every evening in summer they all come swarming out at once, rising up into the city sky like a tornado before spreading out in all directions like plumes of smoke. Standing on the bridge, you might even feel the wind from their wings as they pass by.
Austin is the capital city of the state of Texas in the USA, but it is also the bat capital of North America. The bats under the bridge attract thousands of visitors every year, and every August lovers celebrate Bat Fest on the bridge in their honour.
Answer: The answer is Texas but the teacher told us it was likely children would not be familiar enough with American geography to know that Austin is not a state.
But I doubt that could have been kept quiet.
The answer to the question is obvious to you, me and everyone on PB, but we’re weirdos.
Replace it with a British political geography question, I recon.
Not fair to mark them down on the question, as it is.
Desert also concerned by lack of rain.
Is there a surer sign of a, somehow, legal grift than overly complex corporate structuring? It doesn't appear likely to make running a corporation easier.
More significant than either is the substantial 20% of 2019 Tory voters now DK
Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦
@bayraktar_1love
/1. From the CNN article, it is possible to assume that Patriot was involved in recent string of air crashes in the Bryansk region.
“Defense officials and congressional staffers told that 🇺🇦 has in recent weeks used Patriot to shoot down at least one faraway Russian fighter” -CNN
https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1659322199675682816
That's why I don't get the criticism that children may not be familiar enough to know Austin is not a state - whether they even know Texas is a state, or the USA a country, is irrelevant, surely, when the text states 'Austin is the capital city of the state of Texas in the USA'?
Is that a hard question for a 10 year old? As I say I have no idea, and was a strong reader from a fairly young age so hard for me to judge, but it doesn't seem fair to criticise the question for unfairly testing geographic knowledge when it was not doing so as far as I can see.
*much like a kle4 post.
If you want the 8 apples not just 4, look again at the type of privatisation/public private partnerships.
And only three months after that Sunak will hand over saying “with two such brilliant candidates for the party to choose its leader from, we just couldn’t lose.” And someone will shout out - yes. Because you weren’t one of them.
The beaming Braverman will then be applauded to the stage. 😈
https://twitter.com/j_amesmarriott/status/1658817816504463361/photo/1
https://news.yahoo.com/exclusive-us-could-train-ukrainian-pilots-to-fly-f-16s-in-4-months-184136820.html
So given where Reform's current support overwhelmingly came from, it's telling that even in the absence of a Reform candidate at a future General Election, there would be almost no net benefit to the Conservatives. That is, if Reform could count on say 6% support broadly in line with their national polling, then the absence of a Reform candidate would only give back a net 0.6% margin to the Conservatives over Labour (i.e. 25% back to Con, 15% back to Lab, so net 10% of the 6% is 0.6%.)
Reality though is that this time Reform intend to stand in every Conservative constituency as well. If they average even 5% in 2019 Conservative constituencies, which is below their current national polling by and large, then that's 5% more than they got in 2019. So there's the potential for a particularly big swing against the Conservatives in the sort of seats which the Conservatives need to hold to stop Labour getting close to a majority.
A bigger 20% of 2019 Tory voters are DK and 11%, almost the same, are now RefUK
https://docs.cdn.yougov.com/hkn95fc08v/TheTimes_VI_230510_W.pdf
Tugendhat, Mordaunt and probably Badenoch too would easily beat her again in the MPs rounds as they did last year while Barclay picks up most of Sunak's support if Rishi resigned post election defeat
But it feels like making mountains out of a molehill. What's 'unduly stressed' versus 'duly' stressed in this situation? I mean, surely unless everyone gets 100% they will be facing uncertainty about what the right answer is in every question of every test that is ever taken? It's unfair that some people got stressed over that but not those who might have stressed over 'easier' questions because they are not as strong readers to begin with?
The issue is can they reasonably be expected to figure out the correct answer, and the apparent worst example the story could find is one where some people were stressing about an ambiguity but still will have gotten it right.
That is the example the story led with, which given the tenor of the piece was sympathetic was probably the hardest question they could find in the whole paper. I don't want children stressing more than they have to when taking tests, but if that is the most ambiguous example they found it wasn't as bad as some we've probably all seen.
Not saying she will actually win such a contest, I think it's so dependent on just how bad the loss is and so who remains, and of course your insider view may well be correct, but I think you might be writing her off too soon based on her performance last time. She was not as big a figure then as she is now (she'd only been Attorny General), and may have a 'resigned in protest as Rishi would not let me stop the boats/leave the ECHR' moment to win people over.
Second one: text literally says "state of texas" so the criticism is bollocks.
Braveman will never be leader, she is not establishment enough to take the leadership post losing power like Barclay, in terms of doing a William Hague or Ed Miliband role.
Nor does she inspire the right and base as much as The Mogg does.
If Barclay enters an empty room, it feels emptier.
I do think the premise it must have been worse than preivous years because it has caused more reports this time is fundamentally flawed, as that is the nature of virality sometimes, when even mundane occurences can flare up and get attention despite not even being unusual. A 5 second google reveals stories about SAT tests in some previous years which reportedly left children in tears. Those years also may have been a bit unfair, but it could also be 'some kids are in tears over tests' is a cyclical story.
But I'll leave it there.
Jacob Rees-Mogg as Tory leader would be a superb and optimal outcome for the Labour Party, I would say. Penny Mordaunt, not quite so much.
Mordaunt is too woke to be Tory leader now
Then I remember what one of my relatives said about him at Oxford during the '80s ; the comedy and absurdity turn whose eccentricites all the other students would gigglingly marvel at, and enjoy as comedy spectacle and talking point whenever they saw him around town.
There's some of the cult following and hero worship among young tories already mentioned, but a heavy percentage of the new Tory base is also working-class, and Rees-Mogg is more different from them than Corbyn was from his followers. Ergo it would only work, for him if he's the sort of politician that can exercise the kind of obvious, one-off stardust with these voters that Bozo could. I'm not sure about that, speaking personally. Plus he's heavily associated with Hard Brexit, which is unpopular.
You are spot on KLE, it’s bizarre HY thinks the next Tory Leadership election goes the way of the last - like no stock had fallen or risen in the meantime. It’s so bizarre I don’t think he is being honest with us, given us his want, not his suspicion. Which says a lot about his suspicion if Voldemort trips easier off the tongue than Braverman.
We will take HY at face value - he’s being honest but wrong - exactly where he is wrong, and this is a political betting site, share prices do go up and down between elections, which share prices do we feel have gone up and down since Truss got into last two and comfortably beat Sunak? If the Tory leadership election was today, who do we think the sun, mail, express, telegraph, times would row in behind? They would support Tugendhat ahead of Braverman? Penny ahead of Braverman? All come out for Barclay ahead of Braverman?
It goes back to last nights question from Mike, betting against Trump - I posted the link from Barr pointing out that when push comes to shove, an electorate will be drawn not just to policies, but who comes across as best being able to deliver those policies. It’s exactly that toughness, chutzpah and game face that’s moved Braverman so far ahead of the other candidates at the moment.
Sadly, Vanilla has scaled the image down. Summary: europe's battery industry is too small; continental manufacturers, as well as UK ones, want to be able to import batteries from Asia in the meantime; rules of origin scupper this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zh4yqhD98HU
Meanwhile, not a remainer anti-Brexit story, but maybe a don’t let your country down when you sign trade deals for your short term political benefit, scandal brewing.
A billion-pound industry employing thousands of workers in Leave-voting areas is at risk of being wiped out by part of a post-Brexit trade deal being discussed with India, it is also predicted to raise consumer food prices and break UK limits on pesticides.
https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/business-economics/brexit-deal-could-wipe-out-thousands-of-jobs-in-leave-voting-areas-348778/
We are beating France and Japan in it.
https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/business-economics/wealth-of-nations-index-shows-exceptional-drop-for-britain-348454/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfXXslox1PE
(Also, thelondoneconomic is trash)
Correct me where wrong - which I doubt you can because your post was embarrassingly ignorant - but in this report there’s a billion dollar UK industry at stake, and levelling up jobs to protect, and that’s the main purpose for applying tariffs in the first place isn’t it - protect our industries and our workers and their incomes? And are pesticides limits and control not important too?
Whose side are you on, it doesn’t sound like our side, the UK?
But this isn’t really a tariff discussion, but the damage being done to UK everyday through incompetent decision making with the FTA’s the Tory government are negotiating and signing.
You can of course call PoliticsHome trash as well, here they are clearly calling out Business and Trade under this Tory government as being an utter shambles -
fears for firms at risk from cheap imports, that worker protections and economic security are being neglected, that wider opportunities to improve trade performance are being missed, the ‘net zero’ climate promise undermined, also, that the government is weakening its own hand in negotiations.
https://www.politicshome.com/thehouse/article/trade-secret-uks-aims-pursues-new-deals
Humanity is the greatest threat to humanity, egged on by AI.
On median household income though, ie how much money each family gets to spend on nice stuff every year, France is almost 50% higher than us. And Japan is even lower.
But point taken.