Once we have a better understanding of how various genes effect dog behaviour we'll be able to look at a more selective elimination of undesirable traits. Until we reach that point we'll only have crude tools to work with.
During Covid 19 we were constantly told we had to err on the side of caution by locking down the country to protect a small percentage of people. Why aren't we applying the same caution to these dangerous dogs?
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
Could you make dog owners legally responsible for any harm caused by their dog? If you were to imprison dog owners whose dogs caused death or injury would that encourage people to self-regulate and not choose violent dogs?
We have that to an extent. We need to be careful not to provoke owners into simply abandoning their dogs to wander the streets.
Offering £500 per bully to be put down officially? OTOH one has to watch for other undesirable effects (increasing imports).,
Let them loose on grouse moors? Got till the 10th December.
The Conservative London mayoral candidate liked tweets praising Enoch Powell and describing Sadiq Khan as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”.
Susan Hall liked an image of Powell, infamous for his “rivers of blood” speech, on Twitter/X. Alongside the image are the words “it’s never too late to save your country”, a combination once used on the website of the far-right British National Party (BNP). Hall liked a tweet posting the photo with the message: “it’s never too late to get London back!”
Hall, a former Conservative councillor who backed Donald Trump and spoke of her “joy” at Liz Truss’s mini-budget, was selected as the party’s candidate for the mayoral race in July.
In one post liked by Hall, Khan, the London mayor, is described as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”, the term Londonistan a sobriquet anti-racist campaigners say is often used pejoratively. The full tweet reads: “Please be upstanding for @Councillorsuzie reminding our nipple height mayor of Londonistan to stop trying to overturn Brexit and start doing his job. Well done Suzie. X”
In another tweet praising her questioning of the London mayor’s violence against women and girls strategy, Hall liked a comment which said: “Well said Susan, that Labour Traitor RAT likes that sort of thing”.
I'm going to regret asking this but what does 'RAT' stand for in that context?
The vernacular English term for Rattus spp, I believe.
Diagnostic of someone who liked single spacing, green ribbon and the shift key on the typewriter in the old days before Male Online was a thing in Viz?
The analogy with Pascal's wager (which I had to google) is especially elegant.
I suspect you want the election out of the way before the US election has taken place - i suspect the amount of news coverage it would get post election while the vote is fought over would make kicking off any campaign for December very difficult.
Hence I stick to the date I happened upon 10 months ago Thursday October 24th 2024.
A week or so before the US election, gives Rishi exactly 2 years as PM and doesn't look desperate...
Once we have a better understanding of how various genes effect dog behaviour we'll be able to look at a more selective elimination of undesirable traits. Until we reach that point we''ll only have crude tools to work with.
Not speaking against investment in science and general intellectual curiosity, but I'm not sure how high I'd put this on research priorities. Better a cheap quick ban than a lengthy expensive study.
I’d guess that most of the needed tools will come out of Big Ag.
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
That law is said to be awful by everyone, but the fact is, it worked. Deaths by dogs have stayed low for decades. Now they are surging because a new “breed” has dodged the definitions
And if the law doesn’t work for Bully XLs, then just cut and paste the Aussie law, which bans breeds by visual characteristics: if your dog looks enough like a fighting dog, it gets the bullet. Sorry
Anyone who scans through this list should see why the Bully XL should be immediately banned. Good arguments for Staffordshire Bull Terriers and American Bulls in general too.
2/1 Boris getting divorced 5/1 Harry getting divorced (but doesn't know yet) 8/1 Sir Keir divorced from reality 10/1 SNP & Greens to divorce before election 20/1 Nigel Farage's latest bank divorcing him 50/1 Humza Yousuf postpones UK/Scotland divorce 70/1 Unions to divorce Labour https://twitter.com/_RGArmstrong/status/1702632282589184336
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
Could you make dog owners legally responsible for any harm caused by their dog? If you were to imprison dog owners whose dogs caused death or injury would that encourage people to self-regulate and not choose violent dogs?
We have that to an extent. We need to be careful not to provoke owners into simply abandoning their dogs to wander the streets.
Offering £500 per bully to be put down officially? OTOH one has to watch for other undesirable effects (increasing imports).,
Let them loose on grouse moors? Got till the 10th December.
Bit hard on the beaters.
It's a point though - do the owners get compo? Perfectly legal property at the moment, and all that. With the firearms control act after Dunblane as a recent precedent (i.e. owners of hitherto harmless guns/dogs determined as dangerous have to give them up, but get compo).
That may be one reason for HMG talking about the end of the year.
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
Could you make dog owners legally responsible for any harm caused by their dog? If you were to imprison dog owners whose dogs caused death or injury would that encourage people to self-regulate and not choose violent dogs?
We have that to an extent. We need to be careful not to provoke owners into simply abandoning their dogs to wander the streets.
Offering £500 per bully to be put down officially? OTOH one has to watch for other undesirable effects (increasing imports).,
Let them loose on grouse moors? Got till the 10th December.
Bit hard on the beaters.
It's a point though - do the owners get compo? Perfectly legal property at the moment, and all that. With the firearms control act after Dunblane as a recent precedent (i.e. owners of hitherto harmless guns/dogs determined as dangerous have to give them up, but get compo).
That may be one reason for HMG talking about the end of the year.
They will just use it to buy an Australian 4xBully....
Even after all this, it might still be politically savvy to oppose a ban. People love their dogs.
People love their dogs. People don't love other people's dogs. The greatest freedom cherished by the British is the ability to mess with other people's lives, and we had two years of lockdown to prove it. If enough (important?) people want to kill other people's dogs to make them feel safe, the state will oblige.
"Rumour has it the Sunday Times is working on a big story this weekend — biggest of the year, supposedly. Due to drop tomorrow at 3pm. Leave cancelled, all hands to the pump, security tightened, etc. May be a sex scandal of some kind, possibly involving a politician. Anyone know?"
I mean, it's Toby Young so it could be bullshit. But I know PB loves an unsubstantiated rumour.
According to the Twitter comments (!) Iain Dale has also hinted at something, and there’s a Dispatches programme scheduled for 9pm tomorrow on C4, but with no further details of the content.
Presumably it’s a bit more serious than someone in the cabinet snogging their secretary.
3pm seems a bit early to drop a bombshell exclusive as it gives the other papers several hours to copy it, although I suppose a television tie-in might be the reason. Hmm. "Bombshell exclusive" works even though it uses a noun as an adjective and an adjective as a noun. Take that, English teachers!
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
Could you make dog owners legally responsible for any harm caused by their dog? If you were to imprison dog owners whose dogs caused death or injury would that encourage people to self-regulate and not choose violent dogs?
We have that to an extent. We need to be careful not to provoke owners into simply abandoning their dogs to wander the streets.
Offering £500 per bully to be put down officially? OTOH one has to watch for other undesirable effects (increasing imports).,
Let them loose on grouse moors? Got till the 10th December.
Bit hard on the beaters.
It's a point though - do the owners get compo? Perfectly legal property at the moment, and all that. With the firearms control act after Dunblane as a recent precedent (i.e. owners of hitherto harmless guns/dogs determined as dangerous have to give them up, but get compo).
That may be one reason for HMG talking about the end of the year.
Property rights aren't absolute. If we want to ban this breed, we shouldn't automatically default to thinking we have to compensate owners. Maybe chuck them a token quid.
Owners of full automatic-capable SLRs and the like had to get rid of them after Huingerford . Not sure how much they were paid in terms of the prices originally, but I don't suppose your average XL Bully comes with a receipt and VAT invoice from Dugs'r'Us out on the shopping estate. Though there is of course a strand of Conservative thought that is against such nanny statism.
I've undecided on the XL dogs thing (I think a ban might be good though definitions and case law may make it difficult) but it feels very much like a distraction from issues that actually worry people. Do most people - even on rough estates - fret that they might be attacked when they go out? I'd guess not. And every week that Ministers don't seem to be paying attention to problems that actually do worry people is another wasted week for Sunak. He only has about 54 weeks...
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
Could you make dog owners legally responsible for any harm caused by their dog? If you were to imprison dog owners whose dogs caused death or injury would that encourage people to self-regulate and not choose violent dogs?
We have that to an extent. We need to be careful not to provoke owners into simply abandoning their dogs to wander the streets.
Offering £500 per bully to be put down officially? OTOH one has to watch for other undesirable effects (increasing imports).,
Let them loose on grouse moors? Got till the 10th December.
Bit hard on the beaters.
It's a point though - do the owners get compo? Perfectly legal property at the moment, and all that. With the firearms control act after Dunblane as a recent precedent (i.e. owners of hitherto harmless guns/dogs determined as dangerous have to give them up, but get compo).
That may be one reason for HMG talking about the end of the year.
They will just use it to buy an Australian 4xBully....
That too. Hence the need to do something to make the DDA future proof as well, if not on quite tyhe same timescale then pretry soon.
I've undecided on the XL dogs thing (I think a ban might be good though definitions and case law may make it difficult) but it feels very much like a distraction from issues that actually worry people. Do most people - even on rough estates - fret that they might be attacked when they go out? I'd guess not. And every week that Ministers don't seem to be paying attention to problems that actually do worry people is another wasted week for Sunak. He only has about 54 weeks...
Other breeds like pit bulls are banned so not hard to ban these- They are obviously dangerous (the poor man attacked yesterday was killed by two of them) . The benefit of not banning them (ie a load of wannabee hard blokes having them to look tough is not outweighing the danger of them. I normally default against banning anything or having rules imposed by the state but this seems even to me to be pretty clear cut
I've undecided on the XL dogs thing (I think a ban might be good though definitions and case law may make it difficult) but it feels very much like a distraction from issues that actually worry people. Do most people - even on rough estates - fret that they might be attacked when they go out? I'd guess not. And every week that Ministers don't seem to be paying attention to problems that actually do worry people is another wasted week for Sunak. He only has about 54 weeks...
Other breeds like pit bulls are banned so not hard to ban these- They are obviously dangerous (the poor man attacked yesterday was killed by two of them) . The benefit of not banning them (ie a load of wannabee hard blokes having them to look tough is not outweighing the danger of them. I normally default against banning anything or having rules imposed by the state but this seems even to me to be pretty clear cut
The Conservative London mayoral candidate liked tweets praising Enoch Powell and describing Sadiq Khan as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”.
Susan Hall liked an image of Powell, infamous for his “rivers of blood” speech, on Twitter/X. Alongside the image are the words “it’s never too late to save your country”, a combination once used on the website of the far-right British National Party (BNP). Hall liked a tweet posting the photo with the message: “it’s never too late to get London back!”
Hall, a former Conservative councillor who backed Donald Trump and spoke of her “joy” at Liz Truss’s mini-budget, was selected as the party’s candidate for the mayoral race in July.
In one post liked by Hall, Khan, the London mayor, is described as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”, the term Londonistan a sobriquet anti-racist campaigners say is often used pejoratively. The full tweet reads: “Please be upstanding for @Councillorsuzie reminding our nipple height mayor of Londonistan to stop trying to overturn Brexit and start doing his job. Well done Suzie. X”
In another tweet praising her questioning of the London mayor’s violence against women and girls strategy, Hall liked a comment which said: “Well said Susan, that Labour Traitor RAT likes that sort of thing”.
I'm going to regret asking this but what does 'RAT' stand for in that context?
Probably just pointless capitalisation. Random right wing nutters on social media have some of the worst punctuation, grammar and spelling skills I've ever seen. I sometimes read BTL comments under Sadiq Khan FB posts just to top up my feelings of moral and intellectual superiority when they briefly flag.
The Conservative London mayoral candidate liked tweets praising Enoch Powell and describing Sadiq Khan as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”.
Susan Hall liked an image of Powell, infamous for his “rivers of blood” speech, on Twitter/X. Alongside the image are the words “it’s never too late to save your country”, a combination once used on the website of the far-right British National Party (BNP). Hall liked a tweet posting the photo with the message: “it’s never too late to get London back!”
Hall, a former Conservative councillor who backed Donald Trump and spoke of her “joy” at Liz Truss’s mini-budget, was selected as the party’s candidate for the mayoral race in July.
In one post liked by Hall, Khan, the London mayor, is described as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”, the term Londonistan a sobriquet anti-racist campaigners say is often used pejoratively. The full tweet reads: “Please be upstanding for @Councillorsuzie reminding our nipple height mayor of Londonistan to stop trying to overturn Brexit and start doing his job. Well done Suzie. X”
In another tweet praising her questioning of the London mayor’s violence against women and girls strategy, Hall liked a comment which said: “Well said Susan, that Labour Traitor RAT likes that sort of thing”.
I've undecided on the XL dogs thing (I think a ban might be good though definitions and case law may make it difficult) but it feels very much like a distraction from issues that actually worry people. Do most people - even on rough estates - fret that they might be attacked when they go out? I'd guess not. And every week that Ministers don't seem to be paying attention to problems that actually do worry people is another wasted week for Sunak. He only has about 54 weeks...
Though Sunak's other problem is that the stack of problems people are worrying about are increasingly the ones where Conservative Brain isn't that well equipped to solve them. The same happened the other way from about 2007.
I've undecided on the XL dogs thing (I think a ban might be good though definitions and case law may make it difficult) but it feels very much like a distraction from issues that actually worry people. Do most people - even on rough estates - fret that they might be attacked when they go out? I'd guess not. And every week that Ministers don't seem to be paying attention to problems that actually do worry people is another wasted week for Sunak. He only has about 54 weeks...
Surely everyone has had experience of a dog off the leash racing up to them barking and snarling, with the owner alternating between fruitlessly calling at the beast, and failing to reassure with the claim that, "don't worry, he's harmless!"
It doesn't have to make them scared to leave the house to feel as though they might be personally affected.
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
Could you make dog owners legally responsible for any harm caused by their dog? If you were to imprison dog owners whose dogs caused death or injury would that encourage people to self-regulate and not choose violent dogs?
We have that to an extent. We need to be careful not to provoke owners into simply abandoning their dogs to wander the streets.
Offering £500 per bully to be put down officially? OTOH one has to watch for other undesirable effects (increasing imports).,
Let them loose on grouse moors? Got till the 10th December.
Bit hard on the beaters.
It's a point though - do the owners get compo? Perfectly legal property at the moment, and all that. With the firearms control act after Dunblane as a recent precedent (i.e. owners of hitherto harmless guns/dogs determined as dangerous have to give them up, but get compo).
That may be one reason for HMG talking about the end of the year.
Property rights aren't absolute. If we want to ban this breed, we shouldn't automatically default to thinking we have to compensate owners. Maybe chuck them a token quid.
Owners of full automatic-capable SLRs and the like had to get rid of them after Huingerford . Not sure how much they were paid in terms of the prices originally, but I don't suppose your average XL Bully comes with a receipt and VAT invoice from Dugs'r'Us out on the shopping estate. Though there is of course a strand of Conservative thought that is against such nanny statism.
Is there any data from previous elections (1997 may be the best comparison, not because the outcomes will be similar [we don't know that yet], but because the overarching narrative this far out is similar)?
In, say, March 1996, how many Con voters from GE1992 were saying they didn't know which way they'd vote? And what did the voting pattern of GE1992 Con voters end up looking like in GE1997?
If we can find out, that could be a major piece of evidence to help us decide whether the betting markets this time are about right, or whether they really are consistently overrating the chances of a Lab majority, as you've been saying for some while, Mike.
But the big difference - and it underlies the story in the lead - is that whilst we have a government that is utterly discredited in most people’s eyes, we don’t have an opposition with anything like the credibility or that is generating anything like the hope and enthusiasm (misplaced though much of it turned out to be) that Blair’s government in waiting did in 1996-97.
I think you've made a reasonable case for Labour achieving a majority of less than the 177 majority that Blair achieved. But that's very different from making a case that Labour won't achieve a majority at all.
Swing back to the govt must surely be less likely when a new leader or two has been in place since the last election mustn’t it? Especially when the party under the new leaders has never polled as high as it did under the one who voters elected.
1992 gives a strong counter to that argument.
Swingback is usually DKs returning home as much as swing voters swinging back. We can expect some of the DKs to reluctantly return to the Tories - does anyone really expect Labour to win by 20%? - but that's still just dropping the scale of the defeat, not the fact of it.
Sure, but in this case the Tories only sank to being so far behind after they got rid of the election winner - I assume there was an uptick rather than fall in their VI when Major replaced Mrs T.
Interesting to speculate on the margin of victory & turnout level. I wonder could there possibly be a black swan that sees the Tories win? It l’d have to be a pretty big one
That's not entirely true. Tory polling recovered a bit after Truss took over, then tanked spectacularly once she started doing things. Sunak then steadied the ship a little but at levels below where Johnson left them, where they remain.
Johnson's electoral record when not up against the geriatric loony left is less impressive. He was far from an election winner by summer 2022 - the Tories lost a quarter of the seats they were defending at the local elections that year, and had he stayed, his conduct and entitlement would doubtless have dragged his ratings down still further, and his party's with them.
The situation in 1990-2 was also complex. There was a huge swing back to the Tories when they replaced their (three-time) election winner who by then was a liability, which was boosted further by the Gulf War but then sank through 1991 as the economy came centre-stage, to Labour holding healthy but not spectacular leads, only for Major to then turn the tables again in the election campaign.
In mid term Boris was losing by elections and popularity for sure, but I’d bet odds on he’d be doing better than the Tories are now.
Interesting that Livingstone is insulted as geriatric loony left when he was the incumbent Mayor in 2008 &, despite being defeated, was the Labour candidate, increasing their share of the vote, four years later. They couldn’t have thought he was that bad.
Boris may have only beaten Livingstone & Corbyn, but they’re the only people he fought aren’t they? And they both either beat his predecessor, or denied them a majority.
We can all create our own counter factuals.
Sunak is polling only a few points worse than Johnson was when the latter was dumped. Given Johnson's problems with the Privileges Cttee, I doubt he'd have improved on where he was - plus he'd be held more at fault for services so obviously falling apart.
Livingstone got nuttier the longer he went on. The Tories were riding high in 2008 and Ken was ripe for defeat. Johnson holding the mayoralty in 2012 *was* an impressive achievement but the Boris of then is a long way from the Boris of now.
Obviously, you're right about Corbyn in 2017 though that was mainly down to the catastrophic Tory campaign. May was 18-20 points up when she called the election. A confident manner and a sensible manifesto would have delivered a landslide. Remember that despite that, May's ratings were better at every point in the 2017 election than Johnson's were at any point in the 2019 one.
The Conservative London mayoral candidate liked tweets praising Enoch Powell and describing Sadiq Khan as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”.
Susan Hall liked an image of Powell, infamous for his “rivers of blood” speech, on Twitter/X. Alongside the image are the words “it’s never too late to save your country”, a combination once used on the website of the far-right British National Party (BNP). Hall liked a tweet posting the photo with the message: “it’s never too late to get London back!”
Hall, a former Conservative councillor who backed Donald Trump and spoke of her “joy” at Liz Truss’s mini-budget, was selected as the party’s candidate for the mayoral race in July.
In one post liked by Hall, Khan, the London mayor, is described as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”, the term Londonistan a sobriquet anti-racist campaigners say is often used pejoratively. The full tweet reads: “Please be upstanding for @Councillorsuzie reminding our nipple height mayor of Londonistan to stop trying to overturn Brexit and start doing his job. Well done Suzie. X”
In another tweet praising her questioning of the London mayor’s violence against women and girls strategy, Hall liked a comment which said: “Well said Susan, that Labour Traitor RAT likes that sort of thing”.
I thought it’d be difficult to select a candidate worse than Sean Bailey, but by golly they’ve only just gone and done it - and by some margin.
Coming back to why would ex-Tories return to the fold it is precisely by picking such complete morons as Susan Hall that keeps me out of the party and with scant inclination to vote for them.
It was a bit like Dave's appointments - could they really not find any Northern, sensible, non-OE people to appoint as SPADs or PPCs, to which the answer at the time was apparently not.
I've undecided on the XL dogs thing (I think a ban might be good though definitions and case law may make it difficult) but it feels very much like a distraction from issues that actually worry people. Do most people - even on rough estates - fret that they might be attacked when they go out? I'd guess not. And every week that Ministers don't seem to be paying attention to problems that actually do worry people is another wasted week for Sunak. He only has about 54 weeks...
Other breeds like pit bulls are banned so not hard to ban these- They are obviously dangerous (the poor man attacked yesterday was killed by two of them) . The benefit of not banning them (ie a load of wannabee hard blokes having them to look tough is not outweighing the danger of them. I normally default against banning anything or having rules imposed by the state but this seems even to me to be pretty clear cut
STATIST! STATIST!
As I said even me thinks they should be banned
Sounds like a slippery slope to spies in your underwear draw and the government monitoring the frequency of your bowel movements. Never had you down as a totalitarian!
Maybe there's a softer approach where we pay well known members of the wokerati to buy Bully XLs and dress them in pink ribbons etc until ownership of such beasts becomes severely suspect in the circles in which they are popular.
Or short cut that with a Sun story on how Bully XL possession is a sign of repressed homosexuality/liberal voting tendancies/remoanerism or something.
Given lockdown and the circumstances of people buying dogs in lockdown it is no surprise whatsoever that dog attacks have risen so dramatically over the past five years. Of whatever breed.
But well done Leon - he called a ban from the outset and lo it has come to pass.
The Conservative London mayoral candidate liked tweets praising Enoch Powell and describing Sadiq Khan as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”.
Susan Hall liked an image of Powell, infamous for his “rivers of blood” speech, on Twitter/X. Alongside the image are the words “it’s never too late to save your country”, a combination once used on the website of the far-right British National Party (BNP). Hall liked a tweet posting the photo with the message: “it’s never too late to get London back!”
Hall, a former Conservative councillor who backed Donald Trump and spoke of her “joy” at Liz Truss’s mini-budget, was selected as the party’s candidate for the mayoral race in July.
In one post liked by Hall, Khan, the London mayor, is described as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”, the term Londonistan a sobriquet anti-racist campaigners say is often used pejoratively. The full tweet reads: “Please be upstanding for @Councillorsuzie reminding our nipple height mayor of Londonistan to stop trying to overturn Brexit and start doing his job. Well done Suzie. X”
In another tweet praising her questioning of the London mayor’s violence against women and girls strategy, Hall liked a comment which said: “Well said Susan, that Labour Traitor RAT likes that sort of thing”.
I thought it’d be difficult to select a candidate worse than Sean Bailey, but by golly they’ve only just gone and done it - and by some margin.
Unfortunately, Susan Hall probably is an accurate standard bearer for what's left of the Conservatives in London. Probably calamitous in a Londonwide election, and goodness only knows what would happen if she did win, but that's a different matter.
It's quite common for struggling parties to go a long way down the rabbit hole.
The Conservative London mayoral candidate liked tweets praising Enoch Powell and describing Sadiq Khan as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”.
Susan Hall liked an image of Powell, infamous for his “rivers of blood” speech, on Twitter/X. Alongside the image are the words “it’s never too late to save your country”, a combination once used on the website of the far-right British National Party (BNP). Hall liked a tweet posting the photo with the message: “it’s never too late to get London back!”
Hall, a former Conservative councillor who backed Donald Trump and spoke of her “joy” at Liz Truss’s mini-budget, was selected as the party’s candidate for the mayoral race in July.
In one post liked by Hall, Khan, the London mayor, is described as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”, the term Londonistan a sobriquet anti-racist campaigners say is often used pejoratively. The full tweet reads: “Please be upstanding for @Councillorsuzie reminding our nipple height mayor of Londonistan to stop trying to overturn Brexit and start doing his job. Well done Suzie. X”
In another tweet praising her questioning of the London mayor’s violence against women and girls strategy, Hall liked a comment which said: “Well said Susan, that Labour Traitor RAT likes that sort of thing”.
I thought it’d be difficult to select a candidate worse than Sean Bailey, but by golly they’ve only just gone and done it - and by some margin.
Tbf I'm not too sure about condemning people for tweets they have "liked". I know both sides do it, but when I think of some of the PB posts I've liked, it rarely means I agree 100 per cent and wish I'd written it myself.
Back from a sun-drenched Athens, and the scenic Plaka District, to news of dangerous dogs legislation.
Is it the year 1995 ?
Once you pass through immigration at your UK destination airport you will realise your error and recognise it can only be after 2020...or before 1973 ( I can't remember when FoM became a thing).
The Conservative London mayoral candidate liked tweets praising Enoch Powell and describing Sadiq Khan as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”.
Susan Hall liked an image of Powell, infamous for his “rivers of blood” speech, on Twitter/X. Alongside the image are the words “it’s never too late to save your country”, a combination once used on the website of the far-right British National Party (BNP). Hall liked a tweet posting the photo with the message: “it’s never too late to get London back!”
Hall, a former Conservative councillor who backed Donald Trump and spoke of her “joy” at Liz Truss’s mini-budget, was selected as the party’s candidate for the mayoral race in July.
In one post liked by Hall, Khan, the London mayor, is described as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”, the term Londonistan a sobriquet anti-racist campaigners say is often used pejoratively. The full tweet reads: “Please be upstanding for @Councillorsuzie reminding our nipple height mayor of Londonistan to stop trying to overturn Brexit and start doing his job. Well done Suzie. X”
In another tweet praising her questioning of the London mayor’s violence against women and girls strategy, Hall liked a comment which said: “Well said Susan, that Labour Traitor RAT likes that sort of thing”.
I thought it’d be difficult to select a candidate worse than Sean Bailey, but by golly they’ve only just gone and done it - and by some margin.
Tbf I'm not too sure about condemning people for tweets they have "liked". I know both sides do it, but when I think of some of the PB posts I've liked, it rarely means I agree 100 per cent and wish I'd written it myself.
True, but I think most of us have sufficient judgement to avoid liking messages there obviously racist or peddling conspiracy theories.
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
That law is said to be awful by everyone, but the fact is, it worked. Deaths by dogs have stayed low for decades. Now they are surging because a new “breed” has dodged the definitions
And if the law doesn’t work for Bully XLs, then just cut and paste the Aussie law, which bans breeds by visual characteristics: if your dog looks enough like a fighting dog, it gets the bullet. Sorry
Anyone who scans through this list should see why the Bully XL should be immediately banned. Good arguments for Staffordshire Bull Terriers and American Bulls in general too.
And it’s taken to now for this useless government to think about banning them .
Very interesting read on Russian artillery challenges in Ukraine.
Russia's Problems with Artillery Support Are Growing There are major problems now with Russian artillery in Ukraine. "Every day Ukrainian forces are degrading Russian arty which throughout the war has been a strong suit for Moscow. They have leveled out parity and seem to actually have gained the upper hand." https://x.com/randymot4/status/1702657716986991038?s=20
The Conservative London mayoral candidate liked tweets praising Enoch Powell and describing Sadiq Khan as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”.
Susan Hall liked an image of Powell, infamous for his “rivers of blood” speech, on Twitter/X. Alongside the image are the words “it’s never too late to save your country”, a combination once used on the website of the far-right British National Party (BNP). Hall liked a tweet posting the photo with the message: “it’s never too late to get London back!”
Hall, a former Conservative councillor who backed Donald Trump and spoke of her “joy” at Liz Truss’s mini-budget, was selected as the party’s candidate for the mayoral race in July.
In one post liked by Hall, Khan, the London mayor, is described as “our nipple height mayor of Londonistan”, the term Londonistan a sobriquet anti-racist campaigners say is often used pejoratively. The full tweet reads: “Please be upstanding for @Councillorsuzie reminding our nipple height mayor of Londonistan to stop trying to overturn Brexit and start doing his job. Well done Suzie. X”
In another tweet praising her questioning of the London mayor’s violence against women and girls strategy, Hall liked a comment which said: “Well said Susan, that Labour Traitor RAT likes that sort of thing”.
I thought it’d be difficult to select a candidate worse than Sean Bailey, but by golly they’ve only just gone and done it - and by some margin.
Unfortunately, Susan Hall probably is an accurate standard bearer for what's left of the Conservatives in London. Probably calamitous in a Londonwide election, and goodness only knows what would happen if she did win, but that's a different matter.
It's quite common for struggling parties to go a long way down the rabbit hole.
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
Could you make dog owners legally responsible for any harm caused by their dog? If you were to imprison dog owners whose dogs caused death or injury would that encourage people to self-regulate and not choose violent dogs?
We have that to an extent. We need to be careful not to provoke owners into simply abandoning their dogs to wander the streets.
Offering £500 per bully to be put down officially? OTOH one has to watch for other undesirable effects (increasing imports).,
Let them loose on grouse moors? Got till the 10th December.
Bit hard on the beaters.
It's a point though - do the owners get compo? Perfectly legal property at the moment, and all that. With the firearms control act after Dunblane as a recent precedent (i.e. owners of hitherto harmless guns/dogs determined as dangerous have to give them up, but get compo).
That may be one reason for HMG talking about the end of the year.
Property rights aren't absolute. If we want to ban this breed, we shouldn't automatically default to thinking we have to compensate owners. Maybe chuck them a token quid.
Owners of full automatic-capable SLRs and the like had to get rid of them after Huingerford . Not sure how much they were paid in terms of the prices originally, but I don't suppose your average XL Bully comes with a receipt and VAT invoice from Dugs'r'Us out on the shopping estate. Though there is of course a strand of Conservative thought that is against such nanny statism.
Swing back to the govt must surely be less likely when a new leader or two has been in place since the last election mustn’t it? Especially when the party under the new leaders has never polled as high as it did under the one who voters elected.
1992 gives a strong counter to that argument.
Swingback is usually DKs returning home as much as swing voters swinging back. We can expect some of the DKs to reluctantly return to the Tories - does anyone really expect Labour to win by 20%? - but that's still just dropping the scale of the defeat, not the fact of it.
Sure, but in this case the Tories only sank to being so far behind after they got rid of the election winner - I assume there was an uptick rather than fall in their VI when Major replaced Mrs T.
Interesting to speculate on the margin of victory & turnout level. I wonder could there possibly be a black swan that sees the Tories win? It l’d have to be a pretty big one
That's not entirely true. Tory polling recovered a bit after Truss took over, then tanked spectacularly once she started doing things. Sunak then steadied the ship a little but at levels below where Johnson left them, where they remain.
Johnson's electoral record when not up against the geriatric loony left is less impressive. He was far from an election winner by summer 2022 - the Tories lost a quarter of the seats they were defending at the local elections that year, and had he stayed, his conduct and entitlement would doubtless have dragged his ratings down still further, and his party's with them.
The situation in 1990-2 was also complex. There was a huge swing back to the Tories when they replaced their (three-time) election winner who by then was a liability, which was boosted further by the Gulf War but then sank through 1991 as the economy came centre-stage, to Labour holding healthy but not spectacular leads, only for Major to then turn the tables again in the election campaign.
In mid term Boris was losing by elections and popularity for sure, but I’d bet odds on he’d be doing better than the Tories are now.
Interesting that Livingstone is insulted as geriatric loony left when he was the incumbent Mayor in 2008 &, despite being defeated, was the Labour candidate, increasing their share of the vote, four years later. They couldn’t have thought he was that bad.
Boris may have only beaten Livingstone & Corbyn, but they’re the only people he fought aren’t they? And they both either beat his predecessor, or denied them a majority.
We can all create our own counter factuals.
Sunak is polling only a few points worse than Johnson was when the latter was dumped. Given Johnson's problems with the Privileges Cttee, I doubt he'd have improved on where he was - plus he'd be held more at fault for services so obviously falling apart.
Livingstone got nuttier the longer he went on. The Tories were riding high in 2008 and Ken was ripe for defeat. Johnson holding the mayoralty in 2012 *was* an impressive achievement but the Boris of then is a long way from the Boris of now.
Obviously, you're right about Corbyn in 2017 though that was mainly down to the catastrophic Tory campaign. May was 18-20 points up when she called the election. A confident manner and a sensible manifesto would have delivered a landslide. Remember that despite that, May's ratings were better at every point in the 2017 election than Johnson's were at any point in the 2019 one.
Back from a sun-drenched Athens, and the scenic Plaka District, to news of dangerous dogs legislation.
Is it the year 1995 ?
Once you pass through immigration at your UK destination airport you will realise your error and recognise it can only be after 2020...or before 1973 ( I can't remember when FoM became a thing).
Nothing is absolute, but property rights should not be violated unless under a specific law and then genuine compensation provided. My stuff is my stuff, thank you
I reckon the government will still have to move quicker however. “By the end of the year” there will be more deaths and more videos
Immediate muzzling?
Isn't the problem still the boring technical one that our understanding of what they are (yes, horrible evil things) doesn't extend beyond "we can't define it, but we know it when we see it".
And, as with pornography, that makes a ban difficult to do without overreach. Sunak has asked the boffins to come up with a workable definition- what does he do if they come back saying "sorry boss, there isn't one"?
The original Dangerous Dogs Act (1991) is still a law school textbook example of a terrible piece of legislation.
Any amendment to, or extension of, it, needs to be carefully thought through, both that it does what it’s supposed to do, and for any loopholes or unintended consequences.
If you’re going to be prosecuting, or even imprisoning, those who break this law, it needs to be able to stand up to an expert lawyer at the Court of Appeal.
I've mentioned this here before, but if the Dangerous Dogs Act is quite such a terrible piece of legislation, it's interesting it remains on the statute books more than three decades later.
I'd agree it isn't great, caused some consternation at the time for dog owners, and the power to add breeds to the banned list hasn't been exercised for many years (which is a reason for caution). But it has a totemic status as the textbook example of dreadful law that is quite hard to square with its sheer longevity.
It is still on the statute book as it is popular with the public on the whole, as is this XL Bully Dog ban
Swing back to the govt must surely be less likely when a new leader or two has been in place since the last election mustn’t it? Especially when the party under the new leaders has never polled as high as it did under the one who voters elected.
1992 gives a strong counter to that argument.
Swingback is usually DKs returning home as much as swing voters swinging back. We can expect some of the DKs to reluctantly return to the Tories - does anyone really expect Labour to win by 20%? - but that's still just dropping the scale of the defeat, not the fact of it.
Sure, but in this case the Tories only sank to being so far behind after they got rid of the election winner - I assume there was an uptick rather than fall in their VI when Major replaced Mrs T.
Interesting to speculate on the margin of victory & turnout level. I wonder could there possibly be a black swan that sees the Tories win? It l’d have to be a pretty big one
That's not entirely true. Tory polling recovered a bit after Truss took over, then tanked spectacularly once she started doing things. Sunak then steadied the ship a little but at levels below where Johnson left them, where they remain.
Johnson's electoral record when not up against the geriatric loony left is less impressive. He was far from an election winner by summer 2022 - the Tories lost a quarter of the seats they were defending at the local elections that year, and had he stayed, his conduct and entitlement would doubtless have dragged his ratings down still further, and his party's with them.
The situation in 1990-2 was also complex. There was a huge swing back to the Tories when they replaced their (three-time) election winner who by then was a liability, which was boosted further by the Gulf War but then sank through 1991 as the economy came centre-stage, to Labour holding healthy but not spectacular leads, only for Major to then turn the tables again in the election campaign.
In mid term Boris was losing by elections and popularity for sure, but I’d bet odds on he’d be doing better than the Tories are now.
Interesting that Livingstone is insulted as geriatric loony left when he was the incumbent Mayor in 2008 &, despite being defeated, was the Labour candidate, increasing their share of the vote, four years later. They couldn’t have thought he was that bad.
Boris may have only beaten Livingstone & Corbyn, but they’re the only people he fought aren’t they? And they both either beat his predecessor, or denied them a majority.
We can all create our own counter factuals.
Sunak is polling only a few points worse than Johnson was when the latter was dumped. Given Johnson's problems with the Privileges Cttee, I doubt he'd have improved on where he was - plus he'd be held more at fault for services so obviously falling apart.
Livingstone got nuttier the longer he went on. The Tories were riding high in 2008 and Ken was ripe for defeat. Johnson holding the mayoralty in 2012 *was* an impressive achievement but the Boris of then is a long way from the Boris of now.
Obviously, you're right about Corbyn in 2017 though that was mainly down to the catastrophic Tory campaign. May was 18-20 points up when she called the election. A confident manner and a sensible manifesto would have delivered a landslide. Remember that despite that, May's ratings were better at every point in the 2017 election than Johnson's were at any point in the 2019 one.
Nothing is absolute, but property rights should not be violated unless under a specific law and then genuine compensation provided. My stuff is my stuff, thank you
Shame HMG didn't maintain dog licensing as evidence of ownership, as it works both ways. Not having a licence would be characteristic of the typical housing estate attack dog - and an instant way to get rid of it.
In this interview by Chris Williamson, Niall Ferguson discusses historical modelling and why it's not a good idea, and instead recommends looking for close historical examples as a better guide. He also expounds on POTUS 2024. Whilst I agree with some of his points and not on others, the talk is interesting. Here it is.
"The Shocking Lessons Of History Everyone Has Forgotten - Niall Ferguson", Chris Williamson, YouTube, 20230902, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-XRR3z23tU , length 58 mins
Very interesting read on Russian artillery challenges in Ukraine.
Russia's Problems with Artillery Support Are Growing There are major problems now with Russian artillery in Ukraine. "Every day Ukrainian forces are degrading Russian arty which throughout the war has been a strong suit for Moscow. They have leveled out parity and seem to actually have gained the upper hand." https://x.com/randymot4/status/1702657716986991038?s=20
These are Ukrainian reports of Russian artillery losses since the start of spring.
I've undecided on the XL dogs thing (I think a ban might be good though definitions and case law may make it difficult) but it feels very much like a distraction from issues that actually worry people. Do most people - even on rough estates - fret that they might be attacked when they go out? I'd guess not. And every week that Ministers don't seem to be paying attention to problems that actually do worry people is another wasted week for Sunak. He only has about 54 weeks...
Other breeds like pit bulls are banned so not hard to ban these- They are obviously dangerous (the poor man attacked yesterday was killed by two of them) . The benefit of not banning them (ie a load of wannabee hard blokes having them to look tough is not outweighing the danger of them. I normally default against banning anything or having rules imposed by the state but this seems even to me to be pretty clear cut
STATIST! STATIST!
As I said even me thinks they should be banned
The fundamental flaw in libertarianism. “I’m a libertarian until I want to ban something.”
"Rumour has it the Sunday Times is working on a big story this weekend — biggest of the year, supposedly. Due to drop tomorrow at 3pm. Leave cancelled, all hands to the pump, security tightened, etc. May be a sex scandal of some kind, possibly involving a politician. Anyone know?"
I mean, it's Toby Young so it could be bullshit. But I know PB loves an unsubstantiated rumour.
According to the Twitter comments (!) Iain Dale has also hinted at something, and there’s a Dispatches programme scheduled for 9pm tomorrow on C4, but with no further details of the content.
Presumably it’s a bit more serious than someone in the cabinet snogging their secretary.
3pm seems a bit early to drop a bombshell exclusive as it gives the other papers several hours to copy it, although I suppose a television tie-in might be the reason. Hmm. "Bombshell exclusive" works even though it uses a noun as an adjective and an adjective as a noun. Take that, English teachers!
Epic pedantry. I do approve.
Not really, because exclusive is both an adjective and a noun.
On Scotland it does seem to be taking an eternity for Police Scotland to conclude their investigation into the SNP and in the event little comes from it, then a SNP recovery may be on the cards
On Starmer and Cooper 'terrorist' small boats policy it has gone down like a lead balloon across the political spectrum with the Guardian leading the outcry and allowing the conservatives to accuse labour of an open door immigration policy
And as far as I can tell last nights locals were hardly stellar for labour
And we have a year left to GE 24
I still expect a labour majority but the size of it I am very uncertain
It is fact that labour are so crap and anti Scottish that is causing them issues G. SNP are not popular but most will grit their teeth and vote for them as the only real Scottish party.
Don't be so soft. Labour aren't anti-Scottish, they just disagree with you about independence.
You halfwit, they are an offshoot of an English Labour party. They are mere sockpuppets who are ordered what to do and say. They F***ed Scotland over for best part of 40-50 years previously under the same guise. They are not a Scottish political party. They have no policies to improve or do anything for Scotland. Starmer gives the orders to jump and they say how high. Bent SNP party are far better than those clowns.
Yes, they're a UK party. Yes, their leadership is down south.
That doesn't make them anti-Scottish.
Their actions do and thos of their puppet masters are certainly anything but pro Scottish.
Despite the apparent boost to the SNP’s fortunes, backing for independence fell three points to 39 per cent while an unchanged 44 per cent of people said they wanted to remain in the Union. This left 16 per cent who said they were either undecided, would not vote or refused to reveal their preference.
YouGov are on the No-friendly side of major polling companies.
From Wikipedia: A 2021 study of fatal dog attacks in Europe during the period 1995–2016 placed the United Kingdom (with 56 fatalities) as fourth in the top five countries for number of human fatalities alongside Hungary (#1), France (#2), Romania (#3), and Poland (#5).
So, the dangerous dogs act can’t have been working very well!
For the umpteenth time, the 2019 Get Brexit Done election was atypical.
For the umpteenth time - you’re wrong.
Well, then counter it with cogent arguments - same goes for you @Casino_Royale if you're going to 'like' a throwaway.
Nothing in recent polling, including voter party allegiance, the demise of 'Brexit' as a factor, and the positivity towards Labour in the Red Wall, gives any credence to what I suspect to be mere wishful thinking on your part?
I have. Dozens of times. You ignore them. So what's the point in repeating them? All you do is parrot what you think must be true and provide no evidence at all, which makes this post deeply ironic.
Comments
Diagnostic of someone who liked single spacing, green ribbon and the shift key on the typewriter in the old days before Male Online was a thing in Viz?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-66818862
Hence I stick to the date I happened upon 10 months ago Thursday October 24th 2024.
A week or so before the US election, gives Rishi exactly 2 years as PM and doesn't look desperate...
Is it the year 1995 ?
5/1 Harry getting divorced (but doesn't know yet)
8/1 Sir Keir divorced from reality
10/1 SNP & Greens to divorce before election
20/1 Nigel Farage's latest bank divorcing him
50/1 Humza Yousuf postpones UK/Scotland divorce
70/1 Unions to divorce Labour
https://twitter.com/_RGArmstrong/status/1702632282589184336
It's a point though - do the owners get compo? Perfectly legal property at the moment, and all that. With the firearms control act after Dunblane as a recent precedent (i.e. owners of hitherto harmless guns/dogs determined as dangerous have to give them up, but get compo).
That may be one reason for HMG talking about the end of the year.
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/18086052.boris-johnson-compared-gun-crackdown-dunblane-nanny-confiscating-toys/
That guy in the Spectator has a point
The only really nice (not great) meal I’ve had in four days was a plate of steak frites
It doesn't have to make them scared to leave the house to feel as though they might be personally affected.
Sunak is polling only a few points worse than Johnson was when the latter was dumped. Given Johnson's problems with the Privileges Cttee, I doubt he'd have improved on where he was - plus he'd be held more at fault for services so obviously falling apart.
Livingstone got nuttier the longer he went on. The Tories were riding high in 2008 and Ken was ripe for defeat. Johnson holding the mayoralty in 2012 *was* an impressive achievement but the Boris of then is a long way from the Boris of now.
Obviously, you're right about Corbyn in 2017 though that was mainly down to the catastrophic Tory campaign. May was 18-20 points up when she called the election. A confident manner and a sensible manifesto would have delivered a landslide. Remember that despite that, May's ratings were better at every point in the 2017 election than Johnson's were at any point in the 2019 one.
It was a bit like Dave's appointments - could they really not find any Northern, sensible, non-OE people to appoint as SPADs or PPCs, to which the answer at the time was apparently not.
Or short cut that with a Sun story on how Bully XL possession is a sign of repressed homosexuality/liberal voting tendancies/remoanerism or something.
But well done Leon - he called a ban from the outset and lo it has come to pass.
It's quite common for struggling parties to go a long way down the rabbit hole.
https://www.army.mod.uk/news-and-events/news/2023/09/army-to-showcase-jet-propelled-drone-with-laser-guided-missile/
Existing heavy lift drone, missiles, some duct tape....
Bad owners are to blame not the breed - don't ban the XL bully
I believe that the XL bully is a kind, beautiful natured breed that loves children and people in general, and are very loyal and loving pets."
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/643611
Russia's Problems with Artillery Support Are Growing
There are major problems now with Russian artillery in Ukraine. "Every day Ukrainian forces are degrading Russian arty which throughout the war has been a strong suit for Moscow. They have leveled out parity and seem to actually have gained the upper hand."
https://x.com/randymot4/status/1702657716986991038?s=20
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jeremy-corbyn-london-mayor-khan-b2407843.html
Could say he beat Cameron in 2016 too really
Bad owners are to blame not the breed - don't ban the XL bully
7,733 signatures in the last hour
Make XL Bully a banned dog breed in the Dangerous Dogs Act
120 signatures in the last hour"
https://petition.parliament.uk
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/sep/15/conservative-london-mayor-candidate-susan-hall-liked-tweets-praising-enoch-powell
https://petitionmap.unboxedconsulting.com/?petition=643611
To save you time, hotspots are:
- Liverpool
- Staffordshire
- Newcastle
- Airdrie
- Barrow & Furness (didn't see this one coming)
https://petitionmap.unboxedconsulting.com/?petition=642809
Quite a contrast. The latter is presumably a localised response to one attack (or more?) on Merseyside. But the former is startling.
Jeremy is Innocent.
"The Shocking Lessons Of History Everyone Has Forgotten - Niall Ferguson", Chris Williamson, YouTube, 20230902, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-XRR3z23tU , length 58 mins
NEW THREAD
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/exclusive
So, the dangerous dogs act can’t have been working very well!
I have. Dozens of times. You ignore them. So what's the point in repeating them? All you do is parrot what you think must be true and provide no evidence at all, which makes this post deeply ironic.