At this point, who hasn’t actively considered emigration?
Just as a matter of style, I'm not sure Big Brother is the most persuasive comparison. I'd go for Russia or a similar quasi-dictatorship. Actually it might be interesting to compare prosecutions for TwiX posts in Britain and Russia, not least because the KGB does not always use the court system.
Someone has made the comparison
"In the last five years; arrests for social media posts:
Putin’s Russia - 400
UK (since the Communication Act 2003) - 3,300
The English invented the concept of free speech and decrying the governing orthodoxy - now we’re a global embarrassment."
I remind you of my long-standing rant on this: specifically that free speech does not exists in the UK, has never existed, and the only task of the statistician is to measure what speech is repressed. This is why I invented the #PBfreespeech hashtag. The British are perfectly comfortable with people being arrested/jobs lost etc for their speech, only complaining when the wrong kind of people/speech is repressed. We are the country that put somebody in prison for saying something bad about Captain Tom. We have non-crime hate-speech registers. We're not a global embarrassment, we're a global bad example.
I'm not sure - we're still better than many if not most but we've a very long way to go.
Free Speech is one thing - Fair Speech is another. Too many voices are never heard and too few voices are heard all the time. Social media empowers radical speech as a way of getting "noticed" (followers). They shout and they type and they cancel as someone recently said.
The echo chamber is comforting and reassuring and makes people happy. Being confronted continuously with views and opinions isn't easy and it's easier to shut up and run away or just fall in line with the majority who are, of course, the largest number of people wrong about any given topic at any given time.
Those who shout loudest get heard (unfortunately), those who whisper quietly in the dark are ignored but you can be sure they are the ones who need to be heard. Had social media existed in WW2, would we have countenanced anyone with a negative opinion against the Russians, our allies, the ones bleeding the Wehrmacht dry? Yet many knew of the horrors of the Stalinist state but if my enemy's enemy is my friend, so be it.
The trouble is the subjective judgements that may be formed - but cannot be proven - should you exercise it.
In theory, I can say what I like, when I like, and that free exchange of views amongst free citizens is how it should be. In practice, I fear that would come at considerable risk to my employment or career, and the cost-benefit ratio of that (that potential cost, versus the benefit of making a slightly good point, and contributing to improving a debate) is simply too high for me to risk it.
So, I self-censor and moderate.
That used to be on Brexit and immigration; lately, it's been about being very coy about being a Conservative at all (particularly when a lead equity partner on a community call 2-weeks ago talked about "idiots in blue-suits" with over 300 members of staff on it being forced to listen).
At this point, who hasn’t actively considered emigration?
Just as a matter of style, I'm not sure Big Brother is the most persuasive comparison. I'd go for Russia or a similar quasi-dictatorship. Actually it might be interesting to compare prosecutions for TwiX posts in Britain and Russia, not least because the KGB does not always use the court system.
Someone has made the comparison
"In the last five years; arrests for social media posts:
Putin’s Russia - 400
UK (since the Communication Act 2003) - 3,300
The English invented the concept of free speech and decrying the governing orthodoxy - now we’re a global embarrassment."
I remind you of my long-standing rant on this: specifically that free speech does not exists in the UK, has never existed, and the only task of the statistician is to measure what speech is repressed. This is why I invented the #PBfreespeech hashtag. The British are perfectly comfortable with people being arrested/jobs lost etc for their speech, only complaining when the wrong kind of people/speech is repressed. We are the country that put somebody in prison for saying something bad about Captain Tom. We have non-crime hate-speech registers. We're not a global embarrassment, we're a global bad example.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
41,000 replies, all bitterly mocking the UK Government. This is hugely damaging to our international image. They are now trying to stop people replying
Have you seen the kinds of people doing the replying? They're mostly Qanon obsessed American nutters who don't have a positive view of anyone who's surname isn't Trump.
lol. They have now removed the ability to reply
What a triumph for Gov.UK. Write a tweet to really send a message, then realise the tweet is so madly offensive and unpopular it gets bitterly mocked, worldwide, and now the government is actively trying to hide the tweet. They’ll probably end up deleting it. Brilliant way to send the message. Gold star for PR
Farcical morons
Its not offensive to write what the law is.
Getting mocked by trolls online is irrelevant.
David Cameron was right when he said that Twitter isn't Britain. Foreign trolls on Twitter are even less Britain.
But the UKG govt clearly does care about Twitter, hence the hysterical calls to ban it or restrict it
What does the devastatingly bad tweet actually say? (I'm not on Twatter)
It says if you incite violence on Twitter you'll get your collar felt.
It says if you incite violence or hatred on Twitter you get your collar felt. The second concept is a vast gulf away from the first, so I'm puzzled you didn’t feel it worthy of mention.
Violence and hatred aren't the same but there's hardly a 'vast gulf' between them.
Something like 'violence and cornflakes' - there'd be a vast gulf there.
Hatred is an emotion. Incitement to hatred is open to wide interpretation, as well as the views of the alleged victims. One may be very confident that one's social media post is not an incitement to violence, but considerably less so that controversial concepts or passionate debate will not fall into somebody's definition of inciting hatred.inciting hatred. That's why the latter has a chilling effect on freedom of speech of a far greater magnitude - I would say a gulf in magnitude, than the former.
"incitement to racial hatred" has been a criminal offence since 1976
The Tweet doesn’t mention incitement to "racial" hatred, just "hatred" - perhaps you SKS fans should consider if you actually support the Tweet, given both posts above defending it have had to misrepresent the contents to do so.
"Content that incites violence or hatred isn't just harmful - it can be illegal."
Is a statement of the law which amounts to
"Inciting hatred
In England and Wales it can be an offence to stir up hatred on the grounds of:
Race Religion Sexual Orientation"
I really can't see any problem with the tweet whatsoever. If you disagree with the law, then say so and why.
Also when have I ever mentioned SKS? Sure sign you know you've lost the argument when you start making things up about the people you disagree with.
My issue with this publicity campaign is that in an era where some crimes (fraud, burglary, cannabis-use, shoplifting) that have devastating impacts on businesses, individuals, and health, have been virtually decriminalised, and others (as serious as rape) receive derisory sentences, apparently due to lack of resource in the system, it is discouraging to see the Government and the CPS thinking a crackdown on free speech on Twitter is any sort of priority. It feels like a sloppy, easy target to quell dissent amongst the law abiding rather than using shoe leather to impede the work of muggers and theives.
And if you're not an SKS fan, apologies, clearly you have better taste than I credited you with.
So far this 'crackdown' amounts to a couple of tweets, and a review of the Online Safety Act.
In no sense is it "quelling dissent by the law abiding", so far, other than in your collective imaginations.
At this point, who hasn’t actively considered emigration?
Just as a matter of style, I'm not sure Big Brother is the most persuasive comparison. I'd go for Russia or a similar quasi-dictatorship. Actually it might be interesting to compare prosecutions for TwiX posts in Britain and Russia, not least because the KGB does not always use the court system.
Someone has made the comparison
"In the last five years; arrests for social media posts:
Putin’s Russia - 400
UK (since the Communication Act 2003) - 3,300
The English invented the concept of free speech and decrying the governing orthodoxy - now we’re a global embarrassment."
I remind you of my long-standing rant on this: specifically that free speech does not exists in the UK, has never existed, and the only task of the statistician is to measure what speech is repressed. This is why I invented the #PBfreespeech hashtag. The British are perfectly comfortable with people being arrested/jobs lost etc for their speech, only complaining when the wrong kind of people/speech is repressed. We are the country that put somebody in prison for saying something bad about Captain Tom. We have non-crime hate-speech registers. We're not a global embarrassment, we're a global bad example.
I don't really get the 'free speech absolutist' position - other than noting that many who claim it (like Musk) are merely virtue signalling and don't walk the walk when it comes to speech they don't like,
But leaving aside the hypocrisy, why should you be able to say absolutely anything you want regardless of the consequences? You can't *do* absolutely anything you want regardless of the consequences. So why a free pass for this thing called 'speech'?
Speech and action aren't fundamentally different beasts. Speech *is* an action. You have your mouth open emitting words, or you're writing or typing them. If that action leads to - and is designed to lead to - harm to others, why should this be outside the scope of the law?
There's a pretty poor understanding of the 1st Amendment in the US, too. It's only the result of what the US right would call 'judicial activism' that the right to free speech is as strongly protected as it is now.
And even then, it's far from a free for all. Try, for example, posting something even moderately threatening against the President...
So it's always a 'drawing the line' debate. You wouldn't know that from listening to the free speech warriors.
Latest IPSOS polling Harris lead by 2 in a straight fight and by 5 if Kenedy and others included, Trumpee back at 38%
More indications that Kennedy helps Harris. Stand by for a withdrawal?
RFK is too vain, you can see it shining out of his eyes
I can only see him withdrawing if Trump offers a great job, and Trump looks set to win
And if RFK believes Trump. Rory tells the story of how Boris approached him about supporting his leadership bid, opening you shouldn't believe everything I say but you'd make a great Foreign Secretary!
Do you really NEED that thought? Is it an *acceptable* thought? Might your unspoken and silent opinion cause offence to someone with a protected characteristic anywhere in the world, or anyone else, in history, ever? Or could your time be better spent not thinking at all, and let US do the thinking for you?
Tell us YOUR half-formed thoughts first, here at the Home Office, before you think them
THINK BEFORE YOU THINK
36 days since Leon voted for Labour and here we are folks.
The torment. The self-loathing.
Not taking it well, are they. The Leons, the AlanBrookes, the Casinos.
And yes with Leon there's the added (and very singular) factor that he voted for this decade of national renewal under a changed Labour Party that is back in the service of working people.
I suppose it's the dashed hope that is stinging. They say it's the hope that kills you, don't they.
The only consolation about the dire state of the government I foolishly elected is that I only spend 15% of the year suffering its dreary inanities and national self harm, whereas the rest of you are near 100%. Oh well. Sorry about that
We're only a month into a 10 year spell of absolute Labour power and control. Perhaps a modicum of patience wouldn't go amiss?
Do you really NEED that thought? Is it an *acceptable* thought? Might your unspoken and silent opinion cause offence to someone with a protected characteristic anywhere in the world, or anyone else, in history, ever? Or could your time be better spent not thinking at all, and let US do the thinking for you?
Tell us YOUR half-formed thoughts first, here at the Home Office, before you think them
THINK BEFORE YOU THINK
36 days since Leon voted for Labour and here we are folks.
The torment. The self-loathing.
Not taking it well, are they. The Leons, the AlanBrookes, the Casinos.
And yes with Leon there's the added (and very singular) factor that he voted for this decade of national renewal under a changed Labour Party that is back in the service of working people.
I suppose it's the dashed hope that is stinging. They say it's the hope that kills you, don't they.
The only consolation about the dire state of the government I foolishly elected is that I only spend 15% of the year suffering its dreary inanities and national self harm, whereas the rest of you are near 100%. Oh well. Sorry about that
We're only a month into a 10 year spell of absolute Labour power and control. Perhaps a modicum of patience wouldn't go amiss?
Remember, you're talking to Leon, for whom everything is either *BRILLIANT!!!* or *APOCALYPSE!!!*. Patience doesn't feature.
At this point, who hasn’t actively considered emigration?
Just as a matter of style, I'm not sure Big Brother is the most persuasive comparison. I'd go for Russia or a similar quasi-dictatorship. Actually it might be interesting to compare prosecutions for TwiX posts in Britain and Russia, not least because the KGB does not always use the court system.
Someone has made the comparison
"In the last five years; arrests for social media posts:
Putin’s Russia - 400
UK (since the Communication Act 2003) - 3,300
The English invented the concept of free speech and decrying the governing orthodoxy - now we’re a global embarrassment."
I remind you of my long-standing rant on this: specifically that free speech does not exists in the UK, has never existed, and the only task of the statistician is to measure what speech is repressed. This is why I invented the #PBfreespeech hashtag. The British are perfectly comfortable with people being arrested/jobs lost etc for their speech, only complaining when the wrong kind of people/speech is repressed. We are the country that put somebody in prison for saying something bad about Captain Tom. We have non-crime hate-speech registers. We're not a global embarrassment, we're a global bad example.
I don't really get the 'free speech absolutist' position - other than noting that many who claim it (like Musk) are merely virtue signalling and don't walk the walk when it comes to speech they don't like,
But leaving aside the hypocrisy, why should you be able to say absolutely anything you want regardless of the consequences? You can't *do* absolutely anything you want regardless of the consequences. So why a free pass for this thing called 'speech'?
Speech and action aren't fundamentally different beasts. Speech *is* an action. You have your mouth open emitting words, or you're writing or typing them. If that action leads to - and is designed to lead to - harm to others, why should this be outside the scope of the law?
(Points to the sign saying "...the only task of the statistician is to measure what speech is repressed...")
Ah but I thought the statistician was opining on the underlyings in this instance. It is allowed.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
41,000 replies, all bitterly mocking the UK Government. This is hugely damaging to our international image. They are now trying to stop people replying
Have you seen the kinds of people doing the replying? They're mostly Qanon obsessed American nutters who don't have a positive view of anyone who's surname isn't Trump.
lol. They have now removed the ability to reply
What a triumph for Gov.UK. Write a tweet to really send a message, then realise the tweet is so madly offensive and unpopular it gets bitterly mocked, worldwide, and now the government is actively trying to hide the tweet. They’ll probably end up deleting it. Brilliant way to send the message. Gold star for PR
Farcical morons
Its not offensive to write what the law is.
Getting mocked by trolls online is irrelevant.
David Cameron was right when he said that Twitter isn't Britain. Foreign trolls on Twitter are even less Britain.
But the UKG govt clearly does care about Twitter, hence the hysterical calls to ban it or restrict it
What does the devastatingly bad tweet actually say? (I'm not on Twatter)
It says if you incite violence on Twitter you'll get your collar felt.
It says if you incite violence or hatred on Twitter you get your collar felt. The second concept is a vast gulf away from the first, so I'm puzzled you didn’t feel it worthy of mention.
Violence and hatred aren't the same but there's hardly a 'vast gulf' between them.
Something like 'violence and cornflakes' - there'd be a vast gulf there.
Hatred is an emotion. Incitement to hatred is open to wide interpretation, as well as the views of the alleged victims. One may be very confident that one's social media post is not an incitement to violence, but considerably less so that controversial concepts or passionate debate will not fall into somebody's definition of inciting hatred.inciting hatred. That's why the latter has a chilling effect on freedom of speech of a far greater magnitude - I would say a gulf in magnitude, than the former.
"incitement to racial hatred" has been a criminal offence since 1976
The Tweet doesn’t mention incitement to "racial" hatred, just "hatred" - perhaps you SKS fans should consider if you actually support the Tweet, given both posts above defending it have had to misrepresent the contents to do so.
"Content that incites violence or hatred isn't just harmful - it can be illegal."
Is a statement of the law which amounts to
"Inciting hatred
In England and Wales it can be an offence to stir up hatred on the grounds of:
Race Religion Sexual Orientation"
I really can't see any problem with the tweet whatsoever. If you disagree with the law, then say so and why.
Also when have I ever mentioned SKS? Sure sign you know you've lost the argument when you start making things up about the people you disagree with.
My issue with this publicity campaign is that in an era where some crimes (fraud, burglary, cannabis-use, shoplifting) that have devastating impacts on businesses, individuals, and health, have been virtually decriminalised, and others (as serious as rape) receive derisory sentences, apparently due to lack of resource in the system, it is discouraging to see the Government and the CPS thinking a crackdown on free speech on Twitter is any sort of priority. It feels like a sloppy, easy target to quell dissent amongst the law abiding rather than using shoe leather to impede the work of muggers and theives.
And if you're not an SKS fan, apologies, clearly you have better taste than I credited you with.
So far this 'crackdown' amounts to a couple of tweets, and a review of the Online Safety Act.
In no sense is it "quelling dissent by the law abiding", so far, other than in your collective imaginations.
Some PB_Tories are just engaging in a persecution fantasy now that their lot isn't in power. It's projecting what they wanted to do to others and assuming that the others will do to them. After all, in the 2011 Duggan riots, people were sentenced to long prison terms for posting on Facebook encouraging people to riot even when there was no such riot. Are those people saying now that was an attack on free speech?
Do you really NEED that thought? Is it an *acceptable* thought? Might your unspoken and silent opinion cause offence to someone with a protected characteristic anywhere in the world, or anyone else, in history, ever? Or could your time be better spent not thinking at all, and let US do the thinking for you?
Tell us YOUR half-formed thoughts first, here at the Home Office, before you think them
THINK BEFORE YOU THINK
36 days since Leon voted for Labour and here we are folks.
The torment. The self-loathing.
It's remarkable how quick people were to forget what a Labour government is actually LIKE, so blinded were they by intense loathing for the Tories. I remember it always being brought back to that when I raised any of it before the election. But, absolutely none of it should come as any surprise. This is what they do.
We had all of it 14 years ago, and they should all have remembered that - were they thinking clearly - to make a rational and balanced choice based on the two realistic options before them.
I clearly remember the Labour government 1997-2010 and I think it was pretty good. It wasn't perfect, got derailed by Iraq and was clearly running out of steam by the end but overall the best government of my lifetime.
Do you really NEED that thought? Is it an *acceptable* thought? Might your unspoken and silent opinion cause offence to someone with a protected characteristic anywhere in the world, or anyone else, in history, ever? Or could your time be better spent not thinking at all, and let US do the thinking for you?
Tell us YOUR half-formed thoughts first, here at the Home Office, before you think them
THINK BEFORE YOU THINK
36 days since Leon voted for Labour and here we are folks.
The torment. The self-loathing.
It's remarkable how quick people were to forget what a Labour government is actually LIKE, so blinded were they by intense loathing for the Tories. I remember it always being brought back to that when I raised any of it before the election. But, absolutely none of it should come as any surprise. This is what they do.
We had all of it 14 years ago, and they should all have remembered that - were they thinking clearly - to make a rational and balanced choice based on the two realistic options before them.
I clearly remember the Labour government 1997-2010 and I think it was pretty good. It wasn't perfect, got derailed by Iraq and was clearly running out of steam by the end but overall the best government of my lifetime.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
More than the PM?
Paying what a backbench PM earns would be overkill.
Why can't they find someone for median wages willing and able to read from a teleprompter?
Not in general a massive fan of the "If you have done nothing wrong you have nothing to fear" line, but do we have examples of someone being convicted of an online hate crime that wasn't a clear example of incitement?
I would say Mark Meechan, the nazi dog guy. On balance I think that more on the very stupid than clear incitement.
Though wasn't convicted of incitement, but rather for being grossly offensive. I think people should be allowed to be grossly offensive - Leon wears gillets, for example.
Inciting hatred is an older law and came in under Thatcher.
I'm not sure there's a legal difference. There needs to be a direct or indirect victim for every crime. Presumably in Meechan's case the perceived victims are Jewish people who might feel threatened by this video.
Thinking about it, the test for hate crimes versus allowable commentary should be whether there is a direct threat to anyone or whether people might reasonably feel threatened by the action or speech.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
More than the PM?
Paying what a backbench PM earns would be overkill.
Why can't they find someone for median wages willing and able to read from a teleprompter?
41,000 replies, all bitterly mocking the UK Government. This is hugely damaging to our international image. They are now trying to stop people replying
Have you seen the kinds of people doing the replying? They're mostly Qanon obsessed American nutters who don't have a positive view of anyone who's surname isn't Trump.
lol. They have now removed the ability to reply
What a triumph for Gov.UK. Write a tweet to really send a message, then realise the tweet is so madly offensive and unpopular it gets bitterly mocked, worldwide, and now the government is actively trying to hide the tweet. They’ll probably end up deleting it. Brilliant way to send the message. Gold star for PR
Farcical morons
Its not offensive to write what the law is.
Getting mocked by trolls online is irrelevant.
David Cameron was right when he said that Twitter isn't Britain. Foreign trolls on Twitter are even less Britain.
But the UKG govt clearly does care about Twitter, hence the hysterical calls to ban it or restrict it
What does the devastatingly bad tweet actually say? (I'm not on Twatter)
It says if you incite violence on Twitter you'll get your collar felt.
It says if you incite violence or hatred on Twitter you get your collar felt. The second concept is a vast gulf away from the first, so I'm puzzled you didn’t feel it worthy of mention.
Violence and hatred aren't the same but there's hardly a 'vast gulf' between them.
Something like 'violence and cornflakes' - there'd be a vast gulf there.
Hatred is an emotion. Incitement to hatred is open to wide interpretation, as well as the views of the alleged victims. One may be very confident that one's social media post is not an incitement to violence, but considerably less so that controversial concepts or passionate debate will not fall into somebody's definition of inciting hatred.inciting hatred. That's why the latter has a chilling effect on freedom of speech of a far greater magnitude - I would say a gulf in magnitude, than the former.
"incitement to racial hatred" has been a criminal offence since 1976
The Tweet doesn’t mention incitement to "racial" hatred, just "hatred" - perhaps you SKS fans should consider if you actually support the Tweet, given both posts above defending it have had to misrepresent the contents to do so.
"Content that incites violence or hatred isn't just harmful - it can be illegal."
Is a statement of the law which amounts to
"Inciting hatred
In England and Wales it can be an offence to stir up hatred on the grounds of:
Race Religion Sexual Orientation"
I really can't see any problem with the tweet whatsoever. If you disagree with the law, then say so and why.
Also when have I ever mentioned SKS? Sure sign you know you've lost the argument when you start making things up about the people you disagree with.
My issue with this publicity campaign is that in an era where some crimes (fraud, burglary, cannabis-use, shoplifting) that have devastating impacts on businesses, individuals, and health, have been virtually decriminalised, and others (as serious as rape) receive derisory sentences, apparently due to lack of resource in the system, it is discouraging to see the Government and the CPS thinking a crackdown on free speech on Twitter is any sort of priority. It feels like a sloppy, easy target to quell dissent amongst the law abiding rather than using shoe leather to impede the work of muggers and theives.
And if you're not an SKS fan, apologies, clearly you have better taste than I credited you with.
So why do you object to a factual tweet? - it surely uses minimal resources, unless loads of people start making spurious complaints about it.
And if it makes a few people think before they post, and that results in less incitement that means the police will have MORe resources into fighting those other crimes, rather than putting everyone available into riot control. Which is what you say you want.
Unless you think the disturbances haven't been even a tiny bit caused by people posting without thinking? Finding it hard to understand the logic of your position.
It was 1992 when the US Secret Service first arrested some for Internet threats against the President. Mouthing off against Clinton on USENET IIRC
The official and legal reaction to an action will always be in proportion to the *result* of an action.
Hence the “make a bomb joke in an airport, got to jail thing”. In the 90s, the PIRA started getting low level helpers to phone in phone bomb threats to airports. Which would shut them down, costing millions.
There was much wailing and appeals to European courts when the little helpers started getting vacations at Club HMG.
So if you stir up a riot via Twatter, they will drop the cost of the riot on you. Whining that “I only typed 20 words” isn’t the point. It’s the end result.
If ever I get a bit despairing about the world, and, despite my relentless cheeriness, sometimes that happens, then I look at science. Amazing things are happening every day
Latest IPSOS polling Harris lead by 2 in a straight fight and by 5 if Kenedy and others included, Trumpee back at 38%
More indications that Kennedy helps Harris. Stand by for a withdrawal?
RFK is too vain, you can see it shining out of his eyes
I can only see him withdrawing if Trump offers a great job, and Trump looks set to win
And if RFK believes Trump. Rory tells the story of how Boris approached him about supporting his leadership bid, opening you shouldn't believe everything I say but you'd make a great Foreign Secretary!
Pretty sure Trump has already offered RFK a "great job". Maybe RFK rightly doesn't trust Trump's promises, maybe they've already done a deal and just want to time it for most impact, or maybe RFK thinks his brand is worth more if he stays in the race.
RFK seems fairly cuckoo but even he must have noticed that a lot of people who get into bed with Trump regret it.
Interesting tweet from John Burn-Murdoch on the shifting of the Green voting block, much more left wing economically and progressive socially. It'll be a challenge for the Greens to carry on riding both horses and represent Bristol Central as well as Waveney Valley.
It was 1992 when the US Secret Service first arrested some for Internet threats against the President. Mouthing off against Clinton on USENET IIRC
The official and legal reaction to an action will always be in proportion to the *result* of an action.
Hence the “make a bomb joke in an airport, got to jail thing”. In the 90s, the PIRA started getting low level helpers to phone in phone bomb threats to airports. Which would shut them down, costing millions.
There was much wailing and appeals to European courts when the little helpers started getting vacations at Club HMG.
So if you stir up a riot via Twatter, they will drop the cost of the riot on you. Whining that “I only typed 20 words” isn’t the point. It’s the end result.
There’s a very, very long list of Americans who said something like “the President is coming to my town next week, I have my gun and my bullet ready”, who found out out that the US Secret Service take every one of these online threats seriously, turning up and imprisoning people during the visit of the VIP, only letting them go once their principal was wheels up out of the city.
Latest IPSOS polling Harris lead by 2 in a straight fight and by 5 if Kenedy and others included, Trumpee back at 38%
More indications that Kennedy helps Harris. Stand by for a withdrawal?
RFK is too vain, you can see it shining out of his eyes
I can only see him withdrawing if Trump offers a great job, and Trump looks set to win
And if RFK believes Trump. Rory tells the story of how Boris approached him about supporting his leadership bid, opening you shouldn't believe everything I say but you'd make a great Foreign Secretary!
Pretty sure Trump has already offered RFK a "great job". Maybe RFK rightly doesn't trust Trump's promises, maybe they've already done a deal and just want to time it for most impact, or maybe RFK thinks his brand is worth more if he stays in the race.
RFK seems fairly cuckoo but even he must have noticed that a lot of people who get into bed with Trump regret it.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
That's a bizarre law. So if you control three school districts consisting of 0.1% of all students in Utah you can ban a book from every school district in the state.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
My point is that the BBC really shouldn’t be in the market for ‘talent’ at all, and that their being in the market in the first place is a distortion to the rest of the market.
That's a bizarre law. So if you control three school districts consisting of 0.1% of all students in Utah you can ban a book from every school district in the state.
I wonder which weird party brought in such a weird law...
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
For this to be true, there must be a rival football network that would, given the chance, snap up Gary Lineker and pay him at least £1.3 MILLLION a year, as at the moment he gets £1.35m
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
Do they still do a sour cream and chive? that was quite nice.
41,000 replies, all bitterly mocking the UK Government. This is hugely damaging to our international image. They are now trying to stop people replying
Have you seen the kinds of people doing the replying? They're mostly Qanon obsessed American nutters who don't have a positive view of anyone who's surname isn't Trump.
lol. They have now removed the ability to reply
What a triumph for Gov.UK. Write a tweet to really send a message, then realise the tweet is so madly offensive and unpopular it gets bitterly mocked, worldwide, and now the government is actively trying to hide the tweet. They’ll probably end up deleting it. Brilliant way to send the message. Gold star for PR
Farcical morons
Its not offensive to write what the law is.
Getting mocked by trolls online is irrelevant.
David Cameron was right when he said that Twitter isn't Britain. Foreign trolls on Twitter are even less Britain.
But the UKG govt clearly does care about Twitter, hence the hysterical calls to ban it or restrict it
What does the devastatingly bad tweet actually say? (I'm not on Twatter)
It says if you incite violence on Twitter you'll get your collar felt.
It says if you incite violence or hatred on Twitter you get your collar felt. The second concept is a vast gulf away from the first, so I'm puzzled you didn’t feel it worthy of mention.
Violence and hatred aren't the same but there's hardly a 'vast gulf' between them.
Something like 'violence and cornflakes' - there'd be a vast gulf there.
Violence and milk?
Just see what happens when you put a bowl of some of those cereals in front of a dietitician.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
Should the BBC replace Lineker with the Excellent Jermaine Jenas, rather than bung Jenas a few quid more they would double his salary, I don't understand that.
As to radio presenters, serial listener shedder Zoe Ball is on £900,000 grand. Surely there are plenty of better local radio DJs that would bite the BBC's hand off for a gig on R2 for £100k pa.
41,000 replies, all bitterly mocking the UK Government. This is hugely damaging to our international image. They are now trying to stop people replying
Have you seen the kinds of people doing the replying? They're mostly Qanon obsessed American nutters who don't have a positive view of anyone who's surname isn't Trump.
lol. They have now removed the ability to reply
What a triumph for Gov.UK. Write a tweet to really send a message, then realise the tweet is so madly offensive and unpopular it gets bitterly mocked, worldwide, and now the government is actively trying to hide the tweet. They’ll probably end up deleting it. Brilliant way to send the message. Gold star for PR
Farcical morons
Its not offensive to write what the law is.
Getting mocked by trolls online is irrelevant.
David Cameron was right when he said that Twitter isn't Britain. Foreign trolls on Twitter are even less Britain.
But the UKG govt clearly does care about Twitter, hence the hysterical calls to ban it or restrict it
What does the devastatingly bad tweet actually say? (I'm not on Twatter)
It says if you incite violence on Twitter you'll get your collar felt.
It says if you incite violence or hatred on Twitter you get your collar felt. The second concept is a vast gulf away from the first, so I'm puzzled you didn’t feel it worthy of mention.
Violence and hatred aren't the same but there's hardly a 'vast gulf' between them.
Something like 'violence and cornflakes' - there'd be a vast gulf there.
Hatred is an emotion. Incitement to hatred is open to wide interpretation, as well as the views of the alleged victims. One may be very confident that one's social media post is not an incitement to violence, but considerably less so that controversial concepts or passionate debate will not fall into somebody's definition of inciting hatred.inciting hatred. That's why the latter has a chilling effect on freedom of speech of a far greater magnitude - I would say a gulf in magnitude, than the former.
"incitement to racial hatred" has been a criminal offence since 1976
The Tweet doesn’t mention incitement to "racial" hatred, just "hatred" - perhaps you SKS fans should consider if you actually support the Tweet, given both posts above defending it have had to misrepresent the contents to do so.
"Content that incites violence or hatred isn't just harmful - it can be illegal."
Is a statement of the law which amounts to
"Inciting hatred
In England and Wales it can be an offence to stir up hatred on the grounds of:
Race Religion Sexual Orientation"
I really can't see any problem with the tweet whatsoever. If you disagree with the law, then say so and why.
Also when have I ever mentioned SKS? Sure sign you know you've lost the argument when you start making things up about the people you disagree with.
My issue with this publicity campaign is that in an era where some crimes (fraud, burglary, cannabis-use, shoplifting) that have devastating impacts on businesses, individuals, and health, have been virtually decriminalised, and others (as serious as rape) receive derisory sentences, apparently due to lack of resource in the system, it is discouraging to see the Government and the CPS thinking a crackdown on free speech on Twitter is any sort of priority. It feels like a sloppy, easy target to quell dissent amongst the law abiding rather than using shoe leather to impede the work of muggers and theives.
And if you're not an SKS fan, apologies, clearly you have better taste than I credited you with.
So far this 'crackdown' amounts to a couple of tweets, and a review of the Online Safety Act.
In no sense is it "quelling dissent by the law abiding", so far, other than in your collective imaginations.
Quelling dissent IS ACHIEVED by the lawmakers' bringing influence to bear on the collective imagination.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
My point is that the BBC really shouldn’t be in the market for ‘talent’ at all, and that their being in the market in the first place is a distortion to the rest of the market.
Bringing up new talent has been a staple of the BBC for decades. When that new talent becomes too expensive and the calls are coming from Sky/ITV, off they go and the BBC starts again. Seems like a good system. Paying Huw Edwards and a hundred more like him half a million a year to retain his loyalty is a poor use of the licence fee.
Put me in the minority who think the BBC should pay market rates for talent.
I don't particularly care for Gary Lineker, and the hatred for Fiona Bruce and Laura Kuenssberg truly baffles me, but just because they make it look easy doesn't mean it is.
So many problems are caused across the public sector with this "no-one should be paid more than the PM" malarkey, and it really holds back both quality of service and delivery of projects and drives a massive demand for consultants and contractors. Which are even more expensive.
Whether we should pay Gary Lineker a market rate or not is quite a separate question to whether we should employ Gary Lineker himself or not.
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
One young Ukranian lady had some fun with a Thriller tribute dance, but it’s really not a sport.
Not in general a massive fan of the "If you have done nothing wrong you have nothing to fear" line, but do we have examples of someone being convicted of an online hate crime that wasn't a clear example of incitement?
I would say Mark Meechan, the nazi dog guy. On balance I think that more on the very stupid than clear incitement.
Though wasn't convicted of incitement, but rather for being grossly offensive. I think people should be allowed to be grossly offensive - Leon wears gillets, for example.
Inciting hatred is an older law and came in under Thatcher.
I'm not sure there's a legal difference. There needs to be a direct or indirect victim for every crime. Presumably in Meechan's case the perceived victims are Jewish people who might feel threatened by this video.
Thinking about it, the test for hate crimes versus allowable commentary should be whether there is a direct threat to anyone or whether people might reasonably feel threatened by the action or speech.
NAL But he was definitely convicted under 2003 act rather than 1986 or a Scots equivalent.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
For this to be true, there must be a rival football network that would, given the chance, snap up Gary Lineker and pay him at least £1.3 MILLLION a year, as at the moment he gets £1.35m
I simply don't believe it
I'd say there is and I don't find it so inexplicable. With Lineker you're not just getting top level subject matter (football) expertise delivered with humour and professionalism, you also know that there's an elevated political sensibility there. Broadcasters like that don't grow on trees.
Put me in the minority who think the BBC should pay market rates for talent.
I don't particularly care for Gary Lineker, and the hatred for Fiona Bruce and Laura Kuenssberg truly baffles me, but just because they make it look easy doesn't mean it is.
So many problems are caused across the public sector with this "no-one should be paid more than the PM" malarkey, and it really holds back both quality of service and delivery of projects and drives a massive demand for consultants and contractors. Which are even more expensive.
Whether we should pay Gary Lineker a market rate or not is quite a separate question to whether we should employ Gary Lineker himself or not.
We should pay a market rate I agree.
Put the job out to tender annually and hire the person (with the requisite skills) with the lowest demand.
Still not entirely sure what Labour have done so catastrophically wrong so far.
They haven't really done anything, which is a possible source of complaint. But I'm a fan of the "do nothing" option if a sensible, simple fix isn't available, so not too fussed so far.
Starmer's response to the riots has been staid but steadfast, as people would expect.
Do you really NEED that thought? Is it an *acceptable* thought? Might your unspoken and silent opinion cause offence to someone with a protected characteristic anywhere in the world, or anyone else, in history, ever? Or could your time be better spent not thinking at all, and let US do the thinking for you?
Tell us YOUR half-formed thoughts first, here at the Home Office, before you think them
THINK BEFORE YOU THINK
36 days since Leon voted for Labour and here we are folks.
The torment. The self-loathing.
Not taking it well, are they. The Leons, the AlanBrookes, the Casinos.
And yes with Leon there's the added (and very singular) factor that he voted for this decade of national renewal under a changed Labour Party that is back in the service of working people.
I suppose it's the dashed hope that is stinging. They say it's the hope that kills you, don't they.
The only consolation about the dire state of the government I foolishly elected is that I only spend 15% of the year suffering its dreary inanities and national self harm, whereas the rest of you are near 100%. Oh well. Sorry about that
We're only a month into a 10 year spell of absolute Labour power and control. Perhaps a modicum of patience wouldn't go amiss?
Remember, you're talking to Leon, for whom everything is either *BRILLIANT!!!* or *APOCALYPSE!!!*. Patience doesn't feature.
Maybe we ought to club together and buy him a wooden model kit of HMS Victory, complete with rigging.
Still not entirely sure what Labour have done so catastrophically wrong so far.
They haven't really done anything, which is a possible source of complaint. But I'm a fan of the "do nothing" option if a sensible, simple fix isn't available, so not too fussed so far.
Starmer's response to the riots has been staid but steadfast, as people would expect.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
When it comes to “talent” it is pretty clear that the top jobs are handed out to people in the right magic circle. With talent, sure. But it’s not an open hiring process.
Might be fun to see what a talent show for presenters could turn up.
"Riots were about state of Britain - not Southport killings, says Tory peer
People have taken part in riots because of the state of the country - not over the killings of three girls in Southport, an incoming Tory peer has claimed.
Craig Mackinlay, the former MP for South Thanet, who lost his arms and legs to sepsis, told Chopper’s Political Podcast on GB News: “This is almost one of those moments where I think a lot of people have said, forget what Southport was actually all about. It actually made people rather annoyed about the state of Britain today.”
Mr Mackinlay said those involved in the violent disorder following the killings of three little girls in Southport are not limited to extremists.
He said that although the demonstrations were organised by the far-Right, “normal people” are attending to voice their dissatisfaction with the state of the country.
Mr Mackinlay added: “If the far-Right are that good at organising things then they’re far better at organising things than any political party or government that I know in the UK. So I actually don’t believe it fully.
“There’s always going to be some nutters, and they should be dealt with very robustly, and they should be in prison where appropriate. I’m fully in favour of all of that. But if you look at some of these rallies that are going on, there are lots of couples on these rallies that you’d expect to go and see in the Dog and Duck on a Friday afternoon. These are normal people.”
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
You're only looking at half the equation. There is also a market for viewers, so the BBC finds itself in a weird semi-competitive position of trying to get people to turn the telly on while being a public broadcaster.
Simply put, I would be more than happy to be CEO of Shell for £100,000, but I'd immediately and catastrophically destroy the business.
Put me in the minority who think the BBC should pay market rates for talent.
I don't particularly care for Gary Lineker, and the hatred for Fiona Bruce and Laura Kuenssberg truly baffles me, but just because they make it look easy doesn't mean it is.
So many problems are caused across the public sector with this "no-one should be paid more than the PM" malarkey, and it really holds back both quality of service and delivery of projects and drives a massive demand for consultants and contractors. Which are even more expensive.
Whether we should pay Gary Lineker a market rate or not is quite a separate question to whether we should employ Gary Lineker himself or not.
We should pay a market rate I agree.
Put the job out to tender annually and hire the person (with the requisite skills) with the lowest demand.
Pleased that you agree, and if you did that annual tender then everyone would be on, effectively, a temporary contract with no security of tenure. So you'd lose out to organisations that offered permanent positions with a career path and pension benefits to match. You'd probably have to pay a higher headline rate and you'd get a different sort of person applying. More mercenary and commercial. It would work two-ways.
I think it's better to just have decent annual performance appraisals, and be stricter on that.
Still not entirely sure what Labour have done so catastrophically wrong so far.
They haven't really done anything, which is a possible source of complaint. But I'm a fan of the "do nothing" option if a sensible, simple fix isn't available, so not too fussed so far.
Starmer's response to the riots has been staid but steadfast, as people would expect.
We’ve not rejoined the EU yet as some Tories promised Starmer would do.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
When it comes to “talent” it is pretty clear that the top jobs are handed out to people in the right magic circle. With talent, sure. But it’s not an open hiring process.
Might be fun to see what a talent show for presenters could turn up.
Every programme on any channel and on YouTube might be seen as part of a global talent show for presenters.
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
Do they still do a sour cream and chive? that was quite nice.
Ah that's a new one on me. I'd be willing to give it a go but without high hopes. Apols for going a bit Pulp Fiction but it's something about the shape and texture of a hula hoop that lends itself only to barbecue beef. Eg I actually prefer lots of crisps flavours to barbecue beef (in fact I'd rank barbecue beef quite low down when it comes to crisps) yet those very same flavours transposed to hula hoops don't appeal at all.
Still not entirely sure what Labour have done so catastrophically wrong so far.
They haven't really done anything, which is a possible source of complaint. But I'm a fan of the "do nothing" option if a sensible, simple fix isn't available, so not too fussed so far.
Starmer's response to the riots has been staid but steadfast, as people would expect.
We’ve not rejoined the EU yet as some Tories promised Starmer would do.
Still not entirely sure what Labour have done so catastrophically wrong so far.
They haven't really done anything, which is a possible source of complaint. But I'm a fan of the "do nothing" option if a sensible, simple fix isn't available, so not too fussed so far.
Starmer's response to the riots has been staid but steadfast, as people would expect.
I agree. Nevertheless I expect Starmer to push hard on "the causes of the riots" in the aftermath, where Reform have a case to answer and the Conservatives guilt by association. This could benefit Labour politically. Just as the Conservatives benefited from Corbyn's antisemitism that Starmer eventually dealt with, Labour could benefit from the Conservatives similar but order-of-magnitude worse problem with racism and Islamaphobia. Particularly if, as is likely, the Tories double down, just as Corbyn did.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
You're only looking at half the equation. There is also a market for viewers, so the BBC finds itself in a weird semi-competitive position of trying to get people to turn the telly on while being a public broadcaster.
Simply put, I would be more than happy to be CEO of Shell for £100,000, but I'd immediately and catastrophically destroy the business.
Which is why I said "with the requisite skills".
That doesn't mean writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, or incumbent.
Would replacing Gary Lineker with many of the thousands of ex-footballers "destroy" Match of the Day? No, it would not.
Would replacing Huw Edwards with another broadcaster "destroy" the news? No, it does not.
What skills are required to host the news? Put out for that and hire the person who requires the least that has all required talents, that is the market rate.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
When it comes to “talent” it is pretty clear that the top jobs are handed out to people in the right magic circle. With talent, sure. But it’s not an open hiring process.
Might be fun to see what a talent show for presenters could turn up.
A long time ago The Big Match (I think) did a talent hunt for a new commentator - I recorded a commentary and posted it in on cassette, think I was about five or six.
Put me in the minority who think the BBC should pay market rates for talent.
I don't particularly care for Gary Lineker, and the hatred for Fiona Bruce and Laura Kuenssberg truly baffles me, but just because they make it look easy doesn't mean it is.
So many problems are caused across the public sector with this "no-one should be paid more than the PM" malarkey, and it really holds back both quality of service and delivery of projects and drives a massive demand for consultants and contractors. Which are even more expensive.
Whether we should pay Gary Lineker a market rate or not is quite a separate question to whether we should employ Gary Lineker himself or not.
Is the market rate for Zoe Ball £900,000? I suspect it is not. Cut her lose.
The BBC can't afford market rates to retain talent. Take Susannah Reid. She would be one of the BBC's higher earners on £500,000 if she had stayed ten years ago, but she left and as her stock rose on GMB her salary increased into the millions. Now if ITV believe Susannah Reid brings in advertising revenue they would be mad not to pay her her worth. That doesn't work for the BBC, and besides, much of their "talent" wouldn't bring in extra advertising revenue were it a requirement.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
You're only looking at half the equation. There is also a market for viewers, so the BBC finds itself in a weird semi-competitive position of trying to get people to turn the telly on while being a public broadcaster.
Simply put, I would be more than happy to be CEO of Shell for £100,000, but I'd immediately and catastrophically destroy the business.
The whole point of a public broadcaster is that they shouldn’t care about their ‘numbers’.
Put me in the minority who think the BBC should pay market rates for talent.
I don't particularly care for Gary Lineker, and the hatred for Fiona Bruce and Laura Kuenssberg truly baffles me, but just because they make it look easy doesn't mean it is.
So many problems are caused across the public sector with this "no-one should be paid more than the PM" malarkey, and it really holds back both quality of service and delivery of projects and drives a massive demand for consultants and contractors. Which are even more expensive.
Whether we should pay Gary Lineker a market rate or not is quite a separate question to whether we should employ Gary Lineker himself or not.
We should pay a market rate I agree.
Put the job out to tender annually and hire the person (with the requisite skills) with the lowest demand.
Pleased that you agree, and if you did that annual tender then everyone would be on, effectively, a temporary contract with no security of tenure. So you'd lose out to organisations that offered permanent positions with a career path and pension benefits to match. You'd probably have to pay a higher headline rate and you'd get a different sort of person applying. More mercenary and commercial. It would work two-ways.
I think it's better to just have decent annual performance appraisals, and be stricter on that.
I think you'd find the lowest tender would be considerably less than what it is currently.
Though if you would like to make it say a 2-3 year contract before it goes out to tender again, I'd have no problem with that.
Paying close to a million pounds is not a market rate, that is not the rate that is required to keep supply and demand in equilibrium.
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
Do they still do a sour cream and chive? that was quite nice.
Ah that's a new one on me. I'd be willing to give it a go but without high hopes. Apols for going a bit Pulp Fiction but it's something about the shape and texture of a hula hoop that lends itself only to barbecue beef. Eg I actually prefer lots of crisps flavours to barbecue beef (in fact I'd rank barbecue beef quite low down when it comes to crisps) yet those very same flavours transposed to hula hoops don't appeal at all.
Have you ever thought of a weekend in Bruges? It's not for everyone, it's a bit of a travel challenge, but I think you'd enjoy it
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
One young Ukranian lady had some fun with a Thriller tribute dance, but it’s really not a sport.
A line was crossed with the introduction of Synchronised Swimming in 1984 and it's been difficult to object to the introduction of equally silly sports since then. On the upside though, that kind of thing has made it easier to allow in some genuinely fun contemporary events which even traditionalists like me find it hard to object to.
Personally I'll always have a problem with sports where you need a panel of experts to explain to you who is winning, and why, but the sheer exuberance amongst competitors and spectators alike at events like the skateboarding do make you want to see them included, even if they have little more claim to being a sport than ballet or morris dancing.
It was 1992 when the US Secret Service first arrested some for Internet threats against the President. Mouthing off against Clinton on USENET IIRC
The official and legal reaction to an action will always be in proportion to the *result* of an action.
Hence the “make a bomb joke in an airport, got to jail thing”. In the 90s, the PIRA started getting low level helpers to phone in phone bomb threats to airports. Which would shut them down, costing millions.
There was much wailing and appeals to European courts when the little helpers started getting vacations at Club HMG.
So if you stir up a riot via Twatter, they will drop the cost of the riot on you. Whining that “I only typed 20 words” isn’t the point. It’s the end result.
There’s a very, very long list of Americans who said something like “the President is coming to my town next week, I have my gun and my bullet ready”, who found out out that the US Secret Service take every one of these online threats seriously, turning up and imprisoning people during the visit of the VIP, only letting them go once their principal was wheels up out of the city.
People say this, but then we had the Trump shooting where they were told about a disaffected teenagers out with a rifle and their response was decidedly tepid.
Are you sure that story about the secret service is true, or is it a fable based on it happening somewhere, once?
...The FTSE 100 owner of the Drax power plant made profits of £500m over the first half of this year, helped by biomass subsidies of almost £400m over this period. It handed its shareholders a windfall of £300m for the first half of the year...
There's a potential spending cut, right there.
..The government is considering the company’s request for billpayers to foot the cost of supporting its power plant beyond the subsidy scheme’s deadline in 2027 so it can keep burning wood for power until the end of the decade...
Just no.
Drax's clever switch to American wood pellets (which I deplore in principle) is the only thing that has allowed it to stay open, and by extension keep the UK's lights on. Condemning it is remarkably stupid.
Biomass amount to about 6% of UK generation. It's eminently replaceable.
Subsidising dead end tech - and outsize profits to its owners - is remarkably stupid.
It is a subsidy that happens to support reliable power that isn't wind, season, sun, or time of day reliant - that's immensely valuable to the grid for anyone who isn't a crazed loon.
While that's true... the vast majority of the biomass that is burnt in the UK does not come from the UK. Most is wood pellets from the US, with a smaller share coming from Europe. There's also a small portion that is avocado pips (yes really) from a nearby cosmetics factory where they are waste product. (I forget which factory; but it uses avocado oil, and Drax takes away the pips for free.)
So we are subsidising the importation of wood to burn. If it was from local forests, and therefore added to energy security, it would be one thing. But paying subsidies to import wood from Georgia and Alabama on big bulk cargo ships seems wasteful to me, especially as the energy density of wood chips is pretty low: you might as well just burn the oil that powers the ship.
"Riots were about state of Britain - not Southport killings, says Tory peer
People have taken part in riots because of the state of the country - not over the killings of three girls in Southport, an incoming Tory peer has claimed.
Craig Mackinlay, the former MP for South Thanet, who lost his arms and legs to sepsis, told Chopper’s Political Podcast on GB News: “This is almost one of those moments where I think a lot of people have said, forget what Southport was actually all about. It actually made people rather annoyed about the state of Britain today.”
Mr Mackinlay said those involved in the violent disorder following the killings of three little girls in Southport are not limited to extremists.
He said that although the demonstrations were organised by the far-Right, “normal people” are attending to voice their dissatisfaction with the state of the country.
Mr Mackinlay added: “If the far-Right are that good at organising things then they’re far better at organising things than any political party or government that I know in the UK. So I actually don’t believe it fully.
“There’s always going to be some nutters, and they should be dealt with very robustly, and they should be in prison where appropriate. I’m fully in favour of all of that. But if you look at some of these rallies that are going on, there are lots of couples on these rallies that you’d expect to go and see in the Dog and Duck on a Friday afternoon. These are normal people.”
Hang on. This is revolutionary. Next time there's a demo against something the Tories like, and it is full of mums in prams and grannies with knitting but with a few SWP types in it (or Mr Corbyn J. whatever the bete noire du jour is), the Tories won't instantly tar it all with the same brush as the SWP, Mr C., etc.?
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
Do they still do a sour cream and chive? that was quite nice.
Ah that's a new one on me. I'd be willing to give it a go but without high hopes. Apols for going a bit Pulp Fiction but it's something about the shape and texture of a hula hoop that lends itself only to barbecue beef. Eg I actually prefer lots of crisps flavours to barbecue beef (in fact I'd rank barbecue beef quite low down when it comes to crisps) yet those very same flavours transposed to hula hoops don't appeal at all.
Have you ever thought of a weekend in Bruges? It's not for everyone, it's a bit of a travel challenge, but I think you'd enjoy it
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
I think the BBC is trying, not always successfully, to produce the best programming across the board given the budget it has available. It will always be outbid for showing the most popular football games, so it can try to compensate by having the best commentary. I think Lineker's salary can easily be justified on that basis.
Huw Edwards, even disregarding his recently discovered criminality, not so much.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
You're only looking at half the equation. There is also a market for viewers, so the BBC finds itself in a weird semi-competitive position of trying to get people to turn the telly on while being a public broadcaster.
Simply put, I would be more than happy to be CEO of Shell for £100,000, but I'd immediately and catastrophically destroy the business.
Which is why I said "with the requisite skills".
That doesn't mean writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, or incumbent.
Would replacing Gary Lineker with many of the thousands of ex-footballers "destroy" Match of the Day? No, it would not.
Would replacing Huw Edwards with another broadcaster "destroy" the news? No, it does not.
What skills are required to host the news? Put out for that and hire the person who requires the least that has all required talents, that is the market rate.
Ah fair enough, I didn't see the following post. But it is a tricky balance, I suggest. And not really a competitive market with so few people of Lineker's calibre/experience available.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
You're only looking at half the equation. There is also a market for viewers, so the BBC finds itself in a weird semi-competitive position of trying to get people to turn the telly on while being a public broadcaster.
Simply put, I would be more than happy to be CEO of Shell for £100,000, but I'd immediately and catastrophically destroy the business.
The whole point of a public broadcaster is that they shouldn’t care about their ‘numbers’.
I'd tend to agree. The BBC, as currently set up, is a bit lost.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
I think the BBC is trying, not always successfully, to produce the best programming across the board given the budget it has available. It will always be outbid for showing the most popular football games, so it can try to compensate by having the best commentary. I think Lineker's salary can easily be justified on that basis.
Huw Edwards, even disregarding his recently discovered criminality, not so much.
It does not need "the best", especially when it is funded by law and not by subscribers or advertising.
I suspect most people who watch Match of the Day do so because they want to watch the football highlights, not specifically Lineker. And if it is specifically Lineker, and not a public broadcasting of the football highlights, then fund that with advertising or subscribers.
The market rate is the rate at which supply and demand are in equilibrium, not the rate demanded by "the best". If someone else will do it cheaper, and they have the requisite skills (or can be trained to get them), that's the market rate.
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
Do they still do a sour cream and chive? that was quite nice.
Ah that's a new one on me. I'd be willing to give it a go but without high hopes. Apols for going a bit Pulp Fiction but it's something about the shape and texture of a hula hoop that lends itself only to barbecue beef. Eg I actually prefer lots of crisps flavours to barbecue beef (in fact I'd rank barbecue beef quite low down when it comes to crisps) yet those very same flavours transposed to hula hoops don't appeal at all.
Have you ever thought of a weekend in Bruges? It's not for everyone, it's a bit of a travel challenge, but I think you'd enjoy it
I went there recently as you well know. Magical town. I don't think we have anything quite like it.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
You're only looking at half the equation. There is also a market for viewers, so the BBC finds itself in a weird semi-competitive position of trying to get people to turn the telly on while being a public broadcaster.
Simply put, I would be more than happy to be CEO of Shell for £100,000, but I'd immediately and catastrophically destroy the business.
The whole point of a public broadcaster is that they shouldn’t care about their ‘numbers’.
I'd tend to agree. The BBC, as currently set up, is a bit lost.
In fact, it should care about the numbers. It should be trying to reach as many people as possible with media that is generally beneficial to society.
Defining that could take PB weeks. I don't even know what I think yet.
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
Do they still do a sour cream and chive? that was quite nice.
Ah that's a new one on me. I'd be willing to give it a go but without high hopes. Apols for going a bit Pulp Fiction but it's something about the shape and texture of a hula hoop that lends itself only to barbecue beef. Eg I actually prefer lots of crisps flavours to barbecue beef (in fact I'd rank barbecue beef quite low down when it comes to crisps) yet those very same flavours transposed to hula hoops don't appeal at all.
Have you ever thought of a weekend in Bruges? It's not for everyone, it's a bit of a travel challenge, but I think you'd enjoy it
1) The alcoves in the park are nice 2) The tower is great. Watch out for falling stuff 3) No dim-dims. You know you shouldn't.
Do you really NEED that thought? Is it an *acceptable* thought? Might your unspoken and silent opinion cause offence to someone with a protected characteristic anywhere in the world, or anyone else, in history, ever? Or could your time be better spent not thinking at all, and let US do the thinking for you?
Tell us YOUR half-formed thoughts first, here at the Home Office, before you think them
THINK BEFORE YOU THINK
36 days since Leon voted for Labour and here we are folks.
The torment. The self-loathing.
It's remarkable how quick people were to forget what a Labour government is actually LIKE, so blinded were they by intense loathing for the Tories. I remember it always being brought back to that when I raised any of it before the election. But, absolutely none of it should come as any surprise. This is what they do.
We had all of it 14 years ago, and they should all have remembered that - were they thinking clearly - to make a rational and balanced choice based on the two realistic options before them.
Yes, and still voting for Starmer's Labour was a better option than Sunak's Tories. Even for this right-winger.
Which says more about Sunak's Tories than Starmer's Labour.
Hopefully now the Tories can sort themselves out in opposition, don't become a Farage tribute act, and become worthy of voting for again.
You aren't a rightwinger, you are a liberal centrist except on housing where you want a building free for all.
Leon however is a rightwinger who probably regrets he didn't vote for Reform rather than Starmer but looks likely to switch back to the Tories if they elect Jenrick as leader
I'll be doing it tonight with a beer. Barbecue beef flavour. No other flavour works for some reason - which is odd because that's not the case with crisps.
Do they still do a sour cream and chive? that was quite nice.
Ah that's a new one on me. I'd be willing to give it a go but without high hopes. Apols for going a bit Pulp Fiction but it's something about the shape and texture of a hula hoop that lends itself only to barbecue beef. Eg I actually prefer lots of crisps flavours to barbecue beef (in fact I'd rank barbecue beef quite low down when it comes to crisps) yet those very same flavours transposed to hula hoops don't appeal at all.
Hula hoops belong in the 1970s and 1980s when all food was shit. Their continued existence is baffling. They are the Austin Allegro of potato based snackage.
I am a little perplexed. We have had a week of riots where literal lies have been propagated on TwiX and elsewhere to incite hatred and violence.
We can see how harmful it is to spread malicious shit on social media. Serious crimes can be incited by it and literal crimes are being committed by the people propagating it.
So why is Leon foaming on about some kind of Big Brother reaction from the government? We *need* laws to be upheld, and we should require public figures like Farage and Braverman to be held to account for what they have done.
"Riots were about state of Britain - not Southport killings, says Tory peer
People have taken part in riots because of the state of the country - not over the killings of three girls in Southport, an incoming Tory peer has claimed.
Craig Mackinlay, the former MP for South Thanet, who lost his arms and legs to sepsis, told Chopper’s Political Podcast on GB News: “This is almost one of those moments where I think a lot of people have said, forget what Southport was actually all about. It actually made people rather annoyed about the state of Britain today.”
Mr Mackinlay said those involved in the violent disorder following the killings of three little girls in Southport are not limited to extremists.
He said that although the demonstrations were organised by the far-Right, “normal people” are attending to voice their dissatisfaction with the state of the country.
Mr Mackinlay added: “If the far-Right are that good at organising things then they’re far better at organising things than any political party or government that I know in the UK. So I actually don’t believe it fully.
“There’s always going to be some nutters, and they should be dealt with very robustly, and they should be in prison where appropriate. I’m fully in favour of all of that. But if you look at some of these rallies that are going on, there are lots of couples on these rallies that you’d expect to go and see in the Dog and Duck on a Friday afternoon. These are normal people.”
Hang on. This is revolutionary. Next time there's a demo against something the Tories like, and it is full of mums in prams and grannies with knitting but with a few SWP types in it (or Mr Corbyn J. whatever the bete noire du jour is), the Tories won't instantly tar it all with the same brush as the SWP, Mr C., etc.?
Nobody on the left is going to bother to demo against the Tories now they are in opposition, they will do so against the Starmer government for not being leftwing enough and against the far right and maybe Farage but they won't bother with the Tories for the time being
🇬🇧MAN JAILED IN UK FOR COMMENTING ON FACEBOOK POST ABOUT RIOTS
31-year-old Billy Thompson was sent to prison for 12 weeks after he replied "Filthy ba**ards" on a post about the Police issuing a dispersal order to try and prevent protests from becoming violent.
It also included emojis of an ethnic minority person and a gun.
His lawyer said Billy had made the comment as part of an online Facebook conversation with a family member.
The judge found him guilty of encouraging violence and imposed the sentence to "discourage the kind of violent behavior that such messages encouraged."
Judge Temperley:
"It may be right that the starting point [sentence] is a community order for this offense, but I am afraid this has to be viewed within the context of the current civil unrest up and down the country."
Do you really NEED that thought? Is it an *acceptable* thought? Might your unspoken and silent opinion cause offence to someone with a protected characteristic anywhere in the world, or anyone else, in history, ever? Or could your time be better spent not thinking at all, and let US do the thinking for you?
Tell us YOUR half-formed thoughts first, here at the Home Office, before you think them
THINK BEFORE YOU THINK
36 days since Leon voted for Labour and here we are folks.
The torment. The self-loathing.
It's remarkable how quick people were to forget what a Labour government is actually LIKE, so blinded were they by intense loathing for the Tories. I remember it always being brought back to that when I raised any of it before the election. But, absolutely none of it should come as any surprise. This is what they do.
We had all of it 14 years ago, and they should all have remembered that - were they thinking clearly - to make a rational and balanced choice based on the two realistic options before them.
Yes, and still voting for Starmer's Labour was a better option than Sunak's Tories. Even for this right-winger.
Which says more about Sunak's Tories than Starmer's Labour.
Hopefully now the Tories can sort themselves out in opposition, don't become a Farage tribute act, and become worthy of voting for again.
You aren't a rightwinger, you are a liberal centrist except on housing where you want a building free for all.
Leon however is a rightwinger who probably regrets he didn't vote for Reform rather than Starmer but looks likely to switch back to the Tories if they elect Jenrick as leader
I'm a liberal rightwinger.
My view on housing is I want liberalism. Get the government to back off, cut red tape, and let the market solve the problems.
How is that anything other than right wing liberalism?
The problem is you and Sunak and May and other Conservatives want rightwing illiberalism.
...The FTSE 100 owner of the Drax power plant made profits of £500m over the first half of this year, helped by biomass subsidies of almost £400m over this period. It handed its shareholders a windfall of £300m for the first half of the year...
There's a potential spending cut, right there.
..The government is considering the company’s request for billpayers to foot the cost of supporting its power plant beyond the subsidy scheme’s deadline in 2027 so it can keep burning wood for power until the end of the decade...
Just no.
Drax's clever switch to American wood pellets (which I deplore in principle) is the only thing that has allowed it to stay open, and by extension keep the UK's lights on. Condemning it is remarkably stupid.
Biomass amount to about 6% of UK generation. It's eminently replaceable.
Subsidising dead end tech - and outsize profits to its owners - is remarkably stupid.
It is a subsidy that happens to support reliable power that isn't wind, season, sun, or time of day reliant - that's immensely valuable to the grid for anyone who isn't a crazed loon.
While that's true... the vast majority of the biomass that is burnt in the UK does not come from the UK. Most is wood pellets from the US, with a smaller share coming from Europe. There's also a small portion that is avocado pips (yes really) from a nearby cosmetics factory where they are waste product. (I forget which factory; but it uses avocado oil, and Drax takes away the pips for free.)
So we are subsidising the importation of wood to burn. If it was from local forests, and therefore added to energy security, it would be one thing. But paying subsidies to import wood from Georgia and Alabama on big bulk cargo ships seems wasteful to me, especially as the energy density of wood chips is pretty low: you might as well just burn the oil that powers the ship.
I couldn't agree with you more. If it were up to me, I'd still burn British coal in it - it is no more than Germany does, and I don’t see anyone here ripping into Germany every day for their crimes against the climate. However, given the legislative environment we face, I support Drax's move because their survival protects other areas of the economy from further damage.
I would also like there to be a many more incinerators - burning rubbish (safely) seems sensible to me. And again, our civilised continental neighbours do it a lot more than us.
🇬🇧MAN JAILED IN UK FOR COMMENTING ON FACEBOOK POST ABOUT RIOTS
31-year-old Billy Thompson was sent to prison for 12 weeks after he replied "Filthy ba**ards" on a post about the Police issuing a dispersal order to try and prevent protests from becoming violent.
It also included emojis of an ethnic minority person and a gun.
His lawyer said Billy had made the comment as part of an online Facebook conversation with a family member.
The judge found him guilty of encouraging violence and imposed the sentence to "discourage the kind of violent behavior that such messages encouraged."
Judge Temperley:
"It may be right that the starting point [sentence] is a community order for this offense, but I am afraid this has to be viewed within the context of the current civil unrest up and down the country."
That is stretching encouraging violent behaviour somewhat, you might argue it was grossly offensive to the police in contravention of the Malicious Communications Act but that is it
🇬🇧MAN JAILED IN UK FOR COMMENTING ON FACEBOOK POST ABOUT RIOTS
31-year-old Billy Thompson was sent to prison for 12 weeks after he replied "Filthy ba**ards" on a post about the Police issuing a dispersal order to try and prevent protests from becoming violent.
It also included emojis of an ethnic minority person and a gun.
His lawyer said Billy had made the comment as part of an online Facebook conversation with a family member.
The judge found him guilty of encouraging violence and imposed the sentence to "discourage the kind of violent behavior that such messages encouraged."
Judge Temperley:
"It may be right that the starting point [sentence] is a community order for this offense, but I am afraid this has to be viewed within the context of the current civil unrest up and down the country."
Latest IPSOS polling Harris lead by 2 in a straight fight and by 5 if Kenedy and others included, Trumpee back at 38%
More indications that Kennedy helps Harris. Stand by for a withdrawal?
RFK is too vain, you can see it shining out of his eyes
I can only see him withdrawing if Trump offers a great job, and Trump looks set to win
And if RFK believes Trump. Rory tells the story of how Boris approached him about supporting his leadership bid, opening you shouldn't believe everything I say but you'd make a great Foreign Secretary!
Pretty sure Trump has already offered RFK a "great job". Maybe RFK rightly doesn't trust Trump's promises, maybe they've already done a deal and just want to time it for most impact, or maybe RFK thinks his brand is worth more if he stays in the race.
RFK seems fairly cuckoo but even he must have noticed that a lot of people who get into bed with Trump regret it.
Fairly ?
He'd be a Trump scale loon, except he's on 5% in the polls.
Also, I nearly broke a rib reading this. I fear for @ydoethur 's irony and bullshit meters.
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/4818724-joe-rogan-supports-rfk-jr-over-trump-harris/ ...Podcaster Joe Rogan on Thursday threw his weight behind independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over either of the major party candidates, making the online influencer known for dabbling in conspiracies one of Kennedy’s most notable endorsements. Rogan said on his video podcast “The Joe Rogan Experience” that he views both Democrats and Republicans as perverting democratic norms. “That’s just what they do. That’s politics. They do it on the left, they do it on the right,” Rogan said. “They gaslight you, they manipulate you, they promote narratives, and the only one who is not doing that is Robert F. Kennedy Jr.”..
Do you really NEED that thought? Is it an *acceptable* thought? Might your unspoken and silent opinion cause offence to someone with a protected characteristic anywhere in the world, or anyone else, in history, ever? Or could your time be better spent not thinking at all, and let US do the thinking for you?
Tell us YOUR half-formed thoughts first, here at the Home Office, before you think them
THINK BEFORE YOU THINK
36 days since Leon voted for Labour and here we are folks.
The torment. The self-loathing.
It's remarkable how quick people were to forget what a Labour government is actually LIKE, so blinded were they by intense loathing for the Tories. I remember it always being brought back to that when I raised any of it before the election. But, absolutely none of it should come as any surprise. This is what they do.
We had all of it 14 years ago, and they should all have remembered that - were they thinking clearly - to make a rational and balanced choice based on the two realistic options before them.
Yes, and still voting for Starmer's Labour was a better option than Sunak's Tories. Even for this right-winger.
Which says more about Sunak's Tories than Starmer's Labour.
Hopefully now the Tories can sort themselves out in opposition, don't become a Farage tribute act, and become worthy of voting for again.
You aren't a rightwinger, you are a liberal centrist except on housing where you want a building free for all.
Leon however is a rightwinger who probably regrets he didn't vote for Reform rather than Starmer but looks likely to switch back to the Tories if they elect Jenrick as leader
I'm a liberal rightwinger.
My view on housing is I want liberalism. Get the government to back off, cut red tape, and let the market solve the problems.
How is that anything other than right wing liberalism?
The problem is you and Sunak and May and other Conservatives want rightwing illiberalism.
You are about as rightwing as Ed Davey, except on housing where you make even the average developer look like a NIMBY!
🇬🇧MAN JAILED IN UK FOR COMMENTING ON FACEBOOK POST ABOUT RIOTS
31-year-old Billy Thompson was sent to prison for 12 weeks after he replied "Filthy ba**ards" on a post about the Police issuing a dispersal order to try and prevent protests from becoming violent.
It also included emojis of an ethnic minority person and a gun.
His lawyer said Billy had made the comment as part of an online Facebook conversation with a family member.
The judge found him guilty of encouraging violence and imposed the sentence to "discourage the kind of violent behavior that such messages encouraged."
Judge Temperley:
"It may be right that the starting point [sentence] is a community order for this offense, but I am afraid this has to be viewed within the context of the current civil unrest up and down the country."
Inciting or threatening violence is a crime in every country. That's not ridiculous.
Free speech doesn't give you a right to threaten others with guns.
No apparently it does if you think that immigration is a problem and people should be allowed to have weaponised stupidity and ignorance aimed at them to incite literal riots.
"Nobody supports riots" allegedly. Yet here we are...
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
I think the BBC is trying, not always successfully, to produce the best programming across the board given the budget it has available. It will always be outbid for showing the most popular football games, so it can try to compensate by having the best commentary. I think Lineker's salary can easily be justified on that basis.
Huw Edwards, even disregarding his recently discovered criminality, not so much.
It does not need "the best", especially when it is funded by law and not by subscribers or advertising.
I suspect most people who watch Match of the Day do so because they want to watch the football highlights, not specifically Lineker. And if it is specifically Lineker, and not a public broadcasting of the football highlights, then fund that with advertising or subscribers.
The market rate is the rate at which supply and demand are in equilibrium, not the rate demanded by "the best". If someone else will do it cheaper, and they have the requisite skills (or can be trained to get them), that's the market rate.
The BBC will be looking at their programming in the round where football is seen as an important piece. They can't afford to show full games because they are always outbid so Match of the Day is all they have got. People switch into that programme because of Lineker. Dedicating 0.02% of their budget to Lineker so they can stay in the football broadcasting space is money well spent for the BBC.
LOL, they have no way of actually getting their money back, and the ridiculous six-figure pension for life isn’t going anywhere either.
There do seem to be conflicting accounts from the top of the BBC about whether Huw Edwards had kept them in the picture. £200,000 is not even a rounding error in the BBC's accounts so this looks like cheap theatre to keep Lisa Nandy and the tabloids at bay.
I'm not sure I approve of the Stalinist removal of Gary Glitter, Stuart Hall, Huw Edwards etc. from historical content, but the BBC not only paying Edwards after he had been charged and giving him a 40 grand annual pay rise too is an absurdity. If I was Edwards I'd tell the BBC to do one.
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
The BBC salaries in news and radio always made no sense at all. They should be bringing up young ‘talent’, not keeping the same people for decades and paying them massive salaries. If they want the kudos they can work for the BBC, if they want the money they can work for ITV, C4, or Sky.
BBC salaries make sense because they are in a market for talent. It is funny watching some who claim to be Conservatives, and to be supporters of free markets, jump through hoops to deny this. Worse, I'm not even sure they understand it. If the BBC wants the best, there's a price.
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
If they were in a market for talent then salaries would be 90% lower.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
You're only looking at half the equation. There is also a market for viewers, so the BBC finds itself in a weird semi-competitive position of trying to get people to turn the telly on while being a public broadcaster.
Simply put, I would be more than happy to be CEO of Shell for £100,000, but I'd immediately and catastrophically destroy the business.
Which is why I said "with the requisite skills".
That doesn't mean writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, or incumbent.
Would replacing Gary Lineker with many of the thousands of ex-footballers "destroy" Match of the Day? No, it would not.
Would replacing Huw Edwards with another broadcaster "destroy" the news? No, it does not.
What skills are required to host the news? Put out for that and hire the person who requires the least that has all required talents, that is the market rate.
You make a point. The risk, though, is that the BBC would end up as a kind of bargain basement mediocre service which would only be watched by those who had no choice, ie the poor. There are so many areas like this in our 'money talks' society and it'd be a great shame if TV becomes another one.
Comments
In theory, I can say what I like, when I like, and that free exchange of views amongst free citizens is how it should be. In practice, I fear that would come at considerable risk to my employment or career, and the cost-benefit ratio of that (that potential cost, versus the benefit of making a slightly good point, and contributing to improving a debate) is simply too high for me to risk it.
So, I self-censor and moderate.
That used to be on Brexit and immigration; lately, it's been about being very coy about being a Conservative at all (particularly when a lead equity partner on a community call 2-weeks ago talked about "idiots in blue-suits" with over 300 members of staff on it being forced to listen).
I can only see him withdrawing if Trump offers a great job, and Trump looks set to win
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/olympics/articles/cpw8r1r4ne9o
What the Huw Edwards salary debacle has demonstrated is the BBC are paying, through the ranks talent, far too much. There are some real no marks on £200,000, £300,000, £500,000 salaries simply for reading the news. Another problem is a £450,000 salary wasn't unique to a former National Treasures like Edwards. Utter w**k like Kuenssberg and Fiona Bruce are also earning those figures. In Kuenssberg's case for an hour of airtime a week. Cut them all back to no more than the salary of the PM. If they don't like it they can f*** off to GMB!
In no sense is it "quelling dissent by the law abiding", so far, other than in your collective imaginations.
Paying what a backbench PM earns would be overkill.
Why can't they find someone for median wages willing and able to read from a teleprompter?
Thinking about it, the test for hate crimes versus allowable commentary should be whether there is a direct threat to anyone or whether people might reasonably feel threatened by the action or speech.
Oh shit.
And if it makes a few people think before they post, and that results in less incitement that means the police will have MORe resources into fighting those other crimes, rather than putting everyone available into riot control. Which is what you say you want.
Unless you think the disturbances haven't been even a tiny bit caused by people posting without thinking? Finding it hard to understand the logic of your position.
It was 1992 when the US Secret Service first arrested some for Internet threats against the President. Mouthing off against Clinton on USENET IIRC
The official and legal reaction to an action will always be in proportion to the *result* of an action.
Hence the “make a bomb joke in an airport, got to jail thing”. In the 90s, the PIRA started getting low level helpers to phone in phone bomb threats to airports. Which would shut them down, costing millions.
There was much wailing and appeals to European courts when the little helpers started getting vacations at Club HMG.
So if you stir up a riot via Twatter, they will drop the cost of the riot on you. Whining that “I only typed 20 words” isn’t the point. It’s the end result.
https://x.com/BrianRoemmele/status/1821744904995066070
If ever I get a bit despairing about the world, and, despite my relentless cheeriness, sometimes that happens, then I look at science. Amazing things are happening every day
https://x.com/margaretatwood/status/1821320409146356007?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q
RFK seems fairly cuckoo but even he must have noticed that a lot of people who get into bed with Trump regret it.
https://x.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1821866681704013859
Now, I might think Man City overpay Haaland and that Anthony could score as many goals, but that is a different argument. As it happens, I do not rate Huw Edwards but cannot understand the scorn poured over Fiona Bruce each week. Gary Lineker is head and shoulders above Alan Shearer as a pundit.
ETA In radio it is even easier. Chris Evans was worth more than Terry Wogan because he got more listeners.
https://www.blightymilitaria.com/en-GB/ww2-british-uniform/original-1944-dated-british-army-leather-jerkin---size-2/prod_54541?r=https://www.militariazone.com/uniforms/original-1944-dated-british-army-leather-jerkin---size-2/itm44390
I simply don't believe it
As to radio presenters, serial listener shedder Zoe Ball is on £900,000 grand. Surely there are plenty of better local radio DJs that would bite the BBC's hand off for a gig on R2 for £100k pa.
I don't particularly care for Gary Lineker, and the hatred for Fiona Bruce and Laura Kuenssberg truly baffles me, but just because they make it look easy doesn't mean it is.
So many problems are caused across the public sector with this "no-one should be paid more than the PM" malarkey, and it really holds back both quality of service and delivery of projects and drives a massive demand for consultants and contractors. Which are even more expensive.
Whether we should pay Gary Lineker a market rate or not is quite a separate question to whether we should employ Gary Lineker himself or not.
The market rate is that such that supply and demand are in equilibrium. It is not writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, backed by imprisoning people if they won't make payments even if they don't consume your services.
A free market means that if there are 3 vacancies for say Match of the Day and the most expensive person for the job will only take the job for £500k and the third-cheapest person (with the requisite skills) will only take the job for £30k, then the free market rate is £30k.
Put the job out to tender annually and hire the person (with the requisite skills) with the lowest demand.
They haven't really done anything, which is a possible source of complaint. But I'm a fan of the "do nothing" option if a sensible, simple fix isn't available, so not too fussed so far.
Starmer's response to the riots has been staid but steadfast, as people would expect.
Might be fun to see what a talent show for presenters could turn up.
People have taken part in riots because of the state of the country - not over the killings of three girls in Southport, an incoming Tory peer has claimed.
Craig Mackinlay, the former MP for South Thanet, who lost his arms and legs to sepsis, told Chopper’s Political Podcast on GB News: “This is almost one of those moments where I think a lot of people have said, forget what Southport was actually all about. It actually made people rather annoyed about the state of Britain today.”
Mr Mackinlay said those involved in the violent disorder following the killings of three little girls in Southport are not limited to extremists.
He said that although the demonstrations were organised by the far-Right, “normal people” are attending to voice their dissatisfaction with the state of the country.
Mr Mackinlay added: “If the far-Right are that good at organising things then they’re far better at organising things than any political party or government that I know in the UK. So I actually don’t believe it fully.
“There’s always going to be some nutters, and they should be dealt with very robustly, and they should be in prison where appropriate. I’m fully in favour of all of that. But if you look at some of these rallies that are going on, there are lots of couples on these rallies that you’d expect to go and see in the Dog and Duck on a Friday afternoon. These are normal people.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/09/riots-latest-news-protesters-stay-home/
Simply put, I would be more than happy to be CEO of Shell for £100,000, but I'd immediately and catastrophically destroy the business.
I think it's better to just have decent annual performance appraisals, and be stricter on that.
That doesn't mean writing a blank cheque to the highest bidder, or incumbent.
Would replacing Gary Lineker with many of the thousands of ex-footballers "destroy" Match of the Day? No, it would not.
Would replacing Huw Edwards with another broadcaster "destroy" the news? No, it does not.
What skills are required to host the news? Put out for that and hire the person who requires the least that has all required talents, that is the market rate.
The BBC can't afford market rates to retain talent. Take Susannah Reid. She would be one of the BBC's higher earners on £500,000 if she had stayed ten years ago, but she left and as her stock rose on GMB her salary increased into the millions. Now if ITV believe Susannah Reid brings in advertising revenue they would be mad not to pay her her worth. That doesn't work for the BBC, and besides, much of their "talent" wouldn't bring in extra advertising revenue were it a requirement.
Though if you would like to make it say a 2-3 year contract before it goes out to tender again, I'd have no problem with that.
Paying close to a million pounds is not a market rate, that is not the rate that is required to keep supply and demand in equilibrium.
Personally I'll always have a problem with sports where you need a panel of experts to explain to you who is winning, and why, but the sheer exuberance amongst competitors and spectators alike at events like the skateboarding do make you want to see them included, even if they have little more claim to being a sport than ballet or morris dancing.
Are you sure that story about the secret service is true, or is it a fable based on it happening somewhere, once?
So we are subsidising the importation of wood to burn. If it was from local forests, and therefore added to energy security, it would be one thing. But paying subsidies to import wood from Georgia and Alabama on big bulk cargo ships seems wasteful to me, especially as the energy density of wood chips is pretty low: you might as well just burn the oil that powers the ship.
Go and join the Cirque du Solail, it’s great to watch, but it’s not an Olympic sport.
Huw Edwards, even disregarding his recently discovered criminality, not so much.
I suspect most people who watch Match of the Day do so because they want to watch the football highlights, not specifically Lineker. And if it is specifically Lineker, and not a public broadcasting of the football highlights, then fund that with advertising or subscribers.
The market rate is the rate at which supply and demand are in equilibrium, not the rate demanded by "the best". If someone else will do it cheaper, and they have the requisite skills (or can be trained to get them), that's the market rate.
Zoe Ball = no commercial broadcaster is going to pay her anything like what the BBC does.
Defining that could take PB weeks. I don't even know what I think yet.
2) The tower is great. Watch out for falling stuff
3) No dim-dims. You know you shouldn't.
Leon however is a rightwinger who probably regrets he didn't vote for Reform rather than Starmer but looks likely to switch back to the Tories if they elect Jenrick as leader
We can see how harmful it is to spread malicious shit on social media. Serious crimes can be incited by it and literal crimes are being committed by the people propagating it.
So why is Leon foaming on about some kind of Big Brother reaction from the government? We *need* laws to be upheld, and we should require public figures like Farage and Braverman to be held to account for what they have done.
🇬🇧MAN JAILED IN UK FOR COMMENTING ON FACEBOOK POST ABOUT RIOTS
31-year-old Billy Thompson was sent to prison for 12 weeks after he replied "Filthy ba**ards" on a post about the Police issuing a dispersal order to try and prevent protests from becoming violent.
It also included emojis of an ethnic minority person and a gun.
His lawyer said Billy had made the comment as part of an online Facebook conversation with a family member.
The judge found him guilty of encouraging violence and imposed the sentence to "discourage the kind of violent behavior that such messages encouraged."
Judge Temperley:
"It may be right that the starting point [sentence] is a community order for this offense, but I am afraid this has to be viewed within the context of the current civil unrest up and down the country."
Source: NW Evening Mail
https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/1821796789327982937
My view on housing is I want liberalism. Get the government to back off, cut red tape, and let the market solve the problems.
How is that anything other than right wing liberalism?
The problem is you and Sunak and May and other Conservatives want rightwing illiberalism.
I would also like there to be a many more incinerators - burning rubbish (safely) seems sensible to me. And again, our civilised continental neighbours do it a lot more than us.
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1988/27/section/1
Inciting or threatening violence is a crime in every country. That's not ridiculous.
Free speech doesn't give you a right to threaten others with guns.
He'd be a Trump scale loon, except he's on 5% in the polls.
Also, I nearly broke a rib reading this.
I fear for @ydoethur 's irony and bullshit meters.
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/4818724-joe-rogan-supports-rfk-jr-over-trump-harris/
...Podcaster Joe Rogan on Thursday threw his weight behind independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over either of the major party candidates, making the online influencer known for dabbling in conspiracies one of Kennedy’s most notable endorsements.
Rogan said on his video podcast “The Joe Rogan Experience” that he views both Democrats and Republicans as perverting democratic norms.
“That’s just what they do. That’s politics. They do it on the left, they do it on the right,” Rogan said. “They gaslight you, they manipulate you, they promote narratives, and the only one who is not doing that is Robert F. Kennedy Jr.”..
"Nobody supports riots" allegedly. Yet here we are...