"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
Don't you ask yourself how one in five of us are going to vote Farage (according to the polls)? I'd be most surprised if any posters on here are going to and I certainly don't know anyone personally who would.
What do these weird people look like? what are their life experiences? Where do they live and spend their time? Did they go to school? Mix with other people in the playground?
I think we should be told!
I've met quite a few when canvassing. They were not very political, but reacting against the cautious approach of the main parties - things are difficult, we must be realistic etc. They don't necessarily want Farage as PM but feel that he and a bunch of his mates could stir things up in an otherwise over-cautious Commons.
You’re facing the loss of your business, your home, your family, your liberty, your life. You reach out for help and discover someone like #GeorgeThomson as your only lifeline. Imagine the horror. #PostOfficeInquiry"
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Edit: Also improve the fertility rate, with childcare easier to manage and more time for activities.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
Were you finding you were spending far too much time contributing to meaningless arguments on political blogs?
No, finding I was spending far too much time working.
What was it like on here during lockdown?
Much the same, but I had more time to make contributions to meaningless arguments.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
All fossil fuel that is mined/produced will be burned. The increase in global temperature doesn't care if it is Saudi oil or US oil. By not stopping the production of oil the only remaining possible way to stop the global warming is through a very high level of carbon capture.
We need to stop the consumption of oil.
Production is a secondary matter.
We already consume more than we produce, which is a terrible failure. We need to work harder on reducing consumption, not production.
Globally we won't reduce consuming oil without reducing production. A reduction in consumption leads to lower prices which drives up consumption again. It is only when the price drops so much that the production becomes more expensive per unit than selling it does.
You are wrong, yes we will.
I changed my car last year. My old car was costing me ~£80 a tank of petrol which would last me 350 miles. My new car costs me ~£40 a tank of petrol which lasts me 350 miles. Does that mean I'm driving twice as many miles as I was to keep my expenditure the same? Of course it doesn't!
My oil consumption has come down by roughly 50% in that vehicle, not because of changes to production globally (of which OPEC of course adapts to keep prices where it wants it) but because I've adopted a technological change.
My old car was just petrol, my new one is not even a plug in, just a self-charging hybrid, that gets over twice the miles to the gallon as the old one.
We are seeing technological change like that on a micro and macro scale all over the planet. Over half my oil consumption has gone in my vehicle in one step and my intention is my next vehicle will be a net zero pure electric one, its just that's too expensive today.
Clean technology adaptation is the only way to solve the mess and clean the environment.
You are still destroying the planet.
...maybe, but only half as fast seemingly...
Are you saying - as per Zeno's paradox - he will never stop destroying the planet.
..wow, I had to google that.
If Barty kept buying cars which doubled his mileage on the same amount of fuel each time, then yes, I'd agree...
I have an 18-year-old car. The new version of the same car is more than twice as fuel efficient. Most new petrol cars sold now do 60mpg.
Imagine how much more that increase would be if FF cars had not increased in mass by perhaps 300kg over the period. That's an estimated figure - the overall is more like 400kg, but I can't find one with disaggrerated data by ICE vs Electric.
I expect most of the increase in mass is to do with "safety".
Most of the increase in mass is to do with the environment.
Batteries are heavy. My hybrid needs to carry a battery, its predecessor did not [besides the 12V one of course].
Since my comment relates to Fossil Fuel cars, it does not have much to do with batteries :-), which add even more extra.
The non-battery weight increase is very much to do with safety and also emissions, and came earlier - things such as door girders, compulsory airbags and catalytic converters.
More recently it is batteries, but also marketing of larger vehicles as "safer" (for those inside them, not outside).
One interesting question for the future is whether we actually need the huge batteries, never mind the tonka-tanks to carry them around in.
I wonder if once Sir Kier gets around to addressing Excise Duty etc on electric vehicles, and where the ~£2500 per year he needs from every vehicle to maintain revenue is going to come from, there will be a weight component in excise duty. It could be arguably justified on either environmental or safety grounds.
~£2500 per annum from vehicles is nowhere near needed to maintain our roads, which is all that drivers should be paying for.
Actually to be fair cyclists and most public transport use the roads too, so drivers should only be paying a proportion of road costs.
Vehicles should not be treated as a golden goose to be plucked for unrelated taxes. Everyone should pay their taxes equally, not just drivers.
Cyclists cause next to zero road wear. Fourth power law.
So I'd be more than happy to pay my proportional road tax of £1 per annum.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
All fossil fuel that is mined/produced will be burned. The increase in global temperature doesn't care if it is Saudi oil or US oil. By not stopping the production of oil the only remaining possible way to stop the global warming is through a very high level of carbon capture.
We need to stop the consumption of oil.
Production is a secondary matter.
We already consume more than we produce, which is a terrible failure. We need to work harder on reducing consumption, not production.
Globally we won't reduce consuming oil without reducing production. A reduction in consumption leads to lower prices which drives up consumption again. It is only when the price drops so much that the production becomes more expensive per unit than selling it does.
You are wrong, yes we will.
I changed my car last year. My old car was costing me ~£80 a tank of petrol which would last me 350 miles. My new car costs me ~£40 a tank of petrol which lasts me 350 miles. Does that mean I'm driving twice as many miles as I was to keep my expenditure the same? Of course it doesn't!
My oil consumption has come down by roughly 50% in that vehicle, not because of changes to production globally (of which OPEC of course adapts to keep prices where it wants it) but because I've adopted a technological change.
My old car was just petrol, my new one is not even a plug in, just a self-charging hybrid, that gets over twice the miles to the gallon as the old one.
We are seeing technological change like that on a micro and macro scale all over the planet. Over half my oil consumption has gone in my vehicle in one step and my intention is my next vehicle will be a net zero pure electric one, its just that's too expensive today.
Clean technology adaptation is the only way to solve the mess and clean the environment.
You are still destroying the planet.
...maybe, but only half as fast seemingly...
Are you saying - as per Zeno's paradox - he will never stop destroying the planet.
..wow, I had to google that.
If Barty kept buying cars which doubled his mileage on the same amount of fuel each time, then yes, I'd agree...
I have an 18-year-old car. The new version of the same car is more than twice as fuel efficient. Most new petrol cars sold now do 60mpg.
Imagine how much more that increase would be if FF cars had not increased in mass by perhaps 300kg over the period. That's an estimated figure - the overall is more like 400kg, but I can't find one with disaggrerated data by ICE vs Electric.
I expect most of the increase in mass is to do with "safety".
Most of the increase in mass is to do with the environment.
Batteries are heavy. My hybrid needs to carry a battery, its predecessor did not [besides the 12V one of course].
Since my comment relates to Fossil Fuel cars, it does not have much to do with batteries :-), which add even more extra.
The non-battery weight increase is very much to do with safety and also emissions, and came earlier - things such as door girders, compulsory airbags and catalytic converters.
More recently it is batteries, but also marketing of larger vehicles as "safer" (for those inside them, not outside).
One interesting question for the future is whether we actually need the huge batteries, never mind the tonka-tanks to carry them around in.
I wonder if once Sir Kier gets around to addressing Excise Duty etc on electric vehicles, and where the ~£2500 per year he needs from every vehicle to maintain revenue is going to come from, there will be a weight component in excise duty. It could be arguably justified on either environmental or safety grounds.
~£2500 per annum from vehicles is nowhere near needed to maintain our roads, which is all that drivers should be paying for.
Actually to be fair cyclists and most public transport use the roads too, so drivers should only be paying a proportion of road costs.
Vehicles should not be treated as a golden goose to be plucked for unrelated taxes. Everyone should pay their taxes equally, not just drivers.
Cyclists cause next to zero road wear. Fourth power law.
So I'd be more than happy to pay my proportional road tax of £1 per annum.
It would cost the government much more than 1 pound to collect the 1 pound.
I wonder if @Leon might have hit on something with his pollution-poll analysis? Both of the seats surveyed that are showing Green gains have major waterways in their bounds, and are beauty spots defined by those rivers (the Waveney in Norfolk/Suffolk and the Wye in Herefordshire).
Interestingly, the Greens are trading at roughly even money in both seats.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
My mother told me the other day that in the late 1950s she missed out on a geography field trip to Italy as part of her degree because the airfare was £400 return (nominal, not equivalent of). Nowadays it's potentially £20. This seems wrong.
The question does arise whether a train would have been viable but it is sadly too late to ask
The international aviation market is skewed, in the same way international shipping is. It's atrocious that aviation kerosene is tax exempt, especially for domestic flights, while rail or bus travel is liable for fuel duty.
Yet placing tax on aviation kerosene is very difficult due to the international nature of the industry.
That should be changed, even if people have to pay more for flights.
And whilst I'm world dictator, I'd also stop flags of convenience schemes in shipping, and ensure ships' crews are treated decently.
If the UK taxed Kerosene, the Emirates A380 would take off from Dubai with the tanks filled to the brim, land at Heathrow and fly back to Dubai without refuelling. Using quite a bit more fuel in the process. The BA A380 would do exactly the same on Dubai trips.
Planes flying domestic routes would make a point of going somewhere close (Amsterdam, Dublin) to fill up there.
Airline flight planning departments already factor in the price of fuel at various destinations, when deciding how much to carry on any given flight.
In the same way that Ryanair planes may start and end in some part of Eastern Europe while spending the rest of the day flying round Western Europe - as that keeps some staff cheap...
Yes, they have loads of half-empty flights out of places like Bucharest in the morning, so they can pay the cabin crew and maintenance crew Romanian wages.
I can believe that poll in Herefordshire. When I was there last year the sewage in the Wye was - and surely still is - a massive issue for everyone. The Tories are despised for “letting it happen”. One of Britain’s most beautiful rivers ruined by effluent from chicken farms. Horrible
Makes sense that the Greens will benefit
Doubt anything will get done about it though, regardless of who wins that seat. Firstly, the next Government has so many problems to deal with that it'll use the imperative of addressing some of them as an excuse to ignore the rest. Secondly, much of the chicken shit comes from Wales and I doubt that Starmer will view picking a fight with Vaughan Gething as a priority.
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
Trying to determine who "did the most" to win WWII is willy-waving, that we, the Americans, and Russians all engage in. I think it would be fair to say that each of those three (and don't forget China) was indispensable towards the achievement of victory.
The Royal Navy, US economic might, and Soviet manpower were key to victory.
I've never read serious history books that portray the UK as some kind of meek little labrador. Being portrayed as the werwolf is actually pretty cool, but overstates our power.
Isn’t there a famous summation of this
The British bought the time The Americans provided the money The Russians gave the me
Each was differently crucial
It's exactly the same with the Napoleonic wars. Trying to determine who did "the most" to defeat France is a pointless exercise.
People forget or refuse to remember that the British forces were under French command for a large part of WWI.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
There won't be a Lab landslide in terms of votes, which would arguably require them to get at least 45% of votes, (which incidentally is what the polls were showing at the start of the campaign). But a landslide in seats is very likely if the right-of-centre vote is split down the middle.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
And yet another survey that shows the Tories winning about 50 seats. We forget how incredible this is
Yes, I struggle to believe that 19% of the country still want to vote for more of the same. Incredible.
There are some of us that don't want more of the same particularly, but equally don't want untrammelled power given to a bunch of lightweight crypto-socialists who only a few years ago were trying to persuade us to make Corbyn PM.
I wonder if @Leon might have hit on something with his pollution-poll analysis? Both of the seats surveyed that are showing Green gains have major waterways in their bounds, and are beauty spots defined by those rivers (the Waveney in Norfolk/Suffolk and the Wye in Herefordshire).
Interestingly, the Greens are trading at roughly even money in both seats.
With the right wing vote split and confused tactical voting, there are going to be a few cases when a random left wing party comes through the middle.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Presumably you will be taking the 29 available on NOM on BX while laughing all the way to the bank?
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Given that they have to get a swing going on for the size of blairs in 1997 to get a majority, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility.
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
Trying to determine who "did the most" to win WWII is willy-waving, that we, the Americans, and Russians all engage in. I think it would be fair to say that each of those three (and don't forget China) was indispensable towards the achievement of victory.
The Royal Navy, US economic might, and Soviet manpower were key to victory.
I've never read serious history books that portray the UK as some kind of meek little labrador. Being portrayed as the werwolf is actually pretty cool, but overstates our power.
Isn’t there a famous summation of this
The British bought the time The Americans provided the money The Russians gave the me
Each was differently crucial
It's exactly the same with the Napoleonic wars. Trying to determine who did "the most" to defeat France is a pointless exercise.
People forget or refuse to remember that the British forces were under French command for a large part of WWI.
Couldn't be, they didn't surrender.
Beautiful illustration of the point. That silly insult works if you are American (and think war crimes are clever and funny). If you are British there's the embarrassment that the French delayed their surrender, at the cost of 10s of thousands of casualties, to let 340000 runaway monkeys bravely run away. I am guessing you don't know that.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Remember the laments on PB on how London would rot from the core outwards. And how too too awful it was for the property investors.
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
That dumb illustration (probably by some self-loathing lefty) could equally apply to the United States, France, Germany, China, Japan and definitely Russia. I am anti-nationalism, but my simple message to self-loathing lefties is if you don't like your country, then please fuck off and try living elsewhere.
I agree with what you say on Brexit, but everything else you post doesn’t float my boat.
I’d argue that a mature, grown-up understanding of our history would have helped to avoid the gigantic self-imposed clusterfuck that Brexit has brought. The ignorance of our place in the world, and what we’ve done for good and bad, feeds the exceptionalism and insular chauvinism that the Leave campaigns so skilfully, sadly, exploited.
But you feel free to splutter about self-loathing lefties if you wish.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Given that they have to get a swing going on for the size of blairs in 1997 to get a majority, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility.
No, it is not, but is trading at 29 on BX, the longest it has been. So fill your boots if you want the value!
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
Your definition of 'essential' appears to be one not found in any dictionary.
No matter how clean electric cars are we should not be encouraging more journeys. Going electric does not magically increase the capacity of the roads, it does not reduce parking problems, and it actually increases road maintenance costs. There's a strong (IMO) argument that more cars reduces overall mobility - if you doubled the number of cars on the road there would be gridlock, electric or not.
Actually improving ease of mobility for most people will involve a mix of better public transport, improved provision for cycling, increased use of light vehicles like motorcycles and scooters, and eventually hire-by-the-hour self driving electric cars.
In the village where I live traffic is often completely choked at busy times because far too many people get out their huge SUVs to go shopping. This in a place where you can literally walk from one end of the village to the other in 10 minutes. My neighbour always gets out her car to go shopping, even though we live a 3 minute walk from the shops. I can walk there, buy what I need and be home before she's even found a parking spot.
There needs to be an attitude change where cars are seen as a last resort when no other means of transport is suitable, or all of the current issues are just going to get worse.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Yep.
My other big gripe was that we didn't use COVID to improve the general health of the population. Oddly enough, that's what I'm most furious with Johnson about.
5 pounds off to save the NHS. 5K run to save the NHS. 500 calories down to save the NHS.
But no, just more whining about the waiting lists and the NHS.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Given that they have to get a swing going on for the size of blairs in 1997 to get a majority, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility.
No, it is not, but is trading at 29 on BX, the longest it has been. So fill your boots if you want the value!
It’s quite conceivable the Greens could end up with 3 seats, one being Brighton and the other two those rural seats now looking in play. Or even just those two and lose Brighton.
That would represent a huge paradigm shift for the party. The people in Herefordshire and Suffolk will be voting for them for good old nature conservation reason. They almost certainly worry about climate change too, and they may well think favourably about nationalising water companies, but I doubt many are unreconstructed Corbynites obsessed with Israel or the overthrow of the bourgeoisie.
Does the national party evolve to look more like its Herefordshire and Suffolk representatives in that situation, or does it carry on as the watermelon party regardless?
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
That dumb illustration (probably by some self-loathing lefty) could equally apply to the United States, France, Germany, China, Japan and definitely Russia. I am anti-nationalism, but my simple message to self-loathing lefties is if you don't like your country, then please fuck off and try living elsewhere.
I agree with what you say on Brexit, but everything else you post doesn’t float my boat.
I’d argue that a mature, grown-up understanding of our history would have helped to avoid the gigantic self-imposed clusterfuck that Brexit has brought. The ignorance of our place in the world, and what we’ve done for good and bad, feeds the exceptionalism and insular chauvinism that the Leave campaigns so skilfully, sadly, exploited.
But you feel free to splutter about self-loathing lefties if you wish.
One remembers the anti-EU leaflets of the Brexit campaign. Illustrated duly with patriotic Spitfires. Which happened to come* from a squadron manned by Poles - who made a disproportionate contribution, man for man, to the Battle of Britain.
*As one could tell from the large squadron code letters painted on the fuselage.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Remember the laments on PB on how London would rot from the core outwards. And how too too awful it was for the property investors.
Ironically, it was the sort of disruptive idea you might expect Cummings to run with and actually make himself useful by pushing through. Sadly he only runs with the ideas he cribs from the book or blog he read most recently, and no one gave him that idea to steal.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Remember the laments on PB on how London would rot from the core outwards. And how too too awful it was for the property investors.
Remind me, have we had record rent increases in the whole country over the last year, or just in London?
And yet another survey that shows the Tories winning about 50 seats. We forget how incredible this is
I wonder how much that score has percolated out from the Westminster Bubble?
Suppose we all wake up in two weeks' time and the final score is something like Lab 360 Con 200 Libs 50 Scots 20 NI 20. By most standards, that's a very good win for Labour, a very bad defeat for the Conservatives- basically, 2019 in reverse and nobdody was talking about that as anything other than a thumping for Corbyn and a triumph for Boris. (I'm not expecting that now, though it's close to my entry in the prediction competition, I think). But compared with what the polls are suggesting to those in the know, it would feel rather flat for Keir and a relative triumph for Rishi.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Remember the laments on PB on how London would rot from the core outwards. And how too too awful it was for the property investors.
Ironically, it was the sort of disruptive idea you might expect Cummings to run with and actually make himself useful by pushing through. Sadly he only runs with the ideas he cribs from the book or blog he read most recently, and no one gave him that idea to steal.
Those Green polls are something. As ever with constituency polling the smart money bets against the people piling in to follow the poll.
In this case though it’s possible they could create their own momentum (with a small m). There’s a fun novelty factor about being in a constituency with an unusual party that cuts across the usual partisan divide. I could imagine people of all stripes thinking “what fun, let’s have a green MP!”
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
Your definition of 'essential' appears to be one not found in any dictionary.
No matter how clean electric cars are we should not be encouraging more journeys. Going electric does not magically increase the capacity of the roads, it does not reduce parking problems, and it actually increases road maintenance costs. There's a strong (IMO) argument that more cars reduces overall mobility - if you doubled the number of cars on the road there would be gridlock, electric or not.
Actually improving ease of mobility for most people will involve a mix of better public transport, improved provision for cycling, increased use of light vehicles like motorcycles and scooters, and eventually hire-by-the-hour self driving electric cars.
In the village where I live traffic is often completely choked at busy times because far too many people get out their huge SUVs to go shopping. This in a place where you can literally walk from one end of the village to the other in 10 minutes. My neighbour always gets out her car to go shopping, even though we live a 3 minute walk from the shops. I can walk there, buy what I need and be home before she's even found a parking spot.
There needs to be an attitude change where cars are seen as a last resort when no other means of transport is suitable, or all of the current issues are just going to get worse.
One of the issues is perhaps the fixed costs involved in car ownership. Once you've bought, taxed and insured your vehicle, it seems logical to make full use of it. It would be better if, say, tax and insurance costs were proportional to the number of miles driven.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
Your definition of 'essential' appears to be one not found in any dictionary.
No matter how clean electric cars are we should not be encouraging more journeys. Going electric does not magically increase the capacity of the roads, it does not reduce parking problems, and it actually increases road maintenance costs. There's a strong (IMO) argument that more cars reduces overall mobility - if you doubled the number of cars on the road there would be gridlock, electric or not.
Actually improving ease of mobility for most people will involve a mix of better public transport, improved provision for cycling, increased use of light vehicles like motorcycles and scooters, and eventually hire-by-the-hour self driving electric cars.
In the village where I live traffic is often completely choked at busy times because far too many people get out their huge SUVs to go shopping. This in a place where you can literally walk from one end of the village to the other in 10 minutes. My neighbour always gets out her car to go shopping, even though we live a 3 minute walk from the shops. I can walk there, buy what I need and be home before she's even found a parking spot.
There needs to be an attitude change where cars are seen as a last resort when no other means of transport is suitable, or all of the current issues are just going to get worse.
Every journey everyone is making is of the utmost importance to them at the time they are making it. That is why they are making it, if it wasn't, they'd be doing something different.
As for capacity, build more roads, problem solved. Good for your neighbour for taking her car shopping with her, that means she can put the shopping into her car.
If there's not enough roads for the volume of cars, build more. Our road capacity hasn't kept up with our population growth in recent years so it is a major thing we need to invest in.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Yep.
My other big gripe was that we didn't use COVID to improve the general health of the population. Oddly enough, that's what I'm most furious with Johnson about.
5 pounds off to save the NHS. 5K run to save the NHS. 500 calories down to save the NHS.
But no, just more whining about the waiting lists and the NHS.
And what the hell didn’t they do all the road/rail maintenance in the gap, and get a head start on the likes of HS2? We needed stimulus and that was all there.
Jesus Christ it's a beautiful day but it is very hard to be optimistic about the West at the moment
I would set your sights lower. Beans or peas for supper tonight, perhaps.
I'm off for a picnic in the Chilterns with my eldest, to try and take her mind off her A Levels, which she thinks she has flunked
And on that note, manana
Maybe she needed her dad around in her life rather than him ratting on her mum the whole time and posting FAKE travel
If you are even her dad that is
What's your definition of fake travel?
A ride in a fake taxi?
***Googles fake taxi***
Oh my.
If I was to guess who would be the first to get my joke…
You didn’t have to Google.
Oh I didn’t Google it.
I don't want to be a puritanical arsehole but fake PHCs are a significant threat to young women on nights out, with quite a few serious sexual assaults (and close misses) around universities in the UK and elsewhere.
If you were to restrict any kind of content, those would be the ones to go for. They plant an idea.
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
That dumb illustration (probably by some self-loathing lefty) could equally apply to the United States, France, Germany, China, Japan and definitely Russia. I am anti-nationalism, but my simple message to self-loathing lefties is if you don't like your country, then please fuck off and try living elsewhere.
I agree with what you say on Brexit, but everything else you post doesn’t float my boat.
I’d argue that a mature, grown-up understanding of our history would have helped to avoid the gigantic self-imposed clusterfuck that Brexit has brought. The ignorance of our place in the world, and what we’ve done for good and bad, feeds the exceptionalism and insular chauvinism that the Leave campaigns so skilfully, sadly, exploited.
But you feel free to splutter about self-loathing lefties if you wish.
Giving my age away, I had a teacher at my bog-standard comp who during the Falklands War used to refer to the Falklands as The Malvinas. This, along with arguing with many lefties that I met at university who seemed to admire the autocratic Soviet Union more than Britain, gave me a life long contempt for those on the hard left, and a pretty good understanding that these muppets seem to delight in assuming that any country was far superior to their own.
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
Trying to determine who "did the most" to win WWII is willy-waving, that we, the Americans, and Russians all engage in. I think it would be fair to say that each of those three (and don't forget China) was indispensable towards the achievement of victory.
The Royal Navy, US economic might, and Soviet manpower were key to victory.
I've never read serious history books that portray the UK as some kind of meek little labrador. Being portrayed as the werwolf is actually pretty cool, but overstates our power.
Isn’t there a famous summation of this
The British bought the time The Americans provided the money The Russians gave the me
Each was differently crucial
It's exactly the same with the Napoleonic wars. Trying to determine who did "the most" to defeat France is a pointless exercise.
People forget or refuse to remember that the British forces were under French command for a large part of WWI.
Quite so.
One reason for writing my thesis on the Peninsular War was to refute the view that the Spanish did very little to earn their own liberation from Napoleon. Even the different names for the conflict tell their own story. The Spanish call it The War of Independence, and the Catalans call it The French War.
It’s quite conceivable the Greens could end up with 3 seats, one being Brighton and the other two those rural seats now looking in play. Or even just those two and lose Brighton.
That would represent a huge paradigm shift for the party. The people in Herefordshire and Suffolk will be voting for them for good old nature conservation reason. They almost certainly worry about climate change too, and they may well think favourably about nationalising water companies, but I doubt many are unreconstructed Corbynites obsessed with Israel or the overthrow of the bourgeoisie.
Does the national party evolve to look more like its Herefordshire and Suffolk representatives in that situation, or does it carry on as the watermelon party regardless?
Don't forget Bristol Central.
Since they are nowhere close to achieving national power they can face in multiple directions at once. Certainly nobody in leafy Tory areas need worry that a Green vote will actually result in wealth taxes, so it's a free hit.
The problem only comes when you're forced to choose which route to take, as the Liberal Democrats can attest.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
Your definition of 'essential' appears to be one not found in any dictionary.
No matter how clean electric cars are we should not be encouraging more journeys. Going electric does not magically increase the capacity of the roads, it does not reduce parking problems, and it actually increases road maintenance costs. There's a strong (IMO) argument that more cars reduces overall mobility - if you doubled the number of cars on the road there would be gridlock, electric or not.
Actually improving ease of mobility for most people will involve a mix of better public transport, improved provision for cycling, increased use of light vehicles like motorcycles and scooters, and eventually hire-by-the-hour self driving electric cars.
In the village where I live traffic is often completely choked at busy times because far too many people get out their huge SUVs to go shopping. This in a place where you can literally walk from one end of the village to the other in 10 minutes. My neighbour always gets out her car to go shopping, even though we live a 3 minute walk from the shops. I can walk there, buy what I need and be home before she's even found a parking spot.
There needs to be an attitude change where cars are seen as a last resort when no other means of transport is suitable, or all of the current issues are just going to get worse.
Every journey everyone is making is of the utmost importance to them at the time they are making it. That is why they are making it, if it wasn't, they'd be doing something different.
As for capacity, build more roads, problem solved. Good for your neighbour for taking her car shopping with her, that means she can put the shopping into her car.
If there's not enough roads for the volume of cars, build more. Our road capacity hasn't kept up with our population growth in recent years so it is a major thing we need to invest in.
Er, no. The fact that one chooses to do something doesn't make it of utmost importance. I've chosen to waste my time tapping this post on PB, but that doesn't automatically make it of utmost importance.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Given that they have to get a swing going on for the size of blairs in 1997 to get a majority, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility.
I still hold that the best result for the country generally, is a Labour administration with a very small majority.
Those Green polls are something. As ever with constituency polling the smart money bets against the people piling in to follow the poll.
In this case though it’s possible they could create their own momentum (with a small m). There’s a fun novelty factor about being in a constituency with an unusual party that cuts across the usual partisan divide. I could imagine people of all stripes thinking “what fun, let’s have a green MP!”
My theory is this is the nascent rebirth of the next successful iteration of the Conservative party, after it eventually has had enough of fantasist populist nationalism.
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
That dumb illustration (probably by some self-loathing lefty) could equally apply to the United States, France, Germany, China, Japan and definitely Russia. I am anti-nationalism, but my simple message to self-loathing lefties is if you don't like your country, then please fuck off and try living elsewhere.
I agree with what you say on Brexit, but everything else you post doesn’t float my boat.
I’d argue that a mature, grown-up understanding of our history would have helped to avoid the gigantic self-imposed clusterfuck that Brexit has brought. The ignorance of our place in the world, and what we’ve done for good and bad, feeds the exceptionalism and insular chauvinism that the Leave campaigns so skilfully, sadly, exploited.
But you feel free to splutter about self-loathing lefties if you wish.
Giving my age away, I had a teacher at my bog-standard comp who during the Falklands War used to refer to the Falklands as The Malvinas. This, along with arguing with many lefties that I met at university who seemed to admire the autocratic Soviet Union more than Britain, gave me a life long contempt for those on the hard left, and a pretty good understanding that these muppets seem to delight in assuming that any country was far superior to their own.
Brett Deveraux's Unmitigated Pedantry website is a joy to read. He's a left of centre, military historian, at North Carolina University.
I liked his point that the most brutal of all the European colonial empires was the one that lasted the longest, namely the USSR.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Given that they have to get a swing going on for the size of blairs in 1997 to get a majority, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility.
No, it is not, but is trading at 29 on BX, the longest it has been. So fill your boots if you want the value!
Cripes. NOM was only 12:1 on Ladbookes yeaterday
That would be a mug punter wager. I don't think NOM has been any shorter than 25 on BX for weeks...
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
Your definition of 'essential' appears to be one not found in any dictionary.
No matter how clean electric cars are we should not be encouraging more journeys. Going electric does not magically increase the capacity of the roads, it does not reduce parking problems, and it actually increases road maintenance costs. There's a strong (IMO) argument that more cars reduces overall mobility - if you doubled the number of cars on the road there would be gridlock, electric or not.
Actually improving ease of mobility for most people will involve a mix of better public transport, improved provision for cycling, increased use of light vehicles like motorcycles and scooters, and eventually hire-by-the-hour self driving electric cars.
In the village where I live traffic is often completely choked at busy times because far too many people get out their huge SUVs to go shopping. This in a place where you can literally walk from one end of the village to the other in 10 minutes. My neighbour always gets out her car to go shopping, even though we live a 3 minute walk from the shops. I can walk there, buy what I need and be home before she's even found a parking spot.
There needs to be an attitude change where cars are seen as a last resort when no other means of transport is suitable, or all of the current issues are just going to get worse.
Every journey everyone is making is of the utmost importance to them at the time they are making it. That is why they are making it, if it wasn't, they'd be doing something different.
As for capacity, build more roads, problem solved. Good for your neighbour for taking her car shopping with her, that means she can put the shopping into her car.
If there's not enough roads for the volume of cars, build more. Our road capacity hasn't kept up with our population growth in recent years so it is a major thing we need to invest in.
Er, no. The fact that one chooses to do something doesn't make it of utmost importance. I've chosen to waste my time tapping this post on PB, but that doesn't automatically make it of utmost importance.
Maybe it is what's important to you for now, for your mental health. Especially if you're eg working at home alone.
There is a lot of research linking mental health with socialisation etc
Who is anyone to judge what someone else is doing and why it is important to them?
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Remember the laments on PB on how London would rot from the core outwards. And how too too awful it was for the property investors.
Remind me, have we had record rent increases in the whole country over the last year, or just in London?
Round here we rented a two bedroom house 23 years ago for £650 a month. You are looking at about £1000-1100 for something similar.
Inflation over that period takes £650 to £1183.
House I bought later that year now up over 300% in value.
Is @DoubleDutch some nutter returning to the site or a Russian bot with a new style of random abuse?
Good old fashioned and original troll in the sense of insinuating themselves into an online chat group with a seeming credible views on the topic and then sowing discord to get everyone fighting each other.
As if we need any help in doing that.
They clearly don't realise we're not locked in here with her, they's locked in here with us.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
Your definition of 'essential' appears to be one not found in any dictionary.
No matter how clean electric cars are we should not be encouraging more journeys. Going electric does not magically increase the capacity of the roads, it does not reduce parking problems, and it actually increases road maintenance costs. There's a strong (IMO) argument that more cars reduces overall mobility - if you doubled the number of cars on the road there would be gridlock, electric or not.
Actually improving ease of mobility for most people will involve a mix of better public transport, improved provision for cycling, increased use of light vehicles like motorcycles and scooters, and eventually hire-by-the-hour self driving electric cars.
In the village where I live traffic is often completely choked at busy times because far too many people get out their huge SUVs to go shopping. This in a place where you can literally walk from one end of the village to the other in 10 minutes. My neighbour always gets out her car to go shopping, even though we live a 3 minute walk from the shops. I can walk there, buy what I need and be home before she's even found a parking spot.
There needs to be an attitude change where cars are seen as a last resort when no other means of transport is suitable, or all of the current issues are just going to get worse.
One of the issues is perhaps the fixed costs involved in car ownership. Once you've bought, taxed and insured your vehicle, it seems logical to make full use of it. It would be better if, say, tax and insurance costs were proportional to the number of miles driven.
Yea, simultaneously increase car ownership/access while reducing the number of short journeys used by them. Win win, particularly for young people.
Car clubs already exist and will likely be the future for motoring in urban areas.
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
Trying to determine who "did the most" to win WWII is willy-waving, that we, the Americans, and Russians all engage in. I think it would be fair to say that each of those three (and don't forget China) was indispensable towards the achievement of victory.
The Royal Navy, US economic might, and Soviet manpower were key to victory.
I've never read serious history books that portray the UK as some kind of meek little labrador. Being portrayed as the werwolf is actually pretty cool, but overstates our power.
Isn’t there a famous summation of this
The British bought the time The Americans provided the money The Russians gave the me
Each was differently crucial
It's exactly the same with the Napoleonic wars. Trying to determine who did "the most" to defeat France is a pointless exercise.
People forget or refuse to remember that the British forces were under French command for a large part of WWI.
Quite so.
One reason for writing my thesis on the Peninsular was to refute the view that the Spanish did very little to earn their own liberation from Napoleon. Even the different names for the conflict tell their own story. The Spanish call it The War of Independence, and the Catalans call it The French War.
I learned all I know about the Peninsular War from Sharpe, so I know it all.
The Spanish rebels fought in small groups, each of which contained an attractive woman. They used to wait around for a tiny British formation of perhaps half a company to turn up before making any kind of attack, which would be poorly led by a posh twerp until a junior rifles officer put down the attractive woman, took over and turned the tide.
It’s quite conceivable the Greens could end up with 3 seats, one being Brighton and the other two those rural seats now looking in play. Or even just those two and lose Brighton.
That would represent a huge paradigm shift for the party. The people in Herefordshire and Suffolk will be voting for them for good old nature conservation reason. They almost certainly worry about climate change too, and they may well think favourably about nationalising water companies, but I doubt many are unreconstructed Corbynites obsessed with Israel or the overthrow of the bourgeoisie.
Does the national party evolve to look more like its Herefordshire and Suffolk representatives in that situation, or does it carry on as the watermelon party regardless?
Sort of like the Teal Independents in Australia? And driven by push factors that, at the very least, rhyme.
The pile of votes labelled "politically homeless Cameroons" isn't big enough to form a meaningful UK party by itself, but I suspect it's big enough for one of the existing groupings to make a play for it at some point.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Given that they have to get a swing going on for the size of blairs in 1997 to get a majority, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility.
I still hold that the best result for the country generally, is a Labour administration with a very small majority.
I'm not sure. That gives the Dianne Abbots and similar a lot of leverage.
It’s quite conceivable the Greens could end up with 3 seats, one being Brighton and the other two those rural seats now looking in play. Or even just those two and lose Brighton.
That would represent a huge paradigm shift for the party. The people in Herefordshire and Suffolk will be voting for them for good old nature conservation reason. They almost certainly worry about climate change too, and they may well think favourably about nationalising water companies, but I doubt many are unreconstructed Corbynites obsessed with Israel or the overthrow of the bourgeoisie.
Does the national party evolve to look more like its Herefordshire and Suffolk representatives in that situation, or does it carry on as the watermelon party regardless?
They also have a shot in Bristol Central, so maybe four seats is their high watermark?
It's a great question you pose. No idea why they have become a looney bin for nutters of the Far Left like the Ludicrous Owls on here. One hopes that if they do gain these conservation seats with handsome rivers they focus on what they are supposed to focus on: the environment.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Remember the laments on PB on how London would rot from the core outwards. And how too too awful it was for the property investors.
Remind me, have we had record rent increases in the whole country over the last year, or just in London?
Round here we rented a two bedroom house 23 years ago for £650 a month. You are looking at about £1000-1100 for something similar.
Inflation over that period takes £650 to £1183.
House I bought later that year now up over 300% in value.
Sorry but you have the current rates wrong. The cheapest 2 bed house to rent in Luton is £1200 a month and more likely £1300-1400 (source Rightmove search 30 seconds ago).
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
Trying to determine who "did the most" to win WWII is willy-waving, that we, the Americans, and Russians all engage in. I think it would be fair to say that each of those three (and don't forget China) was indispensable towards the achievement of victory.
The Royal Navy, US economic might, and Soviet manpower were key to victory.
I've never read serious history books that portray the UK as some kind of meek little labrador. Being portrayed as the werwolf is actually pretty cool, but overstates our power.
Isn’t there a famous summation of this
The British bought the time The Americans provided the money The Russians gave the me
Each was differently crucial
It's exactly the same with the Napoleonic wars. Trying to determine who did "the most" to defeat France is a pointless exercise.
People forget or refuse to remember that the British forces were under French command for a large part of WWI.
Quite so.
One reason for writing my thesis on the Peninsular was to refute the view that the Spanish did very little to earn their own liberation from Napoleon. Even the different names for the conflict tell their own story. The Spanish call it The War of Independence, and the Catalans call it The French War.
I learned all I know about the Peninsular War from Sharpe, so I know it all.
The Spanish rebels fought in small groups, each of which contained an attractive woman. They used to wait around for a tiny British formation of perhaps half a company to turn up before making any kind of attack, which would be poorly led by a posh twerp until a junior rifles officer put down the attractive woman, took over and turned the tide.
Ah, but that's because the cameras are British and only follow the junior rifles officer. Don't show what is happening elsewhere.
Maybe there is a clue in the fact that 'guerilla' is a loan word in English, like Blitzkrieg.
"What Everyone Knows About Britain* (*Except the British)"
"If only Britain knew how it was viewed abroad If the country were a person, it would need its friends to sit it down and deliver it a few home truths about its damaging behaviour to itself and others, says Michael Peel"
You don’t have to spend too much time on history twitter so see stuff like this:
We are profoundly ignorant of our history, as a society. There was a survey doing the rounds around the D-Day anniversary the other week that said that supposedly half of the UK thought we had done the most, as a country, to win WW2.
I love my country, we have done wonderful things throughout history. But I wish we had a more grown up, nuanced understanding of our history and the things we have done, good and bad, and how that’s impacted other countries and peoples, for good or ill. That might help ameliorate the problems the column highlights.
I’m not holding my breath, the English, especially the elites, do so love their self-bestowed exceptionalism.
There is an argument for that. Had Hitler won the Battle of Britain he could have conquered Britain by late 1940 and captured Moscow by the end of summer 1941.
The Nazis could then have invaded the Eastern USA and Canada and the Japanese the Western USA and Australia, NZ and India
No that I've seen/read it, but isn't that akin to the plot of The Man In The High Castle?
Fatherland seems more plausible to me.
I'm interested in the logistics of Hitler invading the Eastern USA !
Especially given that it took 3 years for the British Empire / USA to build up the capability to invade France from the UK, and Hitler's matchbox navy. D-Day was 2.5 years after the explicit "Europe First" decision.
Even in 1938 the combined UK-British-Empire-USA economy was about 5x larger than that of Germany, and that disparity increased during the war.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Given that they have to get a swing going on for the size of blairs in 1997 to get a majority, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility.
I still hold that the best result for the country generally, is a Labour administration with a very small majority.
Yes because we have never seen governments with very small majorities having to do ridiculous side deals with fringe interests and get bogged down in managing party rather than country. Never happened before, why would it this time?
And yet another survey that shows the Tories winning about 50 seats. We forget how incredible this is
That was published yesterday.
From Twitter interactions (not always the most reliable ore representative of pseudo-focus groups), a lot of people either haven't yet cottoned on to the scale of the impending Tory implosion, or refuse to believe the figures because they sit so far outside their experience that they can't believe it possible, like a cat meeting a see-through bridge.
Even here on PB, I don't think people have properly digested the implications of such a rout, even if they recognise the surface implications of such a result - the immense Labour majority, the loss of so many senior Tory figures, the Lib Dems possibly forming the Opposition, Reform winning MPs - and so on.
Politics, like nature, abhors a vacuum. If the Tories fail to recover - and there's an easy enough path to that happening - then something will fill the space on the right-of-centre.
We should not assume that the inertial forces of habit, elected representatives elsewhere, institutional support from media and third parties, and so on, will necessarily be enough. This is not 1985 any more and there are more than three parties (unless you're Selby Churches Together organising a hustings).
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Given that they have to get a swing going on for the size of blairs in 1997 to get a majority, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility.
I still hold that the best result for the country generally, is a Labour administration with a very small majority.
I would be concerned that if they have a very small majority they will be more beholden to the more loony fringes of the left and have to throw them bones for support on other policies.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Remember the laments on PB on how London would rot from the core outwards. And how too too awful it was for the property investors.
Remind me, have we had record rent increases in the whole country over the last year, or just in London?
Round here we rented a two bedroom house 23 years ago for £650 a month. You are looking at about £1000-1100 for something similar.
Inflation over that period takes £650 to £1183.
House I bought later that year now up over 300% in value.
Sorry but that is complete bollox. The cheapest 2 bed house to rent in Luton is £1200 a month....
I'm not in Luton I'm a bit further north. 2 bedroom cluster house on the market here for £925.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
There won't be a Lab landslide in terms of votes, which would arguably require them to get at least 45% of votes, (which incidentally is what the polls were showing at the start of the campaign). But a landslide in seats is very likely if the right-of-centre vote is split down the middle.
I would define a landslide in votes as a vote share lead of more than 10pp. Blair didn't reach 45% in 1997, but would you really say that wasn't a landslide?
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
Your definition of 'essential' appears to be one not found in any dictionary.
No matter how clean electric cars are we should not be encouraging more journeys. Going electric does not magically increase the capacity of the roads, it does not reduce parking problems, and it actually increases road maintenance costs. There's a strong (IMO) argument that more cars reduces overall mobility - if you doubled the number of cars on the road there would be gridlock, electric or not.
Actually improving ease of mobility for most people will involve a mix of better public transport, improved provision for cycling, increased use of light vehicles like motorcycles and scooters, and eventually hire-by-the-hour self driving electric cars.
In the village where I live traffic is often completely choked at busy times because far too many people get out their huge SUVs to go shopping. This in a place where you can literally walk from one end of the village to the other in 10 minutes. My neighbour always gets out her car to go shopping, even though we live a 3 minute walk from the shops. I can walk there, buy what I need and be home before she's even found a parking spot.
There needs to be an attitude change where cars are seen as a last resort when no other means of transport is suitable, or all of the current issues are just going to get worse.
One of the issues is perhaps the fixed costs involved in car ownership. Once you've bought, taxed and insured your vehicle, it seems logical to make full use of it. It would be better if, say, tax and insurance costs were proportional to the number of miles driven.
Yea, simultaneously increase car ownership/access while reducing the number of short journeys used by them. Win win, particularly for young people.
Car clubs already exist and will likely be the future for motoring in urban areas.
We have had quite a big drop in diesel prices locally. I filled up my car yesterday at 144p/per litre which resulted in a full tank for just over £94. That is at least £10 down on what it was last month.
The differential between what you can get at a supermarket here and what you get charged on a motorway is as large as I have ever seen it, over 12p per litre or more than £7 a tank extra.
Building more roads produces more congestion. This has been proven over and over again.
No, it hasn't.
One more lane bro
Yes adding more lanes (or better yet more roads) adds more capacity.
It doesn't add infinite capacity if you have population growth though. Then you need to add more, continuously, for as long as you have population growth.
Jesus Christ it's a beautiful day but it is very hard to be optimistic about the West at the moment
I would set your sights lower. Beans or peas for supper tonight, perhaps.
I'm off for a picnic in the Chilterns with my eldest, to try and take her mind off her A Levels, which she thinks she has flunked
And on that note, manana
Maybe she needed her dad around in her life rather than him ratting on her mum the whole time and posting FAKE travel
If you are even her dad that is
What's your definition of fake travel?
A ride in a fake taxi?
***Googles fake taxi***
Oh my.
If I was to guess who would be the first to get my joke…
You didn’t have to Google.
Oh I didn’t Google it.
I don't want to be a puritanical arsehole but fake PHCs are a significant threat to young women on nights out, with quite a few serious sexual assaults (and close misses) around universities in the UK and elsewhere.
If you were to restrict any kind of content, those would be the ones to go for. They plant an idea.
Oh I know.
I have mentioned before I've been on a few girls night out and one of my duties everybody got home same.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Remember the laments on PB on how London would rot from the core outwards. And how too too awful it was for the property investors.
Remind me, have we had record rent increases in the whole country over the last year, or just in London?
Round here we rented a two bedroom house 23 years ago for £650 a month. You are looking at about £1000-1100 for something similar.
Inflation over that period takes £650 to £1183.
House I bought later that year now up over 300% in value.
Sorry but you have the current rates wrong. The cheapest 2 bed house to rent in Luton is £1200 a month and more likely £1300-1400 (source Rightmove search 30 seconds ago).
I don't live in Luton and where I do live there are 2 bed cluster houses on the market for £925
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Remember the laments on PB on how London would rot from the core outwards. And how too too awful it was for the property investors.
Remind me, have we had record rent increases in the whole country over the last year, or just in London?
Round here we rented a two bedroom house 23 years ago for £650 a month. You are looking at about £1000-1100 for something similar.
Inflation over that period takes £650 to £1183.
House I bought later that year now up over 300% in value.
Sorry but you have the current rates wrong. The cheapest 2 bed house to rent in Luton is £1200 a month and more likely £1300-1400 (source Rightmove search 30 seconds ago).
I don't live in Luton and where I do live there are 2 bed cluster houses on the market for £925
I believe that.
What I don't believe is that an equivalent 2 bed cluster house in the same location in 2001 cost £650 pcm.
Campbell is right. You see it on here, with lefties luxuriating in their silly protest votes for minor parties thinking that it 'will send a message'. It won't send any sort of message. It will be ignored. That's the problem with protest votes in FPP, no fucker ever notices them, they are just wasted votes, pure and simple.
I just don't believe there will be a Labour landslide to be honest. Just doesn't feel right. We'll know in two weeks whether the polling industry has a massive problem with DKs and very last minute switchers-back.
As I said the other day, unlikely though it is, I am going to laugh so much if Starmer does a TMay and turns predictions of a landslide into a lame duck minority administration. I will chuckle for weeks. Unlikely, admittedly, but it is an appealing thought. It would be the best thing in political news since Boris Johnson was defenestrated.
Given that they have to get a swing going on for the size of blairs in 1997 to get a majority, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility.
I still hold that the best result for the country generally, is a Labour administration with a very small majority.
I'm not sure. That gives the Dianne Abbots and similar a lot of leverage.
A bigger majority means SKS can shrug them off.
I personally think they will anyway. Anyone who thinks that Starmer, or particularly Rainer, is a moderate are as deluded as those who believe that Sunak is not right wing. Maybe Starmer will hold the moderate pretence if he thinks it will give him a second term, but I am not convinced.
@Gabriel_Pogrund EXCLUSIVE: Jeremy Hunt’s re-election campaign and CCHQ have accepted tens of thousands from a dormant shell company with undisclosed ties to a Mayfair private equity fund
The Tory Treasurer's department initially rejected donations from "Ironduke Management", fearing it broke Electoral Commission rules, then U-turned
Would be nice to start getting turnout back to 70% but it's hard to see it at this election with so many Con voters refusing to turn out.
Bit difficult, not having Plaid to vote for in most places.
Seriously, though, HYUFD did have a good point in doing his voting duty (though IMV tactically mistaken: I myself don't use my whole suite of votes if I really don't like some candidates: but that is a different matter). Shame to see so many Conservatives not doing their democratic duty.
Building more roads produces more congestion. This has been proven over and over again.
building (the right) roads has been shown to promote economic growth, economic growth promotes congestion. Saying "don't build that road" is effectively saying "Don't have economic growth".
Building more roads produces more congestion. This has been proven over and over again.
building (the right) roads has been shown to promote economic growth, economic growth promotes congestion. Saying "don't build that road" is effectively saying "Don't have economic growth".
"Everyone wants growth" says the people consistently opposed to all development who object when those in favour of development say there should be growth.
This appointed court is not a part of our constitution; it has no legitimacy, and it is effectively making up law. It needs to be binned.
Um no, it interprets the current law and generates a result.
The new Labour Government can change the law and fix the issue all the Supreme Court has done is combine the law as it currently is and come to (an admittedly unexpected) conclusion..
People like @Luckyguy1983 clearly have no understanding of our legal system whatsoever. This is how it has ALWAYS worked.
Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities. It is a complete abuse of "supreme court" powers to intervene on these spurious grounds, effectively to prevent any new oil wells being built in this country - economical self-harm which is for elected parliamentarians to inflict if they so wish, because they can be de-elected again. It's not for an appointed body to stretch its remit and make decisions like this.
They can intervene if the process was not followed properly. That’s a fundamental principle of the rule of law.
Their judgement is based upon a highly troubling interpretation of what that process should be - that's the point. The emissions involved in the set up and ongoing operation of the business were reported on in the usual way. The emissions generated subsequently were not, and I've explained why to demand that they are is deeply concerning in other posts.
I worry that this bit of the above… : “ Whether a new oil well can proceed legally is a matter for parliament and the appropriate local authorities”
…Shows a confusion between parliament and the executive.
Parliament makes laws. The executive (Government or SCC) makes decisions which should be legal, but if there is doubt the Judicial system will decide
This is part of the citizenship exam. Maybe it should be taught in schools too?
That's true but the court made a mistake in its ruling.
The emissions generated by the burning of the oil should not be counted as the net difference of oil burnt as a result of the well is zero.
Why zero? Because oil is fungible and had we not extracted from this well we'd have just imported from Saudi Arabia or somewhere else the exact same amount of oil.
So the total net emissions of a fungible product is zero, unless or until we start forbidding imports.
As pointed out by someone previously, the Supreme Court did not rule on the substance of the issue, but only on whether the county council had considered the substance of the issue. Which they had not.
So your objection is not relevant, or in order, and we could expect that a revised planning decision from the country council, which did consider the substance of the issue, has a high probability of concluding that it shouldn't be a bar to approving the application, for the logical reasons you set out.
That outcome would be law followed, planning approved, everyone happy (especially the lawyers!)
Not the locals. Not people who care about the countryside. Not those who want to save the planet.
but, yeah, it was about legal processes at the moment
I want to save the planet.
To do that we need to follow science, not dogma.
The science is we need to transition away from consuming oil.
We still need oil for the transition though and there is no scientific reason why OPEC-produced oil is better for the environment than domestically produced oil.
If the world needs to transition away from consuming oil, then basic logic says that the world also has to transition away from producing oil. As a country, we should therefore transition away from both producing and consuming oil as well as appropriately taxing the import of oil and oil derivatives to encourage other countries to do likewise.
No. We should maximise oil production in democratic states in order to minimise the flow of cash to despots and dictators. As long as we need it, the "west" should produce it.
This.
Regdrding renewables. The economic arguments for wind turbines etc. are barking. They have to be backed 100% by conventional power stations (gas) to cover still windless dark cold periods.
The eco argument is equally ludicrous and industry destroying with higher costs when China and India etc extracting vast amounts of coal for cheap electricity.
There is an argument for it on security reasons, with our own oil running out thenturbines mean we need less gas/oil from Vladimir and Khassogis murderers.
But pointing that out would mean the politicians saying "we've cocked up energy policy, ours is running out and we've got to spend a fortune otherwise Vlad and Sundry Sheiks will have us over a barrel"
Far better to say "you wicked people, you are destroying the planet, we must go green to save it"
The downside of that is that the green zealots are as uncontrollable and destructive as any other zealot and they have been allowed within the citadel.
oh, ffs.
The anti wind argument again.
We should be moving toward a mixed energy source system, which for the majority of time would mean most of our energy being provided by wind/solar. In these times only a small amount is fossil fuel based. EG now we have 15GW wind/solar and 5GW gas fired. Sometimes that mix needs to change obviously, but overall the use of wind/solar reduces our need for gas on average.
The anti-renewables loons are Putin's little shills.
As well as being a big exporter of fossil fuels, Russia is one of the few countries that is likely to benefit from anthropogenic climate change, so it's in their interests to deter moves away from fossil fuel consumption. It is also in their interest for those countries with small reserves to squander them as quickly as possible on fuel production so that they will be dependent on countries like Russia for raw materials for plastics, etc, in the future.
There seems to be no shortage of useful idiots, especially on the right of the political spectrum.
Many of the rewnewables-or-nothing loons, like Extinction Rebellion or Just Stop Oil, are Putin's little shills as well. He knows we will keep on buying fossil fuels for the immediate future, but the arguments between the anti-renewables and environmental extremists suit him, as they are very disruptive.
As for your last line: I might suggest that Just Stop Oil's behaviour over the last few days shows the useful idiots are also on the left of the political spectrum as well.
So you also believe that we should extract every last drop of UK oil as quickly as possible, thus leaving us at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia in the future when it's all gone?
No.
It's a matter of progress. We need to move towards green energy - and we've been doing that really, really fast (*). But there is a limit to the speed by which we can do that without ruining the economy, and major technological hurdles remain (social ones as well, but less so).
Whilst this is in progress and we need oil and gas, we should try to be as self-sufficient as possible. Whilst also going great guns towards both reducing the need for oil and gas, and also being greener.
The alternate view involves us buying the oil and gas we need from those very regimes you named. Except not in some hypothetical future, but right now.
(*) It is a crying shame that so many so-called environmentalists ignore this.
That view epitomises short-term thinking. We know that our reserves of fossil fuels are small compared to those of Russia, etc, and we also know that we will need a certain amount of fossil fuel for essential purposes for an indefinite period. Given those two facts, it makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now. It's asking for trouble in the future.
As for going great guns, no. While we, as a planet, have made some progress towards reducing emissions, it has been pitifully slow, to the extent that there has thus far been no noticeable effect on the rate of increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. Indeed, it is still accelerating. We are applauding our efforts while losing the war.
No. My view epitomises both long-term and short-term thinking. What we need to do now, to get where we need to be in the future. You just want to give as much money as possible to bad/evil regimes now. Regimes who have no reason to advance a green future. Gradatim ferociter, as a certain billionaire might say.
" makes no long-term sense at all to be exploiting our own reserves for non-essential purposes now."
Gas and oil is used for essential purposes now. Even on a sunny day with some wind, gas is providing us with some power. Petrol and diesel is allowing most of us to get around. And you think that is non-essential?
As for your last paragraph: we as a country have been going great guns. The world might not have been, but it's crass to deny how much progress our country has made over the last two decades.
When I look at of my window at all the single-occupant tonka-truck SUVs driving past my house, it's pretty hard to believe that we are using all that oil for essential purposes. Ditto the tourist-filled jets flying overhead.
You have zero idea why people are making those journeys. Zero. They may not seem essential to you; but can I judge your lifestyle too, please?
Now you're just being ridiculous. You're effectively claiming that every journey made is essential. Even if that were the case, it is certainly not essential that it be made in a gas-guzzling SUV. And you have the gall to call me a Putin apologist? Just take a look at yourself.
Yes, every journey made is essential for whoever is making that journey for whatever reason they are making it.
We should be wanting to increase mobility and ensure more journeys can be made for whatever reason than they are now.
As we head into a cleaner, electric, future the cost of motoring ought to be a tiny fraction of what it is today and we ought to see many more journeys made. Cleanly.
We clearly have very different understandings of the meaning of the word "essential".
Clearly.
Name a single journey you could eliminate which wouldn't harm anyone's economic, mental or physical health or wellbeing.
For lots of people in office jobs, the commute.
No thanks. I went back to the office (with permission) towards the end of one of the lockdowns (can't remember which one) as working at home was driving me crazy.
I don't like WFH either, but it was a great opportunity to increase productivity (gain all those hours back commuting) and spread housing demand more evenly around the country.
Just imagine if we had used increased home working as a way of achieving levelling up. We could have spread work around the country and revitalised the high street in every town. City centres would have taken a hit, but the pandemic was the perfect cover for the transition.
Yep.
My other big gripe was that we didn't use COVID to improve the general health of the population. Oddly enough, that's what I'm most furious with Johnson about.
5 pounds off to save the NHS. 5K run to save the NHS. 500 calories down to save the NHS.
But no, just more whining about the waiting lists and the NHS.
Jesus Christ it's a beautiful day but it is very hard to be optimistic about the West at the moment
I would set your sights lower. Beans or peas for supper tonight, perhaps.
I'm off for a picnic in the Chilterns with my eldest, to try and take her mind off her A Levels, which she thinks she has flunked
And on that note, manana
Maybe she needed her dad around in her life rather than him ratting on her mum the whole time and posting FAKE travel
If you are even her dad that is
What's your definition of fake travel?
A ride in a fake taxi?
***Googles fake taxi***
Oh my.
If I was to guess who would be the first to get my joke…
You didn’t have to Google.
Oh I didn’t Google it.
I don't want to be a puritanical arsehole but fake PHCs are a significant threat to young women on nights out, with quite a few serious sexual assaults (and close misses) around universities in the UK and elsewhere.
If you were to restrict any kind of content, those would be the ones to go for. They plant an idea.
Oh I know.
I have mentioned before I've been on a few girls night out and one of my duties everybody got home same.
This is why Uber is a game changer on that front.
Last private hire cab I took was from a company in Worcester (or "Woo" as the local youth call it). They have rebranded themselves "Woober". Superb branding.
It’s quite conceivable the Greens could end up with 3 seats, one being Brighton and the other two those rural seats now looking in play. Or even just those two and lose Brighton.
That would represent a huge paradigm shift for the party. The people in Herefordshire and Suffolk will be voting for them for good old nature conservation reason. They almost certainly worry about climate change too, and they may well think favourably about nationalising water companies, but I doubt many are unreconstructed Corbynites obsessed with Israel or the overthrow of the bourgeoisie.
Does the national party evolve to look more like its Herefordshire and Suffolk representatives in that situation, or does it carry on as the watermelon party regardless?
I know a few Greens in Scotland and England, and most of the ones I know are more in it for the environmental reasons. There are a couple of die-hard socialists in there though. All of them long-standing members, I don't know any new joiners.
Greens have long had a problem deciding on the core of their identity, and on incomers treating them as a place to go when their own political home collapses.
An example was the Comrade Delta rape-crisis in the SWP, when a lot of appalled SWP members treated the Greens as a landing zone.
Do Greens want to be a party of liberal democracy, or of the revolutionary (even rhetorical 'revolutionary') left? They are still imo not clear about that, and the two are not really compatible.
"Then comes Priti Patel. The former home secretary is understood to be on manoeuvres and is expected to stand with one main pledge: to resign after a year."
"There will probably be another two Tory leaders before the next general election – and the repair work could well take a decade to complete. And that work will have to start in two weeks time."
Comments
You didn’t have to Google.
Edit: Also improve the fertility rate, with childcare easier to manage and more time for activities.
Could be that around 10% of people have voted already too. Postal votes are normally returned pretty soon after being received, I think.
Interestingly, the Greens are trading at roughly even money in both seats.
@MrHarryCole
🏇 2:30 at Ascot...
California Dreamer...
"Couldn't convert at odds-on when running green on debut before finishing third.... probably went too early."
25/1
The dawn of the 5 way marginal.
I’d argue that a mature, grown-up understanding of our history would have helped to avoid the gigantic self-imposed clusterfuck that Brexit has brought. The ignorance of our place in the world, and what we’ve done for good and bad, feeds the exceptionalism and insular chauvinism that the Leave campaigns so skilfully, sadly, exploited.
But you feel free to splutter about self-loathing lefties if you wish.
No matter how clean electric cars are we should not be encouraging more journeys. Going electric does not magically increase the capacity of the roads, it does not reduce parking problems, and it actually increases road maintenance costs. There's a strong (IMO) argument that more cars reduces overall mobility - if you doubled the number of cars on the road there would be gridlock, electric or not.
Actually improving ease of mobility for most people will involve a mix of better public transport, improved provision for cycling, increased use of light vehicles like motorcycles and scooters, and eventually hire-by-the-hour self driving electric cars.
In the village where I live traffic is often completely choked at busy times because far too many people get out their huge SUVs to go shopping. This in a place where you can literally walk from one end of the village to the other in 10 minutes. My neighbour always gets out her car to go shopping, even though we live a 3 minute walk from the shops. I can walk there, buy what I need and be home before she's even found a parking spot.
There needs to be an attitude change where cars are seen as a last resort when no other means of transport is suitable, or all of the current issues are just going to get worse.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ceqq74pg1evo
Some, not the majority, but there remains a surprising proportion of innumerates for a betting site.
My other big gripe was that we didn't use COVID to improve the general health of the population. Oddly enough, that's what I'm most furious with Johnson about.
5 pounds off to save the NHS. 5K run to save the NHS. 500 calories down to save the NHS.
But no, just more whining about the waiting lists and the NHS.
That would represent a huge paradigm shift for the party. The people in Herefordshire and Suffolk will be voting for them for good old nature conservation reason. They almost certainly worry about climate change too, and they may well think favourably about nationalising water companies, but I doubt many are unreconstructed Corbynites obsessed with Israel or the overthrow of the bourgeoisie.
Does the national party evolve to look more like its Herefordshire and Suffolk representatives in that situation, or does it carry on as the watermelon party regardless?
*As one could tell from the large squadron code letters painted on the fuselage.
Suppose we all wake up in two weeks' time and the final score is something like Lab 360 Con 200 Libs 50 Scots 20 NI 20. By most standards, that's a very good win for Labour, a very bad defeat for the Conservatives- basically, 2019 in reverse and nobdody was talking about that as anything other than a thumping for Corbyn and a triumph for Boris. (I'm not expecting that now, though it's close to my entry in the prediction competition, I think). But compared with what the polls are suggesting to those in the know, it would feel rather flat for Keir and a relative triumph for Rishi.
Just to take one random dictionary website definition I'll go with "of the utmost importance" - https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/essential
Every journey everyone is making is of the utmost importance to them at the time they are making it. That is why they are making it, if it wasn't, they'd be doing something different.
As for capacity, build more roads, problem solved. Good for your neighbour for taking her car shopping with her, that means she can put the shopping into her car.
If there's not enough roads for the volume of cars, build more. Our road capacity hasn't kept up with our population growth in recent years so it is a major thing we need to invest in.
I AM NOT CLICKING THOSE LINKS.
If you were to restrict any kind of content, those would be the ones to go for. They plant an idea.
One reason for writing my thesis on the Peninsular War was to refute the view that the Spanish did very little to earn their own liberation from Napoleon. Even the different names for the conflict tell their own story. The Spanish call it The War of Independence, and the Catalans call it The French War.
Since they are nowhere close to achieving national power they can face in multiple directions at once. Certainly nobody in leafy Tory areas need worry that a Green vote will actually result in wealth taxes, so it's a free hit.
The problem only comes when you're forced to choose which route to take, as the Liberal Democrats can attest.
I liked his point that the most brutal of all the European colonial empires was the one that lasted the longest, namely the USSR.
There is a lot of research linking mental health with socialisation etc
Who is anyone to judge what someone else is doing and why it is important to them?
Inflation over that period takes £650 to £1183.
House I bought later that year now up over 300% in value.
They clearly don't realise we're not locked in here with her, they's locked in here with us.
Car clubs already exist and will likely be the future for motoring in urban areas.
The Spanish rebels fought in small groups, each of which contained an attractive woman. They used to wait around for a tiny British formation of perhaps half a company to turn up before making any kind of attack, which would be poorly led by a posh twerp until a junior rifles officer put down the attractive woman, took over and turned the tide.
The pile of votes labelled "politically homeless Cameroons" isn't big enough to form a meaningful UK party by itself, but I suspect it's big enough for one of the existing groupings to make a play for it at some point.
A bigger majority means SKS can shrug them off.
It's a great question you pose. No idea why they have become a looney bin for nutters of the Far Left like the Ludicrous Owls on here. One hopes that if they do gain these conservation seats with handsome rivers they focus on what they are supposed to focus on: the environment.
Your corporate firewalls will soon tell you if they are bad or not...
Maybe there is a clue in the fact that 'guerilla' is a loan word in English, like Blitzkrieg.
Especially given that it took 3 years for the British Empire / USA to build up the capability to invade France from the UK, and Hitler's matchbox navy. D-Day was 2.5 years after the explicit "Europe First" decision.
Even in 1938 the combined UK-British-Empire-USA economy was about 5x larger than that of Germany, and that disparity increased during the war.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1334182/wwii-pre-war-gdp/
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1334676/wwii-annual-war-gdp-largest-economies/
From Twitter interactions (not always the most reliable ore representative of pseudo-focus groups), a lot of people either haven't yet cottoned on to the scale of the impending Tory implosion, or refuse to believe the figures because they sit so far outside their experience that they can't believe it possible, like a cat meeting a see-through bridge.
Even here on PB, I don't think people have properly digested the implications of such a rout, even if they recognise the surface implications of such a result - the immense Labour majority, the loss of so many senior Tory figures, the Lib Dems possibly forming the Opposition, Reform winning MPs - and so on.
Politics, like nature, abhors a vacuum. If the Tories fail to recover - and there's an easy enough path to that happening - then something will fill the space on the right-of-centre.
We should not assume that the inertial forces of habit, elected representatives elsewhere, institutional support from media and third parties, and so on, will necessarily be enough. This is not 1985 any more and there are more than three parties (unless you're Selby Churches Together organising a hustings).
The differential between what you can get at a supermarket here and what you get charged on a motorway is as large as I have ever seen it, over 12p per litre or more than £7 a tank extra.
It doesn't add infinite capacity if you have population growth though. Then you need to add more, continuously, for as long as you have population growth.
Same with any type of infrastructure anywhere.
I have mentioned before I've been on a few girls night out and one of my duties everybody got home same.
This is why Uber is a game changer on that front.
What I don't believe is that an equivalent 2 bed cluster house in the same location in 2001 cost £650 pcm.
EXCLUSIVE: Jeremy Hunt’s re-election campaign and CCHQ have accepted tens of thousands from a dormant shell company with undisclosed ties to a Mayfair private equity fund
The Tory Treasurer's department initially rejected donations from "Ironduke Management", fearing it broke Electoral Commission rules, then U-turned
Here's the story
https://x.com/Gabriel_Pogrund/status/1804118149731684409
Seriously, though, HYUFD did have a good point in doing his voting duty (though IMV tactically mistaken: I myself don't use my whole suite of votes if I really don't like some candidates: but that is a different matter). Shame to see so many Conservatives not doing their democratic duty.
An example was the Comrade Delta rape-crisis in the SWP, when a lot of appalled SWP members treated the Greens as a landing zone.
Do Greens want to be a party of liberal democracy, or of the revolutionary (even rhetorical 'revolutionary') left? They are still imo not clear about that, and the two are not really compatible.
"There will probably be another two Tory leaders before the next general election – and the repair work could well take a decade to complete. And that work will have to start in two weeks time."
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/06/20/vote-priti-get-boris-tories-dreaming-of-better-times/
He also mentions Fox. I have taken a nibble at 75.