‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
How about letting manufacturers choose what size bottle they want, so long as it is clearly and accurately labelled as such?
Why does it need to be 200, 500, 568 or 700?
If someone wants to sell a bottle in 420ml then so long as it clearly says 420ml then why should that be verboten? Or any other number, just make clear what it is and let the consumer decide.
Agree.
However I think the point @Benpointer was probably referring to was probably:
'Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this'
What an arse. Almost on the same level as 'Blue passports' and straight bananas. Mostly these things are not true i.e. we can do them anyway, but businesses choose not to and even if they couldn't these are mindbogglingly trivial gains. I mean is this really what people wanted from Brexit?
oopps. Should make clear I was not suggesting @Benpointer or @BartholomewRoberts are arses. On the contrary they both made posts I agree with and approve of.
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
How about letting manufacturers choose what size bottle they want, so long as it is clearly and accurately labelled as such?
Why does it need to be 200, 500, 568 or 700?
If someone wants to sell a bottle in 420ml then so long as it clearly says 420ml then why should that be verboten? Or any other number, just make clear what it is and let the consumer decide.
Agree.
However I think the point @Benpointer was probably referring to was probably:
'Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this'
What an arse. Almost on the same level as 'Blue passports' and straight bananas. Mostly these things are not true i.e. we can do them anyway, but businesses choose not to and even if they couldn't these are mindbogglingly trivial gains. I mean is this really what people wanted from Brexit?
I mean is this really what people wanted from Brexit?
Speaking personally: No.
What I wanted from Brexit is for our laws and policies to be determined in a Parliament we elect, and debated at elections in which we vote.
If the current Government aren't implementing sensible policies that's a reason to elect a new one, not a reason to bemoan Brexit.
Budget I think will be a pre-election one. Election in May I think.
Let's go back to fixed-term parliaments. This nonsense with governments playing silly buggers with the election date really is a national disgrace.
Can we do it after the next election so we can get back to the sane plan of an election every x years in early May to go alongside the other local elections...
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
Another flop in the making. Bet these will be sold as a novelty for a short while, then disappear.
Jennies (500ml bottles) have been sold for ages - mainly for Barsac and Tokai as well as Sauternes.
Indeed. There are tons of sizes apart from 750ml.
Tons is a bit strong. The regulations for wine only permit 100 — 187 — 250 — 375 — 500 — 750 — 1 000 — 1 500 ml. "Yellow wine" must be in 620ml bottles. And sparkling can be 125 — 200 — 375 — 750 — 1 500 ml. (Sizes below 100 or above 1500ml aren't covered.)
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
The discussion has moved on from whether I - a female lawyer who believes in human rights, the worth of the ECHR, a decent justice system, a police force that doesn't break the law, the rule of law, women's rights, men behaving decently towards women, fairness, accountability for those at the top of organisations, free speech and legal representation, even for the unpopular and disliked, protecting children and leaving them a better world than the one we inherited and the inestimable value of gardening - am some sort of far right Nazi. Had those of you doing this imbibed too much Xmas sherry?
"Most terrorism in the UK has been conducted by people born in the UK. Some has been conducted by immigrants. Among immigrants, most terrorism has been conducted by immigrants from the Republic of Ireland. No other group comes close."
Not true actually. Most has been conducted by people from Northern Ireland, who are British citizens. They were not immigrants though they had a citizenship they did not want to have - which was the source of the terrorism. The worst act of terrorism during the Troubles was carried out by Northern Unionists - British citizens again - when they bombed Dublin and Monaghan in 1974. 33 people were killed, an unborn child and 258 people injured. That makes it only second to the July 2005 bombings in London.
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
Another flop in the making. Bet these will be sold as a novelty for a short while, then disappear.
Jennies (500ml bottles) have been sold for ages - mainly for Barsac and Tokai as well as Sauternes.
Indeed. There are tons of sizes apart from 750ml.
Tons is a bit strong. The regulations for wine only permit 100 — 187 — 250 — 375 — 500 — 750 — 1 000 — 1 500 ml. "Yellow wine" must be in 620ml bottles. And sparkling can be 125 — 200 — 375 — 750 — 1 500 ml. (Sizes below 100 or above 1500ml aren't covered.)
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
Let the market decide.
If customers want bigger or smaller bottles, let them decide that.
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
Another flop in the making. Bet these will be sold as a novelty for a short while, then disappear.
Jennies (500ml bottles) have been sold for ages - mainly for Barsac and Tokai as well as Sauternes.
Indeed. There are tons of sizes apart from 750ml.
Tons is a bit strong. The regulations for wine only permit 100 — 187 — 250 — 375 — 500 — 750 — 1 000 — 1 500 ml. "Yellow wine" must be in 620ml bottles. And sparkling can be 125 — 200 — 375 — 750 — 1 500 ml. (Sizes below 100 or above 1500ml aren't covered.)
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
Let the market decide.
If customers want bigger or smaller bottles, let them decide that.
If they don't, let them decide that too.
It's more likely that the entities doing the deciding will be the supermarkets, not the customers. A fully unregulated market often leads to bad outcomes, so governments need to regulate at least some of the time. But in general I agree that this particular regulation isn't too important to retain. Conversely, it hardly seems important to actively dump it either -- the government should have bigger fish[*] to fry right now, and actively diverging from EU standards is going to make future trade accomodations trickier.
[*] And luckily for them there is no restriction on the permitted portion sizes for fried fish...
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
How about letting manufacturers choose what size bottle they want, so long as it is clearly and accurately labelled as such?
Why does it need to be 200, 500, 568 or 700?
If someone wants to sell a bottle in 420ml then so long as it clearly says 420ml then why should that be verboten? Or any other number, just make clear what it is and let the consumer decide.
Agree.
However I think the point @Benpointer was probably referring to was probably:
'Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this'
What an arse. Almost on the same level as 'Blue passports' and straight bananas. Mostly these things are not true i.e. we can do them anyway, but businesses choose not to and even if they couldn't these are mindbogglingly trivial gains. I mean is this really what people wanted from Brexit?
I mean is this really what people wanted from Brexit?
Speaking personally: No.
What I wanted from Brexit is for our laws and policies to be determined in a Parliament we elect, and debated at elections in which we vote.
If the current Government aren't implementing sensible policies that's a reason to elect a new one, not a reason to bemoan Brexit.
@BartholomewRoberts although I disagree with you on Brexit I appreciate your reasons were the sane ones and there are sane reasons for Brexit. As an internationalist I appreciate the issue of restriction on international trade by being a member of the EU for instance. I, like you, made a decision on the balance of the pros and cons.
However when people like this minister come out with crap like this eg reverting to a pint bottle of beer in the shop and blue passports as a benefit of Brexit I just want to punch him. He does the Brexit cause no favours.
I also agree it should be a market decision as to what size bottle you use as long as you don't misrepresent it.
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
Another flop in the making. Bet these will be sold as a novelty for a short while, then disappear.
Jennies (500ml bottles) have been sold for ages - mainly for Barsac and Tokai as well as Sauternes.
Indeed. There are tons of sizes apart from 750ml.
Tons is a bit strong. The regulations for wine only permit 100 — 187 — 250 — 375 — 500 — 750 — 1 000 — 1 500 ml. "Yellow wine" must be in 620ml bottles. And sparkling can be 125 — 200 — 375 — 750 — 1 500 ml. (Sizes below 100 or above 1500ml aren't covered.)
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
Let the market decide.
If customers want bigger or smaller bottles, let them decide that.
If they don't, let them decide that too.
It's more likely that the entities doing the deciding will be the supermarkets, not the customers. A fully unregulated market often leads to bad outcomes, so governments need to regulate at least some of the time. But in general I agree that this particular regulation isn't too important to retain. Conversely, it hardly seems important to actively dump it either -- the government should have bigger fish[*] to fry right now, and actively diverging from EU standards is going to make future trade accomodations trickier.
[*] And luckily for them there is no restriction on the permitted portion sizes for fried fish...
So what?
Beer can sizes are not regulated, but almost all end up in the same size anyway because that's what consumers overwhelmingly choose and there's a competitive advantage to sticking to uniform sizes.
If people or businesses choose otherwise, let them.
There's absolutely no reason whatsoever for governments to dictate sizes. Dictate transparency on weights and measures sure, but not sizes.
Mr Gullis tweeted: “Axing inheritance tax is something we should do, just not yet. Tax cuts for Spring 2024 I’d prefer us to prioritise: Raise the higher rate income tax threshold; Cut the basic rate of income tax; Scrap IR35 reforms; Increase VAT registration threshold to £250,000.”
Ignoring IR35 the actual fix for VAT isn't to increase the threshold to £250,000 it would be to reduce it to £25,000 or so and ensure most people have to charge it so the £83,000 level isn't a barrier for expansion..
I honestly can't see squillionaire Rishi and millionaire Hunt passing such a nakedly self-serving measure as abolishing inheritance tax. Increasing thresholds, no doubt, as a trap for Labour but complete abolition would see Opposition attack lines writing themselves.
Indeed, Labour will argue that the Sunaks stand to gain $800m from abolishing IHT (40% of Akshata Murty's likely inheritance from her father's $4bn wealth).
No doubt the Sunaks will explain that they were going to avoid the IHT anyway due to non-Dom or other tax dodges - a defence that may be counter-productive.
Given Rishi's instinctive grasp of politics, he will probably explain he will not benefit personally as he plans to emigrate next year.
Mr Gullis tweeted: “Axing inheritance tax is something we should do, just not yet. Tax cuts for Spring 2024 I’d prefer us to prioritise: Raise the higher rate income tax threshold; Cut the basic rate of income tax; Scrap IR35 reforms; Increase VAT registration threshold to £250,000.”
Ignoring IR35 the actual fix for VAT isn't to increase the threshold to £250,000 it would be to reduce it to £25,000 or so and ensure most people have to charge it so the £83,000 level isn't a barrier for expansion..
I honestly can't see squillionaire Rishi and millionaire Hunt passing such a nakedly self-serving measure as abolishing inheritance tax. Increasing thresholds, no doubt, as a trap for Labour but complete abolition would see Opposition attack lines writing themselves.
Indeed, Labour will argue that the Sunaks stand to gain $800m from abolishing IHT (40% of Akshata Murty's likely inheritance from her father's $4bn wealth).
No doubt the Sunaks will explain that they were going to avoid the IHT anyway due to non-Dom or other tax dodges - a defence that may be counter-productive.
Given Rishi's instinctive grasp of politics, he will probably explain he will not benefit personally as he plans to emigrate next year.
The discussion has moved on from whether I - a female lawyer who believes in human rights, the worth of the ECHR, a decent justice system, a police force that doesn't break the law, the rule of law, women's rights, men behaving decently towards women, fairness, accountability for those at the top of organisations, free speech and legal representation, even for the unpopular and disliked, protecting children and leaving them a better world than the one we inherited and the inestimable value of gardening - am some sort of far right Nazi. Had those of you doing this imbibed too much Xmas sherry?
"Most terrorism in the UK has been conducted by people born in the UK. Some has been conducted by immigrants. Among immigrants, most terrorism has been conducted by immigrants from the Republic of Ireland. No other group comes close."
Not true actually. Most has been conducted by people from Northern Ireland, who are British citizens. They were not immigrants though they had a citizenship they did not want to have - which was the source of the terrorism. The worst act of terrorism during the Troubles was carried out by Northern Unionists - British citizens again - when they bombed Dublin and Monaghan in 1974. 33 people were killed, an unborn child and 258 people injured. That makes it only second to the July 2005 bombings in London.
We appear to be talking at cross-purposes.
I said, "Most terrorism in the UK has been conducted by people born in the UK." You then said, "Most has been conducted by people from Northern Ireland, who are British citizens." These statements do not appear to contradict, so I am unclear why you said, "Not true actually." Northern Ireland is part of the UK. We are in agreement, are we not?
Some terrorism associated with the Troubles was conducted by people from the Republic of Ireland who entered the UK, either on a short-term basis or who had immigrated. Not most of it, but some. Certain Enoch Powell fans on PB are obsessed with immigrants causing terrorism. If we just look at the minority of terrorist attacks conducted by immigrants, then I believe immigrants from the Republic of Ireland are the largest group. But I agree that the vast majority of terrorism in UK history has not been conducted by immigrants. I don't see immigration as a cause of terrorism. Enoch Powell was wrong.
I think some people are conflating charity with reliance on charity. The one is generally a good thing, the other not so much.
Agreed.
People will always face hardships though, always have done, always will do.
When they do, having charity available is better than predators available.
If debt problems were rising and food bank donations were falling, then yes I'd agree that would be a problem.
But debt problems are falling and food bank usage (read: donations) are rising, so that is unquestioningly an excellent thing.
You can't be agreeing, that means something's gone wrong. I'd expand and summarize as follows:
To the extent higher foodbank use is destroying the loan-shark business, yes that's good. To the extent it's caused by hard up people feeling even more hard up than they did before, no it isn't.
All can be happy, I think, now I've put it like this?
Since private debt levels are falling, not rising, then it doesn't seem people are feeling more hard up than they did before, which is good.
Doesn't mean things can't be better.
And of course its the cost of housing which utterly dwarfs the cost of food. Food is a total distraction when it comes to hardship, but the rise of food banks is fantastic not miserable.
There's some nuance in the issue of foodbanks, yes, but much of their increasing popularity will almost certainly be due to greater levels of financial distress amongst the badly off. Even if some of it is replacing loan sharks the situation as a whole, ie foodbanks on the rise, cannot be described as "fantastic". This is not an apt use of that word. Fantastic would be people not needing to use either charity or loan sharks to feed themselves and their families.
Don't be ridiculous, people always have and always will run into hardship.
If someone's car breaks down and it costs £500 to fix it, then that's going to cause hardship.
In that situation, would you rather they borrow money from Wonga to get through to next payday, or go to a foodbank and get some charity to take them through to next payday?
Their increased popularity is due to awareness and people donating to them, rather than food going to landfill. That's a good thing, there's no downside.
You and your Wonga. Look, once more for the road, to the extent foodbanks are replacing Wonga that is good. However much of this is zero to do with Wonga. It's down to people feeling the pinch more than they did before. And that is not good (let alone "fantastic").
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
Another flop in the making. Bet these will be sold as a novelty for a short while, then disappear.
Jennies (500ml bottles) have been sold for ages - mainly for Barsac and Tokai as well as Sauternes.
Indeed. There are tons of sizes apart from 750ml.
Tons is a bit strong. The regulations for wine only permit 100 — 187 — 250 — 375 — 500 — 750 — 1 000 — 1 500 ml. "Yellow wine" must be in 620ml bottles. And sparkling can be 125 — 200 — 375 — 750 — 1 500 ml. (Sizes below 100 or above 1500ml aren't covered.)
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
Which is tons of sizes. What is annoying is that the French wine industry lied about domestic production of bottles - they claimed the glass was all made in France. It turns out that the double bottle size (and other large formats) were actually being made in China. And that got disrupted. So lots of vintages have very few magnums available.
The discussion has moved on from whether I - a female lawyer who believes in human rights, the worth of the ECHR, a decent justice system, a police force that doesn't break the law, the rule of law, women's rights, men behaving decently towards women, fairness, accountability for those at the top of organisations, free speech and legal representation, even for the unpopular and disliked, protecting children and leaving them a better world than the one we inherited and the inestimable value of gardening - am some sort of far right Nazi. Had those of you doing this imbibed too much Xmas sherry?
Felt a little called out did we? If the boot fits...maybe you could think about what that means?
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
Another flop in the making. Bet these will be sold as a novelty for a short while, then disappear.
Jennies (500ml bottles) have been sold for ages - mainly for Barsac and Tokai as well as Sauternes.
Indeed. There are tons of sizes apart from 750ml.
Tons is a bit strong. The regulations for wine only permit 100 — 187 — 250 — 375 — 500 — 750 — 1 000 — 1 500 ml. "Yellow wine" must be in 620ml bottles. And sparkling can be 125 — 200 — 375 — 750 — 1 500 ml. (Sizes below 100 or above 1500ml aren't covered.)
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
Let the market decide.
If customers want bigger or smaller bottles, let them decide that.
If they don't, let them decide that too.
It's more likely that the entities doing the deciding will be the supermarkets, not the customers. A fully unregulated market often leads to bad outcomes, so governments need to regulate at least some of the time. But in general I agree that this particular regulation isn't too important to retain. Conversely, it hardly seems important to actively dump it either -- the government should have bigger fish[*] to fry right now, and actively diverging from EU standards is going to make future trade accomodations trickier.
[*] And luckily for them there is no restriction on the permitted portion sizes for fried fish...
So what?
Beer can sizes are not regulated, but almost all end up in the same size anyway because that's what consumers overwhelmingly choose and there's a competitive advantage to sticking to uniform sizes.
If people or businesses choose otherwise, let them.
There's absolutely no reason whatsoever for governments to dictate sizes. Dictate transparency on weights and measures sure, but not sizes.
The answer to "so what?" is that all governments must have priorities -- they have limited time and limited capacity to effectively pursue multiple aims at once, and if they chase after every policy squirrel that crosses their path they will achieve nothing. A hallmark of good government therefore is that the things it chooses to act on are the important ones (by its own political, philosophical and ideological lights). Fiddling about with the regulations on wine bottle sizes is not going to have a major effect on anything, even for a political party whose views are fully aligned with the idea of greater market choice, and there are likely a dozen areas more important to forwarding that political philosophy than cancelling this particular leftover regulation. Making a song and dance about it is therefore in my view bad government, and characteristic of this particular government which has spent years squandering its parliamentary position and not achieving much. (I happen to be personally not hugely unhappy with that squandering because I suspect I would disagree with many of the things a more effective Tory party might have carried out; but I think it's objectively not been an effective government.)
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
Another flop in the making. Bet these will be sold as a novelty for a short while, then disappear.
Jennies (500ml bottles) have been sold for ages - mainly for Barsac and Tokai as well as Sauternes.
Indeed. There are tons of sizes apart from 750ml.
Tons is a bit strong. The regulations for wine only permit 100 — 187 — 250 — 375 — 500 — 750 — 1 000 — 1 500 ml. "Yellow wine" must be in 620ml bottles. And sparkling can be 125 — 200 — 375 — 750 — 1 500 ml. (Sizes below 100 or above 1500ml aren't covered.)
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
Let the market decide.
If customers want bigger or smaller bottles, let them decide that.
If they don't, let them decide that too.
It's more likely that the entities doing the deciding will be the supermarkets, not the customers. A fully unregulated market often leads to bad outcomes, so governments need to regulate at least some of the time. But in general I agree that this particular regulation isn't too important to retain. Conversely, it hardly seems important to actively dump it either -- the government should have bigger fish[*] to fry right now, and actively diverging from EU standards is going to make future trade accomodations trickier.
[*] And luckily for them there is no restriction on the permitted portion sizes for fried fish...
So what?
Beer can sizes are not regulated, but almost all end up in the same size anyway because that's what consumers overwhelmingly choose and there's a competitive advantage to sticking to uniform sizes.
If people or businesses choose otherwise, let them.
There's absolutely no reason whatsoever for governments to dictate sizes. Dictate transparency on weights and measures sure, but not sizes.
The answer to "so what?" is that all governments must have priorities -- they have limited time and limited capacity to effectively pursue multiple aims at once, and if they chase after every policy squirrel that crosses their path they will achieve nothing. A hallmark of good government therefore is that the things it chooses to act on are the important ones (by its own political, philosophical and ideological lights). Fiddling about with the regulations on wine bottle sizes is not going to have a major effect on anything, even for a political party whose views are fully aligned with the idea of greater market choice, and there are likely a dozen areas more important to forwarding that political philosophy than cancelling this particular leftover regulation. Making a song and dance about it is therefore in my view bad government, and characteristic of this particular government which has spent years squandering its parliamentary position and not achieving much. (I happen to be personally not hugely unhappy with that squandering because I suspect I would disagree with many of the things a more effective Tory party might have carried out; but I think it's objectively not been an effective government.)
You're right that Governments have too little time or capacity to do multiple things, which is why the Government regulating this is ridiculous and bad governance.
Its amusing that you consider that scrapping this regulation a bad thing, as its not what the Government should be doing, but don't consider implementing this regulation a bad thing for the same reason.
If there's no justification for a regulation, it should not exist.
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
Another flop in the making. Bet these will be sold as a novelty for a short while, then disappear.
Jennies (500ml bottles) have been sold for ages - mainly for Barsac and Tokai as well as Sauternes.
Indeed. There are tons of sizes apart from 750ml.
Tons is a bit strong. The regulations for wine only permit 100 — 187 — 250 — 375 — 500 — 750 — 1 000 — 1 500 ml. "Yellow wine" must be in 620ml bottles. And sparkling can be 125 — 200 — 375 — 750 — 1 500 ml. (Sizes below 100 or above 1500ml aren't covered.)
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
Let the market decide.
If customers want bigger or smaller bottles, let them decide that.
If they don't, let them decide that too.
It's more likely that the entities doing the deciding will be the supermarkets, not the customers. A fully unregulated market often leads to bad outcomes, so governments need to regulate at least some of the time. But in general I agree that this particular regulation isn't too important to retain. Conversely, it hardly seems important to actively dump it either -- the government should have bigger fish[*] to fry right now, and actively diverging from EU standards is going to make future trade accomodations trickier.
[*] And luckily for them there is no restriction on the permitted portion sizes for fried fish...
So what?
Beer can sizes are not regulated, but almost all end up in the same size anyway because that's what consumers overwhelmingly choose and there's a competitive advantage to sticking to uniform sizes.
If people or businesses choose otherwise, let them.
There's absolutely no reason whatsoever for governments to dictate sizes. Dictate transparency on weights and measures sure, but not sizes.
The answer to "so what?" is that all governments must have priorities -- they have limited time and limited capacity to effectively pursue multiple aims at once, and if they chase after every policy squirrel that crosses their path they will achieve nothing. A hallmark of good government therefore is that the things it chooses to act on are the important ones (by its own political, philosophical and ideological lights). Fiddling about with the regulations on wine bottle sizes is not going to have a major effect on anything, even for a political party whose views are fully aligned with the idea of greater market choice, and there are likely a dozen areas more important to forwarding that political philosophy than cancelling this particular leftover regulation. Making a song and dance about it is therefore in my view bad government, and characteristic of this particular government which has spent years squandering its parliamentary position and not achieving much. (I happen to be personally not hugely unhappy with that squandering because I suspect I would disagree with many of the things a more effective Tory party might have carried out; but I think it's objectively not been an effective government.)
You're right that Governments have too little time or capacity to do multiple things, which is why the Government regulating this is ridiculous and bad governance.
Its amusing that you consider that scrapping this regulation a bad thing, as its not what the Government should be doing, but don't consider implementing this regulation a bad thing for the same reason.
If there's no justification for a regulation, it should not exist.
When did I ever say I thought implementing the regulation was a good thing? Anyway, this one *does* have a justification -- I linked to the EU paper on it in an earlier post. You might disagree with that justification but you can't claim the regulation is still in place for no reason at all. (Personally I would probably have gone with dropping the size rules for wine along with everything else in 2007/2009, rather than leaving them as a special case.)
I think some people are conflating charity with reliance on charity. The one is generally a good thing, the other not so much.
Agreed.
People will always face hardships though, always have done, always will do.
When they do, having charity available is better than predators available.
If debt problems were rising and food bank donations were falling, then yes I'd agree that would be a problem.
But debt problems are falling and food bank usage (read: donations) are rising, so that is unquestioningly an excellent thing.
You can't be agreeing, that means something's gone wrong. I'd expand and summarize as follows:
To the extent higher foodbank use is destroying the loan-shark business, yes that's good. To the extent it's caused by hard up people feeling even more hard up than they did before, no it isn't.
All can be happy, I think, now I've put it like this?
Since private debt levels are falling, not rising, then it doesn't seem people are feeling more hard up than they did before, which is good.
Doesn't mean things can't be better.
And of course its the cost of housing which utterly dwarfs the cost of food. Food is a total distraction when it comes to hardship, but the rise of food banks is fantastic not miserable.
There's some nuance in the issue of foodbanks, yes, but much of their increasing popularity will almost certainly be due to greater levels of financial distress amongst the badly off. Even if some of it is replacing loan sharks the situation as a whole, ie foodbanks on the rise, cannot be described as "fantastic". This is not an apt use of that word. Fantastic would be people not needing to use either charity or loan sharks to feed themselves and their families.
Don't be ridiculous, people always have and always will run into hardship.
If someone's car breaks down and it costs £500 to fix it, then that's going to cause hardship.
In that situation, would you rather they borrow money from Wonga to get through to next payday, or go to a foodbank and get some charity to take them through to next payday?
Their increased popularity is due to awareness and people donating to them, rather than food going to landfill. That's a good thing, there's no downside.
You and your Wonga. Look, once more for the road, to the extent foodbanks are replacing Wonga that is good. However much of this is zero to do with Wonga. It's down to people feeling the pinch more than they did before. And that is not good (let alone "fantastic").
People have always felt the pinch, always have and always will.
The fact people feel pinches has not changed, the variable that has changed is the fact that people have an alternative.
‘Pint’ size wine stocked on Britain’s shelves for the first time ever thanks to new freedoms from leaving the European Union Still and sparkling wine to be sold in 200ml, 500ml and 568ml ‘pint’ sizes in 2024 900 British vineyards set to benefit across the country from new freedoms
Minister for Enterprise, Markets and Small Business Kevin Hollinrake said: "Innovation, freedom and choice – that’s what today’s announcement gives to producers and consumers alike.
Our exit from the EU was all about moments just like this, where we can seize new opportunities and provide a real boost to our great British wineries and further growing the economy."
Another flop in the making. Bet these will be sold as a novelty for a short while, then disappear.
Jennies (500ml bottles) have been sold for ages - mainly for Barsac and Tokai as well as Sauternes.
Indeed. There are tons of sizes apart from 750ml.
Tons is a bit strong. The regulations for wine only permit 100 — 187 — 250 — 375 — 500 — 750 — 1 000 — 1 500 ml. "Yellow wine" must be in 620ml bottles. And sparkling can be 125 — 200 — 375 — 750 — 1 500 ml. (Sizes below 100 or above 1500ml aren't covered.)
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
Let the market decide.
If customers want bigger or smaller bottles, let them decide that.
If they don't, let them decide that too.
It's more likely that the entities doing the deciding will be the supermarkets, not the customers. A fully unregulated market often leads to bad outcomes, so governments need to regulate at least some of the time. But in general I agree that this particular regulation isn't too important to retain. Conversely, it hardly seems important to actively dump it either -- the government should have bigger fish[*] to fry right now, and actively diverging from EU standards is going to make future trade accomodations trickier.
[*] And luckily for them there is no restriction on the permitted portion sizes for fried fish...
So what?
Beer can sizes are not regulated, but almost all end up in the same size anyway because that's what consumers overwhelmingly choose and there's a competitive advantage to sticking to uniform sizes.
If people or businesses choose otherwise, let them.
There's absolutely no reason whatsoever for governments to dictate sizes. Dictate transparency on weights and measures sure, but not sizes.
The answer to "so what?" is that all governments must have priorities -- they have limited time and limited capacity to effectively pursue multiple aims at once, and if they chase after every policy squirrel that crosses their path they will achieve nothing. A hallmark of good government therefore is that the things it chooses to act on are the important ones (by its own political, philosophical and ideological lights). Fiddling about with the regulations on wine bottle sizes is not going to have a major effect on anything, even for a political party whose views are fully aligned with the idea of greater market choice, and there are likely a dozen areas more important to forwarding that political philosophy than cancelling this particular leftover regulation. Making a song and dance about it is therefore in my view bad government, and characteristic of this particular government which has spent years squandering its parliamentary position and not achieving much. (I happen to be personally not hugely unhappy with that squandering because I suspect I would disagree with many of the things a more effective Tory party might have carried out; but I think it's objectively not been an effective government.)
You're right that Governments have too little time or capacity to do multiple things, which is why the Government regulating this is ridiculous and bad governance.
Its amusing that you consider that scrapping this regulation a bad thing, as its not what the Government should be doing, but don't consider implementing this regulation a bad thing for the same reason.
If there's no justification for a regulation, it should not exist.
When did I ever say I thought implementing the regulation was a good thing? Anyway, this one *does* have a justification -- I linked to the EU paper on it in an earlier post. You might disagree with that justification but you can't claim the regulation is still in place for no reason at all. (Personally I would probably have gone with dropping the size rules for wine along with everything else in 2007/2009, rather than leaving them as a special case.)
What's the justification?
You've not stated one.
That supermarkets may want bigger or smaller sizes isn't a justification. People get to choose what they buy or don't buy.
If you're standing in the way of what people or businesses want then that's not justified. Demanding transparency: clear labelling etc, that's utterly reasonable, but telling people what to do without good reason, that's not.
I think some people are conflating charity with reliance on charity. The one is generally a good thing, the other not so much.
Agreed.
People will always face hardships though, always have done, always will do.
When they do, having charity available is better than predators available.
If debt problems were rising and food bank donations were falling, then yes I'd agree that would be a problem.
But debt problems are falling and food bank usage (read: donations) are rising, so that is unquestioningly an excellent thing.
You can't be agreeing, that means something's gone wrong. I'd expand and summarize as follows:
To the extent higher foodbank use is destroying the loan-shark business, yes that's good. To the extent it's caused by hard up people feeling even more hard up than they did before, no it isn't.
All can be happy, I think, now I've put it like this?
Since private debt levels are falling, not rising, then it doesn't seem people are feeling more hard up than they did before, which is good.
Doesn't mean things can't be better.
And of course its the cost of housing which utterly dwarfs the cost of food. Food is a total distraction when it comes to hardship, but the rise of food banks is fantastic not miserable.
There's some nuance in the issue of foodbanks, yes, but much of their increasing popularity will almost certainly be due to greater levels of financial distress amongst the badly off. Even if some of it is replacing loan sharks the situation as a whole, ie foodbanks on the rise, cannot be described as "fantastic". This is not an apt use of that word. Fantastic would be people not needing to use either charity or loan sharks to feed themselves and their families.
Don't be ridiculous, people always have and always will run into hardship.
If someone's car breaks down and it costs £500 to fix it, then that's going to cause hardship.
In that situation, would you rather they borrow money from Wonga to get through to next payday, or go to a foodbank and get some charity to take them through to next payday?
Their increased popularity is due to awareness and people donating to them, rather than food going to landfill. That's a good thing, there's no downside.
You and your Wonga. Look, once more for the road, to the extent foodbanks are replacing Wonga that is good. However much of this is zero to do with Wonga. It's down to people feeling the pinch more than they did before. And that is not good (let alone "fantastic").
People have always felt the pinch, always have and always will.
The fact people feel pinches has not changed, the variable that has changed is the fact that people have an alternative.
And that is absolutely fantastic.
Do you accept the possibility that the number of people feeling the pinch may have changed over time? That’s what food banks are reporting to be the case.
One wonders if Tony Blair will end up joining Sir Keir Starmer's cabinet, or indeed Gordon Brown.
Or vice versa. Starmer will take his place on the Tony Blair Institute global org chart as Senior Vice President for the UK and Ireland region reporting directly to Blair.
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
I think some people are conflating charity with reliance on charity. The one is generally a good thing, the other not so much.
Agreed.
People will always face hardships though, always have done, always will do.
When they do, having charity available is better than predators available.
If debt problems were rising and food bank donations were falling, then yes I'd agree that would be a problem.
But debt problems are falling and food bank usage (read: donations) are rising, so that is unquestioningly an excellent thing.
You can't be agreeing, that means something's gone wrong. I'd expand and summarize as follows:
To the extent higher foodbank use is destroying the loan-shark business, yes that's good. To the extent it's caused by hard up people feeling even more hard up than they did before, no it isn't.
All can be happy, I think, now I've put it like this?
Since private debt levels are falling, not rising, then it doesn't seem people are feeling more hard up than they did before, which is good.
Doesn't mean things can't be better.
And of course its the cost of housing which utterly dwarfs the cost of food. Food is a total distraction when it comes to hardship, but the rise of food banks is fantastic not miserable.
There's some nuance in the issue of foodbanks, yes, but much of their increasing popularity will almost certainly be due to greater levels of financial distress amongst the badly off. Even if some of it is replacing loan sharks the situation as a whole, ie foodbanks on the rise, cannot be described as "fantastic". This is not an apt use of that word. Fantastic would be people not needing to use either charity or loan sharks to feed themselves and their families.
Don't be ridiculous, people always have and always will run into hardship.
If someone's car breaks down and it costs £500 to fix it, then that's going to cause hardship.
In that situation, would you rather they borrow money from Wonga to get through to next payday, or go to a foodbank and get some charity to take them through to next payday?
Their increased popularity is due to awareness and people donating to them, rather than food going to landfill. That's a good thing, there's no downside.
You and your Wonga. Look, once more for the road, to the extent foodbanks are replacing Wonga that is good. However much of this is zero to do with Wonga. It's down to people feeling the pinch more than they did before. And that is not good (let alone "fantastic").
People have always felt the pinch, always have and always will.
The fact people feel pinches has not changed, the variable that has changed is the fact that people have an alternative.
And that is absolutely fantastic.
Do you accept the possibility that the number of people feeling the pinch may have changed over time? That’s what food banks are reporting to be the case.
Yes, absolutely I do.
What I do not accept though is that the quantity of food parcels being given out has any connection whatsoever to the number of people feeling the pinch though - it is instead inextricably linked to the quantity of donations being made.
Incidentally that charities are reporting that there is demand for what their employees are paid to provide is a case of Mandy Rice-Davies applies.
One wonders if Tony Blair will end up joining Sir Keir Starmer's cabinet, or indeed Gordon Brown.
Doubtful. The only position either could realistically have is Foreign Secretary (anything else that can be done from the Lords would be too lowly within the Cabinet) and that's unlikely post-Iraq, even given this isn't the Labour Party of four years ago.
I can see either being figurehead of some kind of "task force" (Lords reform, social care, devolution) but not a return to Cabinet.
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
I think it has been pointed out before if you ask people if they want a tax reduced or abolished you will get support. Similarly if you ask for more money spent on the NHS that will also get support. Such polls in isolation are meaningless and lead to contradictions.
There was even an episode of 'Yes Minister/Prime Minister' that covered this very point.
I think some people are conflating charity with reliance on charity. The one is generally a good thing, the other not so much.
Agreed.
People will always face hardships though, always have done, always will do.
When they do, having charity available is better than predators available.
If debt problems were rising and food bank donations were falling, then yes I'd agree that would be a problem.
But debt problems are falling and food bank usage (read: donations) are rising, so that is unquestioningly an excellent thing.
You can't be agreeing, that means something's gone wrong. I'd expand and summarize as follows:
To the extent higher foodbank use is destroying the loan-shark business, yes that's good. To the extent it's caused by hard up people feeling even more hard up than they did before, no it isn't.
All can be happy, I think, now I've put it like this?
Since private debt levels are falling, not rising, then it doesn't seem people are feeling more hard up than they did before, which is good.
Doesn't mean things can't be better.
And of course its the cost of housing which utterly dwarfs the cost of food. Food is a total distraction when it comes to hardship, but the rise of food banks is fantastic not miserable.
There's some nuance in the issue of foodbanks, yes, but much of their increasing popularity will almost certainly be due to greater levels of financial distress amongst the badly off. Even if some of it is replacing loan sharks the situation as a whole, ie foodbanks on the rise, cannot be described as "fantastic". This is not an apt use of that word. Fantastic would be people not needing to use either charity or loan sharks to feed themselves and their families.
Don't be ridiculous, people always have and always will run into hardship.
If someone's car breaks down and it costs £500 to fix it, then that's going to cause hardship.
In that situation, would you rather they borrow money from Wonga to get through to next payday, or go to a foodbank and get some charity to take them through to next payday?
Their increased popularity is due to awareness and people donating to them, rather than food going to landfill. That's a good thing, there's no downside.
You and your Wonga. Look, once more for the road, to the extent foodbanks are replacing Wonga that is good. However much of this is zero to do with Wonga. It's down to people feeling the pinch more than they did before. And that is not good (let alone "fantastic").
People have always felt the pinch, always have and always will.
The fact people feel pinches has not changed, the variable that has changed is the fact that people have an alternative.
And that is absolutely fantastic.
Do you accept the possibility that the number of people feeling the pinch may have changed over time? That’s what food banks are reporting to be the case.
Yes, absolutely I do.
What I do not accept though is that the quantity of food parcels being given out has any connection whatsoever to the number of people feeling the pinch though - it is instead inextricably linked to the quantity of donations being made.
Incidentally that charities are reporting that there is demand for what their employees are paid to provide is a case of Mandy Rice-Davies applies.
So, the food banks themselves, who are in a position to assess demand, cannot be trusted. But you, who aren’t in any position to make this assessment and who fails to provide evidence to back up your claims, should be taken as the trusted authority on the matter?
One wonders if Tony Blair will end up joining Sir Keir Starmer's cabinet, or indeed Gordon Brown.
Doubtful. The only position either could realistically have is Foreign Secretary (anything else that can be done from the Lords would be too lowly within the Cabinet) and that's unlikely post-Iraq, even given this isn't the Labour Party of four years ago.
I can see either being figurehead of some kind of "task force" (Lords reform, social care, devolution) but not a return to Cabinet.
We could make Edinburgh born Blair the Secretary of State for Scotland and ask him to kill Scottish nationalism stone dead for a second time.
Thank God David Cameron was around to clean up that mess and keep Scotland in the Union.
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
More realistically, what happens to those numbers when you ask people if they'd pay an extra penny in the pound in income tax (which is actually slightly less than it would require) to remove a tax that affects about one in twenty estates.
I think some people are conflating charity with reliance on charity. The one is generally a good thing, the other not so much.
Agreed.
People will always face hardships though, always have done, always will do.
When they do, having charity available is better than predators available.
If debt problems were rising and food bank donations were falling, then yes I'd agree that would be a problem.
But debt problems are falling and food bank usage (read: donations) are rising, so that is unquestioningly an excellent thing.
You can't be agreeing, that means something's gone wrong. I'd expand and summarize as follows:
To the extent higher foodbank use is destroying the loan-shark business, yes that's good. To the extent it's caused by hard up people feeling even more hard up than they did before, no it isn't.
All can be happy, I think, now I've put it like this?
Since private debt levels are falling, not rising, then it doesn't seem people are feeling more hard up than they did before, which is good.
Doesn't mean things can't be better.
And of course its the cost of housing which utterly dwarfs the cost of food. Food is a total distraction when it comes to hardship, but the rise of food banks is fantastic not miserable.
There's some nuance in the issue of foodbanks, yes, but much of their increasing popularity will almost certainly be due to greater levels of financial distress amongst the badly off. Even if some of it is replacing loan sharks the situation as a whole, ie foodbanks on the rise, cannot be described as "fantastic". This is not an apt use of that word. Fantastic would be people not needing to use either charity or loan sharks to feed themselves and their families.
Don't be ridiculous, people always have and always will run into hardship.
If someone's car breaks down and it costs £500 to fix it, then that's going to cause hardship.
In that situation, would you rather they borrow money from Wonga to get through to next payday, or go to a foodbank and get some charity to take them through to next payday?
Their increased popularity is due to awareness and people donating to them, rather than food going to landfill. That's a good thing, there's no downside.
You and your Wonga. Look, once more for the road, to the extent foodbanks are replacing Wonga that is good. However much of this is zero to do with Wonga. It's down to people feeling the pinch more than they did before. And that is not good (let alone "fantastic").
People have always felt the pinch, always have and always will.
The fact people feel pinches has not changed, the variable that has changed is the fact that people have an alternative.
And that is absolutely fantastic.
Do you accept the possibility that the number of people feeling the pinch may have changed over time? That’s what food banks are reporting to be the case.
Yes, absolutely I do.
What I do not accept though is that the quantity of food parcels being given out has any connection whatsoever to the number of people feeling the pinch though - it is instead inextricably linked to the quantity of donations being made.
Incidentally that charities are reporting that there is demand for what their employees are paid to provide is a case of Mandy Rice-Davies applies.
So, the food banks themselves, who are in a position to assess demand, cannot be trusted. But you, who aren’t in any position to make this assessment and who fails to provide evidence to back up your claims, should be taken as the trusted authority on the matter?
Demand is an economic phenomenon that is not the same as need.
Problem is Mr Eagles, given the way the Dems have twisted the legal system, what happens if there is a large slice of the electorate who want revenge and are happy to vote for it ?
I kinda know a former GOP strategist and his advice in the run up to 2020 was watch Trump's ratings with independents.
They thought Trump was doing well on the economy but his ratings on everything else pointed to a Trump defeat.
I am following that strategy again.
Are you doing that for Biden ? He's the incumbent.
Yes.
Another fun fact, Biden is doing better than Obama in 2011 and Trump worse than Romney in 2011 at this point in the electoral cycle.
The other factor that also helps Biden is abortion.
One thing that is shredding GOP votes is how the GOP have gone from saying it should be left to the states to decide, the states decide we want to keep abortion and now the GOP are talking about bypassing the states and introducing a national ban on abortion.
Are they? Even Trump hasn't gone so far as to propose a national ban on abortion. I think the only candidate who proposed that was Pence.
If the economy recovers further and interest rates fall as inflation has then Biden will be better placed for re election, especially as the poll shows in the header that for many Independent voters his main motivation is revenge rather than vision for the USA
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
More realistically, what happens to those numbers when you ask people if they'd pay an extra penny in the pound in income tax (which is actually slightly less than it would require) to remove a tax that affects about one in twenty estates.
That poll is nonsense.
As soon as it is released and Labour demonstrates that it impacts only the richest, its support will plummet.
Problem is Mr Eagles, given the way the Dems have twisted the legal system, what happens if there is a large slice of the electorate who want revenge and are happy to vote for it ?
I kinda know a former GOP strategist and his advice in the run up to 2020 was watch Trump's ratings with independents.
They thought Trump was doing well on the economy but his ratings on everything else pointed to a Trump defeat.
I am following that strategy again.
Are you doing that for Biden ? He's the incumbent.
Yes.
Another fun fact, Biden is doing better than Obama in 2011 and Trump worse than Romney in 2011 at this point in the electoral cycle.
The other factor that also helps Biden is abortion.
One thing that is shredding GOP votes is how the GOP have gone from saying it should be left to the states to decide, the states decide we want to keep abortion and now the GOP are talking about bypassing the states and introducing a national ban on abortion.
Are they? Even Trump hasn't gone so far as to propose a national ban on abortion. I think the only candidate who proposed that was Pence.
If the economy recovers further and interest rates fall as inflation has then Biden will be better placed for re election, especially as the poll shows in the header that for many Independent voters his main motivation is revenge rather than vision for the USA
One wonders if Tony Blair will end up joining Sir Keir Starmer's cabinet, or indeed Gordon Brown.
Doubtful. The only position either could realistically have is Foreign Secretary (anything else that can be done from the Lords would be too lowly within the Cabinet) and that's unlikely post-Iraq, even given this isn't the Labour Party of four years ago.
I can see either being figurehead of some kind of "task force" (Lords reform, social care, devolution) but not a return to Cabinet.
We could make Edinburgh born Blair the Secretary of State for Scotland and ask him to kill Scottish nationalism stone dead for a second time.
Thank God David Cameron was around to clean up that mess and keep Scotland in the Union.
Forget it, Cameron's reputation is tarnished forever by BREXIT. What a total f*ck-up.
I think some people are conflating charity with reliance on charity. The one is generally a good thing, the other not so much.
Agreed.
People will always face hardships though, always have done, always will do.
When they do, having charity available is better than predators available.
If debt problems were rising and food bank donations were falling, then yes I'd agree that would be a problem.
But debt problems are falling and food bank usage (read: donations) are rising, so that is unquestioningly an excellent thing.
You can't be agreeing, that means something's gone wrong. I'd expand and summarize as follows:
To the extent higher foodbank use is destroying the loan-shark business, yes that's good. To the extent it's caused by hard up people feeling even more hard up than they did before, no it isn't.
All can be happy, I think, now I've put it like this?
Since private debt levels are falling, not rising, then it doesn't seem people are feeling more hard up than they did before, which is good.
Doesn't mean things can't be better.
And of course its the cost of housing which utterly dwarfs the cost of food. Food is a total distraction when it comes to hardship, but the rise of food banks is fantastic not miserable.
There's some nuance in the issue of foodbanks, yes, but much of their increasing popularity will almost certainly be due to greater levels of financial distress amongst the badly off. Even if some of it is replacing loan sharks the situation as a whole, ie foodbanks on the rise, cannot be described as "fantastic". This is not an apt use of that word. Fantastic would be people not needing to use either charity or loan sharks to feed themselves and their families.
Don't be ridiculous, people always have and always will run into hardship.
If someone's car breaks down and it costs £500 to fix it, then that's going to cause hardship.
In that situation, would you rather they borrow money from Wonga to get through to next payday, or go to a foodbank and get some charity to take them through to next payday?
Their increased popularity is due to awareness and people donating to them, rather than food going to landfill. That's a good thing, there's no downside.
You and your Wonga. Look, once more for the road, to the extent foodbanks are replacing Wonga that is good. However much of this is zero to do with Wonga. It's down to people feeling the pinch more than they did before. And that is not good (let alone "fantastic").
People have always felt the pinch, always have and always will.
The fact people feel pinches has not changed, the variable that has changed is the fact that people have an alternative.
And that is absolutely fantastic.
Do you accept the possibility that the number of people feeling the pinch may have changed over time? That’s what food banks are reporting to be the case.
Yes, absolutely I do.
What I do not accept though is that the quantity of food parcels being given out has any connection whatsoever to the number of people feeling the pinch though - it is instead inextricably linked to the quantity of donations being made.
Incidentally that charities are reporting that there is demand for what their employees are paid to provide is a case of Mandy Rice-Davies applies.
So, the food banks themselves, who are in a position to assess demand, cannot be trusted. But you, who aren’t in any position to make this assessment and who fails to provide evidence to back up your claims, should be taken as the trusted authority on the matter?
Excuse me, but I've not made a single claim whatsoever on the number of people feeling the pinch.
If I was to, I'd make the same assessment as the food banks themselves - and I would blame the Government's policies such as fiscal drag. Its part of the reason I oppose this Government.
What I won't accept is that the rise in charity is a bad thing, its a good thing even if there's bad things happening.
I don’t know if this is so off topic to be spam, but as it’s Crossword season, I have found a mystical/historical/religious crossword that’s way too tough for me!
MoonRabbits found mystical/historical/religious crossword that’s way too tough for her
Across 2. Greatest dedication to a single holy carving? (10) 4. The erstwhile lord of the ring. (7) 5. There were more than you could shake a stick at, but Dee only played in this one. (7) 7. Rest for a mystic month. (10) 10. Kelley perhaps owned this man’s hand-written nothing. (7) 13. Veracious and loyal kinsman. (8) 15. Chamber of Dee’s interrogation. (4) 16. Very good residence of the hospitable lord. (6) 17. This grandson stood by his man. (3) 21. The subject of a burly attempt at reform. (8) 25. Quality of these seven daughters. (8) 27. Deferred, but not of this lady’s blessed memory forgotten. (9) 28. He used to see on the road to Damascus. (4) 29. A bit tall, but otherwise what else could he be? (6) 30. Eponymous river. (3) 31. A thesaurus of this language is hard to find. (6)
Down 1. A retreating Greek might call this book holy. (5) 3. Spiritual movements. (7) 4. Royal cousin of blood-soaked Bess. (7) 6. Witness of the destruction by fire. (5) 8. The secret of this wood was its mysterious inner bark. (5) 9. Bibliophile lord apparently known to the Danes! (9) 11. Jonson’s caricature of Dee is hardly this. (6) 12. Dee caused this to ascend the highest heaven of invention. (6) 14. Divine diction. (8) 18. I hear it rumoured a painful harvest for these two. (4) 19. The Light of God. (5) 20. Not uncouth, a philosopher. (5) 22. Soothing ancestor of the Spanish Ambassador. (4) 23. Sulphur. (6) 24. The impecunious Palatine. (5) 26. Before whose countenance Dee wrote. (6)
It is a stinker. I can't get very far with it.
15AStar (from Star Chamber to which John Dee was hauled) 28A Saul? 31A try occult
4d - cousin of Elizabeth of England (pejorative name for the latter) but the obvious one, Mary/Marie Stuart of Scotland, doesn't fit
24d must refer to the Poor Palatines, immigrants from the Holy Roman Empire.
31 across is obviously going to be enochian. “A thesaurus of this language is hard to find. (6)” Let me count the letters.
Nope too many letters.
Is the Thesaurus hard to find because it’s in a hidden cavern full of snakes?
Awww. What's wrong with occult? An occult language is hidden/unknown by definition. (But I'd only pencil it in till I was sure it fitted other clues.)
Yes. It’s going to need a pencil.
I’ve no problem with snakes though.
Across 2. Greatest dedication to a single holy carving? (10) 4. The erstwhile lord of the ring. (7) 5. There were more than you could shake a stick at, but Dee only played in this one. (7) 7. Rest for a mystic month. (10) 10. Kelley perhaps owned this man’s hand-written nothing. (7) 13. Veracious and loyal kinsman. (8) 15. Chamber of Dee’s interrogation. (4) 16. Very good residence of the hospitable lord. (6) 17. This grandson stood by his man. (3) 21. The subject of a burly attempt at reform. (8) 25. Quality of these seven daughters. (8) 27. Deferred, but not of this lady’s blessed memory forgotten. (9) 28. He used to see on the road to Damascus. (4) 29. A bit tall, but otherwise what else could he be? (6) 30. Eponymous river. (3) 31. A thesaurus of this language is hard to find. (6)
Down 1. A retreating Greek might call this book holy. (5) 3. Spiritual movements. (7) 4. Royal cousin of blood-soaked Bess. (7) 6. Witness of the destruction by fire. (5) 8. The secret of this wood was its mysterious inner bark. (5) 9. Bibliophile lord apparently known to the Danes! (9) 11. Jonson’s caricature of Dee is hardly this. (6) 12. Dee caused this to ascend the highest heaven of invention. (6) 14. Divine diction. (8) 18. I hear it rumoured a painful harvest for these two. (4) 19. The Light of God. (5) 20. Not uncouth, a philosopher. (5) 22. Soothing ancestor of the Spanish Ambassador. (4) 23. Sulphur. (6) 24. The impecunious Palatine. (5) 26. Before whose countenance Dee wrote. (6)
The light of God 5 letters?
Lumen: lumen Christi (Lat.: light of Christ) is apparently a thing.
4a is Isildur is it not? (But there may be others.) And I Had been wondering about Elbib for 1D - 'Bible' reversed but also a Greek name on checking. That fits Isildur.
Many of the clues seem to pertain to John Dee the astrologer and the Tudor and Stuart periods. But a dollop of modern mysticism. 8D may be birch - the inner bark used as a fabric/writing material, for codices etc. There seems to be some odd storyu about such things.
Anyway, best I can do - have to go off and do stuff. Certainly different from the old regular arguments (some with new tweaks) going on today.
Spring budget day announced by Hunt for the 6th March
All the speculation about tax and IHT cuts will be revealed then, but I doubt IHT changes are high in the list of priorities, even the Telegraph said they are 3rd in line for consideration and they have an agenda
Received an e mail today from conservative home which confirms the members backbencher of the year is none other than Jacob Rees Mogg
Says it all about the membership really
6th March is the Wednesday before Cheltenham, so the clash is avoided but isn't Tuesday more traditional? I've not checked but dimly recall it being on Champion Hurdle day.
Budgets have been on a Wednesday for the past 20 or so years IIRC; previously they used to be traditionally on a Tuesday.
It's quite hard to unlearn what you absorbed at a particular age. Derby day is a Wednesday. Budget Day is a Tuesday. Boat race is a Saturday. Kick off is 3 pm Saturday. Shops close on Good Friday except for fish, no papers, no racing. Test matches go Thursday to Tuesday with no play on the Sunday. Shops close for half day on Thursday. Early closing in central London is Saturday. Christmas decorations go up about 21st December. Tree bought for 7/6 (37p) on Saturday before Christmas. Entire nation stops for FA Cup final, which, amazingly, is broadcast live. On BBC and ITV.
Shops close for half day on a Wednesday....
The pubs are only open all day on market day.
Fish and chips are wrapped in newspaper and cost 2/6 (12.5p).
When adult passengers are standing, children give up their seats.
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
More realistically, what happens to those numbers when you ask people if they'd pay an extra penny in the pound in income tax (which is actually slightly less than it would require) to remove a tax that affects about one in twenty estates.
If the Tories had a manifesto commitment to abolish IHT (or at least raise the threshold from £325k) and were re elected on that basis then they would pay for it by spending cuts not a rise in income tax
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
More realistically, what happens to those numbers when you ask people if they'd pay an extra penny in the pound in income tax (which is actually slightly less than it would require) to remove a tax that affects about one in twenty estates.
If the Tories had a manifesto commitment to abolish IHT (or at least raise the threshold from £325k) and were re elected on that basis then they would pay for it by spending cuts not a rise in income tax
Problem is Mr Eagles, given the way the Dems have twisted the legal system, what happens if there is a large slice of the electorate who want revenge and are happy to vote for it ?
I kinda know a former GOP strategist and his advice in the run up to 2020 was watch Trump's ratings with independents.
They thought Trump was doing well on the economy but his ratings on everything else pointed to a Trump defeat.
I am following that strategy again.
Are you doing that for Biden ? He's the incumbent.
Yes.
Another fun fact, Biden is doing better than Obama in 2011 and Trump worse than Romney in 2011 at this point in the electoral cycle.
The other factor that also helps Biden is abortion.
One thing that is shredding GOP votes is how the GOP have gone from saying it should be left to the states to decide, the states decide we want to keep abortion and now the GOP are talking about bypassing the states and introducing a national ban on abortion.
Are they? Even Trump hasn't gone so far as to propose a national ban on abortion. I think the only candidate who proposed that was Pence.
If the economy recovers further and interest rates fall as inflation has then Biden will be better placed for re election, especially as the poll shows in the header that for many Independent voters his main motivation is revenge rather than vision for the USA
But it isn't like the others have a terribly clear line on it. Haley says she'd sign it into law but thinks it's hard to achieve without many more Republicans in Congress, DeSantis is coy on the matter despite being pretty restrictive in Florida, Ramaswamy opines it'd be unconstiutional although he thinks it's basically a good idea, Trump tailors his view to his audience.
What they aren't is either pro-choice or prepared to say they'd veto a ban at the national level (or something close to it).
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
Yep - I'd replace it with capital gains tax - because it's a capital gain....
While I'd replace it with income tax, because its an income.
But either way we would both answer the question "Do you wish to abolish inheritance tax?" with a YES. Just not for the reasons HUYFD would expect and not with the consequences he was hoping for....
Problem is Mr Eagles, given the way the Dems have twisted the legal system, what happens if there is a large slice of the electorate who want revenge and are happy to vote for it ?
I kinda know a former GOP strategist and his advice in the run up to 2020 was watch Trump's ratings with independents.
They thought Trump was doing well on the economy but his ratings on everything else pointed to a Trump defeat.
I am following that strategy again.
Are you doing that for Biden ? He's the incumbent.
Yes.
Another fun fact, Biden is doing better than Obama in 2011 and Trump worse than Romney in 2011 at this point in the electoral cycle.
The other factor that also helps Biden is abortion.
One thing that is shredding GOP votes is how the GOP have gone from saying it should be left to the states to decide, the states decide we want to keep abortion and now the GOP are talking about bypassing the states and introducing a national ban on abortion.
Are they? Even Trump hasn't gone so far as to propose a national ban on abortion. I think the only candidate who proposed that was Pence.
If the economy recovers further and interest rates fall as inflation has then Biden will be better placed for re election, especially as the poll shows in the header that for many Independent voters his main motivation is revenge rather than vision for the USA
Though he co-authored an abortion ban from 15 weeks not a full outright ban.
Trump is actually surprisingly moderate on abortion in GOP terms and has been criticised by some pro life groups in response.
'Mr Trump attacked his chief Republican rival, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, for his state's six-week abortion ban. The six-week ban "is a terrible thing and a terrible mistake", he said.
But when pressed by host Kristen Welker on his own position, Mr Trump ducked. Would he support a 15-week federal ban - widely considered the minimum standard by anti-abortion groups? "I'm not going to say I would or I wouldn't," Mr Trump replied.
The backlash was swift.
Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the influential anti-abortion group SBA Pro-Life America, issued a statement saying anything later than a 15-week ban "makes no sense". And Students for Life president Kristan Hawkins wrote her letter, threatening to pull her group's 1,000 volunteers off the campaign trail.
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
More realistically, what happens to those numbers when you ask people if they'd pay an extra penny in the pound in income tax (which is actually slightly less than it would require) to remove a tax that affects about one in twenty estates.
If the Tories had a manifesto commitment to abolish IHT (or at least raise the threshold from £325k) and were re elected on that basis then they would pay for it by spending cuts not a rise in income tax
I'm sure that's what the Tory manifesto would say, and bless your tiny cotton socks for believing it.
Sunak's triangulation is clearly targeting that previously unknown sector of the electorate who are desperate for the day when they can donate a pint bottle of Champagne to their local food bank.
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
More realistically, what happens to those numbers when you ask people if they'd pay an extra penny in the pound in income tax (which is actually slightly less than it would require) to remove a tax that affects about one in twenty estates.
If the Tories had a manifesto commitment to abolish IHT (or at least raise the threshold from £325k) and were re elected on that basis then they would pay for it by spending cuts not a rise in income tax
Blissfully irrelevant in the circs
But a good way for Rishi to get out the Tory core vote and win back voters lost to Reform which would be his main aim from such a policy proposal
Spring budget day announced by Hunt for the 6th March
All the speculation about tax and IHT cuts will be revealed then, but I doubt IHT changes are high in the list of priorities, even the Telegraph said they are 3rd in line for consideration and they have an agenda
Received an e mail today from conservative home which confirms the members backbencher of the year is none other than Jacob Rees Mogg
Says it all about the membership really
6th March is the Wednesday before Cheltenham, so the clash is avoided but isn't Tuesday more traditional? I've not checked but dimly recall it being on Champion Hurdle day.
Budgets have been on a Wednesday for the past 20 or so years IIRC; previously they used to be traditionally on a Tuesday.
It's quite hard to unlearn what you absorbed at a particular age. Derby day is a Wednesday. Budget Day is a Tuesday. Boat race is a Saturday. Kick off is 3 pm Saturday. Shops close on Good Friday except for fish, no papers, no racing. Test matches go Thursday to Tuesday with no play on the Sunday. Shops close for half day on Thursday. Early closing in central London is Saturday. Christmas decorations go up about 21st December. Tree bought for 7/6 (37p) on Saturday before Christmas. Entire nation stops for FA Cup final, which, amazingly, is broadcast live. On BBC and ITV.
Shops close for half day on a Wednesday....
The pubs are only open all day on market day.
Fish and chips are wrapped in newspaper and cost 2/6 (12.5p).
When adult passengers are standing, children give up their seats.
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
More realistically, what happens to those numbers when you ask people if they'd pay an extra penny in the pound in income tax (which is actually slightly less than it would require) to remove a tax that affects about one in twenty estates.
If the Tories had a manifesto commitment to abolish IHT (or at least raise the threshold from £325k) and were re elected on that basis then they would pay for it by spending cuts not a rise in income tax
Dear Lord, is nothing sacred in Rishi's crusade to save his miserable butt?
At least he's following a consultation that told him his Govt was gibbering.
Wasn't there another one this morning that the Govt is still wazzocking on about reducing its revenue by abolishing iHT, whilst still running a deficit of around £100bn a year? When what we need is investment.
That has the theoretical advantage of appearing to be attractive to less wealthy people whilst actually only cutting taxes for 30k of the not-quite-richest (the richest dodge it) households per annum.
I think it is the inevitability of a government coming to the end of its life. They have lost all sense of what matters and they have lost all sense of how to communicate it.
I can't think of something that would show the Tories as more out of touch than tackling IHT. Labour will love to demonstrate how it will benefit Rishi and his friends.
So that is exactly what Rishi will do. He just seems a bit thick.
According to one poll 55% of voters would abolish IHT completely
More realistically, what happens to those numbers when you ask people if they'd pay an extra penny in the pound in income tax (which is actually slightly less than it would require) to remove a tax that affects about one in twenty estates.
If the Tories had a manifesto commitment to abolish IHT (or at least raise the threshold from £325k) and were re elected on that basis then they would pay for it by spending cuts not a rise in income tax
Blissfully irrelevant in the circs
But a good way for Rishi to get out the Tory core vote and win back voters lost to Reform which would be his main aim from such a policy proposal
No-one seems particularly minded to vote Reform when it comes to it, anyhow
Problem is Mr Eagles, given the way the Dems have twisted the legal system, what happens if there is a large slice of the electorate who want revenge and are happy to vote for it ?
I kinda know a former GOP strategist and his advice in the run up to 2020 was watch Trump's ratings with independents.
They thought Trump was doing well on the economy but his ratings on everything else pointed to a Trump defeat.
I am following that strategy again.
Are you doing that for Biden ? He's the incumbent.
Yes.
Another fun fact, Biden is doing better than Obama in 2011 and Trump worse than Romney in 2011 at this point in the electoral cycle.
The other factor that also helps Biden is abortion.
One thing that is shredding GOP votes is how the GOP have gone from saying it should be left to the states to decide, the states decide we want to keep abortion and now the GOP are talking about bypassing the states and introducing a national ban on abortion.
Are they? Even Trump hasn't gone so far as to propose a national ban on abortion. I think the only candidate who proposed that was Pence.
If the economy recovers further and interest rates fall as inflation has then Biden will be better placed for re election, especially as the poll shows in the header that for many Independent voters his main motivation is revenge rather than vision for the USA
Though he co-authored an abortion ban from 15 weeks not a full outright ban.
Trump is actually surprisingly moderate on abortion in GOP terms and has been criticised by some pro life groups in response.
'Mr Trump attacked his chief Republican rival, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, for his state's six-week abortion ban. The six-week ban "is a terrible thing and a terrible mistake", he said.
But when pressed by host Kristen Welker on his own position, Mr Trump ducked. Would he support a 15-week federal ban - widely considered the minimum standard by anti-abortion groups? "I'm not going to say I would or I wouldn't," Mr Trump replied.
The backlash was swift.
Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the influential anti-abortion group SBA Pro-Life America, issued a statement saying anything later than a 15-week ban "makes no sense". And Students for Life president Kristan Hawkins wrote her letter, threatening to pull her group's 1,000 volunteers off the campaign trail.
In 2021, Johnson even co-sponsored a bill that would have nationally banned abortions past roughly six weeks of pregnancy. The bill would have allowed abortions in cases where a woman’s life is endangered due to a physical condition, but not due to a psychological one.
I think some people are conflating charity with reliance on charity. The one is generally a good thing, the other not so much.
Agreed.
People will always face hardships though, always have done, always will do.
When they do, having charity available is better than predators available.
If debt problems were rising and food bank donations were falling, then yes I'd agree that would be a problem.
But debt problems are falling and food bank usage (read: donations) are rising, so that is unquestioningly an excellent thing.
You can't be agreeing, that means something's gone wrong. I'd expand and summarize as follows:
To the extent higher foodbank use is destroying the loan-shark business, yes that's good. To the extent it's caused by hard up people feeling even more hard up than they did before, no it isn't.
All can be happy, I think, now I've put it like this?
Since private debt levels are falling, not rising, then it doesn't seem people are feeling more hard up than they did before, which is good.
Doesn't mean things can't be better.
And of course its the cost of housing which utterly dwarfs the cost of food. Food is a total distraction when it comes to hardship, but the rise of food banks is fantastic not miserable.
There's some nuance in the issue of foodbanks, yes, but much of their increasing popularity will almost certainly be due to greater levels of financial distress amongst the badly off. Even if some of it is replacing loan sharks the situation as a whole, ie foodbanks on the rise, cannot be described as "fantastic". This is not an apt use of that word. Fantastic would be people not needing to use either charity or loan sharks to feed themselves and their families.
Don't be ridiculous, people always have and always will run into hardship.
If someone's car breaks down and it costs £500 to fix it, then that's going to cause hardship.
In that situation, would you rather they borrow money from Wonga to get through to next payday, or go to a foodbank and get some charity to take them through to next payday?
Their increased popularity is due to awareness and people donating to them, rather than food going to landfill. That's a good thing, there's no downside.
You and your Wonga. Look, once more for the road, to the extent foodbanks are replacing Wonga that is good. However much of this is zero to do with Wonga. It's down to people feeling the pinch more than they did before. And that is not good (let alone "fantastic").
People have always felt the pinch, always have and always will.
The fact people feel pinches has not changed, the variable that has changed is the fact that people have an alternative.
And that is absolutely fantastic.
The feeling-the-pinch variable hasn't changed? And here was everyone thinking we have a Cost of Living crisis which particularly impacts the less well off.
Why are you talking palpable nonsense, is there a particular reason? Is it because it's Christmas?
The discussion has moved on from whether I - a female lawyer who believes in human rights, the worth of the ECHR, a decent justice system, a police force that doesn't break the law, the rule of law, women's rights, men behaving decently towards women, fairness, accountability for those at the top of organisations, free speech and legal representation, even for the unpopular and disliked, protecting children and leaving them a better world than the one we inherited and the inestimable value of gardening - am some sort of far right Nazi. Had those of you doing this imbibed too much Xmas sherry?
"Most terrorism in the UK has been conducted by people born in the UK. Some has been conducted by immigrants. Among immigrants, most terrorism has been conducted by immigrants from the Republic of Ireland. No other group comes close."
Not true actually. Most has been conducted by people from Northern Ireland, who are British citizens. They were not immigrants though they had a citizenship they did not want to have - which was the source of the terrorism. The worst act of terrorism during the Troubles was carried out by Northern Unionists - British citizens again - when they bombed Dublin and Monaghan in 1974. 33 people were killed, an unborn child and 258 people injured. That makes it only second to the July 2005 bombings in London.
We appear to be talking at cross-purposes.
I said, "Most terrorism in the UK has been conducted by people born in the UK." You then said, "Most has been conducted by people from Northern Ireland, who are British citizens." These statements do not appear to contradict, so I am unclear why you said, "Not true actually." Northern Ireland is part of the UK. We are in agreement, are we not?
Some terrorism associated with the Troubles was conducted by people from the Republic of Ireland who entered the UK, either on a short-term basis or who had immigrated. Not most of it, but some. Certain Enoch Powell fans on PB are obsessed with immigrants causing terrorism. If we just look at the minority of terrorist attacks conducted by immigrants, then I believe immigrants from the Republic of Ireland are the largest group. But I agree that the vast majority of terrorism in UK history has not been conducted by immigrants. I don't see immigration as a cause of terrorism. Enoch Powell was wrong.
Mass immigration was the cause of Islamic terrorism in the UK. The perpetrators weren’t immigrants, they were were 2nd/3rd generation immigrants who failed to assimilate, precisely as Powell warned
Maybe the government could help alleviate food poverty *and* improve the nation's health by distributing free healthy food to anyone who wants it? One collection per person per week allowed.
Free stuff is expensive, creates a sense of entitlement on those who receive it (for which they are not grateful and for whom it's never enough) and doesn't do much to transform outcomes.
I'd maybe look more seriously at subsidising healthy food, and teaching home economics/simple cooking to all, but I think a price must be paid for it to be valued and appreciated.
I think it would be far better to look at ways that we can make our national staples (bread, milk, spreading fat, pasta, potatoes) healthier. That could have a dramatic effect on levels of overall health, and benefit the poor disproportionately, as these 'basics' will feature nore heavily in their diets.
If people overall were horrendously struggling then the number of donations would have collapsed as people looked after themselves first, which would mean fewer parcels given as there'd be less supply available.
People are less indebted now than they were. I hope donations to charity, and thus parcels handed out, continue to rise under Labour not fall and people have to turn back to debt once more.
Anyone who thinks that the distribution of surplus food to people who need it is a terrible thing really needs to consider the implications of their politics.
Anyone who thinks that in modern Britain it is acceptable for people to be unable to afford to feed themselves and their families needs to consider the implications of their politics.
People have always faced unexpected hardships, there is nothing new there.
People face things breaking down at home, or their car breaking down, or other problems that suddenly blow their finances. Always have, always will.
In the past the only solution was to get into a vicious debt spiral. Now they can turn to support instead.
That's not bad, that's fantastic.
Charity existed in the past, Bart. It has existed for literally millennia. The welfare state has also existed for decades. It is a very strange history of the world if you believe "In the past the only solution was to get into a vicious debt spiral." Have you been eating too much brandy butter?
Where was the charity in Blair and Brown's time that was existing as an alternative to Wonga for people who faced too much month at the end of their money?
The welfare state was not a fix for short-term problems. Wonga was then, food banks are today.
Bart, are you saying that there were no charities operating in the UK before 2010? Are you bonkers? Shelter was founded in 1966. The Trussell Trust was founded in 1997. FareShare was founded in 1994 by Crisis. Crisis were founded in 1967. Church Action on Poverty was founded in 1982.
The welfare state has multiple mechanisms to support people with short-term problems, as has been true for decades. Councils can provide emergency funds and also have specific help for housing costs. Councils can also provide interest-free loans. The DWP can provide interest-free advances on universal credit. The DWP also has budgeting advances and budgeting loans.
There were charities yes, but very, very limited supply of aid for people facing too much month at the end of their money.
Which is precisely where firms like Wonga stepped in, to fill the void, and were making tens of millions in profits from desperate people who were in vicious debt spirals.
Since then, charitable donations to the likes of Trussel Trust have utterly surged and Wonga have gone out of business.
Loans are not as good a solution to people who face sudden unexpected hardship as charitable safety nets are, since loans need to be repaid - even interest free loans.
Wonga went out of business because their brand was tainted. Equivalent forms still exist today.
If people overall were horrendously struggling then the number of donations would have collapsed as people looked after themselves first, which would mean fewer parcels given as there'd be less supply available.
People are less indebted now than they were. I hope donations to charity, and thus parcels handed out, continue to rise under Labour not fall and people have to turn back to debt once more.
Anyone who thinks that the distribution of surplus food to people who need it is a terrible thing really needs to consider the implications of their politics.
Anyone who thinks that in modern Britain it is acceptable for people to be unable to afford to feed themselves and their families needs to consider the implications of their politics.
People have always faced unexpected hardships, there is nothing new there.
People face things breaking down at home, or their car breaking down, or other problems that suddenly blow their finances. Always have, always will.
In the past the only solution was to get into a vicious debt spiral. Now they can turn to support instead.
That's not bad, that's fantastic.
Charity existed in the past, Bart. It has existed for literally millennia. The welfare state has also existed for decades. It is a very strange history of the world if you believe "In the past the only solution was to get into a vicious debt spiral." Have you been eating too much brandy butter?
Where was the charity in Blair and Brown's time that was existing as an alternative to Wonga for people who faced too much month at the end of their money?
The welfare state was not a fix for short-term problems. Wonga was then, food banks are today.
Bart, are you saying that there were no charities operating in the UK before 2010? Are you bonkers? Shelter was founded in 1966. The Trussell Trust was founded in 1997. FareShare was founded in 1994 by Crisis. Crisis were founded in 1967. Church Action on Poverty was founded in 1982.
The welfare state has multiple mechanisms to support people with short-term problems, as has been true for decades. Councils can provide emergency funds and also have specific help for housing costs. Councils can also provide interest-free loans. The DWP can provide interest-free advances on universal credit. The DWP also has budgeting advances and budgeting loans.
There were charities yes, but very, very limited supply of aid for people facing too much month at the end of their money.
Which is precisely where firms like Wonga stepped in, to fill the void, and were making tens of millions in profits from desperate people who were in vicious debt spirals.
Since then, charitable donations to the likes of Trussel Trust have utterly surged and Wonga have gone out of business.
Loans are not as good a solution to people who face sudden unexpected hardship as charitable safety nets are, since loans need to be repaid - even interest free loans.
This is fantasy, Bart. Show me a source saying there was a “very, very limited supply of aid” before 2010. Show me a source saying there was any causal relationship between the rise of food banks and Wonga going out of business.
First show me a source saying that the Trussel Trust was sending 99% of its donations to landfill rather than giving them to people in need before 2010.
Why? I’ve not made that claim.
You’ve made a claim. Show your evidence.
Given you’ve already claimed there was no charity 1997-2010 and that the welfare state has no emergency funding systems, both errant nonsense, I presume you don’t have any evidence.
I never said no charity, I said less charity.
There's more charity now.
You said, “In the past the only solution was to get into a vicious debt spiral.” That is not true.
Provide a source saying there is more charity now.
Either the Trussell Trust was sending 99.9% of donations to landfill in the past, or donations have risen tremendously. Which is it?
Trussell Trust has been aggressively expanding into areas already well served by other charities. They are a very publicity orientated and self serving organisation.
The figures would be different if you looked at *total-* packages not just Trussell Trust packages
Comments
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/dec/27/pint-of-wine-anyone-uk-looks-to-bring-back-silly-measure
I'm not very good at this writing thing.
Speaking personally: No.
What I wanted from Brexit is for our laws and policies to be determined in a Parliament we elect, and debated at elections in which we vote.
If the current Government aren't implementing sensible policies that's a reason to elect a new one, not a reason to bemoan Brexit.
These 660 ml bottles do not align with any glassware in my possession.
The justification for not deregulating package sizes for wine back in 2009 along with almost everything else (including beer) seems to have been lobbying by the wine industry to the effect that because there were many small producers and only a few supermarket chain buyers, that without regulation the supermarkets would force the producers to provide "slightly smaller than the standard size" bottles like 730 or 710ml, or bigger bottles for "10% extra free" promotions. The EU paper on the topic is this one: https://ec.europa.eu/docsroom/documents/6555/attachments/1/translations/en/renditions/native
The discussion has moved on from whether I - a female lawyer who believes in human rights, the worth of the ECHR, a decent justice system, a police force that doesn't break the law, the rule of law, women's rights, men behaving decently towards women, fairness, accountability for those at the top of organisations, free speech and legal representation, even for the unpopular and disliked, protecting children and leaving them a better world than the one we inherited and the inestimable value of gardening - am some sort of far right Nazi. Had those of you doing this imbibed too much Xmas sherry?
Anyway @bondegezou said -
"Most terrorism in the UK has been conducted by people born in the UK. Some has been conducted by immigrants. Among immigrants, most terrorism has been conducted by immigrants from the Republic of Ireland. No other group comes close."
Not true actually. Most has been conducted by people from Northern Ireland, who are British citizens. They were not immigrants though they had a citizenship they did not want to have - which was the source of the terrorism. The worst act of terrorism during the Troubles was carried out by Northern Unionists - British citizens again - when they bombed Dublin and Monaghan in 1974. 33 people were killed, an unborn child and 258 people injured. That makes it only second to the July 2005 bombings in London.
If customers want bigger or smaller bottles, let them decide that.
If they don't, let them decide that too.
[*] And luckily for them there is no restriction on the permitted portion sizes for fried fish...
However when people like this minister come out with crap like this eg reverting to a pint bottle of beer in the shop and blue passports as a benefit of Brexit I just want to punch him. He does the Brexit cause no favours.
I also agree it should be a market decision as to what size bottle you use as long as you don't misrepresent it.
Beer can sizes are not regulated, but almost all end up in the same size anyway because that's what consumers overwhelmingly choose and there's a competitive advantage to sticking to uniform sizes.
If people or businesses choose otherwise, let them.
There's absolutely no reason whatsoever for governments to dictate sizes. Dictate transparency on weights and measures sure, but not sizes.
https://metricviews.uk/2017/06/01/pint-sized-beer-and-cider-in-british-shops/
I said, "Most terrorism in the UK has been conducted by people born in the UK." You then said, "Most has been conducted by people from Northern Ireland, who are British citizens." These statements do not appear to contradict, so I am unclear why you said, "Not true actually." Northern Ireland is part of the UK. We are in agreement, are we not?
Some terrorism associated with the Troubles was conducted by people from the Republic of Ireland who entered the UK, either on a short-term basis or who had immigrated. Not most of it, but some. Certain Enoch Powell fans on PB are obsessed with immigrants causing terrorism. If we just look at the minority of terrorist attacks conducted by immigrants, then I believe immigrants from the Republic of Ireland are the largest group. But I agree that the vast majority of terrorism in UK history has not been conducted by immigrants. I don't see immigration as a cause of terrorism. Enoch Powell was wrong.
Its amusing that you consider that scrapping this regulation a bad thing, as its not what the Government should be doing, but don't consider implementing this regulation a bad thing for the same reason.
If there's no justification for a regulation, it should not exist.
The fact people feel pinches has not changed, the variable that has changed is the fact that people have an alternative.
And that is absolutely fantastic.
You've not stated one.
That supermarkets may want bigger or smaller sizes isn't a justification. People get to choose what they buy or don't buy.
If you're standing in the way of what people or businesses want then that's not justified. Demanding transparency: clear labelling etc, that's utterly reasonable, but telling people what to do without good reason, that's not.
I mean could you sleep with all those deaths on your conscience?
https://www.kingsleynapley.co.uk/our-news/press-releases/yougov-poll-shows-majority-of-public-now-supports-scrapping-iht-and-even-a-majority-of-labour-voters-oppose-raising-the-current-40-iht-rate
What I do not accept though is that the quantity of food parcels being given out has any connection whatsoever to the number of people feeling the pinch though - it is instead inextricably linked to the quantity of donations being made.
Incidentally that charities are reporting that there is demand for what their employees are paid to provide is a case of Mandy Rice-Davies applies.
I can see either being figurehead of some kind of "task force" (Lords reform, social care, devolution) but not a return to Cabinet.
There was even an episode of 'Yes Minister/Prime Minister' that covered this very point.
Thank God David Cameron was around to clean up that mess and keep Scotland in the Union.
More realistically, what happens to those numbers when you ask people if they'd pay an extra penny in the pound in income tax (which is actually slightly less than it would require) to remove a tax that affects about one in twenty estates.
How would their lucrative 'estate planning' services survive if there is no tax to avoid?
If the economy recovers further and interest rates fall as inflation has then Biden will be better placed for re election, especially as the poll shows in the header that for many Independent voters his main motivation is revenge rather than vision for the USA
As soon as it is released and Labour demonstrates that it impacts only the richest, its support will plummet.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/oct/26/republican-speaker-mike-johnson-roe-v-wade
If I was to, I'd make the same assessment as the food banks themselves - and I would blame the Government's policies such as fiscal drag. Its part of the reason I oppose this Government.
What I won't accept is that the rise in charity is a bad thing, its a good thing even if there's bad things happening.
4a is Isildur is it not? (But there may be others.) And I Had been wondering about Elbib for 1D - 'Bible' reversed but also a Greek name on checking. That fits Isildur.
Many of the clues seem to pertain to John Dee the astrologer and the Tudor and Stuart periods. But a dollop of modern mysticism. 8D may be birch - the inner bark used as a fabric/writing material, for codices etc. There seems to be some odd storyu about such things.
Anyway, best I can do - have to go off and do stuff. Certainly different from the old regular arguments (some with new tweaks) going on today.
What they aren't is either pro-choice or prepared to say they'd veto a ban at the national level (or something close to it).
Trump is actually surprisingly moderate on abortion in GOP terms and has been criticised by some pro life groups in response.
'Mr Trump attacked his chief Republican rival, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, for his state's six-week abortion ban. The six-week ban "is a terrible thing and a terrible mistake", he said.
But when pressed by host Kristen Welker on his own position, Mr Trump ducked. Would he support a 15-week federal ban - widely considered the minimum standard by anti-abortion groups? "I'm not going to say I would or I wouldn't," Mr Trump replied.
The backlash was swift.
Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the influential anti-abortion group SBA Pro-Life America, issued a statement saying anything later than a 15-week ban "makes no sense". And Students for Life president Kristan Hawkins wrote her letter, threatening to pull her group's 1,000 volunteers off the campaign trail.
"The pro-life vote is up for grabs," Ms Hawkins said.'
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-66850451
NEW THREAD
In 2021, Johnson even co-sponsored a bill that would have nationally banned abortions past roughly six weeks of pregnancy. The bill would have allowed abortions in cases where a woman’s life is endangered due to a physical condition, but not due to a psychological one.
Why are you talking palpable nonsense, is there a particular reason? Is it because it's Christmas?
That has value
Consequently renting can, in some circumstances, be worth a premium to ownership.
I have close relatives who know him well - they totally disagree with Iraq for whatever it is worth.
The figures would be different if you looked at *total-* packages not just Trussell Trust packages