This is the sort of thing the UN gets shit over - Lots of people on here have expressed some concerns about the goverment's attitude toward protesting in general, and just because there are many countries which are far far worse does not mean the UK is exempt from criticism, but just the tone, whinging about a lack of reply (when the government says it has responded) will probably put a lot of people side of the government against the UN. These rappoteur's can sometimes have reports which seem completely random.
Long jail sentences handed to two Just Stop Oil climate campaigners could stifle protest, the United Nations has warned the UK government.
The protestors caused traffic gridlock after scaling the Dartford Crossing Bridge for almost 40 hours in October last year. Morgan Trowland, 40, was jailed for three years and Marcus Decker, 34, for two years for causing a public nuisance.
The warning comes in a letter shown to BBC News, sent to the government by the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights in the context of climate change, Ian Fry, on 15 August this year.
The sentences are "significantly more severe than previous sentences imposed for this type of offending in the past," Mr Fry notes.
He says he is worried about “the exercise of their rights to freedom of expression and freedom of peaceful assembly and association”.
I doubt very much if he’d worry about the freedom of expression of people he disliked.
What brings the system of Special Rapporteurs into disrepute is that they are not impartial observers, but rather fervent partisans. But, their appointment by the UN lends them a credibility they don’t merit.
They weren’t jailed for exercising their right to free speech, they were jailed for forcing the closure of one of the busiest roads on the country for two days, at a cost to the operator of c.£1m in toll revenue, plus countless millions more in traffic that was disrupted, appointments that were missed, journeys that were not undertaken etc.
Perhaps these UN idiots should best focus their ire on actual freedom of speech issues?
The right to protest does not mean the right to break any law you feel like and face no consequences for your actions.
Good that these prats are starting to get the prison sentences they deserve for being criminals. Any others who break the law should be held to account accordingly.
That appears to be the UN issue, exemplary sentences, or sentences that are out of line with prior norms, or "these prats are starting to get the prison sentences they deserve".
Parliament passed an Act to increase sentencing and the courts have responded accordingly, entirely democratic and entirely appropriate.
Act within the law.
The liberal principle is that you can do what you like, so long as you're not causing harm to others. These prats are causing harm to others, illegally, yet expect to get away with it simply because their beliefs trump the harm to others and the law in their eyes.
Not how it works in either a liberal society, or a democracy.
You have the right to protest, but if you cross the line into criminal behaviour then you can go to prison for that.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
If we really wanted to get more people fit for work, mentally and physically, by far the best way to do that is to invest in fitness. Free adult classes for anything related to fitness, from gym to dance to home cooking and many more. It would take a few years to filter through but is a no brainer economically as well as for physical and emotional health. The "take a few years to filter through" part means it sadly won't happen in a democracy.
What works better is rewards for actually working towards and achieving fitness. See the Vitality program from Prudential.
For the middle classes, sure.
The principle is/was simple - do stuff, get rewards. Free gym memberships might well not get used. With Vitality, walking x thousand steps would get you free cinema tickets etc…
Pay up front and get cash back if you do x,y or z things that are good for you is not going to work for most of the economically struggling. Or most of those that are already struggling with mental and physical health as they might not believe they can do x,y or z.
Just make an hour or two a week free. Because we will end up with fewer people unable to work from mental and physical health, and those that are working will be more productive too. So it is far cheaper than paying people to be economically inactive for years to come.
Just checked their website, it seems plans begin at about £45 a month (not put in for a quote, but seems around that) - and for that you might win some cinema tickets?
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
There’s a number of moving parts here, and it’s needs carrots as well as sticks from the government side - yet all we’ve been hearing about is the sticks.
The number of people signed off sick long-term has gone up dramatically since the start of the pandemic, as has the number of people making themselves economically inactive by taking early retirement.
I wonder if employers can be encouraged to take on these people on a part-time, perhaps almost casual basis, for jobs such as call centres and customer service roles? Everyone will have their own requirements, and not all will be suitable, but it could well be that a lot of people signed off sick are able to work from home for two or three hours a day at their own discretion.
The trouble is the 'almost casual' bit, as I understand it. Varying income and work from week to week is utterly fatal to dealing with the DWP and getting one's necessary top ups. No idea if this aspect has improved, but my impression is otherwise?
Why?
Since the advent of realtime reporting, that shouldn't be a problem in this day and age.
UC is meant to be able to handle variable incomes in a way the old tax credit system couldn't do well.
I mean, it's meant to, but I think it still struggles with people paid every four weeks sometimes receiving two parts packets in a calendar month.
Haley is a very astute politician - especially when it comes to calculating charting her next move. There are few individuals who can recognise shift in a political landscape and shift themselves - and others - so adroitly.
For 150 years, South Carolina was dominated by the Democratic Party. Yet by the late ‘60s it was turning rightward; Strom Thurmond jumped ship in ’64 followed by Tom Wofford in ’66. By ’75, the likes of Olin Johnson and Fritz Hollings were increasingly out of step with the new political landscape. In the decades since, the GOP has tightened its grip both in Columbia and in Washington.
What makes Haley remarkable is how she has remained firmly in the centre ground whilst making overtures towards to the liberals and the right. Think back to 2015 when the Confederate flag was removed from the grounds of the Statehouse. In a state where the views of the right were - and are - so deeply entrenched, where its role in the Civil War is celebrated and where the “white old boy” network persists, it was a remarkable achievement to get all sides to agree to remove the flag. It was regarded by many on the right in South Carolina as a liberal move and an act of betrayal. The liberals and the Democrats loved it.
The following year she challenged the right of the GOP again when she objected to a anti-transgender bathroom bill. She saw no need to copy North Carolina’s HB2 which would require all transgender individuals to use bathrooms that reflected their sex at birth. It would solve none of the problems facing the people of South Carolina and serve only to stoke the culture war.
Of course, the following year she’s the US Ambassador to the UN and effectively a card-carrying member of the Trump movement. Notwithstanding her earlier liberal or Democrat-leaning decisions, she’s moved towards the right and largely been accepted. Indeed, the nature of her departure from the Trump administration - with warm wishes and little antagonism from Trump - helped placate some of those in the GOP who distrusted her.
Fast forward to today and… Nikki Haley is back in the centre ground - cognisant of the impact that January 6th had on the country. Overtures to the liberals, the Democrats and the independents - all of whom she would need to secure the White House. Overtures to the right to keep the Trump movement (minus the nutters) on board.
What nobody is looking at is the future. The Trump campaign hasn’t really attacked her. Which begs a question. Why? Should Trump make it to the White House he’s a lame duck. He can’t run in 2028. So what if Haley has calculated that her best chance is to serve as his Vice President?
I still think Haley will be the nominee and will win against Biden. There’s too much baggage with Trump and any one of his legal problems could very easily throw the entire race up in the air. But if he does make through, don’t be surprised if Haley doesn’t emerge as his Vice President.
This was clearly a gesture to the GOP right, but seems her first misstep of the campaign to me.
Have arrived on The Beach from Alex Garland’s the Beach
M’pai village on Koh Rong Sanloem. Lost to the world. Yet it has a wine and cheese bar. Dogs pant in the sun. Kids play in the sand. Everyone sleeps. You can get a really good pizza or watch the Khmer fishermen drink moonshine at noon
It’s one of those places where you think if I lived here would I kill my self with boredom after a week or would I be tranquil and happy forever and ever
I agree. KRS is the closest I've been to paradise, apart from the mosquitos. I spent a couple of weeks writing once. No distractions, gorgeous weather and a stunning beach. It was perfect.
Ooh. You’ve been here? Where did you stay? What beach? What season?
Do you think you could have endured 2 months without hanging yourself?
A serious question. I normally go to Bangkok in the winter but hmmmmm
I stayed in January 2019. I stayed in a guesthouse called (iirc) Mr Song's Guesthouse. It was cheap, it had reasonable wifi, it was about five minutes' walk from the beach and he was a pretty good cook. Also it was concrete not wood, so that kept the mosquitoes out to some extent. There was another guesthouse across the street run by a couple of Englishmen where I'd go for a mug of Yorkshire tea and some English conversation.
With enough good books on my Kindle I could have stayed until the rainy season started. But I'm like that.
I still remember the first words from another traveller as I got off on the jetty a few yards from your photo - "Welcome to Paradise". For once, that wasn't hyperbole.
I'm going to be in Singapore in a couple of weeks. Remembering all this tempts me to head back to KRS for the winter instead of the Philippines, which I was vaguely planning.
Ooh. Philippines. Never been!
Do you know it? Where would you go?
KSR - especially Mpai - is brilliant. What it needs ia just one good 3 star with a balcony room overlooking the beach
I’ve got this view for £10 but it’s a wooden house and I suspect mosquitoes will be hideous
But yeah it is close to Edenic
Yes I know the Philippines quite well. I'd recommend Boracay (obv) and Palawan. Sabang, just south of Manila, is really good for coral. Manila itself is a traffic-choked shithole even by the standards of third world cities, but the Spanish old town is quite nice. I was disappointed by the rice terraces in the north.
I had a wooden guesthouse for my first two nights in KRS. But the sound insulation and mosquitoes were bad so I changed to Mr Song's, though it's about 5 minutes behind the beach. And that was about a tenner a night IIRC.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
There’s a number of moving parts here, and it’s needs carrots as well as sticks from the government side - yet all we’ve been hearing about is the sticks.
The number of people signed off sick long-term has gone up dramatically since the start of the pandemic, as has the number of people making themselves economically inactive by taking early retirement.
I wonder if employers can be encouraged to take on these people on a part-time, perhaps almost casual basis, for jobs such as call centres and customer service roles? Everyone will have their own requirements, and not all will be suitable, but it could well be that a lot of people signed off sick are able to work from home for two or three hours a day at their own discretion.
The trouble is the 'almost casual' bit, as I understand it. Varying income and work from week to week is utterly fatal to dealing with the DWP and getting one's necessary top ups. No idea if this aspect has improved, but my impression is otherwise?
Why?
Since the advent of realtime reporting, that shouldn't be a problem in this day and age.
UC is meant to be able to handle variable incomes in a way the old tax credit system couldn't do well.
I mean, it's meant to, but I think it still struggles with people paid every four weeks sometimes receiving two parts packets in a calendar month.
Yes, I believe that results in a lower payment in a double-payment month, and a higher payment every other month.
But then again, if your rent, utility bills etc are monthly, then I'm not seeing the issue with that. In a month you get paid twice by the employer, you don't need as much UC, and in months when you're only paid a partial month by the employer, then getting more surely helps?
I see that the government intends to cut taxes with the “long term savings” enabled by scrapping HS2, giving up on the North of England, and abandoning the manifesto pledge to address social care.
"Cutting taxes with the long term savings enabled by scrapping HS2".
But I thought the money was being spent on the national potholes mission and tha bit of tram system delivered in 2014.
Unless the tax cuts too are stuff like "scrapping the implementation of the pastie tax".
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
There’s a number of moving parts here, and it’s needs carrots as well as sticks from the government side - yet all we’ve been hearing about is the sticks.
The number of people signed off sick long-term has gone up dramatically since the start of the pandemic, as has the number of people making themselves economically inactive by taking early retirement.
I wonder if employers can be encouraged to take on these people on a part-time, perhaps almost casual basis, for jobs such as call centres and customer service roles? Everyone will have their own requirements, and not all will be suitable, but it could well be that a lot of people signed off sick are able to work from home for two or three hours a day at their own discretion.
Most businesses operate in the opposite way, where their employee resources are at their beck and call. They want to be able to deploy these resources when they're most useful to the business, and the work may have to be done to fit in with the timetable of the rest of a team.
I'm struggling to think of segments which could make it work where an employee only works a few hours a week when they are able. Old-fashioned piecework is the obvious sort of model, but even there it can be problematic. I don't think it's easy, but the government approach is really simplistic.
My thinking was for call centre and customer service work, for companies that already operate a large team, having a few people who might not be able to work all day from an office, but could log in remotely for a couple of hours and clear out an inbox or pickup escalated chatbot conversations, might be feasible if government helped out with eg. Employer NI holiday for a year, when taking on people who were previously long term sick.
It does, as you suggest, require something of a change of mindset from the employers. Many of those with ‘long covid’, or mental health issues arising from the pandemic, could find that a small amount of work improves their health considerably.
But it requires flexibility all round, and government won’t improve anyone’s mental health by seeing the whole idea as primarily to reduce the cost to the Exchequer by threatening benefits payments.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
There’s a number of moving parts here, and it’s needs carrots as well as sticks from the government side - yet all we’ve been hearing about is the sticks.
The number of people signed off sick long-term has gone up dramatically since the start of the pandemic, as has the number of people making themselves economically inactive by taking early retirement.
I wonder if employers can be encouraged to take on these people on a part-time, perhaps almost casual basis, for jobs such as call centres and customer service roles? Everyone will have their own requirements, and not all will be suitable, but it could well be that a lot of people signed off sick are able to work from home for two or three hours a day at their own discretion.
The trouble is the 'almost casual' bit, as I understand it. Varying income and work from week to week is utterly fatal to dealing with the DWP and getting one's necessary top ups. No idea if this aspect has improved, but my impression is otherwise?
Why?
Since the advent of realtime reporting, that shouldn't be a problem in this day and age.
UC is meant to be able to handle variable incomes in a way the old tax credit system couldn't do well.
I mean, it's meant to, but I think it still struggles with people paid every four weeks sometimes receiving two parts packets in a calendar month.
Yes, I believe that results in a lower payment in a double-payment month, and a higher payment every other month.
But then again, if your rent, utility bills etc are monthly, then I'm not seeing the issue with that. In a month you get paid twice by the employer, you don't need as much UC, and in months when you're only paid a partial month by the employer, then getting more surely helps?
My understanding is that, sometimes, the double payment is enough to end your claim altogether.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
There’s a number of moving parts here, and it’s needs carrots as well as sticks from the government side - yet all we’ve been hearing about is the sticks.
The number of people signed off sick long-term has gone up dramatically since the start of the pandemic, as has the number of people making themselves economically inactive by taking early retirement.
I wonder if employers can be encouraged to take on these people on a part-time, perhaps almost casual basis, for jobs such as call centres and customer service roles? Everyone will have their own requirements, and not all will be suitable, but it could well be that a lot of people signed off sick are able to work from home for two or three hours a day at their own discretion.
The trouble is the 'almost casual' bit, as I understand it. Varying income and work from week to week is utterly fatal to dealing with the DWP and getting one's necessary top ups. No idea if this aspect has improved, but my impression is otherwise?
Why?
Since the advent of realtime reporting, that shouldn't be a problem in this day and age.
UC is meant to be able to handle variable incomes in a way the old tax credit system couldn't do well.
Shouldn't doesn't mean isn't.
The issue as I understand it is not the money in itself but the categorisation - the shifts between working and, in some weeks, nto working at all, which resets the Government system. Snakes and ladders game.
Haley is a very astute politician - especially when it comes to calculating charting her next move. There are few individuals who can recognise shift in a political landscape and shift themselves - and others - so adroitly.
For 150 years, South Carolina was dominated by the Democratic Party. Yet by the late ‘60s it was turning rightward; Strom Thurmond jumped ship in ’64 followed by Tom Wofford in ’66. By ’75, the likes of Olin Johnson and Fritz Hollings were increasingly out of step with the new political landscape. In the decades since, the GOP has tightened its grip both in Columbia and in Washington.
What makes Haley remarkable is how she has remained firmly in the centre ground whilst making overtures towards to the liberals and the right. Think back to 2015 when the Confederate flag was removed from the grounds of the Statehouse. In a state where the views of the right were - and are - so deeply entrenched, where its role in the Civil War is celebrated and where the “white old boy” network persists, it was a remarkable achievement to get all sides to agree to remove the flag. It was regarded by many on the right in South Carolina as a liberal move and an act of betrayal. The liberals and the Democrats loved it.
The following year she challenged the right of the GOP again when she objected to a anti-transgender bathroom bill. She saw no need to copy North Carolina’s HB2 which would require all transgender individuals to use bathrooms that reflected their sex at birth. It would solve none of the problems facing the people of South Carolina and serve only to stoke the culture war.
Of course, the following year she’s the US Ambassador to the UN and effectively a card-carrying member of the Trump movement. Notwithstanding her earlier liberal or Democrat-leaning decisions, she’s moved towards the right and largely been accepted. Indeed, the nature of her departure from the Trump administration - with warm wishes and little antagonism from Trump - helped placate some of those in the GOP who distrusted her.
Fast forward to today and… Nikki Haley is back in the centre ground - cognisant of the impact that January 6th had on the country. Overtures to the liberals, the Democrats and the independents - all of whom she would need to secure the White House. Overtures to the right to keep the Trump movement (minus the nutters) on board.
What nobody is looking at is the future. The Trump campaign hasn’t really attacked her. Which begs a question. Why? Should Trump make it to the White House he’s a lame duck. He can’t run in 2028. So what if Haley has calculated that her best chance is to serve as his Vice President?
I still think Haley will be the nominee and will win against Biden. There’s too much baggage with Trump and any one of his legal problems could very easily throw the entire race up in the air. But if he does make through, don’t be surprised if Haley doesn’t emerge as his Vice President.
This was clearly a gesture to the GOP right, but seems her first misstep of the campaign to me.
Have arrived on The Beach from Alex Garland’s the Beach
M’pai village on Koh Rong Sanloem. Lost to the world. Yet it has a wine and cheese bar. Dogs pant in the sun. Kids play in the sand. Everyone sleeps. You can get a really good pizza or watch the Khmer fishermen drink moonshine at noon
It’s one of those places where you think if I lived here would I kill my self with boredom after a week or would I be tranquil and happy forever and ever
I agree. KRS is the closest I've been to paradise, apart from the mosquitos. I spent a couple of weeks writing once. No distractions, gorgeous weather and a stunning beach. It was perfect.
Ooh. You’ve been here? Where did you stay? What beach? What season?
Do you think you could have endured 2 months without hanging yourself?
A serious question. I normally go to Bangkok in the winter but hmmmmm
I stayed in January 2019. I stayed in a guesthouse called (iirc) Mr Song's Guesthouse. It was cheap, it had reasonable wifi, it was about five minutes' walk from the beach and he was a pretty good cook. Also it was concrete not wood, so that kept the mosquitoes out to some extent. There was another guesthouse across the street run by a couple of Englishmen where I'd go for a mug of Yorkshire tea and some English conversation.
With enough good books on my Kindle I could have stayed until the rainy season started. But I'm like that.
I still remember the first words from another traveller as I got off on the jetty a few yards from your photo - "Welcome to Paradise". For once, that wasn't hyperbole.
I'm going to be in Singapore in a couple of weeks. Remembering all this tempts me to head back to KRS for the winter instead of the Philippines, which I was vaguely planning.
Ooh. Philippines. Never been!
Do you know it? Where would you go?
KSR - especially Mpai - is brilliant. What it needs ia just one good 3 star with a balcony room overlooking the beach
I’ve got this view for £10 but it’s a wooden house and I suspect mosquitoes will be hideous
But yeah it is close to Edenic
Yes I know the Philippines quite well. I'd recommend Boracay (obv) and Palawan. Sabang, just south of Manila, is really good for coral. Manila itself is a traffic-choked shithole even by the standards of third world cities, but the Spanish old town is quite nice. I was disappointed by the rice terraces in the north.
I had a wooden guesthouse for my first two nights in KRS. But the sound insulation and mosquitoes were bad so I changed to Mr Song's, though it's about 5 minutes behind the beach. And that was about a tenner a night IIRC.
Manila is quite literally a shithole, with open sewers running through even the nice bits of town. One of the most horrible places I’ve ever been. The only respite was some very cheap beer in a couple of nice hotels.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
If we really wanted to get more people fit for work, mentally and physically, by far the best way to do that is to invest in fitness. Free adult classes for anything related to fitness, from gym to dance to home cooking and many more. It would take a few years to filter through but is a no brainer economically as well as for physical and emotional health. The "take a few years to filter through" part means it sadly won't happen in a democracy.
What works better is rewards for actually working towards and achieving fitness. See the Vitality program from Prudential.
For the middle classes, sure.
The principle is/was simple - do stuff, get rewards. Free gym memberships might well not get used. With Vitality, walking x thousand steps would get you free cinema tickets etc…
Pay up front and get cash back if you do x,y or z things that are good for you is not going to work for most of the economically struggling. Or most of those that are already struggling with mental and physical health as they might not believe they can do x,y or z.
Just make an hour or two a week free. Because we will end up with fewer people unable to work from mental and physical health, and those that are working will be more productive too. So it is far cheaper than paying people to be economically inactive for years to come.
It wouldn’t be “pay up front” if it is an NHS sponsored scheme.
With Vitality, you got the scheme as part of health insurance. You got rewards for activity. There were discounts on sports related stuff - but the rewards for actual activity were the key part.
So if you did nothing, you got nothing. Walk for x steps a day, get some free tickets to the cinema.
A major point was you could get rewards for simple stuff - but more for serious gym work etc. The idea was to get people doing stuff and then get them doing more serious exercise.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
If we really wanted to get more people fit for work, mentally and physically, by far the best way to do that is to invest in fitness. Free adult classes for anything related to fitness, from gym to dance to home cooking and many more. It would take a few years to filter through but is a no brainer economically as well as for physical and emotional health. The "take a few years to filter through" part means it sadly won't happen in a democracy.
What works better is rewards for actually working towards and achieving fitness. See the Vitality program from Prudential.
For the middle classes, sure.
The principle is/was simple - do stuff, get rewards. Free gym memberships might well not get used. With Vitality, walking x thousand steps would get you free cinema tickets etc…
Pay up front and get cash back if you do x,y or z things that are good for you is not going to work for most of the economically struggling. Or most of those that are already struggling with mental and physical health as they might not believe they can do x,y or z.
Just make an hour or two a week free. Because we will end up with fewer people unable to work from mental and physical health, and those that are working will be more productive too. So it is far cheaper than paying people to be economically inactive for years to come.
Just checked their website, it seems plans begin at about £45 a month (not put in for a quote, but seems around that) - and for that you might win some cinema tickets?
For £45 a month I can buy cinema tickets.
The real target was people on work provided health insurance schemes.
There was a whole range of benefits - cheap gym memberships, sports kit etc etc. The activity rewards - which went beyond cinema tickets - were the heart of it, though.
It’s was an interesting sociological experiment in encouraging people into daily exercise. From the stuff I saw, it was extremely effective in getting even the “I never go to the gym” types active.
The critical bit is small rewards for some activity - with the promise of more for more.
The thing is for some countries, Argentina being an example, something akin to 1990s neoliberalism is probably exactly what's needed. Probably not with a weirdo like their new president at the helm, but they could helpfully take a leaf out of the more successful post-Soviet and post Eastern bloc states in the 1990s and shake the country out of its otherwise seemingly terminal decline.
Almost al post-communist states embarked on some form of shock therapy. The ones that succeeded were generally those with stronger institutions and a strong focus on rule of law, transparency and lack of corruption. The ones that failed were those captured by gangster capitalists and oligarchs. Deregulation was an important part of this, and opening the economy up to international capital. Argentina's economy is a regulatory nightmare and riddled with exchange controls that don't work.
For other countries at different stages in their development or with different demographics, 1990s style neoliberalism would be a disaster. Those are the countries with poor infrastructure, no financial safety net and a need for active industrial strategy. Much of sub-saharan Africa for example. And then there are those like India, which could really do with a bit of what countries like Poland and the Baltics did in the 1990s to make itself easier to invest in, but also needs much more concerted infrastructure spending to catch up with China.
That's the thing. No single economic orthodoxy works for all places at all times. Too many commentators assume there is one right way of doing things.
I see that the government intends to cut taxes with the “long term savings” enabled by scrapping HS2, giving up on the North of England, and abandoning the manifesto pledge to address social care.
"Cutting taxes with the long term savings enabled by scrapping HS2".
But I thought the money was being spent on the national potholes mission and tha bit of tram system delivered in 2014.
Unless the tax cuts too are stuff like "scrapping the implementation of the pastie tax".
The sort of smoke and mirrors Gordon Brown would be proud of.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
He's managing the sick out.
More rancid othering by this government . Some simply can’t work because of the level of illness or disability. Where will the line be drawn . The unsustainable part is the triple lock but nothing to see here .
The triple lock is perfectly sustainable, at least for the foreseeable future. The state pension is around £10,000 a year. That is only half the minimum wage. If the government wants to save money on pensions, ending higher rate tax relief on contributions would be the place to start, and higher rate tax-payers could still save money by salary sacrifice.
The triple lock is designed to give an ever higher slice of the economy out to each pensioner. The proportion of pensioners is increasing at the same time. The ever higher part means that within a century or so more than all the government tax take would have to be spent on pensions.
Those who think it is sustainable, let alone perfectly so, need to join Rishi for his remedial maths. Is it sustainable for an electoral cycle or two? Yes, but with further and faster generational unfairness and limiting economic growth.
The aim of the triple lock is to take pensioners who have just the state pension out of poverty. The basic state pension is now about £800 a month. Barbara Castle was a big fan of linking pensions to earnings as well as prices. She gave Gordon Brown what-for after the 75p a week increase Labour gave out one year. The problem is that better-off pensioners, not reliant on the state pension, also benefit. For me, the simple answer to this (and the "why should rich pensioners get the free bus travel/winter fuel allowance etc" question) is to have a lower threshold for over-67s for the 40% income tax band to compensate.
I see that the government intends to cut taxes with the “long term savings” enabled by scrapping HS2, giving up on the North of England, and abandoning the manifesto pledge to address social care.
"Cutting taxes with the long term savings enabled by scrapping HS2".
But I thought the money was being spent on the national potholes mission and tha bit of tram system delivered in 2014.
Unless the tax cuts too are stuff like "scrapping the implementation of the pastie tax".
The sort of smoke and mirrors Gordon Brown would be proud of.
“Investment” in tax credits will take some topping though. He should never have dumped “Prudence” in 2001.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
"“We must remember that the plague years were not just 1348-1353 and 1665-1666, but there were deaths during the intervening years between,” he said. “It will be interesting to see how these deaths fit within a wider context.”
But, he cautioned, historical evidence must be treated objectively. “We have a responsibility to make sure that this information does not get divided between left and right in a culture war,” he added."
I see that the government intends to cut taxes with the “long term savings” enabled by scrapping HS2, giving up on the North of England, and abandoning the manifesto pledge to address social care.
"Cutting taxes with the long term savings enabled by scrapping HS2".
But I thought the money was being spent on the national potholes mission and tha bit of tram system delivered in 2014.
Unless the tax cuts too are stuff like "scrapping the implementation of the pastie tax".
The sort of smoke and mirrors Gordon Brown would be proud of.
“Investment” in tax credits will take some topping though. He should never have dumped “Prudence” in 2001.
Investment, as a term, did a lot of heavy lifting in the early new labour days.
He was, after all, the man who abolished boom and bust !!!
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
He's managing the sick out.
More rancid othering by this government . Some simply can’t work because of the level of illness or disability. Where will the line be drawn . The unsustainable part is the triple lock but nothing to see here .
The triple lock is perfectly sustainable, at least for the foreseeable future. The state pension is around £10,000 a year. That is only half the minimum wage. If the government wants to save money on pensions, ending higher rate tax relief on contributions would be the place to start, and higher rate tax-payers could still save money by salary sacrifice.
The triple lock is designed to give an ever higher slice of the economy out to each pensioner. The proportion of pensioners is increasing at the same time. The ever higher part means that within a century or so more than all the government tax take would have to be spent on pensions.
Those who think it is sustainable, let alone perfectly so, need to join Rishi for his remedial maths. Is it sustainable for an electoral cycle or two? Yes, but with further and faster generational unfairness and limiting economic growth.
The aim of the triple lock is to take pensioners who have just the state pension out of poverty. The basic state pension is now about £800 a month. Barbara Castle was a big fan of linking pensions to earnings as well as prices. She gave Gordon Brown what-for after the 75p a week increase Labour gave out one year. The problem is that better-off pensioners, not reliant on the state pension, also benefit. For me, the simple answer to this (and the "why should rich pensioners get the free bus travel/winter fuel allowance etc" question) is to have a lower threshold for over-67s for the 40% income tax band to compensate.
Pension credit is what lifts poor pensioners out of poverty not the state pension. More than happy to see a significant increase in pension credit in exchange for end of the triple lock and higher rate tax relief.
In off topic news, our next door neighbour's daughter is a budding pop artist with a fancy sound studio which rather noisily backs on to my study. She's rehearsing and the music is *loud*.
This sort of thing would usually drive me into another room but the song she's doing at the moment is really really good. Kind of ambient electronica with a memorable repeating hook, dream-like vocal line and rather pleasant harp stuff going on. I must let her mum know I approve.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
Completely off topic but out with the old, in with the new, my car that I've had since it was new for for over a decade dies today, I'd intended to keep driving it into the ground until I could get an EV, but its reached the point now where its beyond economic repair. I've already spent about £1300 on repairs on it this year alone, and just got quoted over £500 for more repairs.
So trading it in (for scrap value pretty much) and getting a new car instead. Not electric, but [non-plug in] hybrid at least, so a step in the right direction, even from brand new the depreciation on that vehicle will be less than the cost of repairs on my old one has been. Hopefully trade that in, in a few years time, when EVs are as affordable as petrol vehicles are, but this should get about 70% more mpg than my old car was getting [as hybrid, newer and it was no longer as efficient as it should have been].
Was hoping to get it to 100k miles at least, but its on 98,205 - so close, but so far away.
Sometimes these faults happen at the same time; just before Covid, my car had a series of faults that cost me about two grand. It was seven years old. In the three or four years since, I've spent little on it aside from yearly servicing and new tyres. I was tempted to get rid of it then, but am glad I kept it.
Sometimes faults are so elusive that you're not sure whether to give up on the car. I have a 2012 Fiesta which I bought last year. It drives excellently except that now and then the "spanner" warning appears on the dashboard, putting the car into cautionary limp mode (very slow uphill, max speed 50 mph). After a while (perhaps after it's warmed up) and several stops and starts, the problem usually goes away.The handbook says that means it needs a service, but it's just had one, and the three garages that have looked at it all say essentially the fault could be anything. A Ford main dealer has run tests linked to Ford HQ, and they're baffled too.
So...do I just cheerfully go on driving, accepting that sometimes I'll drive barely safely (the limp mode can kick in suddenly and get me into trouble on a hill or a roundabout)? Or scrap the car, writing off £5000? Stark choice.
Extinction Rebellion’s co-founder plotted with others to fly drones near Heathrow in order to “paralyse” the airport and “embarrass” the Government into abandoning plans for a third runway there, a court has been told.
Roger Hallam and other eco-activists wanted backing for the protest, launched under the name Heathrow Pause, to go viral and shut down the airport while also triggering arrests and lots of publicity, London’s Isleworth Crown Court was told.
The ratchet was clearly designed by someone mathematically illiterate - three sequences should be tracked, one 2.5% compounding nominal from 2010, a prices growth chart (CPI I'd assume) and an average earnings sequence. The state pension can then leap about between the best of the three, or just remain as is for a few years if both prices and earnings drop in a year. The ratchet taking the best of the three and leaping about between it makes it a mathematical certainty the pension will eventually be unaffordable in the long term.
Not necessarily innumerate. The Triple Lock was designed to reverse the cuts to the state pension that were made in the 80s, but to do it gradually over time. Inflation and wages were to stop the pension being eroded. 2.5% minimum was so that it would grow during times of low inflation. It isn't meant to stay in perpetuity, just until the pension is back to where it was.
In off topic news, our next door neighbour's daughter is a budding pop artist with a fancy sound studio which rather noisily backs on to my study. She's rehearsing and the music is *loud*.
This sort of thing would usually drive me into another room but the song she's doing at the moment is really really good. Kind of ambient electronica with a memorable repeating hook, dream-like vocal line and rather pleasant harp stuff going on. I must let her mum know I approve.
Do you think she would value your endorsement ? Are you a cool, hip, sort of dude ?
Or would it be the equivalent of "Dad Dancing" !!!!!
I see that the government intends to cut taxes with the “long term savings” enabled by scrapping HS2, giving up on the North of England, and abandoning the manifesto pledge to address social care.
"Cutting taxes with the long term savings enabled by scrapping HS2".
But I thought the money was being spent on the national potholes mission and tha bit of tram system delivered in 2014.
Unless the tax cuts too are stuff like "scrapping the implementation of the pastie tax".
The sort of smoke and mirrors Gordon Brown would be proud of.
“Investment” in tax credits will take some topping though. He should never have dumped “Prudence” in 2001.
Investment, as a term, did a lot of heavy lifting in the early new labour days.
He was, after all, the man who abolished boom and bust !!!
He abolished “Tory boom and bust”, yet failed to see the massive boom that was occurring, followed by the massive bust in 2008 - just as he got himself promoted to the top job!
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
A rather bleak scenario being peddled on GB News for all out world war in, or just after, 2027.
It's like reading the outline for a wacky, far fetched, feature film. Probably with Gerard Butler as a former marine, down on his luck, who somehow is embroiled in all of this and becomes pivotal in saving the day.
I'd love to know the BBC's reasoning on their insane assertion black women were likeliest to die in a medieval plague in London.
Good afternoon, everyone.
Research undertaken by academics at the Museum of London. You could not even say it was a slow news day.
Love to see Leon's thoughts on this.
It’s actually quite depressing. It’s total historical junk. Almost as bad as the “Henry Cort stole the puddling process from enslaved black people” fiasco.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
There’s a number of moving parts here, and it’s needs carrots as well as sticks from the government side - yet all we’ve been hearing about is the sticks.
The number of people signed off sick long-term has gone up dramatically since the start of the pandemic, as has the number of people making themselves economically inactive by taking early retirement.
I wonder if employers can be encouraged to take on these people on a part-time, perhaps almost casual basis, for jobs such as call centres and customer service roles? Everyone will have their own requirements, and not all will be suitable, but it could well be that a lot of people signed off sick are able to work from home for two or three hours a day at their own discretion.
The trouble is the 'almost casual' bit, as I understand it. Varying income and work from week to week is utterly fatal to dealing with the DWP and getting one's necessary top ups. No idea if this aspect has improved, but my impression is otherwise?
Why?
Since the advent of realtime reporting, that shouldn't be a problem in this day and age.
UC is meant to be able to handle variable incomes in a way the old tax credit system couldn't do well.
I mean, it's meant to, but I think it still struggles with people paid every four weeks sometimes receiving two parts packets in a calendar month.
Yes, I believe that results in a lower payment in a double-payment month, and a higher payment every other month.
But then again, if your rent, utility bills etc are monthly, then I'm not seeing the issue with that. In a month you get paid twice by the employer, you don't need as much UC, and in months when you're only paid a partial month by the employer, then getting more surely helps?
Why do some employers persist with four-weekly pay? It's a nonsense. Causes so many problems.
Haley is a very astute politician - especially when it comes to calculating charting her next move. There are few individuals who can recognise shift in a political landscape and shift themselves - and others - so adroitly.
For 150 years, South Carolina was dominated by the Democratic Party. Yet by the late ‘60s it was turning rightward; Strom Thurmond jumped ship in ’64 followed by Tom Wofford in ’66. By ’75, the likes of Olin Johnson and Fritz Hollings were increasingly out of step with the new political landscape. In the decades since, the GOP has tightened its grip both in Columbia and in Washington.
What makes Haley remarkable is how she has remained firmly in the centre ground whilst making overtures towards to the liberals and the right. Think back to 2015 when the Confederate flag was removed from the grounds of the Statehouse. In a state where the views of the right were - and are - so deeply entrenched, where its role in the Civil War is celebrated and where the “white old boy” network persists, it was a remarkable achievement to get all sides to agree to remove the flag. It was regarded by many on the right in South Carolina as a liberal move and an act of betrayal. The liberals and the Democrats loved it.
The following year she challenged the right of the GOP again when she objected to a anti-transgender bathroom bill. She saw no need to copy North Carolina’s HB2 which would require all transgender individuals to use bathrooms that reflected their sex at birth. It would solve none of the problems facing the people of South Carolina and serve only to stoke the culture war.
Of course, the following year she’s the US Ambassador to the UN and effectively a card-carrying member of the Trump movement. Notwithstanding her earlier liberal or Democrat-leaning decisions, she’s moved towards the right and largely been accepted. Indeed, the nature of her departure from the Trump administration - with warm wishes and little antagonism from Trump - helped placate some of those in the GOP who distrusted her.
Fast forward to today and… Nikki Haley is back in the centre ground - cognisant of the impact that January 6th had on the country. Overtures to the liberals, the Democrats and the independents - all of whom she would need to secure the White House. Overtures to the right to keep the Trump movement (minus the nutters) on board.
What nobody is looking at is the future. The Trump campaign hasn’t really attacked her. Which begs a question. Why? Should Trump make it to the White House he’s a lame duck. He can’t run in 2028. So what if Haley has calculated that her best chance is to serve as his Vice President?
I still think Haley will be the nominee and will win against Biden. There’s too much baggage with Trump and any one of his legal problems could very easily throw the entire race up in the air. But if he does make through, don’t be surprised if Haley doesn’t emerge as his Vice President.
Trump is likely to choose a VP running mate based on loyalty to himself. In the long run Haley might be better off if she's not his VP pick.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
He's managing the sick out.
More rancid othering by this government . Some simply can’t work because of the level of illness or disability. Where will the line be drawn . The unsustainable part is the triple lock but nothing to see here .
The triple lock is perfectly sustainable, at least for the foreseeable future. The state pension is around £10,000 a year. That is only half the minimum wage. If the government wants to save money on pensions, ending higher rate tax relief on contributions would be the place to start, and higher rate tax-payers could still save money by salary sacrifice.
The triple lock is designed to give an ever higher slice of the economy out to each pensioner. The proportion of pensioners is increasing at the same time. The ever higher part means that within a century or so more than all the government tax take would have to be spent on pensions.
Those who think it is sustainable, let alone perfectly so, need to join Rishi for his remedial maths. Is it sustainable for an electoral cycle or two? Yes, but with further and faster generational unfairness and limiting economic growth.
The aim of the triple lock is to take pensioners who have just the state pension out of poverty. The basic state pension is now about £800 a month. Barbara Castle was a big fan of linking pensions to earnings as well as prices. She gave Gordon Brown what-for after the 75p a week increase Labour gave out one year. The problem is that better-off pensioners, not reliant on the state pension, also benefit. For me, the simple answer to this (and the "why should rich pensioners get the free bus travel/winter fuel allowance etc" question) is to have a lower threshold for over-67s for the 40% income tax band to compensate.
Do pensioners get housing benefit on top if they are renting?
My wife and I could have a pretty comfortable life on £1600 a month between us. Mortgage paid off, so our essential costs are council tax (boo, hiss), heat and light, and food. This lot probably comes to about £650 a month. If it was just me on my own, it would be tight but probably manageable.
If we didn't own a house, round here it would be £800/month extra for a modest 2 bed. Still manageable as a couple, but getting tight.
On my own on the same budget and without a house I'd be looking at a grim existence in a £500/month house share.
I'm not sure what the fix is (probably getting housing costs down would be best way to solve the biggest part of the problem), but I'm fairly sure that blanket increases in the state pension which will mostly go to homeowning couples who don't actually need the money is a particularly poor way to solve the problem.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
We know that there inequalities in health across ethnicities today. We wish to reduce these. Research on whether similar inequalities existed hundreds of years ago is useful information for understanding the present day situation. Seems like useful research to me.
I'd love to know the BBC's reasoning on their insane assertion black women were likeliest to die in a medieval plague in London.
Good afternoon, everyone.
The best bit is this:
“The team looked at five features of the skulls, such as the shape of the eye area, and by using a forensic databank covering modern and historical populations around the world, explored the individuals’ probable affinity with different populations. The approach, the researchers say, is an established forensic tool, and is not based on controversial methods involving cranial measurements.”
So, how do you know they were African? Did you use horrible race science? OMG did you use skull measurements like Goebbels?
No, no no no, we just used skull measurements - nothing like Goebbels and HIS skull measurements, these are WOKE skull measurements
Completely off topic but out with the old, in with the new, my car that I've had since it was new for for over a decade dies today, I'd intended to keep driving it into the ground until I could get an EV, but its reached the point now where its beyond economic repair. I've already spent about £1300 on repairs on it this year alone, and just got quoted over £500 for more repairs.
So trading it in (for scrap value pretty much) and getting a new car instead. Not electric, but [non-plug in] hybrid at least, so a step in the right direction, even from brand new the depreciation on that vehicle will be less than the cost of repairs on my old one has been. Hopefully trade that in, in a few years time, when EVs are as affordable as petrol vehicles are, but this should get about 70% more mpg than my old car was getting [as hybrid, newer and it was no longer as efficient as it should have been].
Was hoping to get it to 100k miles at least, but its on 98,205 - so close, but so far away.
Sometimes these faults happen at the same time; just before Covid, my car had a series of faults that cost me about two grand. It was seven years old. In the three or four years since, I've spent little on it aside from yearly servicing and new tyres. I was tempted to get rid of it then, but am glad I kept it.
Sometimes faults are so elusive that you're not sure whether to give up on the car. I have a 2012 Fiesta which I bought last year. It drives excellently except that now and then the "spanner" warning appears on the dashboard, putting the car into cautionary limp mode (very slow uphill, max speed 50 mph). After a while (perhaps after it's warmed up) and several stops and starts, the problem usually goes away.The handbook says that means it needs a service, but it's just had one, and the three garages that have looked at it all say essentially the fault could be anything. A Ford main dealer has run tests linked to Ford HQ, and they're baffled too.
So...do I just cheerfully go on driving, accepting that sometimes I'll drive barely safely (the limp mode can kick in suddenly and get me into trouble on a hill or a roundabout)? Or scrap the car, writing off £5000? Stark choice.
ECU faults will also set the 'spanner' light on a Zetec.
So, what causes an intermittent fault on an otherwise healthy ECU? Wiring issue... Check your grounds, battery terminals and alternator.
After that, it's out with the multimeter to test continuity on everything. Cancel all social engagements for the next six months.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
We know that there inequalities in health across ethnicities today. We wish to reduce these. Research on whether similar inequalities existed hundreds of years ago is useful information for understanding the present day situation. Seems like useful research to me.
Please explain how the finding that “many women of colour would have worked in domestic service and experienced race and sex-based discrimination” helps understand the present day situation.
In off topic news, our next door neighbour's daughter is a budding pop artist with a fancy sound studio which rather noisily backs on to my study. She's rehearsing and the music is *loud*.
This sort of thing would usually drive me into another room but the song she's doing at the moment is really really good. Kind of ambient electronica with a memorable repeating hook, dream-like vocal line and rather pleasant harp stuff going on. I must let her mum know I approve.
Do you think she would value your endorsement ? Are you a cool, hip, sort of dude ?
Or would it be the equivalent of "Dad Dancing" !!!!!
She is reasonably friendly, but I doubt my endorsement will count for much. I notice she has 17k insta followers, which is a decent haul but not yet at Dua Lipa levels.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
We know that there inequalities in health across ethnicities today. We wish to reduce these. Research on whether similar inequalities existed hundreds of years ago is useful information for understanding the present day situation. Seems like useful research to me.
How is it useful and how is it pertinent to today especially when they were simply making assumptions as to ethnicity, as is pointed out, from peoples skulls ?
How is the report even valid ?
Inequalities today need resolving, I cannot see how this helps at all. I'd be happy to be told what great insight it gives us.
There was some rather arcane debate over whether the Order in Council was submitted in time given section 4 of the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986 requires the draft order to be submitted to His Majesty in Council within four months, which took us to the end of October whereas this didn't come up for the Privy Council until last week. I think the Government argue it was "submitted" earlier but that's rather dodgy as it pretty clearly needs to be presented at a Privy Council meeting within four months rather than just emailed across to the office... and it missed the October meeting.
I don't believe it could affect validity as section 4(7) prevents the validity of an Order in Council purported to be made under the Act from being called into question in legal proceedings. However, there was possibly a bit of a balls up made over it and it's been fudged a bit.
I'd love to know the BBC's reasoning on their insane assertion black women were likeliest to die in a medieval plague in London.
Good afternoon, everyone.
Statistically, I'd have said that they were one of the lowest risk groups, being nowhere near London at that time.
Plague wasn't mediaeval. Well into the late C17. (And C20 in Essex, Glasgow, etc. though fortunately stamped out in time.). Plague was found notably in maritime ports (to begin with, and right to the end as per Essex, Glasgow etc).
Bl;ack people historically were also most likely to be found in those ports. Sailors, and so on.
And diseases are known to vary their impact according to genetic makeup. Smallpox was lethal to Amerindians who were immunologically naive as far as it was concerned, much more so than Old World people. Bubonic plague is IIRC a primarily central asian disease of rodents, so not native to Africa.
So it's not at all insane a priori. I'd need to see the data, but it's not an unreasonable hypothesis in itself - pending the actual test - that Black people were disproportionately more likely to die than the local natives.
But there are also socio-economic factors - poor people were less able to escape (health, food, ability to move out to the country).
I'd love to know the BBC's reasoning on their insane assertion black women were likeliest to die in a medieval plague in London.
Good afternoon, everyone.
The best bit is this:
“The team looked at five features of the skulls, such as the shape of the eye area, and by using a forensic databank covering modern and historical populations around the world, explored the individuals’ probable affinity with different populations. The approach, the researchers say, is an established forensic tool, and is not based on controversial methods involving cranial measurements.”
So, how do you know they were African? Did you use horrible race science? OMG did you use skull measurements like Goebbels?
No, no no no, we just used skull measurements - nothing like Goebbels and HIS skull measurements, these are WOKE skull measurements
"Only White people can be racist, like Bwana Hitler!"
I'd love to know the BBC's reasoning on their insane assertion black women were likeliest to die in a medieval plague in London.
Good afternoon, everyone.
The best bit is this:
“The team looked at five features of the skulls, such as the shape of the eye area, and by using a forensic databank covering modern and historical populations around the world, explored the individuals’ probable affinity with different populations. The approach, the researchers say, is an established forensic tool, and is not based on controversial methods involving cranial measurements.”
So, how do you know they were African? Did you use horrible race science? OMG did you use skull measurements like Goebbels?
No, no no no, we just used skull measurements - nothing like Goebbels and HIS skull measurements, these are WOKE skull measurements
It was designed to garner publicity. Guess what. Pure junk - but when you commercialise everything that is what you get.
Some researchers are quite desperate to prove that (a) the numbers of black people in the British population was much higher than is commonly thought, and (b) that they were always subject to quite terrible racism and disadvantage.
Completely off topic but out with the old, in with the new, my car that I've had since it was new for for over a decade dies today, I'd intended to keep driving it into the ground until I could get an EV, but its reached the point now where its beyond economic repair. I've already spent about £1300 on repairs on it this year alone, and just got quoted over £500 for more repairs.
So trading it in (for scrap value pretty much) and getting a new car instead. Not electric, but [non-plug in] hybrid at least, so a step in the right direction, even from brand new the depreciation on that vehicle will be less than the cost of repairs on my old one has been. Hopefully trade that in, in a few years time, when EVs are as affordable as petrol vehicles are, but this should get about 70% more mpg than my old car was getting [as hybrid, newer and it was no longer as efficient as it should have been].
Was hoping to get it to 100k miles at least, but its on 98,205 - so close, but so far away.
Feel for you if it has died before 100k; you'd hope a modern car would do more than that.
100k miles is lamentable. Generally there's a few things that need doing when a car gets to around that age, but after that it should be good for another 100k miles.
Engineering anecdote (via a mechanical engineer colleague). Ford routinely reject parts that are designed to last too long (typically they wanted failure after - 100,000 miles). This differs from Japanese manufacturers.
I have had many Japanese cars, with very few problems. Anecdote number two is that the AA chaps we encounter with our classic mini (all too often) all say that Japanese are the most reliable.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
We know that there inequalities in health across ethnicities today. We wish to reduce these. Research on whether similar inequalities existed hundreds of years ago is useful information for understanding the present day situation. Seems like useful research to me.
Please explain how the finding that “many women of colour would have worked in domestic service and experienced race and sex-based discrimination” helps understand the present day situation.
We see inequalities in health across ethnicities very clearly, but exactly what causes these is often not clear. If we see similar (or greater or lesser) inequalities in a historical setting, that may suggest what mechanisms are more or less likely to explain the observed inequalities.
I’ve just been looking for the original paper, but haven’t been able to find it. (It doesn’t seem to be up on the journal website yet.) I am thus unable to comment on the detail of what they’ve done.
I'd love to know the BBC's reasoning on their insane assertion black women were likeliest to die in a medieval plague in London.
Good afternoon, everyone.
Statistically, I'd have said that they were one of the lowest risk groups, being nowhere near London at that time.
Plague wasn't mediaeval. Well into the late C17. (And C20 in Essex, Glasgow, etc. though fortunately stamped out in time.). Plague was found notably in maritime ports (to begin with, and right to the end as per Essex, Glasgow etc).
Bl;ack people historically were also most likely to be found in those ports. Sailors, and so on.
And diseases are known to vary their impact according to genetic makeup. Smallpox was lethal to Amerindians who were immunologically naive as far as it was concerned, much more so than Old World people. Bubonic plague is IIRC a primarily central asian disease of rodents, so not native to Africa.
So it's not at all insane a priori. I'd need to see the data, but it's not an unreasonable hypothesis in itself - pending the actual test - that Black people were disproportionately more likely to die than the local natives.
But there are also socio-economic factors - poor people were less able to escape (health, food, ability to move out to the country).
Bubonic plague cases still crop up around the world today from time to time - a handful a year. However, with treatment and sanitary conditions having been transformed completely over the years, there's no material risk of an epidemic.
In The Life Scientific on R4 this morning Sir Mark Berry, a theoretical physicist, realised he was a bit of a rebel when he was told by his nursery to lie down on a camp bed for an afternoon nap - but he refused. The same thing happened to me. Any other PBers?
Does Cleese conclude that the origin of 'woke' was a backlash against the arguably racist way Manuel was treated in Fawlty Towers?
Fawlty Towers was of its time, as were other programmes such as Rising Damp etc. Times change, attitudes change and the world improves.
Of greater interest is that at the time of Basil Fawlty being racist to the Spaniards, we also had the classic racism of the working classes being mocked in the character of Alf Garnett.
Completely off topic but out with the old, in with the new, my car that I've had since it was new for for over a decade dies today, I'd intended to keep driving it into the ground until I could get an EV, but its reached the point now where its beyond economic repair. I've already spent about £1300 on repairs on it this year alone, and just got quoted over £500 for more repairs.
So trading it in (for scrap value pretty much) and getting a new car instead. Not electric, but [non-plug in] hybrid at least, so a step in the right direction, even from brand new the depreciation on that vehicle will be less than the cost of repairs on my old one has been. Hopefully trade that in, in a few years time, when EVs are as affordable as petrol vehicles are, but this should get about 70% more mpg than my old car was getting [as hybrid, newer and it was no longer as efficient as it should have been].
Was hoping to get it to 100k miles at least, but its on 98,205 - so close, but so far away.
Sometimes these faults happen at the same time; just before Covid, my car had a series of faults that cost me about two grand. It was seven years old. In the three or four years since, I've spent little on it aside from yearly servicing and new tyres. I was tempted to get rid of it then, but am glad I kept it.
Sometimes faults are so elusive that you're not sure whether to give up on the car. I have a 2012 Fiesta which I bought last year. It drives excellently except that now and then the "spanner" warning appears on the dashboard, putting the car into cautionary limp mode (very slow uphill, max speed 50 mph). After a while (perhaps after it's warmed up) and several stops and starts, the problem usually goes away.The handbook says that means it needs a service, but it's just had one, and the three garages that have looked at it all say essentially the fault could be anything. A Ford main dealer has run tests linked to Ford HQ, and they're baffled too.
So...do I just cheerfully go on driving, accepting that sometimes I'll drive barely safely (the limp mode can kick in suddenly and get me into trouble on a hill or a roundabout)? Or scrap the car, writing off £5000? Stark choice.
ECU faults will also set the 'spanner' light on a Zetec.
So, what causes an intermittent fault on an otherwise healthy ECU? Wiring issue... Check your grounds, battery terminals and alternator.
After that, it's out with the multimeter to test continuity on everything. Cancel all social engagements for the next six months.
I had a weird one like that once. My dashboard went into what I call 'christmas tree' mode, where several lights would randomly appear, some remaining on. Few seemed related; e.g. water temperature and ABS.
I took it to a local (good) garage, who after some head scratching, found that the drainplug in the passenger door was blocked, and a wiring plug was under water. Somehow this was shorting out and causing loads of other error indications. They unblocked the drain, cleaned and dried the plug, and everything went back to normal.
No, I didn't believe them. But they only charged me half an hour's labour...
Still, that wasn't as bad as my first car; an ex-utility Land Rover 110. The electrics on that thing were exceptionally weird.
Completely off topic but out with the old, in with the new, my car that I've had since it was new for for over a decade dies today, I'd intended to keep driving it into the ground until I could get an EV, but its reached the point now where its beyond economic repair. I've already spent about £1300 on repairs on it this year alone, and just got quoted over £500 for more repairs.
What do the thieves want 500 quid to fix?
Not contesting that it's probably beyond economical repair. Just interested.
Think 10 times before you get an e v car. There are a multiplicity of reasons not to.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
"“We must remember that the plague years were not just 1348-1353 and 1665-1666, but there were deaths during the intervening years between,” he said. “It will be interesting to see how these deaths fit within a wider context.”
But, he cautioned, historical evidence must be treated objectively. “We have a responsibility to make sure that this information does not get divided between left and right in a culture war,” he added."
Too late!
Sample size looks a bit small. Also can't see the actual study, so no way of seeing how they determined ethnicity. Any links anywhere?
I'd love to know the BBC's reasoning on their insane assertion black women were likeliest to die in a medieval plague in London.
Good afternoon, everyone.
I believe if you read the relevant news report you will be informed. This tends to be a reliable method for ascertaining information unavailable from the headline alone.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
We know that there inequalities in health across ethnicities today. We wish to reduce these. Research on whether similar inequalities existed hundreds of years ago is useful information for understanding the present day situation. Seems like useful research to me.
How is it useful and how is it pertinent to today especially when they were simply making assumptions as to ethnicity, as is pointed out, from peoples skulls ?
How is the report even valid ?
Inequalities today need resolving, I cannot see how this helps at all. I'd be happy to be told what great insight it gives us.
If someone has a link to the actual paper, I would be happy to dig into it.
We don’t know what causes many of the inequalities seen today. Is it about confounders, people from minoritised ethnic groups being more likely to earn less or live in poorer housing or live in more urban areas, for example? Is it about more direct racism, e.g. a patient’s own report of their symptoms being taken less seriously? Is it about people from different ethnic groups having different attitudes towards healthcare services? Is it about differences in social factors (family size, living in multigenerational households)?
Those factors will be different if you go back a few centuries. If we see similar (or different) inequalities, then that may shed light on what factors matter.
I'd love to know the BBC's reasoning on their insane assertion black women were likeliest to die in a medieval plague in London.
Good afternoon, everyone.
Statistically, I'd have said that they were one of the lowest risk groups, being nowhere near London at that time.
There is physical evidence of people from a vast range of locations in medieval London. DNA from skeletons, plus isotope analysis of bones.
The bit to understand about such movements, is that they weren’t direct. Someone in Turkey didn’t necessarily go straight to London. They might sail on a ship to a port a hundred miles from home, then get a job on another ship etc…
International port city has people from all over the place… startling, isn’t?
In The Life Scientific on R4 this morning Sir Mark Berry, a theoretical physicist, realised he was a bit of a rebel when he was told by his nursery to lie down on a camp bed for an afternoon nap - but he refused. The same thing happened to me. Any other PBers?
My main (only) memory of nursery is seeing the alphabet round the top of the room and thinking I already know this ! I can't recall that far back tbh.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
We know that there inequalities in health across ethnicities today. We wish to reduce these. Research on whether similar inequalities existed hundreds of years ago is useful information for understanding the present day situation. Seems like useful research to me.
Wait, I’ve seen Bridgerton, it says black people were kings and queens. Now it’s not true??
I see that the government intends to cut taxes with the “long term savings” enabled by scrapping HS2, giving up on the North of England, and abandoning the manifesto pledge to address social care.
"Cutting taxes with the long term savings enabled by scrapping HS2".
But I thought the money was being spent on the national potholes mission and tha bit of tram system delivered in 2014.
Unless the tax cuts too are stuff like "scrapping the implementation of the pastie tax".
The sort of smoke and mirrors Gordon Brown would be proud of.
“Investment” in tax credits will take some topping though. He should never have dumped “Prudence” in 2001.
Investment, as a term, did a lot of heavy lifting in the early new labour days.
He was, after all, the man who abolished boom and bust !!!
He abolished “Tory boom and bust”, yet failed to see the massive boom that was occurring, followed by the massive bust in 2008 - just as he got himself promoted to the top job!
He didn't, he only changed it to that after the biggest bust in years! Then he saved the world global financial system...
Completely off topic but out with the old, in with the new, my car that I've had since it was new for for over a decade dies today, I'd intended to keep driving it into the ground until I could get an EV, but its reached the point now where its beyond economic repair. I've already spent about £1300 on repairs on it this year alone, and just got quoted over £500 for more repairs.
So trading it in (for scrap value pretty much) and getting a new car instead. Not electric, but [non-plug in] hybrid at least, so a step in the right direction, even from brand new the depreciation on that vehicle will be less than the cost of repairs on my old one has been. Hopefully trade that in, in a few years time, when EVs are as affordable as petrol vehicles are, but this should get about 70% more mpg than my old car was getting [as hybrid, newer and it was no longer as efficient as it should have been].
Was hoping to get it to 100k miles at least, but its on 98,205 - so close, but so far away.
Feel for you if it has died before 100k; you'd hope a modern car would do more than that.
100k miles is lamentable. Generally there's a few things that need doing when a car gets to around that age, but after that it should be good for another 100k miles.
Engineering anecdote (via a mechanical engineer colleague). Ford routinely reject parts that are designed to last too long (typically they wanted failure after - 100,000 miles). This differs from Japanese manufacturers.
I have had many Japanese cars, with very few problems. Anecdote number two is that the AA chaps we encounter with our classic mini (all too often) all say that Japanese are the most reliable.
100k miles to dead is appallingly poor. I took my 1.3 petrol Yaris from 33k miles/ten years old to 160kmiles/15 years old. In that time, it needed three wheel bearings, a handbrake cable, a rear brake adjuster, a front CV joint, and a battery, plus standard service parts (oil, filters, brake pads, tyres...). I sold (still runing fine and with 10months MOT) it to an exporter, and it's probably being bounced round somewhere on Africa now.
My current £500 Passat came at 129k and is now at 150k. That's had a fan belt, an exhaust and a handbrake motor, and a heater blower, but most of that is because it had been left sitting on a drive without moving for 3 years due to the pandemic. From the way it drives I think it will probably make it to over 200k without any major problems.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
Completely off topic but out with the old, in with the new, my car that I've had since it was new for for over a decade dies today, I'd intended to keep driving it into the ground until I could get an EV, but its reached the point now where its beyond economic repair. I've already spent about £1300 on repairs on it this year alone, and just got quoted over £500 for more repairs.
So trading it in (for scrap value pretty much) and getting a new car instead. Not electric, but [non-plug in] hybrid at least, so a step in the right direction, even from brand new the depreciation on that vehicle will be less than the cost of repairs on my old one has been. Hopefully trade that in, in a few years time, when EVs are as affordable as petrol vehicles are, but this should get about 70% more mpg than my old car was getting [as hybrid, newer and it was no longer as efficient as it should have been].
Was hoping to get it to 100k miles at least, but its on 98,205 - so close, but so far away.
Sometimes these faults happen at the same time; just before Covid, my car had a series of faults that cost me about two grand. It was seven years old. In the three or four years since, I've spent little on it aside from yearly servicing and new tyres. I was tempted to get rid of it then, but am glad I kept it.
Sometimes faults are so elusive that you're not sure whether to give up on the car. I have a 2012 Fiesta which I bought last year. It drives excellently except that now and then the "spanner" warning appears on the dashboard, putting the car into cautionary limp mode (very slow uphill, max speed 50 mph). After a while (perhaps after it's warmed up) and several stops and starts, the problem usually goes away.The handbook says that means it needs a service, but it's just had one, and the three garages that have looked at it all say essentially the fault could be anything. A Ford main dealer has run tests linked to Ford HQ, and they're baffled too.
So...do I just cheerfully go on driving, accepting that sometimes I'll drive barely safely (the limp mode can kick in suddenly and get me into trouble on a hill or a roundabout)? Or scrap the car, writing off £5000? Stark choice.
Don't scrap. You have several options. Part exchange at a dealer. You will get less for a car with a check engine light, but they will only put the car out to auction, so so long as they get their money back they won't care. Alternatively privately enter it into an independent auction and see what you get.
£5k seems a lot for a 10 year old Fiesta. You may have been tucked up.
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
We know that there inequalities in health across ethnicities today. We wish to reduce these. Research on whether similar inequalities existed hundreds of years ago is useful information for understanding the present day situation. Seems like useful research to me.
How is it useful and how is it pertinent to today especially when they were simply making assumptions as to ethnicity, as is pointed out, from peoples skulls ?
How is the report even valid ?
Inequalities today need resolving, I cannot see how this helps at all. I'd be happy to be told what great insight it gives us.
If someone has a link to the actual paper, I would be happy to dig into it.
We don’t know what causes many of the inequalities seen today. Is it about confounders, people from minoritised ethnic groups being more likely to earn less or live in poorer housing or live in more urban areas, for example? Is it about more direct racism, e.g. a patient’s own report of their symptoms being taken less seriously? Is it about people from different ethnic groups having different attitudes towards healthcare services? Is it about differences in social factors (family size, living in multigenerational households)?
Those factors will be different if you go back a few centuries. If we see similar (or different) inequalities, then that may shed light on what factors matter.
But you have personally asserted that there is no difference between races. It’s all a social construct, no physical reality
These people are identifying black Africans by measuring their skulls with calipers. So now you agree racial differences are physically real?
I would rather ram aquarium gravel into my urethral meatus than drive some of the shitboxes people have admitted to owning, without any apparent shame, in this discussion.
We are now 36 minutes in and BBC WATO have only just introduced Witty's evidence (after Mark Knofler's guitar auction). Sarah Montague really doesn't like all this evidence criticising Johnson and Sunak.
I would rather ram aquarium gravel into my urethral meatus than drive some of the shitboxes people have admitted to owning, without any apparent shame, in this discussion.
A car is a car. Its a tool to do a job. If you want a race car buy won, but if you want to get to work and back by something sensible for THAT job.
In The Life Scientific on R4 this morning Sir Mark Berry, a theoretical physicist, realised he was a bit of a rebel when he was told by his nursery to lie down on a camp bed for an afternoon nap - but he refused. The same thing happened to me. Any other PBers?
Not the same but I was a pain in primary school and didn't do very well, but blossomed mid way through secondary school. Previously I had put that down to being a late developer, but on reflection it might have been that they didn't spot that I had an aptitude for maths and I just got frustrated. I spent endless hours standing in a corner for talking and got into endless trouble for refusing to memorise my times table (it seemed pointless to me as with a few obvious answers I could work anything out pretty quickly, if not quite the speed of someone memorising them and of course I wasn't limited by 12x12). To this day I don't know my times tables. I accept that for some people it is necessary.
I would rather ram aquarium gravel into my urethral meatus than drive some of the shitboxes people have admitted to owning, without any apparent shame, in this discussion.
I am driving an Avis hired Kamiq today in Northern Ireland. I might have lost my petrolhead enthusiasm because I quite like it.
To be fair, one of my favorite works of Chaucer is Ye Perssonne of Colourye’s Tale
it provides quite an insight into the patriarchal attitudes of the time, and the appalling lack of intersectional equity and inclusion. At one point Ye Personnel of Colouyre meets a Transgendrye
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
Just when I think the BBC can’t go even more batsh*t….
Not just the BBC. Who on earth funded this research and have they got money to burn ? I know who carried it out but wonder if they got a grant to undertake it.
I don't see the problem? They analysed some plague victims, and discovered that there were more African remains that showed higher death rates?
What's so wrong about that?
Sample size for one.
Not having read the paper (as far as I can see it's a book chapter and I can only get the abstract) I also wonder whether there's a differential risk of being buried in one of the studied sites - i.e. poorer (inlcuding ethnic minority) victims more likely to end up there? No idea whether that's true.
On sample size, the abstract suggests the idea is to see whether there is evidence for ethnic minorities in London at that time. You don't need a large sample size to answer that positively. Risk ratios are more problematic, for sure, but I wonder whether the headline is the BBC/others/the museum PR team/one or more of the authors getting overexcited/having an angle. Would be fascinating to read the whole study.
ETA: Number of times I've read a uni press release and had to phone them up and say "no, our study doesn't show that!" to some bizarre speculation
Does Cleese conclude that the origin of 'woke' was a backlash against the arguably racist way Manuel was treated in Fawlty Towers?
Fawlty Towers was of its time, as were other programmes such as Rising Damp etc. Times change, attitudes change and the world improves.
Of greater interest is that at the time of Basil Fawlty being racist to the Spaniards, we also had the classic racism of the working classes being mocked in the character of Alf Garnett.
I fear you've taken my post somewhat more seriously than it was intended (as did Andy JS). But thanks for the history lesson.
Completely off topic but out with the old, in with the new, my car that I've had since it was new for for over a decade dies today, I'd intended to keep driving it into the ground until I could get an EV, but its reached the point now where its beyond economic repair. I've already spent about £1300 on repairs on it this year alone, and just got quoted over £500 for more repairs.
What do the thieves want 500 quid to fix?
Not contesting that it's probably beyond economical repair. Just interested.
Think 10 times before you get an e v car. There are a multiplicity of reasons not to.
I'd love to know the BBC's reasoning on their insane assertion black women were likeliest to die in a medieval plague in London.
Good afternoon, everyone.
I believe if you read the relevant news report you will be informed. This tends to be a reliable method for ascertaining information unavailable from the headline alone.
How many black.people were in London at the time of the plague? 100?
I see that the government intends to cut taxes with the “long term savings” enabled by scrapping HS2, giving up on the North of England, and abandoning the manifesto pledge to address social care.
"Cutting taxes with the long term savings enabled by scrapping HS2".
But I thought the money was being spent on the national potholes mission and tha bit of tram system delivered in 2014.
Unless the tax cuts too are stuff like "scrapping the implementation of the pastie tax".
The sort of smoke and mirrors Gordon Brown would be proud of.
“Investment” in tax credits will take some topping though. He should never have dumped “Prudence” in 2001.
Investment, as a term, did a lot of heavy lifting in the early new labour days.
He was, after all, the man who abolished boom and bust !!!
He abolished “Tory boom and bust”, yet failed to see the massive boom that was occurring, followed by the massive bust in 2008 - just as he got himself promoted to the top job!
He was successful in abolishing Tory boom and bust - so far, at least*. Labour boom and bust proved beyond him, though.
*there's not been any boom, unless I missed it - just bust.
'People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a government minister described today as doing “their duty”.
The new policy will be set out on Wednesday as part of the autumn statement amid a drive by Rishi Sunak to make changes to the welfare system, which he described on Monday as “unsustainable”.
Hundreds of thousands of people will be told to look for work that they can do from home or face having benefits cut by £4,680 a year, under plans that were first reported by the Times.
Laura Trott, chief secretary to the Treasury, told Sky News: “Of course there should be support for people to help them into work but ultimately there is a duty on citizens if they are able to go out to work they should. Those who can work and contribute should contribute.”'
There is some discussion to be had around whether increased working from home creates opportunities for those with physical health problems that may have made it impossible to go into an office, for example (commute not feasible at any reasonable time/cost) and it would be good to see some support for that - more carrot than stick, though. I don't really see - although I'm happy to be enlightened - how home working makes it any easier for those with mental health conditions that were preventing work to take on work.
You've a point. I was thinking that *logically* the only people to whom this should apply are these who for physical or mental reasons cannot go out to work *and are not already working from home* - though equally logically some folk in the latter group will be on UC ...
The sorts of mental condition that might apply could be agoraphobia, or some disorders which affect social interaction, but it's not entirely clear how far one can take this given (a) DWP's infamous ability to cope with the diagnosis of disability, and (b) the limited scope for the equivalent of Victorian of piecework labelling matchboxes.
Edit: there are also constraints in house rental and/or insurance contracts for non-office paperwork type jobs. And also the interaction with any Gmt policies to punish WFH won't help.
Yep. First question is what's the breakdown of people not working due to health conditions, then there can be some analysis on what fraction of those may have new opportunities due to there being more WFH roles (although most roles are still hybrid, at least). Then, ideally, you'd do some research with those groups to understand the barriers and look to address those.
Good point re some of the MH conditions where working from home may offer benefits to going to an office. As you say, there are a whole load of occupations where WFH is not straightforward (aside: wouldn't it be great if there were schemes, e.g. government loans with repayment dependent on income, to help people buy equipment for e.g. home workshops - if space! - for more physical occupations such as craftwork etc? Perhaps there are).
There’s a number of moving parts here, and it’s needs carrots as well as sticks from the government side - yet all we’ve been hearing about is the sticks.
The number of people signed off sick long-term has gone up dramatically since the start of the pandemic, as has the number of people making themselves economically inactive by taking early retirement.
I wonder if employers can be encouraged to take on these people on a part-time, perhaps almost casual basis, for jobs such as call centres and customer service roles? Everyone will have their own requirements, and not all will be suitable, but it could well be that a lot of people signed off sick are able to work from home for two or three hours a day at their own discretion.
The trouble is the 'almost casual' bit, as I understand it. Varying income and work from week to week is utterly fatal to dealing with the DWP and getting one's necessary top ups. No idea if this aspect has improved, but my impression is otherwise?
Why?
Since the advent of realtime reporting, that shouldn't be a problem in this day and age.
UC is meant to be able to handle variable incomes in a way the old tax credit system couldn't do well.
I mean, it's meant to, but I think it still struggles with people paid every four weeks sometimes receiving two parts packets in a calendar month.
Yes, I believe that results in a lower payment in a double-payment month, and a higher payment every other month.
But then again, if your rent, utility bills etc are monthly, then I'm not seeing the issue with that. In a month you get paid twice by the employer, you don't need as much UC, and in months when you're only paid a partial month by the employer, then getting more surely helps?
Why do some employers persist with four-weekly pay? It's a nonsense. Causes so many problems.
For the same very good reason many employers have weekly or fortnightly payments.
If you have very variable inputs and outputs and not a roughly guaranteed wage bill and income amount then aligning pay to weekly (or multiple of weekly) sales makes perfect sense.
Redesigning the year into 13 months of 4 weeks each would be easier than abolishing that.
Completely off topic but out with the old, in with the new, my car that I've had since it was new for for over a decade dies today, I'd intended to keep driving it into the ground until I could get an EV, but its reached the point now where its beyond economic repair. I've already spent about £1300 on repairs on it this year alone, and just got quoted over £500 for more repairs.
What do the thieves want 500 quid to fix?
Not contesting that it's probably beyond economical repair. Just interested.
Think 10 times before you get an e v car. There are a multiplicity of reasons not to.
Potential problems?
Risk of fire? Expensive ir uninsurable? Second hand value repair costs expensive to buy... the lis is considerable
Comments
Act within the law.
The liberal principle is that you can do what you like, so long as you're not causing harm to others. These prats are causing harm to others, illegally, yet expect to get away with it simply because their beliefs trump the harm to others and the law in their eyes.
Not how it works in either a liberal society, or a democracy.
You have the right to protest, but if you cross the line into criminal behaviour then you can go to prison for that.
For £45 a month I can buy cinema tickets.
I had a wooden guesthouse for my first two nights in KRS. But the sound insulation and mosquitoes were bad so I changed to Mr Song's, though it's about 5 minutes behind the beach. And that was about a tenner a night IIRC.
But then again, if your rent, utility bills etc are monthly, then I'm not seeing the issue with that. In a month you get paid twice by the employer, you don't need as much UC, and in months when you're only paid a partial month by the employer, then getting more surely helps?
But I thought the money was being spent on the national potholes mission and tha bit of tram system delivered in 2014.
Unless the tax cuts too are stuff like "scrapping the implementation of the pastie tax".
It does, as you suggest, require something of a change of mindset from the employers. Many of those with ‘long covid’, or mental health issues arising from the pandemic, could find that a small amount of work improves their health considerably.
But it requires flexibility all round, and government won’t improve anyone’s mental health by seeing the whole idea as primarily to reduce the cost to the Exchequer by threatening benefits payments.
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2023/1230/made
The issue as I understand it is not the money in itself but the categorisation - the shifts between working and, in some weeks, nto working at all, which resets the Government system. Snakes and ladders game.
After all, many of the simpletons are probably also attached to their online anonymity.
With Vitality, you got the scheme as part of health insurance. You got rewards for activity. There were discounts on sports related stuff - but the rewards for actual activity were the key part.
So if you did nothing, you got nothing. Walk for x steps a day, get some free tickets to the cinema.
A major point was you could get rewards for simple stuff - but more for serious gym work etc. The idea was to get people doing stuff and then get them doing more serious exercise.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-67472933
Black women most likely to die in medieval London plague
There was a whole range of benefits - cheap gym memberships, sports kit etc etc. The activity rewards - which went beyond cinema tickets - were the heart of it, though.
It’s was an interesting sociological experiment in encouraging people into daily exercise. From the stuff I saw, it was extremely effective in getting even the “I never go to the gym” types active.
The critical bit is small rewards for some activity - with the promise of more for more.
Almost al post-communist states embarked on some form of shock therapy. The ones that succeeded were generally those with stronger institutions and a strong focus on rule of law, transparency and lack of corruption. The ones that failed were those captured by gangster capitalists and oligarchs. Deregulation was an important part of this, and opening the economy up to international capital. Argentina's economy is a regulatory nightmare and riddled with exchange controls that don't work.
For other countries at different stages in their development or with different demographics, 1990s style neoliberalism would be a disaster. Those are the countries with poor infrastructure, no financial safety net and a need for active industrial strategy. Much of sub-saharan Africa for example. And then there are those like India, which could really do with a bit of what countries like Poland and the Baltics did in the 1990s to make itself easier to invest in, but also needs much more concerted infrastructure spending to catch up with China.
That's the thing. No single economic orthodoxy works for all places at all times. Too many commentators assume there is one right way of doing things.
I was quite liking the guy until he said that.
Barbara Castle was a big fan of linking pensions to earnings as well as prices. She gave Gordon Brown what-for after the 75p a week increase Labour gave out one year.
The problem is that better-off pensioners, not reliant on the state pension, also benefit.
For me, the simple answer to this (and the "why should rich pensioners get the free bus travel/winter fuel allowance etc" question) is to have a lower threshold for over-67s for the 40% income tax band to compensate.
But, he cautioned, historical evidence must be treated objectively. “We have a responsibility to make sure that this information does not get divided between left and right in a culture war,” he added."
Too late!
He was, after all, the man who abolished boom and bust !!!
"Downing Street deletes post about Northern Ireland with Irish flag"
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-67485141
This sort of thing would usually drive me into another room but the song she's doing at the moment is really really good. Kind of ambient electronica with a memorable repeating hook, dream-like vocal line and rather pleasant harp stuff going on. I must let her mum know I approve.
So...do I just cheerfully go on driving, accepting that sometimes I'll drive barely safely (the limp mode can kick in suddenly and get me into trouble on a hill or a roundabout)? Or scrap the car, writing off £5000? Stark choice.
Roger Hallam and other eco-activists wanted backing for the protest, launched under the name Heathrow Pause, to go viral and shut down the airport while also triggering arrests and lots of publicity, London’s Isleworth Crown Court was told.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/extinction-rebellion-co-founder-plotted-to-ground-heathrow-traffic-with-drones/ar-AA1kffJb?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=61fea111cbd04d53bb6aec0d8a2b7755&ei=27
Or would it be the equivalent of "Dad Dancing" !!!!!
Good afternoon, everyone.
I don't see the problem? They analysed some plague victims, and discovered that there were more African remains that showed higher death rates?
What's so wrong about that?
"Bubonic?"
"No. Worse!"
"Pneumonic?"
"No, even worse! Historical revisionist racism plague!"
"Ah. Plague of the brain."
Love to see Leon's thoughts on this.
It's like reading the outline for a wacky, far fetched, feature film. Probably with Gerard Butler as a former marine, down on his luck, who somehow is embroiled in all of this and becomes pivotal in saving the day.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/war-is-coming-xi-jinping-s-taiwan-invasion-plan-includes-chilling-warning-about-us-attack/ar-AA1kenV4?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=b02e84b8d20047f6b40fcf28a0825797&ei=35
It’s total historical junk.
Almost as bad as the “Henry Cort stole the puddling process from enslaved black people” fiasco.
In the long run Haley might be better off if she's not his VP pick.
My wife and I could have a pretty comfortable life on £1600 a month between us. Mortgage paid off, so our essential costs are council tax (boo, hiss), heat and light, and food. This lot probably comes to about £650 a month.
If it was just me on my own, it would be tight but probably manageable.
If we didn't own a house, round here it would be £800/month extra for a modest 2 bed. Still manageable as a couple, but getting tight.
On my own on the same budget and without a house I'd be looking at a grim existence in a £500/month house share.
I'm not sure what the fix is (probably getting housing costs down would be best way to solve the biggest part of the problem), but I'm fairly sure that blanket increases in the state pension which will mostly go to homeowning couples who don't actually need the money is a particularly poor way to solve the problem.
“The team looked at five features of the skulls, such as the shape of the eye area, and by using a forensic databank covering modern and historical populations around the world, explored the individuals’ probable affinity with different populations. The approach, the researchers say, is an established forensic tool, and is not based on controversial methods involving cranial measurements.”
So, how do you know they were African? Did you use horrible race science? OMG did you use skull measurements like Goebbels?
No, no no no, we just used skull measurements - nothing like Goebbels and HIS skull measurements, these are WOKE skull measurements
So, what causes an intermittent fault on an otherwise healthy ECU? Wiring issue... Check your grounds, battery terminals and alternator.
After that, it's out with the multimeter to test continuity on everything. Cancel all social engagements for the next six months.
How is the report even valid ?
Inequalities today need resolving, I cannot see how this helps at all. I'd be happy to be told what great insight it gives us.
Palestine v. Australia in a World Cup qualifier!
I don't believe it could affect validity as section 4(7) prevents the validity of an Order in Council purported to be made under the Act from being called into question in legal proceedings. However, there was possibly a bit of a balls up made over it and it's been fudged a bit.
Bl;ack people historically were also most likely to be found in those ports. Sailors, and so on.
And diseases are known to vary their impact according to genetic makeup. Smallpox was lethal to Amerindians who were immunologically naive as far as it was concerned, much more so than Old World people. Bubonic plague is IIRC a primarily central asian disease of rodents, so not native to Africa.
So it's not at all insane a priori. I'd need to see the data, but it's not an unreasonable hypothesis in itself - pending the actual test - that Black people were disproportionately more likely to die than the local natives.
But there are also socio-economic factors - poor people were less able to escape (health, food, ability to move out to the country).
This study should be seen in that light.
I have had many Japanese cars, with very few problems. Anecdote number two is that the AA chaps we encounter with our classic mini (all too often) all say that Japanese are the most reliable.
I’ve just been looking for the original paper, but haven’t been able to find it. (It doesn’t seem to be up on the journal website yet.) I am thus unable to comment on the detail of what they’ve done.
This is according to Raz Segal - an Israeli associate professor of Holocaust and genocide studies
Of greater interest is that at the time of Basil Fawlty being racist to the Spaniards, we also had the classic racism of the working classes being mocked in the character of Alf Garnett.
I took it to a local (good) garage, who after some head scratching, found that the drainplug in the passenger door was blocked, and a wiring plug was under water. Somehow this was shorting out and causing loads of other error indications. They unblocked the drain, cleaned and dried the plug, and everything went back to normal.
No, I didn't believe them. But they only charged me half an hour's labour...
Still, that wasn't as bad as my first car; an ex-utility Land Rover 110. The electrics on that thing were exceptionally weird.
We don’t know what causes many of the inequalities seen today. Is it about confounders, people from minoritised ethnic groups being more likely to earn less or live in poorer housing or live in more urban areas, for example? Is it about more direct racism, e.g. a patient’s own report of their symptoms being taken less seriously? Is it about people from different ethnic groups having different attitudes towards healthcare services? Is it about differences in social factors (family size, living in multigenerational households)?
Those factors will be different if you go back a few centuries. If we see similar (or different) inequalities, then that may shed light on what factors matter.
The bit to understand about such movements, is that they weren’t direct. Someone in Turkey didn’t necessarily go straight to London. They might sail on a ship to a port a hundred miles from home, then get a job on another ship etc…
International port city has people from all over the place… startling, isn’t?
worldglobal financial system...In that time, it needed three wheel bearings, a handbrake cable, a rear brake adjuster, a front CV joint, and a battery, plus standard service parts (oil, filters, brake pads, tyres...). I sold (still runing fine and with 10months MOT) it to an exporter, and it's probably being bounced round somewhere on Africa now.
My current £500 Passat came at 129k and is now at 150k. That's had a fan belt, an exhaust and a handbrake motor, and a heater blower, but most of that is because it had been left sitting on a drive without moving for 3 years due to the pandemic. From the way it drives I think it will probably make it to over 200k without any major problems.
£5k seems a lot for a 10 year old Fiesta. You may have been tucked up.
These people are identifying black Africans by measuring their skulls with calipers. So now you agree racial differences are physically real?
*Confused in Cambodia*
God bless the BBC.
it provides quite an insight into the patriarchal attitudes of the time, and the appalling lack of intersectional equity and inclusion. At one point Ye Personnel of Colouyre meets a Transgendrye
Searing
On sample size, the abstract suggests the idea is to see whether there is evidence for ethnic minorities in London at that time. You don't need a large sample size to answer that positively. Risk ratios are more problematic, for sure, but I wonder whether the headline is the BBC/others/the museum PR team/one or more of the authors getting overexcited/having an angle. Would be fascinating to read the whole study.
ETA: Number of times I've read a uni press release and had to phone them up and say "no, our study doesn't show that!" to some bizarre speculation
*there's not been any boom, unless I missed it - just bust.
If you have very variable inputs and outputs and not a roughly guaranteed wage bill and income amount then aligning pay to weekly (or multiple of weekly) sales makes perfect sense.
Redesigning the year into 13 months of 4 weeks each would be easier than abolishing that.
Second hand value repair costs expensive to buy... the lis is considerable