And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
Yes, fine, but how would you reduce the deficit and borrowing?
I imagine we'll hear the same old mantras of "supply side reform", "50% haircut for public sector pensions", "tax cuts and spending cuts" from the usual suspects but was any of that on offer last July? Is any of that on offer now? You won't hear it from Labour, Reform, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats or Greens - is there some other political movement advocating a return to a blanced budget? How would they achieve it?
"Putting your hands over your ears and humming", as you put it, isn't fair. Plenty of people see the problem but, as with the "small boats", no one has come up with an easy, popular and cheap solution - if there were one, we'd have done it by now.
So it comes back to who has to feel the pain - which group can you demonise enough so everyone will say "yeah, let them suffer" - public sector workers, pensioners, others on welfare, the wealthy, property owners, Scottish lawyers, children - where would you like to start?
No, the usual whingeing every month about the borrowing numbers belies the fact of how we got here and the fact previous Governments allowed us to reach this point. I know what I would do but when I've proposed it, I've had a barrage of abuse from those who already feel "overtaxed" and complain "they" can't pay any more but someone else could and should.
It is simple, income tax/vat rises , end the gold plated public service pensions, 10% reduction in all benefits and then frozen for at least 5 years. No pay rises for public service unless self funding. Easy peasy just needs some bollocks.
'gold plated' is one of those political phrases that people always put in front of public sector pensions without thinking about it.
Yes, it's one of the stages of demonising groups we often see.
Spread the notion public sector workers are all living on huge pensions in luxury and getting regular increases (as well as other freebies) and you can sell notions of "haircuts" quite easily.
The truth is much more complex. We all know public sector pensions come in a variety of shapes and sizes and benefits and contributions but that complicates the issue and muddies the waters which makes it more difficult.
What it masks is the complete and utter failure of the whole area of mortgage and pensions in the private sector. Take out an investment in the stock market - it'll pay your mortgage and your pension - no. Millions were duped into setting up investment plans which returned a fraction of what was needed.
If you want a vast area of untapped wealth, go after the financial sector and the City - how about some nice windfall taxes or a transaction tax on stock market investments? It's the same as "gold plated" public sector pensions, isn't it?
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
Rejoining the EU is clearly the best way to improve the public finances. There's the cost of the referendum to start with. That'll give the economy a significant boost, plus the politicians devoting their time to the campaign.
Good morning, everyone.
I presume you are being sarcastic? Rejoining would cost us something like £40bn a year. Money we simply don't have.
I fear you have been wooshed. The points were that the cost of running the referendum would itself add to GDP (remember all economic statistics are rubbish) and it would divert politicians from any other harmful activity.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Good morning everyone - and thank-you for the interesting header, @TSE .
Fascinating polling - but Yougov are being a little bit mischievous imo asking about extreme positions (Rejoin !) and not putting some more emphasis on adopting a significantly closer position (EFTA / Norway Plus or whatever).
Reading the tables, there seems to be a bit of a divide emerging between Tories and RefUKs - on the Q whether Brexit has been "more of a success" or "more of a failure", and who is responsible.
More than half of 2024 RefUK voters blame Keir Starmer (53%) and the Labour Party (59%) for Brexit being "more of a failure". I'm not sure how that works when they have been in power for under a year nearly a decade later. But it does highlight the low information nature of even the part of the Reform base who are subbed in to Yougov. No wonder Farage is backing his politics of pointing at "anything over there", and blaming it.
The Conservative 2024 Voter equivalent numbers on the same question are 38% blaming Keir Starmer and 50% blaming the Labour Party. And 84%+ of 2024 Conservative Voters think that the Conservative Party is responsible or very responsible for Brexit being more of a failure than a success is an interesting one.
Reform supporters are more dogmatic and persistent in their embrace of symbolic positions that are a lacking in basis ("Keir Starmer !!"), but is a smidge of self-reflection sinking in amongst the Tories?
As for Brexit, I'm tempted to take the Chou-en-Lai approach to the French Revolution though that has apparently, like so many good apocrypha, been debunked.
It's fascinating to see those desperately defending our decision to leave the European Union to the point it's become totemic, a symbol of the triumph of democracy, literally, the people's will.
Cards on the table, I voted to leave as well. Why? Simply because our relationship, as it had become, with the EU, was unsustainable for both sides. We were half hearted, obstructive, rebate-obsessed, whingeing, complaining members standing often on the sidelines, often in a minority of one. They were implacable in their desire for greater political and financial integration.
Whether Cameron generally believed after his unexpected (and I suspect unwanted) 2015 election win (aided and abetted by Nick Clegg, Ed Miliband and Alex Salmond), he could persuade the EU to accept a form of semi-detached membership for the UK I don't know, but the fact it came down to an IN/OUT vote rather than a ratification of a redefined membership is as much down to the EU leaders at the time as it was Cameron's negotiation skills.
Nine years on and for most people most of the time nothing has changed - we all have nice new passports and those who wanted to retire to Spain and Portugal now have a much harder though not impossible task but generally the EU is as invisible now we are out of it as we were when we were in it.
That's perhaps the tragedy and the irony - as OGH repeatedly showed, it didn't really matter to most people but it was whipped into a symbolic issue of sovereignty and identity by a well-organised campaign to which those seeking to defend the status quo had no real response. It became in the end a cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process yet has leaving the EU resolved that frustration and anger?
Did that cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process get heeded? We have a current PM who tried all the tricks he could not to implement the way that cry of frustration was expressed. Because he knew better than the voters.
Now it looks like he will be replaced by the guy who ran THOSE posters in the Brexit campaign. Why? Because he has filled that void, coming up with policies that Starmer tries to look like he wants to implement - but just seeming ever more desperate to be relevent.
No, that's a trite response.
You can put what has happened since July last year at Starmer's door but what about the eight years between the Referendum and that election when the Conservatives were in Government?
What did the Conservatives do to deal with the frustration and anger? They promised "levelling up" - what happened? Nothing. They borrowed huge amounts leaving the current and future Governments with a legacy of debt and deficit and what did they achieve? Nothing.
Unless and until the Conservative Party and its supporters start admitting to their complicity in the current state of the country rather than simply blaming Starmer and Reeves, they won't get a hearing and they won't deserve to. Rishi Sunak's mea culpa on the morning of July 5th is the only significant admission of failure and acceptance of responsibility I've heard from any leading Conservative.
On levelling up, what happened was all the money got spent on Covid.
Then money we didn't have got spent on subsidising fuel bills as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Brexit has happened and a lot has changed but it seems rejoining is not a priority by 44% to 37%
I voted remain, but just cannot see a path to rejoin that is likely and would the EU even want us back and on what terms
In today's uncertain world there are many more important causes, though a closer relationship with the EU is sensible
As far as blaming the conservatives, it seems that an even more anti EU party is dominating the political agenda
I would just gently say all the parties contributed to the present position as they fought a battle from an extreme Brexit to overturning the result and remain when they should have agreed together a Norway style arrangement
Rubbish. Stop gaslighting.
Brexit rests entirely on the shoulders of the Conservative Party, not least on the ample shoulders of former Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
Will joining the EU magically make our politicians tier one operators? Is it going to fix our economy, solve wealth inequality, make our energy cheaper and make us able to build quality infrastructure to a deadline and a budget? Will it save the NHS? Will it make our lives significantly better? If not, what's the point?
A fully fuelled Starship blowing up would be very approximately equivalent to a 5kt nuke.
The Size of the Starship fireball is crazy, if you consider this is like 5% of the methane load that a full stack would have. The sheer amount of propellant on this vehicle sometimes is overwhelming. https://x.com/BCCarCounters/status/1935657790502002694
As for Brexit, I'm tempted to take the Chou-en-Lai approach to the French Revolution though that has apparently, like so many good apocrypha, been debunked.
It's fascinating to see those desperately defending our decision to leave the European Union to the point it's become totemic, a symbol of the triumph of democracy, literally, the people's will.
Cards on the table, I voted to leave as well. Why? Simply because our relationship, as it had become, with the EU, was unsustainable for both sides. We were half hearted, obstructive, rebate-obsessed, whingeing, complaining members standing often on the sidelines, often in a minority of one. They were implacable in their desire for greater political and financial integration.
Whether Cameron generally believed after his unexpected (and I suspect unwanted) 2015 election win (aided and abetted by Nick Clegg, Ed Miliband and Alex Salmond), he could persuade the EU to accept a form of semi-detached membership for the UK I don't know, but the fact it came down to an IN/OUT vote rather than a ratification of a redefined membership is as much down to the EU leaders at the time as it was Cameron's negotiation skills.
Nine years on and for most people most of the time nothing has changed - we all have nice new passports and those who wanted to retire to Spain and Portugal now have a much harder though not impossible task but generally the EU is as invisible now we are out of it as we were when we were in it.
That's perhaps the tragedy and the irony - as OGH repeatedly showed, it didn't really matter to most people but it was whipped into a symbolic issue of sovereignty and identity by a well-organised campaign to which those seeking to defend the status quo had no real response. It became in the end a cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process yet has leaving the EU resolved that frustration and anger?
Did that cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process get heeded? We have a current PM who tried all the tricks he could not to implement the way that cry of frustration was expressed. Because he knew better than the voters.
Now it looks like he will be replaced by the guy who ran THOSE posters in the Brexit campaign. Why? Because he has filled that void, coming up with policies that Starmer tries to look like he wants to implement - but just seeming ever more desperate to be relevent.
No, that's a trite response.
You can put what has happened since July last year at Starmer's door but what about the eight years between the Referendum and that election when the Conservatives were in Government?
What did the Conservatives do to deal with the frustration and anger? They promised "levelling up" - what happened? Nothing. They borrowed huge amounts leaving the current and future Governments with a legacy of debt and deficit and what did they achieve? Nothing.
Unless and until the Conservative Party and its supporters start admitting to their complicity in the current state of the country rather than simply blaming Starmer and Reeves, they won't get a hearing and they won't deserve to. Rishi Sunak's mea culpa on the morning of July 5th is the only significant admission of failure and acceptance of responsibility I've heard from any leading Conservative.
On levelling up, what happened was all the money got spent on Covid.
Then money we didn't have got spent on subsidising fuel bills as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Simply put, Brexit got fucked by "events".
On levelling up, what happened was its main advocate was sacked for taking the pee out of Princess Nut Nut, then Rishi took the up north money and spent it down south.
Blaming Brexit - nobody can say in detail for what precisely - is just an aspect of the country is broken meme which is dominating most of the western world.
Rejoin the EU and within a year two thirds of people would be blaming that for the state of the country.
With some justification as taxes rise and the immigration numbers soared.
"...and the immigration numbers soared"
Um, how can I put this...
The issue is would immigration have been higher if the UK had still been in the EU.
The answer is Yes.
And would immigration be higher if the UK re-joined the EU.
As for Brexit, I'm tempted to take the Chou-en-Lai approach to the French Revolution though that has apparently, like so many good apocrypha, been debunked.
It's fascinating to see those desperately defending our decision to leave the European Union to the point it's become totemic, a symbol of the triumph of democracy, literally, the people's will.
Cards on the table, I voted to leave as well. Why? Simply because our relationship, as it had become, with the EU, was unsustainable for both sides. We were half hearted, obstructive, rebate-obsessed, whingeing, complaining members standing often on the sidelines, often in a minority of one. They were implacable in their desire for greater political and financial integration.
Whether Cameron generally believed after his unexpected (and I suspect unwanted) 2015 election win (aided and abetted by Nick Clegg, Ed Miliband and Alex Salmond), he could persuade the EU to accept a form of semi-detached membership for the UK I don't know, but the fact it came down to an IN/OUT vote rather than a ratification of a redefined membership is as much down to the EU leaders at the time as it was Cameron's negotiation skills.
Nine years on and for most people most of the time nothing has changed - we all have nice new passports and those who wanted to retire to Spain and Portugal now have a much harder though not impossible task but generally the EU is as invisible now we are out of it as we were when we were in it.
That's perhaps the tragedy and the irony - as OGH repeatedly showed, it didn't really matter to most people but it was whipped into a symbolic issue of sovereignty and identity by a well-organised campaign to which those seeking to defend the status quo had no real response. It became in the end a cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process yet has leaving the EU resolved that frustration and anger?
Did that cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process get heeded? We have a current PM who tried all the tricks he could not to implement the way that cry of frustration was expressed. Because he knew better than the voters.
Now it looks like he will be replaced by the guy who ran THOSE posters in the Brexit campaign. Why? Because he has filled that void, coming up with policies that Starmer tries to look like he wants to implement - but just seeming ever more desperate to be relevent.
No, that's a trite response.
You can put what has happened since July last year at Starmer's door but what about the eight years between the Referendum and that election when the Conservatives were in Government?
What did the Conservatives do to deal with the frustration and anger? They promised "levelling up" - what happened? Nothing. They borrowed huge amounts leaving the current and future Governments with a legacy of debt and deficit and what did they achieve? Nothing.
Unless and until the Conservative Party and its supporters start admitting to their complicity in the current state of the country rather than simply blaming Starmer and Reeves, they won't get a hearing and they won't deserve to. Rishi Sunak's mea culpa on the morning of July 5th is the only significant admission of failure and acceptance of responsibility I've heard from any leading Conservative.
On levelling up, what happened was all the money got spent on Covid.
Then money we didn't have got spent on subsidising fuel bills as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Simply put, Brexit got fucked by "events".
Fair enough but the ramifications of those "events" reverberate now so it's unfair then to blame Starmer and Reeves as they are as much victims of these "events" as were Sunak and Hunt?
As for Brexit, I'm tempted to take the Chou-en-Lai approach to the French Revolution though that has apparently, like so many good apocrypha, been debunked.
It's fascinating to see those desperately defending our decision to leave the European Union to the point it's become totemic, a symbol of the triumph of democracy, literally, the people's will.
Cards on the table, I voted to leave as well. Why? Simply because our relationship, as it had become, with the EU, was unsustainable for both sides. We were half hearted, obstructive, rebate-obsessed, whingeing, complaining members standing often on the sidelines, often in a minority of one. They were implacable in their desire for greater political and financial integration.
Whether Cameron generally believed after his unexpected (and I suspect unwanted) 2015 election win (aided and abetted by Nick Clegg, Ed Miliband and Alex Salmond), he could persuade the EU to accept a form of semi-detached membership for the UK I don't know, but the fact it came down to an IN/OUT vote rather than a ratification of a redefined membership is as much down to the EU leaders at the time as it was Cameron's negotiation skills.
Nine years on and for most people most of the time nothing has changed - we all have nice new passports and those who wanted to retire to Spain and Portugal now have a much harder though not impossible task but generally the EU is as invisible now we are out of it as we were when we were in it.
That's perhaps the tragedy and the irony - as OGH repeatedly showed, it didn't really matter to most people but it was whipped into a symbolic issue of sovereignty and identity by a well-organised campaign to which those seeking to defend the status quo had no real response. It became in the end a cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process yet has leaving the EU resolved that frustration and anger?
Did that cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process get heeded? We have a current PM who tried all the tricks he could not to implement the way that cry of frustration was expressed. Because he knew better than the voters.
Now it looks like he will be replaced by the guy who ran THOSE posters in the Brexit campaign. Why? Because he has filled that void, coming up with policies that Starmer tries to look like he wants to implement - but just seeming ever more desperate to be relevent.
No, that's a trite response.
You can put what has happened since July last year at Starmer's door but what about the eight years between the Referendum and that election when the Conservatives were in Government?
What did the Conservatives do to deal with the frustration and anger? They promised "levelling up" - what happened? Nothing. They borrowed huge amounts leaving the current and future Governments with a legacy of debt and deficit and what did they achieve? Nothing.
Unless and until the Conservative Party and its supporters start admitting to their complicity in the current state of the country rather than simply blaming Starmer and Reeves, they won't get a hearing and they won't deserve to. Rishi Sunak's mea culpa on the morning of July 5th is the only significant admission of failure and acceptance of responsibility I've heard from any leading Conservative.
On levelling up, what happened was all the money got spent on Covid.
Then money we didn't have got spent on subsidising fuel bills as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Simply put, Brexit got fucked by "events".
No it didn't. Much like Blair's war with Iraq there was no plan after the victory. Perhaps the most glaring of errors was no one tasked with implementing Brexit knew what it really meant.
As for Brexit, I'm tempted to take the Chou-en-Lai approach to the French Revolution though that has apparently, like so many good apocrypha, been debunked.
It's fascinating to see those desperately defending our decision to leave the European Union to the point it's become totemic, a symbol of the triumph of democracy, literally, the people's will.
Cards on the table, I voted to leave as well. Why? Simply because our relationship, as it had become, with the EU, was unsustainable for both sides. We were half hearted, obstructive, rebate-obsessed, whingeing, complaining members standing often on the sidelines, often in a minority of one. They were implacable in their desire for greater political and financial integration.
Whether Cameron generally believed after his unexpected (and I suspect unwanted) 2015 election win (aided and abetted by Nick Clegg, Ed Miliband and Alex Salmond), he could persuade the EU to accept a form of semi-detached membership for the UK I don't know, but the fact it came down to an IN/OUT vote rather than a ratification of a redefined membership is as much down to the EU leaders at the time as it was Cameron's negotiation skills.
Nine years on and for most people most of the time nothing has changed - we all have nice new passports and those who wanted to retire to Spain and Portugal now have a much harder though not impossible task but generally the EU is as invisible now we are out of it as we were when we were in it.
That's perhaps the tragedy and the irony - as OGH repeatedly showed, it didn't really matter to most people but it was whipped into a symbolic issue of sovereignty and identity by a well-organised campaign to which those seeking to defend the status quo had no real response. It became in the end a cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process yet has leaving the EU resolved that frustration and anger?
‘We were half hearted, obstructive, rebate-obsessed, whingeing, complaining’
Wrong tense.
Does anybody think the EU would remotely have any interest in engaging with the UK on rejoining talks when it looks like it is about to elect Farage? Inside the tent pissing in?
It would be like a publican inviting back the drunken hooligan who just smashed up his pub. Why upset the regulars for the sake of a big spending heavy drinker who can't hold his beer.
That is not necessarily analogous of Sir Nige.
There's no apology to the EU coming from the UK over our temerity to want to leave.
Nor will there ever be whilst Reform is a political force in the land.
Without that apology to Brussels, they will just smile politely at talk of rejoin - and think to themselvrs "Fuck off. We don't need this British psychodrama every few years..."
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
Yes, fine, but how would you reduce the deficit and borrowing?
I imagine we'll hear the same old mantras of "supply side reform", "50% haircut for public sector pensions", "tax cuts and spending cuts" from the usual suspects but was any of that on offer last July? Is any of that on offer now? You won't hear it from Labour, Reform, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats or Greens - is there some other political movement advocating a return to a blanced budget? How would they achieve it?
"Putting your hands over your ears and humming", as you put it, isn't fair. Plenty of people see the problem but, as with the "small boats", no one has come up with an easy, popular and cheap solution - if there were one, we'd have done it by now.
So it comes back to who has to feel the pain - which group can you demonise enough so everyone will say "yeah, let them suffer" - public sector workers, pensioners, others on welfare, the wealthy, property owners, Scottish lawyers, children - where would you like to start?
No, the usual whingeing every month about the borrowing numbers belies the fact of how we got here and the fact previous Governments allowed us to reach this point. I know what I would do but when I've proposed it, I've had a barrage of abuse from those who already feel "overtaxed" and complain "they" can't pay any more but someone else could and should.
It is simple, income tax/vat rises , end the gold plated public service pensions, 10% reduction in all benefits and then frozen for at least 5 years. No pay rises for public service unless self funding. Easy peasy just needs some bollocks.
'gold plated' is one of those political phrases that people always put in front of public sector pensions without thinking about it.
Yes, it's one of the stages of demonising groups we often see.
Spread the notion public sector workers are all living on huge pensions in luxury and getting regular increases (as well as other freebies) and you can sell notions of "haircuts" quite easily.
The truth is much more complex. We all know public sector pensions come in a variety of shapes and sizes and benefits and contributions but that complicates the issue and muddies the waters which makes it more difficult.
What it masks is the complete and utter failure of the whole area of mortgage and pensions in the private sector. Take out an investment in the stock market - it'll pay your mortgage and your pension - no. Millions were duped into setting up investment plans which returned a fraction of what was needed.
If you want a vast area of untapped wealth, go after the financial sector and the City - how about some nice windfall taxes or a transaction tax on stock market investments? It's the same as "gold plated" public sector pensions, isn't it?
Good morning everyone - and thank-you for the interesting header, @TSE .
Fascinating polling - but Yougov are being a little bit mischievous imo asking about extreme positions (Rejoin !) and not putting some more emphasis on adopting a significantly closer position (EFTA / Norway Plus or whatever).
Reading the tables, there seems to be a bit of a divide emerging between Tories and RefUKs - on the Q whether Brexit has been "more of a success" or "more of a failure", and who is responsible.
More than half of 2024 RefUK voters blame Keir Starmer (53%) and the Labour Party (59%) for Brexit being "more of a failure". I'm not sure how that works when they have been in power for under a year nearly a decade later. But it does highlight the low information nature of even the part of the Reform base who are subbed in to Yougov. No wonder Farage is backing his politics of pointing at "anything over there", and blaming it.
The Conservative 2024 Voter equivalent numbers on the same question are 38% blaming Keir Starmer and 50% blaming the Labour Party. And 84%+ of 2024 Conservative Voters think that the Conservative Party is responsible or very responsible for Brexit being more of a failure than a success is an interesting one.
Reform supporters are more dogmatic and persistent in their embrace of symbolic positions that are a lacking in basis ("Keir Starmer !!"), but is a smidge of self-reflection sinking in amongst the Tories?
As you say there are many low-information respondents, and that is one reason YouGov should not follow your suggestion and poll on EFTA or Norway Plus. The voter on the Clapham omnibus has no idea what these terms even mean, let alone how they might work out for Britain.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
Yes, fine, but how would you reduce the deficit and borrowing?
I imagine we'll hear the same old mantras of "supply side reform", "50% haircut for public sector pensions", "tax cuts and spending cuts" from the usual suspects but was any of that on offer last July? Is any of that on offer now? You won't hear it from Labour, Reform, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats or Greens - is there some other political movement advocating a return to a blanced budget? How would they achieve it?
"Putting your hands over your ears and humming", as you put it, isn't fair. Plenty of people see the problem but, as with the "small boats", no one has come up with an easy, popular and cheap solution - if there were one, we'd have done it by now.
So it comes back to who has to feel the pain - which group can you demonise enough so everyone will say "yeah, let them suffer" - public sector workers, pensioners, others on welfare, the wealthy, property owners, Scottish lawyers, children - where would you like to start?
No, the usual whingeing every month about the borrowing numbers belies the fact of how we got here and the fact previous Governments allowed us to reach this point. I know what I would do but when I've proposed it, I've had a barrage of abuse from those who already feel "overtaxed" and complain "they" can't pay any more but someone else could and should.
It is simple, income tax/vat rises , end the gold plated public service pensions, 10% reduction in all benefits and then frozen for at least 5 years. No pay rises for public service unless self funding. Easy peasy just needs some bollocks.
'gold plated' is one of those political phrases that people always put in front of public sector pensions without thinking about it.
Yes, it's one of the stages of demonising groups we often see.
Spread the notion public sector workers are all living on huge pensions in luxury and getting regular increases (as well as other freebies) and you can sell notions of "haircuts" quite easily.
The truth is much more complex. We all know public sector pensions come in a variety of shapes and sizes and benefits and contributions but that complicates the issue and muddies the waters which makes it more difficult.
What it masks is the complete and utter failure of the whole area of mortgage and pensions in the private sector. Take out an investment in the stock market - it'll pay your mortgage and your pension - no. Millions were duped into setting up investment plans which returned a fraction of what was needed.
If you want a vast area of untapped wealth, go after the financial sector and the City - how about some nice windfall taxes or a transaction tax on stock market investments? It's the same as "gold plated" public sector pensions, isn't it?
People need to be aiming for a DC pension pot of half a million.
Which is why any musings about getting rid of salary sacrifice and reducing the tax free limits on DC pensions are so dangerous.
Will joining the EU magically make our politicians tier one operators? Is it going to fix our economy, solve wealth inequality, make our energy cheaper and make us able to build quality infrastructure to a deadline and a budget? Will it save the NHS? Will it make our lives significantly better? If not, what's the point?
That demand for "silver bullet" solutions rather than accepting small, incremental improvements is the problem. The UK electorate fall for the huckster promising a magical solution time after time, it's the reason for Brexit, never completed nuclear power stations rather than well-insulated houses, prescription pills rather than healthy lifestyles, crime rather than sure start...
Sadly true. Russian attacks regularly transit (for example) Romanian airspace, without hindrance.
NATO is the sort of self defense organization that would rather mass migrate a thousand airplanes across the atlantic ocean in a giant air refueling conga line to shoot down a single shahed in Jordan rather than shoot down the shahed in its own air space. https://x.com/AndrewPerpetua/status/1935841909811167729
On the question of how to deal with Russian aircraft in their airspace, the Turks got it right.
If I have my history right, NATO took a more front-foot stance in the Cold War, that has faded from popular memory. It quietened down from about 1970.
There's a lot to be said for recovering part of that stance, now that the temperature has hotted up again.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
Yes, fine, but how would you reduce the deficit and borrowing?
I imagine we'll hear the same old mantras of "supply side reform", "50% haircut for public sector pensions", "tax cuts and spending cuts" from the usual suspects but was any of that on offer last July? Is any of that on offer now? You won't hear it from Labour, Reform, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats or Greens - is there some other political movement advocating a return to a blanced budget? How would they achieve it?
"Putting your hands over your ears and humming", as you put it, isn't fair. Plenty of people see the problem but, as with the "small boats", no one has come up with an easy, popular and cheap solution - if there were one, we'd have done it by now.
So it comes back to who has to feel the pain - which group can you demonise enough so everyone will say "yeah, let them suffer" - public sector workers, pensioners, others on welfare, the wealthy, property owners, Scottish lawyers, children - where would you like to start?
No, the usual whingeing every month about the borrowing numbers belies the fact of how we got here and the fact previous Governments allowed us to reach this point. I know what I would do but when I've proposed it, I've had a barrage of abuse from those who already feel "overtaxed" and complain "they" can't pay any more but someone else could and should.
It is simple, income tax/vat rises , end the gold plated public service pensions, 10% reduction in all benefits and then frozen for at least 5 years. No pay rises for public service unless self funding. Easy peasy just needs some bollocks.
'gold plated' is one of those political phrases that people always put in front of public sector pensions without thinking about it.
I think the pensions for many public sector workers are not gold plated [ I know my daughter's isn’t] but it cannot be denied that in the upper earning groups it is a fair criticism
Yes I agree to an extent (although the amount that actually costs is tiny given the very small numbers of the upper earning groups) but people could talk about gold plated pensions for senior civil servants without having a go at all of the call centre workers, nurses, police workers etc who actually make up most of the public sector.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Good morning everyone - and thank-you for the interesting header, @TSE .
Fascinating polling - but Yougov are being a little bit mischievous imo asking about extreme positions (Rejoin !) and not putting some more emphasis on adopting a significantly closer position (EFTA / Norway Plus or whatever).
Reading the tables, there seems to be a bit of a divide emerging between Tories and RefUKs - on the Q whether Brexit has been "more of a success" or "more of a failure", and who is responsible.
More than half of 2024 RefUK voters blame Keir Starmer (53%) and the Labour Party (59%) for Brexit being "more of a failure". I'm not sure how that works when they have been in power for under a year nearly a decade later. But it does highlight the low information nature of even the part of the Reform base who are subbed in to Yougov. No wonder Farage is backing his politics of pointing at "anything over there", and blaming it.
The Conservative 2024 Voter equivalent numbers on the same question are 38% blaming Keir Starmer and 50% blaming the Labour Party. And 84%+ of 2024 Conservative Voters think that the Conservative Party is responsible or very responsible for Brexit being more of a failure than a success is an interesting one.
Reform supporters are more dogmatic and persistent in their embrace of symbolic positions that are a lacking in basis ("Keir Starmer !!"), but is a smidge of self-reflection sinking in amongst the Tories?
As you say there are many low-information respondents, and that is one reason YouGov should not follow your suggestion and poll on EFTA or Norway Plus. The voter on the Clapham omnibus has no idea what these terms even mean, let alone how they might work out for Britain.
Yes - however they could poll more around terms which are less black and white, but not specific technicalities.
There's a bit of it in the questions asked, but imo not enough.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
Yes, fine, but how would you reduce the deficit and borrowing?
I imagine we'll hear the same old mantras of "supply side reform", "50% haircut for public sector pensions", "tax cuts and spending cuts" from the usual suspects but was any of that on offer last July? Is any of that on offer now? You won't hear it from Labour, Reform, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats or Greens - is there some other political movement advocating a return to a blanced budget? How would they achieve it?
"Putting your hands over your ears and humming", as you put it, isn't fair. Plenty of people see the problem but, as with the "small boats", no one has come up with an easy, popular and cheap solution - if there were one, we'd have done it by now.
So it comes back to who has to feel the pain - which group can you demonise enough so everyone will say "yeah, let them suffer" - public sector workers, pensioners, others on welfare, the wealthy, property owners, Scottish lawyers, children - where would you like to start?
No, the usual whingeing every month about the borrowing numbers belies the fact of how we got here and the fact previous Governments allowed us to reach this point. I know what I would do but when I've proposed it, I've had a barrage of abuse from those who already feel "overtaxed" and complain "they" can't pay any more but someone else could and should.
It is simple, income tax/vat rises , end the gold plated public service pensions, 10% reduction in all benefits and then frozen for at least 5 years. No pay rises for public service unless self funding. Easy peasy just needs some bollocks.
'gold plated' is one of those political phrases that people always put in front of public sector pensions without thinking about it.
Yes, it's one of the stages of demonising groups we often see.
Spread the notion public sector workers are all living on huge pensions in luxury and getting regular increases (as well as other freebies) and you can sell notions of "haircuts" quite easily.
The truth is much more complex. We all know public sector pensions come in a variety of shapes and sizes and benefits and contributions but that complicates the issue and muddies the waters which makes it more difficult.
What it masks is the complete and utter failure of the whole area of mortgage and pensions in the private sector. Take out an investment in the stock market - it'll pay your mortgage and your pension - no. Millions were duped into setting up investment plans which returned a fraction of what was needed.
If you want a vast area of untapped wealth, go after the financial sector and the City - how about some nice windfall taxes or a transaction tax on stock market investments? It's the same as "gold plated" public sector pensions, isn't it?
Absolutely. It's demonising those who are prevented from publicly answering back which makes it especially insidious. Try telling someone who works in a call centre in the DWP or HMRC for not much more than the living wage that their pension is going to allow them to retire in luxury.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
Yes, fine, but how would you reduce the deficit and borrowing?
I imagine we'll hear the same old mantras of "supply side reform", "50% haircut for public sector pensions", "tax cuts and spending cuts" from the usual suspects but was any of that on offer last July? Is any of that on offer now? You won't hear it from Labour, Reform, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats or Greens - is there some other political movement advocating a return to a blanced budget? How would they achieve it?
"Putting your hands over your ears and humming", as you put it, isn't fair. Plenty of people see the problem but, as with the "small boats", no one has come up with an easy, popular and cheap solution - if there were one, we'd have done it by now.
So it comes back to who has to feel the pain - which group can you demonise enough so everyone will say "yeah, let them suffer" - public sector workers, pensioners, others on welfare, the wealthy, property owners, Scottish lawyers, children - where would you like to start?
No, the usual whingeing every month about the borrowing numbers belies the fact of how we got here and the fact previous Governments allowed us to reach this point. I know what I would do but when I've proposed it, I've had a barrage of abuse from those who already feel "overtaxed" and complain "they" can't pay any more but someone else could and should.
It is simple, income tax/vat rises , end the gold plated public service pensions, 10% reduction in all benefits and then frozen for at least 5 years. No pay rises for public service unless self funding. Easy peasy just needs some bollocks.
None of that addresses the vast costs of doing anything. The problem isn't public sector pensions, its a public sector that spends the GDP of other countries administering itself.
Go after pensions if you like, but the cut that is needed are the false market structures. We need more doctors and teachers, not more administrators, contracts and competing administrative units.
We have to have the administrators to deal with all the paperwork, even if it is online. In fact online means more of them because it's so much easier to make changes people can't keep up with current requirements.
Too much of the "paperwork" - physical or virtual - is running the structure rather than the services. If we abolished the endless duplication of management we would cut costs on a far more significant scale than attacking pay and pensions as the right suggest.
I fully understand and appreciate that administration is needed in any structure. I propose to greatly simply the structure to cut the amount of administration needed.
As for Brexit, I'm tempted to take the Chou-en-Lai approach to the French Revolution though that has apparently, like so many good apocrypha, been debunked.
It's fascinating to see those desperately defending our decision to leave the European Union to the point it's become totemic, a symbol of the triumph of democracy, literally, the people's will.
Cards on the table, I voted to leave as well. Why? Simply because our relationship, as it had become, with the EU, was unsustainable for both sides. We were half hearted, obstructive, rebate-obsessed, whingeing, complaining members standing often on the sidelines, often in a minority of one. They were implacable in their desire for greater political and financial integration.
Whether Cameron generally believed after his unexpected (and I suspect unwanted) 2015 election win (aided and abetted by Nick Clegg, Ed Miliband and Alex Salmond), he could persuade the EU to accept a form of semi-detached membership for the UK I don't know, but the fact it came down to an IN/OUT vote rather than a ratification of a redefined membership is as much down to the EU leaders at the time as it was Cameron's negotiation skills.
Nine years on and for most people most of the time nothing has changed - we all have nice new passports and those who wanted to retire to Spain and Portugal now have a much harder though not impossible task but generally the EU is as invisible now we are out of it as we were when we were in it.
That's perhaps the tragedy and the irony - as OGH repeatedly showed, it didn't really matter to most people but it was whipped into a symbolic issue of sovereignty and identity by a well-organised campaign to which those seeking to defend the status quo had no real response. It became in the end a cry of frustration and anger from many who didn't usually participate in the democratic process yet has leaving the EU resolved that frustration and anger?
‘We were half hearted, obstructive, rebate-obsessed, whingeing, complaining’
Wrong tense.
Does anybody think the EU would remotely have any interest in engaging with the UK on rejoining talks when it looks like it is about to elect Farage? Inside the tent pissing in?
It would be like a publican inviting back the drunken hooligan who just smashed up his pub. Why upset the regulars for the sake of a big spending heavy drinker who can't hold his beer.
That is not necessarily analogous of Sir Nige.
There's no apology to the EU coming from the UK over our temerity to want to leave.
Nor will there ever be whilst Reform is a political force in the land.
Without that apology to Brussels, they will just smile politely at talk of rejoin - and think to themselvrs "Fuck off. We don't need this British psychodrama every few years..."
As the polling suggests we only thought we wanted to leave. Like leaving an employer one has worked for with little blemish over 45 years because the grass appeared greener elsewhere, the HR note states "do not re-hire".
The last of the Dead Sea Scrolls has finally been reconstructed and translated They were able to confirm the intact portion says '.......just days from developing a nuclear bomb.......'
Blaming Brexit - nobody can say in detail for what precisely - is just an aspect of the country is broken meme which is dominating most of the western world.
Rejoin the EU and within a year two thirds of people would be blaming that for the state of the country.
With some justification as taxes rise and the immigration numbers soared.
"...and the immigration numbers soared"
Um, how can I put this...
The issue is would immigration have been higher if the UK had still been in the EU.
The answer is Yes.
And would immigration be higher if the UK re-joined the EU.
The answer is Yes.
Immigration would have been lower, probably, had we remained in the EU. The EU promotes labour mobility, so people come and go, which leads to lower net immigration than the approach since we left, where people coming for work have strong incentives to stay.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
Yes, fine, but how would you reduce the deficit and borrowing?
I imagine we'll hear the same old mantras of "supply side reform", "50% haircut for public sector pensions", "tax cuts and spending cuts" from the usual suspects but was any of that on offer last July? Is any of that on offer now? You won't hear it from Labour, Reform, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats or Greens - is there some other political movement advocating a return to a blanced budget? How would they achieve it?
"Putting your hands over your ears and humming", as you put it, isn't fair. Plenty of people see the problem but, as with the "small boats", no one has come up with an easy, popular and cheap solution - if there were one, we'd have done it by now.
So it comes back to who has to feel the pain - which group can you demonise enough so everyone will say "yeah, let them suffer" - public sector workers, pensioners, others on welfare, the wealthy, property owners, Scottish lawyers, children - where would you like to start?
No, the usual whingeing every month about the borrowing numbers belies the fact of how we got here and the fact previous Governments allowed us to reach this point. I know what I would do but when I've proposed it, I've had a barrage of abuse from those who already feel "overtaxed" and complain "they" can't pay any more but someone else could and should.
It is simple, income tax/vat rises , end the gold plated public service pensions, 10% reduction in all benefits and then frozen for at least 5 years. No pay rises for public service unless self funding. Easy peasy just needs some bollocks.
'gold plated' is one of those political phrases that people always put in front of public sector pensions without thinking about it.
Yes, it's one of the stages of demonising groups we often see.
Spread the notion public sector workers are all living on huge pensions in luxury and getting regular increases (as well as other freebies) and you can sell notions of "haircuts" quite easily.
The truth is much more complex. We all know public sector pensions come in a variety of shapes and sizes and benefits and contributions but that complicates the issue and muddies the waters which makes it more difficult.
What it masks is the complete and utter failure of the whole area of mortgage and pensions in the private sector. Take out an investment in the stock market - it'll pay your mortgage and your pension - no. Millions were duped into setting up investment plans which returned a fraction of what was needed.
If you want a vast area of untapped wealth, go after the financial sector and the City - how about some nice windfall taxes or a transaction tax on stock market investments? It's the same as "gold plated" public sector pensions, isn't it?
People need to be aiming for a DC pension pot of half a million.
Which is why any musings about getting rid of salary sacrifice and reducing the tax free limits on DC pensions are so dangerous.
Most people might as well aim for the moon as half a million.
And btw, another sign of our broken economy is how often investment advice involves American rather than British stock markets.
Blaming Brexit - nobody can say in detail for what precisely - is just an aspect of the country is broken meme which is dominating most of the western world.
Rejoin the EU and within a year two thirds of people would be blaming that for the state of the country.
With some justification as taxes rise and the immigration numbers soared.
"...and the immigration numbers soared"
Um, how can I put this...
The issue is would immigration have been higher if the UK had still been in the EU.
The answer is Yes.
And would immigration be higher if the UK re-joined the EU.
The answer is Yes.
Immigration would have been lower, probably, had we remained in the EU. The EU promotes labour mobility, so people come and go, which leads to lower net immigration than the approach since we left, where people coming for work have strong incentives to stay.
Indeed. Bozo was forced to suddenly make up for this fluidity in 2020-21, as we documented in the previous discussion about this.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Sorry, who are we at war with?
Ourselves, mainly.
Actually that relates to something I've thought about recently. Is the old fashioned declaration of war a thing of the past? When was the last time a country officially declared war on another?
A fully fuelled Starship blowing up would be very approximately equivalent to a 5kt nuke.
The Size of the Starship fireball is crazy, if you consider this is like 5% of the methane load that a full stack would have. The sheer amount of propellant on this vehicle sometimes is overwhelming. https://x.com/BCCarCounters/status/1935657790502002694
I've quoted this before, but the devastation after the second N1 moon rocket blew up was quite something. And that was with only 15% of the fuel detonating.
"Only in the trench did I understand the sense of the expression "your heart in your mouth." Something quite improbable was being created all around--the steppe was trembling like a vibration test flg. thundering, rumbling, whistling, gnashing--all mixed together in some terrible, seemingly unending cacophony. The trench proved to be so shallow and unreliable that one wanted to burrow into the sand so as not to hear this nightmare.., the thick wave from the explosion passed over us, sweeping away and leveling everything. Behind it came hot metal raining down from above. Pieces of the rocket were thrown ten kilometers away, and large windows were shattered in structures 40 kilometers away. A 400 kilogram spherical tank landed on the roof of the installation and testing wing. seven kilometers from the launch pad."
"We arrived at the fueling station and were horrified--the windows and doors were smashed out, the iron entrance gate was askew, the equipment was scattered about with the light o[ dawn and was turned to stone--the steppe was literally strewn with dead animals and birds. Where so many o[ them came from and how they appeared in such quantities at the station I still do not understand."
Incidentally, there's an international aspect to yesterday's RUD: large pieces of debris landed across the border in Mexico. Allegedly SpaceX own that land as well, but I can imagine the Mexicans are not best pleased.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
Yes, fine, but how would you reduce the deficit and borrowing?
I imagine we'll hear the same old mantras of "supply side reform", "50% haircut for public sector pensions", "tax cuts and spending cuts" from the usual suspects but was any of that on offer last July? Is any of that on offer now? You won't hear it from Labour, Reform, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats or Greens - is there some other political movement advocating a return to a blanced budget? How would they achieve it?
"Putting your hands over your ears and humming", as you put it, isn't fair. Plenty of people see the problem but, as with the "small boats", no one has come up with an easy, popular and cheap solution - if there were one, we'd have done it by now.
So it comes back to who has to feel the pain - which group can you demonise enough so everyone will say "yeah, let them suffer" - public sector workers, pensioners, others on welfare, the wealthy, property owners, Scottish lawyers, children - where would you like to start?
No, the usual whingeing every month about the borrowing numbers belies the fact of how we got here and the fact previous Governments allowed us to reach this point. I know what I would do but when I've proposed it, I've had a barrage of abuse from those who already feel "overtaxed" and complain "they" can't pay any more but someone else could and should.
It is simple, income tax/vat rises , end the gold plated public service pensions, 10% reduction in all benefits and then frozen for at least 5 years. No pay rises for public service unless self funding. Easy peasy just needs some bollocks.
'gold plated' is one of those political phrases that people always put in front of public sector pensions without thinking about it.
Yes, it's one of the stages of demonising groups we often see.
Spread the notion public sector workers are all living on huge pensions in luxury and getting regular increases (as well as other freebies) and you can sell notions of "haircuts" quite easily.
The truth is much more complex. We all know public sector pensions come in a variety of shapes and sizes and benefits and contributions but that complicates the issue and muddies the waters which makes it more difficult.
What it masks is the complete and utter failure of the whole area of mortgage and pensions in the private sector. Take out an investment in the stock market - it'll pay your mortgage and your pension - no. Millions were duped into setting up investment plans which returned a fraction of what was needed.
If you want a vast area of untapped wealth, go after the financial sector and the City - how about some nice windfall taxes or a transaction tax on stock market investments? It's the same as "gold plated" public sector pensions, isn't it?
Absolutely. It's demonising those who are prevented from publicly answering back which makes it especially insidious. Try telling someone who works in a call centre in the DWP or HMRC for not much more than the living wage that their pension is going to allow them to retire in luxury.
Indeed.
Aren't the two biggest groups of public sector workers nurses and teachers? Neither of those groups are paid particularly well, neither have "gold-plated" pensions, both do very important work.
Will joining the EU magically make our politicians tier one operators? Is it going to fix our economy, solve wealth inequality, make our energy cheaper and make us able to build quality infrastructure to a deadline and a budget? Will it save the NHS? Will it make our lives significantly better? If not, what's the point?
That demand for "silver bullet" solutions rather than accepting small, incremental improvements is the problem. The UK electorate fall for the huckster promising a magical solution time after time, it's the reason for Brexit, never completed nuclear power stations rather than well-insulated houses, prescription pills rather than healthy lifestyles, crime rather than sure start...
Exactly. We need to get our own shite sorted and accept that no one is coming to save us. Magic bullets usually turn out to be blanks.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Sorry, who are we at war with?
We are in a war with Russia at the moment, and have been for a number of years. It is a Cold War at the moment, and I hope it remains that way, but it is a war nonetheless.
It'll be interesting to look back in a few decades and try to work out when it began: Salisbury, or earlier?
Were you feeling hot and bothered? Needed to start another argument on the same topic?
I do not do very well in the heat, I have had about 2 hours sleep in about 15 minute blocks last night.
Serious suggestion for @TSE : Have a look at an air-to-air reversible heat pump which can cool as well as heat at modest cost. You can get ones which are portable or are a single unit installed inside, or one with the other half outside.
Aesthetic considerations may apply especially on the outside walls, but in time I'll going over to these for my whole heating system and I'm happy that I can do it tidily at my place.
Technically these can room by room, or one-to-several-rooms, but WiFi or remote controllers are available (I have an app on my phone).
At present I have a portable unit for trial (since 2. years ago) which is vented to a conservatory via an opening upperlight window, and I'm impressed. It takes the edge off the really hot summer period quite well. You could potentially get one for your bedroom, or for the landing to do the upstairs.
It would probably pay to take a careful look at noise levels if choosing.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
I am resigned to the fact that we're only going to get our public spending sorted when somebody takes away our national credit card.
It'll be fun if it happens under a Reform government.
It really won't. Under whatever government it happens we will be looking at massive increases in tax and massive cuts in spending. All of us will be significantly poorer but inevitably those dependent upon the State will be the worse hit.
We can ameliorate this to some extent by acting now but everything Reeves does makes it worse. These ridiculous arguments about whether she can make her ridiculous targets make those realigning the deck chairs on the Titanic look both purposeful and useful.
I wonder what the impositions will be.
+2% basic income tax +5% top rate income tax +20% council tax plus extra council tax bands +10p fuel duty
End of the triple lock on pensions End of pensions credits End of WFA Rapid increase in state retirement age to 70 20% reduction in invalidity benefits
Immediate conversion of future public sector pension schemes from DB to DC 10% reduction in current DB payments over £50k pa 10% reduction in public sector pay above £100k pa
Don't know how much all that would save but I doubt it would be enough.
Oddly enough, I could support most of that.
I'm a little twitchy about reductions in invalidity benefits but we also need to tackle the social care issue which is bankrupting even well-run councils and needs a more comprehensive national approach.
On tax I'd have 25p basic and a single top rate of 50p BUT I would restore the thresholds to where they would have been allowing for inflation - in other words, eliminate the iniquitous Conservative "fiscal drag".
Nah, we don’t need to do any of that so long as we enthusiastically embrace the Assisted Dying Bill. That should deliver some big savings.
Blaming Brexit - nobody can say in detail for what precisely - is just an aspect of the country is broken meme which is dominating most of the western world.
Rejoin the EU and within a year two thirds of people would be blaming that for the state of the country.
With some justification as taxes rise and the immigration numbers soared.
"...and the immigration numbers soared"
Um, how can I put this...
The issue is would immigration have been higher if the UK had still been in the EU.
The answer is Yes.
And would immigration be higher if the UK re-joined the EU.
The answer is Yes.
Immigration would have been lower, probably, had we remained in the EU. The EU promotes labour mobility, so people come and go, which leads to lower net immigration than the approach since we left, where people coming for work have strong incentives to stay.
No it wouldn't.
The UK would have had the same immigrants plus the regular net immigration from Eastern and Southern Europe.
Incidentally why are immigrants that continually churn in and out deemed to be better than those who make a long term commitment to a new country ?
Eh? Nonsense question framing from YouGov gives: Closer relationship without rejoining: 67% support Rejoining: 56% support
The thread today will be dominated with stale arguments. Out to enjoy the sun instead.
Read the thread, this is the bit I was focussing on, until the Tories can turn this around then it will hinder them.
And that's why it's worth thinking this through, especially if Brexit isn't going to be reversed any time soon.
Normally, political mistakes get reversed. The Poll Tax lasted three years. Labour's original WFA plan lasted less than a year. Brexit, whatever its backers might wish, is seen as a mistake by the public. But it's not going anywhere for now. The way that spills into the wider political game is likely to be odd.
It's possible that the percentage blaming Labour goes up as time passes and the blame for the state of the country naturally accretes to the current incumbents, rather than the previous lot.
"If Brexit was so bad why didn't you do anything about it?"
In case anyone wants to fact check @Malmesbury , this is a good place to brush up on your fission engineering.
Nuclear Technology, Volume 207, Issue sup1 (2021) https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/unct20/207/sup1 Special issue on the Manhattan Project Nuclear Science and Technology Development at Los Alamos National Laboratory
(An open access issue of the usually very much not open access journal.)
Recommended for those interested in the history. ..It is interesting to reflect on the different levels of understanding of atomic weapons physics–in Britain and the U.S., versus Germany–during the war. By the early 1940s, it was well understood in Britain and the U.S. that once a supercritical mass is assembled, the fission chain reaction leads to heating, explosion, and material expansion to the point that the assembly becomes subcritical. This is the heart of the physics embodied in the Frisch-Peierls, Pryce-Dirac, Serber, and Bethe-Feynman formulas. However, in contrast, Jeremy Bernstein’s fascinating 1996 book Hitler’s Uranium Club shows that Heisenberg and his team seemed not to understand this basic idea, thinking erroneously that an atomic bomb could work at 100% efficiency and fission all the nuclear material..
What Heisenberg *ass*umed, seems to be that by the time physical assembly had happened, the nuclear reaction would be done.
I'd recommend https://nuclearweaponarchive.org - it has quite a bit more, including some quite interesting calculations on efficiency.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
I am resigned to the fact that we're only going to get our public spending sorted when somebody takes away our national credit card.
It'll be fun if it happens under a Reform government.
It really won't. Under whatever government it happens we will be looking at massive increases in tax and massive cuts in spending. All of us will be significantly poorer but inevitably those dependent upon the State will be the worse hit.
We can ameliorate this to some extent by acting now but everything Reeves does makes it worse. These ridiculous arguments about whether she can make her ridiculous targets make those realigning the deck chairs on the Titanic look both purposeful and useful.
I wonder what the impositions will be.
+2% basic income tax +5% top rate income tax +20% council tax plus extra council tax bands +10p fuel duty
End of the triple lock on pensions End of pensions credits End of WFA Rapid increase in state retirement age to 70 20% reduction in invalidity benefits
Immediate conversion of future public sector pension schemes from DB to DC 10% reduction in current DB payments over £50k pa 10% reduction in public sector pay above £100k pa
Don't know how much all that would save but I doubt it would be enough.
Oddly enough, I could support most of that.
I'm a little twitchy about reductions in invalidity benefits but we also need to tackle the social care issue which is bankrupting even well-run councils and needs a more comprehensive national approach.
On tax I'd have 25p basic and a single top rate of 50p BUT I would restore the thresholds to where they would have been allowing for inflation - in other words, eliminate the iniquitous Conservative "fiscal drag".
Even Reeves isn't pushing the top rate back to 50% again
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Were you feeling hot and bothered? Needed to start another argument on the same topic?
I do not do very well in the heat, I have had about 2 hours sleep in about 15 minute blocks last night.
Serious suggestion for @TSE : Have a look at an air-to-air reversible heat pump which can cool as well as heat at modest cost. You can get ones which are portable or are a single unit installed inside, or one with the other half outside.
Aesthetic considerations may apply especially on the outside walls, but in time I'll going over to these for my whole heating system and I'm happy that I can do it tidily at my place.
Technically these can room by room, or one-to-several-rooms, but WiFi or remote controllers are available (I have an app on my phone).
At present I have a portable unit for trial (since 2. years ago) which is vented to a conservatory via an opening upperlight window, and I'm impressed. It takes the edge off the really hot summer period quite well. You could potentially get one for your bedroom, or for the landing to do the upstairs.
It would probably pay to take a careful look at noise levels if choosing.
It’s because I was staying in a hotel last night that was the issue.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
I am resigned to the fact that we're only going to get our public spending sorted when somebody takes away our national credit card.
It'll be fun if it happens under a Reform government.
It really won't. Under whatever government it happens we will be looking at massive increases in tax and massive cuts in spending. All of us will be significantly poorer but inevitably those dependent upon the State will be the worse hit.
We can ameliorate this to some extent by acting now but everything Reeves does makes it worse. These ridiculous arguments about whether she can make her ridiculous targets make those realigning the deck chairs on the Titanic look both purposeful and useful.
I wonder what the impositions will be.
+2% basic income tax +5% top rate income tax +20% council tax plus extra council tax bands +10p fuel duty
End of the triple lock on pensions End of pensions credits End of WFA Rapid increase in state retirement age to 70 20% reduction in invalidity benefits
Immediate conversion of future public sector pension schemes from DB to DC 10% reduction in current DB payments over £50k pa 10% reduction in public sector pay above £100k pa
Don't know how much all that would save but I doubt it would be enough.
Oddly enough, I could support most of that.
I'm a little twitchy about reductions in invalidity benefits but we also need to tackle the social care issue which is bankrupting even well-run councils and needs a more comprehensive national approach.
On tax I'd have 25p basic and a single top rate of 50p BUT I would restore the thresholds to where they would have been allowing for inflation - in other words, eliminate the iniquitous Conservative "fiscal drag".
Nah, we don’t need to do any of that so long as we enthusiastically embrace the Assisted Dying Bill. That should deliver some big savings.
Hardly as it only applies to the terminally ill
We’re all dying from day one. Thin the heard, that’s what I say.
Blaming Brexit - nobody can say in detail for what precisely - is just an aspect of the country is broken meme which is dominating most of the western world.
Rejoin the EU and within a year two thirds of people would be blaming that for the state of the country.
With some justification as taxes rise and the immigration numbers soared.
"...and the immigration numbers soared"
Um, how can I put this...
The issue is would immigration have been higher if the UK had still been in the EU.
The answer is Yes.
And would immigration be higher if the UK re-joined the EU.
The answer is Yes.
Immigration would have been lower, probably, had we remained in the EU. The EU promotes labour mobility, so people come and go, which leads to lower net immigration than the approach since we left, where people coming for work have strong incentives to stay.
No it wouldn't.
The UK would have had the same immigrants plus the regular net immigration from Eastern and Southern Europe.
Incidentally why are immigrants that continually churn in and out deemed to be better than those who make a long term commitment to a new country ?
It's supposed to be a cheat. The immigrants arrive fully trained and ready to work, then leave before they become pensioners. So no-cost workforce. Just taxes and productivity.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
I am resigned to the fact that we're only going to get our public spending sorted when somebody takes away our national credit card.
It'll be fun if it happens under a Reform government.
It really won't. Under whatever government it happens we will be looking at massive increases in tax and massive cuts in spending. All of us will be significantly poorer but inevitably those dependent upon the State will be the worse hit.
We can ameliorate this to some extent by acting now but everything Reeves does makes it worse. These ridiculous arguments about whether she can make her ridiculous targets make those realigning the deck chairs on the Titanic look both purposeful and useful.
I wonder what the impositions will be.
+2% basic income tax +5% top rate income tax +20% council tax plus extra council tax bands +10p fuel duty
End of the triple lock on pensions End of pensions credits End of WFA Rapid increase in state retirement age to 70 20% reduction in invalidity benefits
Immediate conversion of future public sector pension schemes from DB to DC 10% reduction in current DB payments over £50k pa 10% reduction in public sector pay above £100k pa
Don't know how much all that would save but I doubt it would be enough.
Oddly enough, I could support most of that.
I'm a little twitchy about reductions in invalidity benefits but we also need to tackle the social care issue which is bankrupting even well-run councils and needs a more comprehensive national approach.
On tax I'd have 25p basic and a single top rate of 50p BUT I would restore the thresholds to where they would have been allowing for inflation - in other words, eliminate the iniquitous Conservative "fiscal drag".
Even Reeves isn't pushing the top rate back to 50% again
Give it time.
As Labour's amazing plan of taxing jobs and spending more somehow fails to stimulate growth, someone will have to pay.
It won't be their unions, the recipient of taxpayer-funded largesse. The wealthy are ideologically convenient for the left to hit with a big tax stick. Just a shame that the consequent actions will be, most probably, less than economically helpful.
Focusing on gouging individuals and corporations with as high a rate as possible instead of recognising lower rates can yield higher revenues (which is what matters for spending) is a stereotypical leftwing failing. We'll see it soon, I suspect.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Sorry, who are we at war with?
We are in a war with Russia at the moment, and have been for a number of years. It is a Cold War at the moment, and I hope it remains that way, but it is a war nonetheless.
It'll be interesting to look back in a few decades and try to work out when it began: Salisbury, or earlier?
OK, so we're not at war with anyone. We are in a "cold war" (i.e., not an actual war) with Russia.
Russia does spread discord and misinformation in our country, including by supporting environmental groups, as well as supporting Brexit (to try to be on topic for the thread) and alt right groups. I agree with you there. At the same time, one of the things that we have that Russia doesn't is democracy, including the right to protest.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Now where is that tin foil hat?
Sounds like an outtake from Fairly Secret Army.
Activists! Fifth columnists!! Distinct threat to the country!!! Harrumph!!!!
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
I am resigned to the fact that we're only going to get our public spending sorted when somebody takes away our national credit card.
It'll be fun if it happens under a Reform government.
It really won't. Under whatever government it happens we will be looking at massive increases in tax and massive cuts in spending. All of us will be significantly poorer but inevitably those dependent upon the State will be the worse hit.
We can ameliorate this to some extent by acting now but everything Reeves does makes it worse. These ridiculous arguments about whether she can make her ridiculous targets make those realigning the deck chairs on the Titanic look both purposeful and useful.
I wonder what the impositions will be.
+2% basic income tax +5% top rate income tax +20% council tax plus extra council tax bands +10p fuel duty
End of the triple lock on pensions End of pensions credits End of WFA Rapid increase in state retirement age to 70 20% reduction in invalidity benefits
Immediate conversion of future public sector pension schemes from DB to DC 10% reduction in current DB payments over £50k pa 10% reduction in public sector pay above £100k pa
Don't know how much all that would save but I doubt it would be enough.
Oddly enough, I could support most of that.
I'm a little twitchy about reductions in invalidity benefits but we also need to tackle the social care issue which is bankrupting even well-run councils and needs a more comprehensive national approach.
On tax I'd have 25p basic and a single top rate of 50p BUT I would restore the thresholds to where they would have been allowing for inflation - in other words, eliminate the iniquitous Conservative "fiscal drag".
Even Reeves isn't pushing the top rate back to 50% again
She made a pinky promise she cant break. Top Economist.
Yesterday was brutal, and I need to go and walk around a lake in the woods before it gets up to the 29C forecast for here. I also need a sunhat, because the wide brim cricket hat I picked up at Grace Road in the noughties has reached the end of the road.
I love how 37% blame the EU (!) for life without them being a disappointment. There's no reasoning with some people. And, yes, let's have lots of apologising from the Tories. For Brexit, for Johnson, for Truss. In general for becoming decadent and grossly self-indulgent at the very time the country needed them most. The apology (if delivered with force and sincerity) is a powerful thing and underused in politics. The Conservative party need to embrace it now if this grand old institution is to save itself. Say sorry, make us believe it, scrape the crud off the keel and set sail for waters new.
In case anyone wants to fact check @Malmesbury , this is a good place to brush up on your fission engineering.
Nuclear Technology, Volume 207, Issue sup1 (2021) https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/unct20/207/sup1 Special issue on the Manhattan Project Nuclear Science and Technology Development at Los Alamos National Laboratory
(An open access issue of the usually very much not open access journal.)
Recommended for those interested in the history. ..It is interesting to reflect on the different levels of understanding of atomic weapons physics–in Britain and the U.S., versus Germany–during the war. By the early 1940s, it was well understood in Britain and the U.S. that once a supercritical mass is assembled, the fission chain reaction leads to heating, explosion, and material expansion to the point that the assembly becomes subcritical. This is the heart of the physics embodied in the Frisch-Peierls, Pryce-Dirac, Serber, and Bethe-Feynman formulas. However, in contrast, Jeremy Bernstein’s fascinating 1996 book Hitler’s Uranium Club shows that Heisenberg and his team seemed not to understand this basic idea, thinking erroneously that an atomic bomb could work at 100% efficiency and fission all the nuclear material..
What Heisenberg *ass*umed, seems to be that by the time physical assembly had happened, the nuclear reaction would be done.
I'd recommend https://nuclearweaponarchive.org - it has quite a bit more, including some quite interesting calculations on efficiency.
The history is pretty interesting. The British contribution to the wartime bomb is often under-acknowledged, particular in comparison with the rightly celebrated Hungarians.
Revelation of the morning, IDS is a biker (or a motorcyclist as he put it). Will the quiet man be buying a set of noisy pipes for his ride?
Not sure Kemi will be too pleased. Motorcyclists have a far higher fatality rate than car drivers in crashes and the last thing she needs is a by election in a Tory seat now.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Sorry, who are we at war with?
We are in a war with Russia at the moment, and have been for a number of years. It is a Cold War at the moment, and I hope it remains that way, but it is a war nonetheless.
It'll be interesting to look back in a few decades and try to work out when it began: Salisbury, or earlier?
OK, so we're not at war with anyone. We are in a "cold war" (i.e., not an actual war) with Russia.
Russia does spread discord and misinformation in our country, including by supporting environmental groups, as well as supporting Brexit (to try to be on topic for the thread) and alt right groups. I agree with you there. At the same time, one of the things that we have that Russia doesn't is democracy, including the right to protest.
And a part of the right to protest, apparently, is to firebomb hotels*. The right to protest is meaningless without some violence, apparently?
Or is it to damage military aircraft?
I get confused as to which violence is AOK and which is bad manners.
Blaming Brexit - nobody can say in detail for what precisely - is just an aspect of the country is broken meme which is dominating most of the western world.
Rejoin the EU and within a year two thirds of people would be blaming that for the state of the country.
With some justification as taxes rise and the immigration numbers soared.
"...and the immigration numbers soared"
Um, how can I put this...
The issue is would immigration have been higher if the UK had still been in the EU.
The answer is Yes.
And would immigration be higher if the UK re-joined the EU.
The answer is Yes.
Immigration would have been lower, probably, had we remained in the EU. The EU promotes labour mobility, so people come and go, which leads to lower net immigration than the approach since we left, where people coming for work have strong incentives to stay.
No it wouldn't.
The UK would have had the same immigrants plus the regular net immigration from Eastern and Southern Europe.
Incidentally why are immigrants that continually churn in and out deemed to be better than those who make a long term commitment to a new country ?
The post-Brexit wave of immigration under Johnson (sorry, I can't think of a shorter way of describing that) was largely in response to labour market shortages that had previously been filled by workers from the EU. So, no, the UK would not have had the same immigrants plus.
Immigrants that come and then go again mean lower net immigration. I wasn't deeming them better or worse, just noting that.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
I am resigned to the fact that we're only going to get our public spending sorted when somebody takes away our national credit card.
It'll be fun if it happens under a Reform government.
It really won't. Under whatever government it happens we will be looking at massive increases in tax and massive cuts in spending. All of us will be significantly poorer but inevitably those dependent upon the State will be the worse hit.
We can ameliorate this to some extent by acting now but everything Reeves does makes it worse. These ridiculous arguments about whether she can make her ridiculous targets make those realigning the deck chairs on the Titanic look both purposeful and useful.
I wonder what the impositions will be.
+2% basic income tax +5% top rate income tax +20% council tax plus extra council tax bands +10p fuel duty
End of the triple lock on pensions End of pensions credits End of WFA Rapid increase in state retirement age to 70 20% reduction in invalidity benefits
Immediate conversion of future public sector pension schemes from DB to DC 10% reduction in current DB payments over £50k pa 10% reduction in public sector pay above £100k pa
Don't know how much all that would save but I doubt it would be enough.
I don't know off the top of my head all the details of how Ireland imposed austerity, but I'd imagine that would be the right sort of place to start looking for what might happen/could work in Britain.
The highlights I do know of were: A new income-related tax, the Universal Social Charge. Across the board cuts in public sector pay (this also cuts salary-related pension entitlements). A new local property tax (charged as a percentage of self-assessed property value) Water charges (which is where the limit of public acquiescence was reached and this was ultimately reversed)
Were you feeling hot and bothered? Needed to start another argument on the same topic?
I do not do very well in the heat, I have had about 2 hours sleep in about 15 minute blocks last night.
Serious suggestion for @TSE : Have a look at an air-to-air reversible heat pump which can cool as well as heat at modest cost. You can get ones which are portable or are a single unit installed inside, or one with the other half outside.
Aesthetic considerations may apply especially on the outside walls, but in time I'll going over to these for my whole heating system and I'm happy that I can do it tidily at my place.
Technically these can room by room, or one-to-several-rooms, but WiFi or remote controllers are available (I have an app on my phone).
At present I have a portable unit for trial (since 2. years ago) which is vented to a conservatory via an opening upperlight window, and I'm impressed. It takes the edge off the really hot summer period quite well. You could potentially get one for your bedroom, or for the landing to do the upstairs.
It would probably pay to take a careful look at noise levels if choosing.
Alan Sugar enters the debate for some shameless self-promotion
For the public finances I think it all went wrong with the EBSS:
most people can afford a huge spike in energy bills, including me.
there is a huge European war on between one country that grows loads of food and another that produces huge volumes of gas and oil. It's reasonable that prices go up, and it's not the fault of the government.
We now have an entitlement society that doesn't just extend to a few council tenants but rather the entire population, in particular those owning property outright. The WFP histrionics is directly caused by this.
we have an extensive and highly effective safety net. Sure, there are minor issues with it like weird tax incentives that require harsh sanctions to get people off the couch, but on the whole it's pretty good. It did not require a universal energy supplement on top. A top up to UC and Pension Credit? Maybe.
there is now a complete disassociation between personal finances and the world economy, war and diplomacy, energy policy and so on. No one really cares about these things because they know politicians will buy their votes, and damn the long term consequences.
Another example is COVID, where people at the bottom were protected from unemployment and rich people simply WFH and generated gigantic savings which fired inflation in the following years
Basically, I think we learn to take stuff on the chin again. Savings aren't just for holidays, but also global pandemics and war.
I love how 37% blame the EU (!) for life without them being a disappointment. There's no reasoning with some people. And, yes, let's have lots of apologising from the Tories. For Brexit, for Johnson, for Truss. In general for becoming decadent and grossly self-indulgent at the very time the country needed them most. The apology (if delivered with force and sincerity) is a powerful thing and underused in politics. The Conservative party need to embrace it now if this grand old institution is to save itself. Say sorry, make us believe it, scrape the crud off the keel and set sail for waters new.
Forced apologies does have shades of a cultural revolution.
It's not enough to condemn wrongthink. Those who are guilty of it must publicly repudiate their doubleplusungood opinions before they can become respected members of society again.
Or, instead of trying to force apologies, we could stop fixating on the EU and start trying to actually mend our economic situation.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Sorry, who are we at war with?
We are in a war with Russia at the moment, and have been for a number of years. It is a Cold War at the moment, and I hope it remains that way, but it is a war nonetheless.
It'll be interesting to look back in a few decades and try to work out when it began: Salisbury, or earlier?
OK, so we're not at war with anyone. We are in a "cold war" (i.e., not an actual war) with Russia.
Russia does spread discord and misinformation in our country, including by supporting environmental groups, as well as supporting Brexit (to try to be on topic for the thread) and alt right groups. I agree with you there. At the same time, one of the things that we have that Russia doesn't is democracy, including the right to protest.
And a part of the right to protest, apparently, is to firebomb hotels*. The right to protest is meaningless without some violence, apparently?
Or is it to damage military aircraft?
I get confused as to which violence is AOK and which is bad manners.
*Sorry, ex-hotels.
Who are you talking to, Malmesbury? Where did I support violent protest?
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
I am resigned to the fact that we're only going to get our public spending sorted when somebody takes away our national credit card.
It'll be fun if it happens under a Reform government.
It really won't. Under whatever government it happens we will be looking at massive increases in tax and massive cuts in spending. All of us will be significantly poorer but inevitably those dependent upon the State will be the worse hit.
We can ameliorate this to some extent by acting now but everything Reeves does makes it worse. These ridiculous arguments about whether she can make her ridiculous targets make those realigning the deck chairs on the Titanic look both purposeful and useful.
I wonder what the impositions will be.
+2% basic income tax +5% top rate income tax +20% council tax plus extra council tax bands +10p fuel duty
End of the triple lock on pensions End of pensions credits End of WFA Rapid increase in state retirement age to 70 20% reduction in invalidity benefits
Immediate conversion of future public sector pension schemes from DB to DC 10% reduction in current DB payments over £50k pa 10% reduction in public sector pay above £100k pa
Don't know how much all that would save but I doubt it would be enough.
Oddly enough, I could support most of that.
I'm a little twitchy about reductions in invalidity benefits but we also need to tackle the social care issue which is bankrupting even well-run councils and needs a more comprehensive national approach.
On tax I'd have 25p basic and a single top rate of 50p BUT I would restore the thresholds to where they would have been allowing for inflation - in other words, eliminate the iniquitous Conservative "fiscal drag".
Even Reeves isn't pushing the top rate back to 50% again
Pity.
So long, of course, as the cut off is a bit above my income!
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Sorry, who are we at war with?
We are in a war with Russia at the moment, and have been for a number of years. It is a Cold War at the moment, and I hope it remains that way, but it is a war nonetheless.
It'll be interesting to look back in a few decades and try to work out when it began: Salisbury, or earlier?
OK, so we're not at war with anyone. We are in a "cold war" (i.e., not an actual war) with Russia.
Russia does spread discord and misinformation in our country, including by supporting environmental groups, as well as supporting Brexit (to try to be on topic for the thread) and alt right groups. I agree with you there. At the same time, one of the things that we have that Russia doesn't is democracy, including the right to protest.
And a part of the right to protest, apparently, is to firebomb hotels*. The right to protest is meaningless without some violence, apparently?
Or is it to damage military aircraft?
I get confused as to which violence is AOK and which is bad manners.
*Sorry, ex-hotels.
Who are you talking to, Malmesbury? Where did I support violent protest?
You didn't. I don't.
But whenever this comes up, there is always a fan club for the protestors, who say things like "Protest without inconvenience for others is meaningless".
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Now where is that tin foil hat?
I am not normally someone who gets accused of that. But if you look at the current situation, I think my claim is backed up by facts. In addition, the parallels with 1938, whilst flawed, are clear.
Were you feeling hot and bothered? Needed to start another argument on the same topic?
I do not do very well in the heat, I have had about 2 hours sleep in about 15 minute blocks last night.
Serious suggestion for @TSE : Have a look at an air-to-air reversible heat pump which can cool as well as heat at modest cost. You can get ones which are portable or are a single unit installed inside, or one with the other half outside.
Aesthetic considerations may apply especially on the outside walls, but in time I'll going over to these for my whole heating system and I'm happy that I can do it tidily at my place.
Technically these can room by room, or one-to-several-rooms, but WiFi or remote controllers are available (I have an app on my phone).
At present I have a portable unit for trial (since 2. years ago) which is vented to a conservatory via an opening upperlight window, and I'm impressed. It takes the edge off the really hot summer period quite well. You could potentially get one for your bedroom, or for the landing to do the upstairs.
It would probably pay to take a careful look at noise levels if choosing.
It’s because I was staying in a hotel last night that was the issue.
I should have packed my Dyson fan.
Take a lukewarm bath before bed in order to reduce your body temperature slightly.
Hold on, you're minted. Just book an air-conditioned hotel room next time.
The people who wish to join (there is no “rejoin”) the EU increasingly look like the Referendum Party of 1997 in reverse. Obsessed bores with no sense of reality.
Revelation of the morning, IDS is a biker (or a motorcyclist as he put it). Will the quiet man be buying a set of noisy pipes for his ride?
Not sure Kemi will be too pleased. Motorcyclists have a far higher fatality rate than car drivers in crashes and the last thing she needs is a by election in a Tory seat now.
Hope IDS enjoys his biking anyway
Look out for dishevelled blond man tying wire across roads at head height.
And an idiot Labour MP prefers to resign rather than do anything to slow future borrowing increases.
It says:
"Borrowing in the financial year to May 2025 was £37.7 billion; this was £1.6 billion more than in the same two-month period of 2024 and the third-highest April to May borrowing since monthly records began, after those of 2020 and 2021."
And Reeves answer to this was a public spending round that will eventually add another £140bn to current spending. We are heading for a disaster and those who put their hands over their ears and hum are doing those that need protection no good at all in the medium term.
I am resigned to the fact that we're only going to get our public spending sorted when somebody takes away our national credit card.
It'll be fun if it happens under a Reform government.
They are probably the only party with the balls to do it. Lib\Lab\Con will simply wheel out platitudes and let the problem roll on.
Oh please, Reform's plans will outdo Rachel Reeves, have you seen their unfunded plans?
Reform are betting the farm on British DOGE. The problem is that its predecessors - the US version and our own Bonfire of the Quangos during the Coalition years - all proved something of a flop. Will whoever Nigel puts in charge be better than Elon Musk or Francis Maude? On that simple question Reform's future lives or dies.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Sorry, who are we at war with?
We are in a war with Russia at the moment, and have been for a number of years. It is a Cold War at the moment, and I hope it remains that way, but it is a war nonetheless.
It'll be interesting to look back in a few decades and try to work out when it began: Salisbury, or earlier?
OK, so we're not at war with anyone. We are in a "cold war" (i.e., not an actual war) with Russia.
Russia does spread discord and misinformation in our country, including by supporting environmental groups, as well as supporting Brexit (to try to be on topic for the thread) and alt right groups. I agree with you there. At the same time, one of the things that we have that Russia doesn't is democracy, including the right to protest.
Well yes, it's a war. A cold war; but that's the point: all it would take is some minor miscalculations for it to go hot. IMV it's really important to acknowledge that.
Also, the right to protest is not unlimited. Rightly so. Do you defend what those people did at Brize Norton?
I love how 37% blame the EU (!) for life without them being a disappointment. There's no reasoning with some people. And, yes, let's have lots of apologising from the Tories. For Brexit, for Johnson, for Truss. In general for becoming decadent and grossly self-indulgent at the very time the country needed them most. The apology (if delivered with force and sincerity) is a powerful thing and underused in politics. The Conservative party need to embrace it now if this grand old institution is to save itself. Say sorry, make us believe it, scrape the crud off the keel and set sail for waters new.
Forced apologies does have shades of a cultural revolution.
It's not enough to condemn wrongthink. Those who are guilty of it must publicly repudiate their doubleplusungood opinions before they can become respected members of society again.
Or, instead of trying to force apologies, we could stop fixating on the EU and start trying to actually mend our economic situation.
We need a bogeyman to blame. Being in the EU, we could blame them. Now we're no longer in the EU, we blame anybody involved in brexit. What's that saying about if you meet arseholes all day, you're the arsehole? We're at the point where we're looking in the mirror and there's an arsehole looking back.
For the public finances I think it all went wrong with the EBSS:
most people can afford a huge spike in energy bills, including me.
there is a huge European war on between one country that grows loads of food and another that produces huge volumes of gas and oil. It's reasonable that prices go up, and it's not the fault of the government.
We now have an entitlement society that doesn't just extend to a few council tenants but rather the entire population, in particular those owning property outright. The WFP histrionics is directly caused by this.
we have an extensive and highly effective safety net. Sure, there are minor issues with it like weird tax incentives that require harsh sanctions to get people off the couch, but on the whole it's pretty good. It did not require a universal energy supplement on top. A top up to UC and Pension Credit? Maybe.
there is now a complete disassociation between personal finances and the world economy, war and diplomacy, energy policy and so on. No one really cares about these things because they know politicians will buy their votes, and damn the long term consequences.
Another example is COVID, where people at the bottom were protected from unemployment and rich people simply WFH and generated gigantic savings which fired inflation in the following years
Basically, I think we learn to take stuff on the chin again. Savings aren't just for holidays, but also global pandemics and war.
On the energy piece, there is a major difference between what you and I can cope with in domestic energy bills and the impact of industrial energy costs being so high.
Two primary drivers why our economy is struggling this badly - energy-price driven inflation and housing costs.
The UK is preposterously expensive on energy costs, with that price chosen by us to be set based on the commodity price of a commodity we use increasingly little of.
That means that everything we buy costs more because energy prices increase the cost to produce. And costs are so high that the UK is now a poor place to invest for manufacturing.
Decouple energy costs from gas prices and we can turbocharge economic performance.
"Tube drivers threaten to strike if £76,000 pay demand refused London Underground drivers are already comfortably inside top 10pc of all salaried employees in Britain"
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Sorry, who are we at war with?
We are in a war with Russia at the moment, and have been for a number of years. It is a Cold War at the moment, and I hope it remains that way, but it is a war nonetheless.
It'll be interesting to look back in a few decades and try to work out when it began: Salisbury, or earlier?
OK, so we're not at war with anyone. We are in a "cold war" (i.e., not an actual war) with Russia.
Russia does spread discord and misinformation in our country, including by supporting environmental groups, as well as supporting Brexit (to try to be on topic for the thread) and alt right groups. I agree with you there. At the same time, one of the things that we have that Russia doesn't is democracy, including the right to protest.
I think that is not strong enough - and TBH that "Cold War" is not accurate.
The Helsinki Commission, for example, identified 150 known or suspected attacks since 2022 on NATO countries, including in the UK. Some of these are large and significant. I would not think it unreasonable, for example, to wonder whether there is a Russian element in the recent attacks on supermarket IT infrastructure.
To visualize the breadth of the Kremlin’s efforts, Helsinki Commission staff have mapped nearly 150 hybrid operations executed in NATO territory occurring since the outset of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine that have been attributed to or suspected of Russia (see Figure 1). The identified hybrid operations fall into four categories: critical infrastructure attacks, violence campaigns, weaponized migration, and election interference and information campaigns. chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.csce.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Spotlight-on-the-Shadow-War-Website.pdf
I love how 37% blame the EU (!) for life without them being a disappointment. There's no reasoning with some people. And, yes, let's have lots of apologising from the Tories. For Brexit, for Johnson, for Truss. In general for becoming decadent and grossly self-indulgent at the very time the country needed them most. The apology (if delivered with force and sincerity) is a powerful thing and underused in politics. The Conservative party need to embrace it now if this grand old institution is to save itself. Say sorry, make us believe it, scrape the crud off the keel and set sail for waters new.
We made it clear what we wanted (something something cake) and they didn't give it to us. Totes their fault.
But as a shrewdie put it,
Britain's political and media classes are way out of date (and out of touch) when it comes to opinion about Brexit.
Leave has comprehensively lost the argument. However, possession is nine-tenths of the law here and the status quo isn't going to change with Reform so strong in the polls.
These pro-Palestinian and pro-environmental extremist groups are becoming a distinct threat to the country.
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Sorry, who are we at war with?
We are in a war with Russia at the moment, and have been for a number of years. It is a Cold War at the moment, and I hope it remains that way, but it is a war nonetheless.
It'll be interesting to look back in a few decades and try to work out when it began: Salisbury, or earlier?
OK, so we're not at war with anyone. We are in a "cold war" (i.e., not an actual war) with Russia.
Russia does spread discord and misinformation in our country, including by supporting environmental groups, as well as supporting Brexit (to try to be on topic for the thread) and alt right groups. I agree with you there. At the same time, one of the things that we have that Russia doesn't is democracy, including the right to protest.
Well yes, it's a war. A cold war; but that's the point: all it would take is some minor miscalculations for it to go hot. IMV it's really important to acknowledge that.
Also, the right to protest is not unlimited. Rightly so. Do you defend what those people did at Brize Norton?
Were you feeling hot and bothered? Needed to start another argument on the same topic?
I do not do very well in the heat, I have had about 2 hours sleep in about 15 minute blocks last night.
Serious suggestion for @TSE : Have a look at an air-to-air reversible heat pump which can cool as well as heat at modest cost. You can get ones which are portable or are a single unit installed inside, or one with the other half outside.
Aesthetic considerations may apply especially on the outside walls, but in time I'll going over to these for my whole heating system and I'm happy that I can do it tidily at my place.
Technically these can room by room, or one-to-several-rooms, but WiFi or remote controllers are available (I have an app on my phone).
At present I have a portable unit for trial (since 2. years ago) which is vented to a conservatory via an opening upperlight window, and I'm impressed. It takes the edge off the really hot summer period quite well. You could potentially get one for your bedroom, or for the landing to do the upstairs.
It would probably pay to take a careful look at noise levels if choosing.
It’s because I was staying in a hotel last night that was the issue.
I should have packed my Dyson fan.
Take a lukewarm bath before bed in order to reduce your body temperature slightly.
Hold on, you're minted. Just book an air-conditioned hotel room next time.
"Tube drivers threaten to strike if £76,000 pay demand refused London Underground drivers are already comfortably inside top 10pc of all salaried employees in Britain"
In case anyone wants to fact check @Malmesbury , this is a good place to brush up on your fission engineering.
Nuclear Technology, Volume 207, Issue sup1 (2021) https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/unct20/207/sup1 Special issue on the Manhattan Project Nuclear Science and Technology Development at Los Alamos National Laboratory
(An open access issue of the usually very much not open access journal.)
Recommended for those interested in the history. ..It is interesting to reflect on the different levels of understanding of atomic weapons physics–in Britain and the U.S., versus Germany–during the war. By the early 1940s, it was well understood in Britain and the U.S. that once a supercritical mass is assembled, the fission chain reaction leads to heating, explosion, and material expansion to the point that the assembly becomes subcritical. This is the heart of the physics embodied in the Frisch-Peierls, Pryce-Dirac, Serber, and Bethe-Feynman formulas. However, in contrast, Jeremy Bernstein’s fascinating 1996 book Hitler’s Uranium Club shows that Heisenberg and his team seemed not to understand this basic idea, thinking erroneously that an atomic bomb could work at 100% efficiency and fission all the nuclear material..
What Heisenberg *ass*umed, seems to be that by the time physical assembly had happened, the nuclear reaction would be done.
I'd recommend https://nuclearweaponarchive.org - it has quite a bit more, including some quite interesting calculations on efficiency.
The history is pretty interesting. The British contribution to the wartime bomb is often under-acknowledged, particular in comparison with the rightly celebrated Hungarians.
It's acknowledge in all the semi-serious histories.
The post war stuff is actually more screwed up.
A lot of authors followed the line that the UK was blundering around, trying to get an H Bomb working (and failing), when the Americans stepped in and took us back on board.
In fact the UK was trying to figure out spherical implosion of the secondary. Which is much, much harder. The Americans went for the simple cylindrical implosion (initially) to simplify the design and increase margins. When they found out that the UK had gone straight to spherical secondaries, they were somewhere between impressed and appalled. The tests were very much hope - calculation was close to impossible in the 50s for such designs.
The fact that the UK got them to work in the end was quite interesting.
"Tube drivers threaten to strike if £76,000 pay demand refused London Underground drivers are already comfortably inside top 10pc of all salaried employees in Britain"
Were you feeling hot and bothered? Needed to start another argument on the same topic?
I do not do very well in the heat, I have had about 2 hours sleep in about 15 minute blocks last night.
Serious suggestion for @TSE : Have a look at an air-to-air reversible heat pump which can cool as well as heat at modest cost. You can get ones which are portable or are a single unit installed inside, or one with the other half outside.
Aesthetic considerations may apply especially on the outside walls, but in time I'll going over to these for my whole heating system and I'm happy that I can do it tidily at my place.
Technically these can room by room, or one-to-several-rooms, but WiFi or remote controllers are available (I have an app on my phone).
At present I have a portable unit for trial (since 2. years ago) which is vented to a conservatory via an opening upperlight window, and I'm impressed. It takes the edge off the really hot summer period quite well. You could potentially get one for your bedroom, or for the landing to do the upstairs.
It would probably pay to take a careful look at noise levels if choosing.
It’s because I was staying in a hotel last night that was the issue.
I should have packed my Dyson fan.
Take a lukewarm bath before bed in order to reduce your body temperature slightly.
Hold on, you're minted. Just book an air-conditioned hotel room next time.
It is air conditioned.
I do not do well in heat.
Nor me. In fact, my legs have grossly swollen since this time yesterday. But the point of air conditioning is to keep the room cool.
I love how 37% blame the EU (!) for life without them being a disappointment. There's no reasoning with some people. And, yes, let's have lots of apologising from the Tories. For Brexit, for Johnson, for Truss. In general for becoming decadent and grossly self-indulgent at the very time the country needed them most. The apology (if delivered with force and sincerity) is a powerful thing and underused in politics. The Conservative party need to embrace it now if this grand old institution is to save itself. Say sorry, make us believe it, scrape the crud off the keel and set sail for waters new.
Self-indulgence is the order of the day in politics unfortunately. Brexit is a prime example and anything to do with Farage even more so.
Nevertheless the Tories might as well apologise. They are not doing well as it is.
The interesting questions are how big the blocking minority on change really is, and what happens while the blockage remains?
It'll be slow and incremental ever closer union with the EU until the wheels come off the latest Farage vanity project and the blocking minority fragments.
The 2029 GE is the inflection point. Any remotely stable LAB-LIB-SNP coalition will mean more of the same until 2034. By then Farage will be 70 (or hopefully dead) and the Turquoise Taliban will have been trying to maintain (lower case 'm') momentum in opposition for 10 years.
Comments
Spread the notion public sector workers are all living on huge pensions in luxury and getting regular increases (as well as other freebies) and you can sell notions of "haircuts" quite easily.
The truth is much more complex. We all know public sector pensions come in a variety of shapes and sizes and benefits and contributions but that complicates the issue and muddies the waters which makes it more difficult.
What it masks is the complete and utter failure of the whole area of mortgage and pensions in the private sector. Take out an investment in the stock market - it'll pay your mortgage and your pension - no. Millions were duped into setting up investment plans which returned a fraction of what was needed.
If you want a vast area of untapped wealth, go after the financial sector and the City - how about some nice windfall taxes or a transaction tax on stock market investments? It's the same as "gold plated" public sector pensions, isn't it?
We are at war, and groups like Extinction Rebellion are very much fifth columnists. The sad thing is that many of the 'activists' probably don't even realise it.
Fascinating polling - but Yougov are being a little bit mischievous imo asking about extreme positions (Rejoin !) and not putting some more emphasis on adopting a significantly closer position (EFTA / Norway Plus or whatever).
Reading the tables, there seems to be a bit of a divide emerging between Tories and RefUKs - on the Q whether Brexit has been "more of a success" or "more of a failure", and who is responsible.
More than half of 2024 RefUK voters blame Keir Starmer (53%) and the Labour Party (59%) for Brexit being "more of a failure". I'm not sure how that works when they have been in power for under a year nearly a decade later. But it does highlight the low information nature of even the part of the Reform base who are subbed in to Yougov. No wonder Farage is backing his politics of pointing at "anything over there", and blaming it.
The Conservative 2024 Voter equivalent numbers on the same question are 38% blaming Keir Starmer and 50% blaming the Labour Party. And 84%+ of 2024 Conservative Voters think that the Conservative Party is responsible or very responsible for Brexit being more of a failure than a success is an interesting one.
Reform supporters are more dogmatic and persistent in their embrace of symbolic positions that are a lacking in basis ("Keir Starmer !!"), but is a smidge of self-reflection sinking in amongst the Tories?
Then money we didn't have got spent on subsidising fuel bills as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Simply put, Brexit got fucked by "events".
Brexit rests entirely on the shoulders of the Conservative Party, not least on the ample shoulders of former Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
If not, what's the point?
The Size of the Starship fireball is crazy, if you consider this is like 5% of the methane load that a full stack would have. The sheer amount of propellant on this vehicle sometimes is overwhelming.
https://x.com/BCCarCounters/status/1935657790502002694
LEAVE 52%
REMAIN 48%
The answer is Yes.
And would immigration be higher if the UK re-joined the EU.
The answer is Yes.
It's a shitshow
QED
Nor will there ever be whilst Reform is a political force in the land.
Without that apology to Brussels, they will just smile politely at talk of rejoin - and think to themselvrs "Fuck off. We don't need this British psychodrama every few years..."
Nor part of Israel"s plan.
Which is why any musings about getting rid of salary sacrifice and reducing the tax free limits on DC pensions are so dangerous.
The UK electorate fall for the huckster promising a magical solution time after time, it's the reason for Brexit, never completed nuclear power stations rather than well-insulated houses, prescription pills rather than healthy lifestyles, crime rather than sure start...
There's a lot to be said for recovering part of that stance, now that the temperature has hotted up again.
(We can probably be sure they aren't taking the Mad Mullahs to sanctuary in Beijing...)
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/PQ9kmb8xKSQ
One-minute video. Jimmy Carr tells Joe Rogan how to fix the economy and how Mickey Mouse degrees led to woke
There's a bit of it in the questions asked, but imo not enough.
If the Conservatives backed rejoin they may as well merge with the LDs with the rest going Reform.
A Truss defection to Reform might help them though
"The public no longer backs spending on international aid, Trade Minister Douglas Alexander has suggested."
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn4lygdx95vo
But China's apparentl involvement certainly doesn't help that.
I fully understand and appreciate that administration is needed in any structure. I propose to greatly simply the structure to cut the amount of administration needed.
They were able to confirm the intact portion says '.......just days from developing a nuclear bomb.......'
And btw, another sign of our broken economy is how often investment advice involves American rather than British stock markets.
Actually that relates to something I've thought about recently. Is the old fashioned declaration of war a thing of the past? When was the last time a country officially declared war on another?
"Only in the trench did I understand the sense of the expression "your heart in your mouth." Something quite improbable was being created all around--the steppe was trembling like a vibration test flg. thundering, rumbling, whistling, gnashing--all mixed together in some terrible, seemingly unending cacophony. The trench proved to be so shallow and unreliable that one wanted to burrow into the sand so as not to hear this nightmare.., the thick wave from the explosion passed over us, sweeping away and leveling everything. Behind it came hot metal raining down from above. Pieces of the rocket were thrown ten kilometers away, and large windows were shattered in structures 40 kilometers away. A 400 kilogram spherical tank landed on the roof of the installation and testing wing. seven kilometers from the launch pad."
"We arrived at the fueling station and were horrified--the windows and doors were smashed out, the iron entrance gate was askew, the equipment was scattered about with the light o[ dawn and was turned to stone--the steppe was literally strewn with dead animals and birds. Where so many o[ them came from and how they appeared in such quantities at the station I still do not understand."
Page 691 of http://wayback.archive-it.org/1792/20100206083806/http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20000088626_2000122281.pdf - which is well worth a read if you're into the space race.
Incidentally, there's an international aspect to yesterday's RUD: large pieces of debris landed across the border in Mexico. Allegedly SpaceX own that land as well, but I can imagine the Mexicans are not best pleased.
Aren't the two biggest groups of public sector workers nurses and teachers? Neither of those groups are paid particularly well, neither have "gold-plated" pensions, both do very important work.
Magic bullets usually turn out to be blanks.
It'll be interesting to look back in a few decades and try to work out when it began: Salisbury, or earlier?
Aesthetic considerations may apply especially on the outside walls, but in time I'll going over to these for my whole heating system and I'm happy that I can do it tidily at my place.
Technically these can room by room, or one-to-several-rooms, but WiFi or remote controllers are available (I have an app on my phone).
At present I have a portable unit for trial (since 2. years ago) which is vented to a conservatory via an opening upperlight window, and I'm impressed. It takes the edge off the really hot summer period quite well. You could potentially get one for your bedroom, or for the landing to do the upstairs.
It would probably pay to take a careful look at noise levels if choosing.
The UK would have had the same immigrants plus the regular net immigration from Eastern and Southern Europe.
Incidentally why are immigrants that continually churn in and out deemed to be better than those who make a long term commitment to a new country ?
"If Brexit was so bad why didn't you do anything about it?"
Micky Mouse is personally responible for modern kids not understanding the geometry of 2d and 3d solids. Those bloody spherical ears !
(/Telegraph)
I'd recommend https://nuclearweaponarchive.org - it has quite a bit more, including some quite interesting calculations on efficiency.
I should have packed my Dyson fan.
Strangely, the immigrants have other ideas.
As Labour's amazing plan of taxing jobs and spending more somehow fails to stimulate growth, someone will have to pay.
It won't be their unions, the recipient of taxpayer-funded largesse. The wealthy are ideologically convenient for the left to hit with a big tax stick. Just a shame that the consequent actions will be, most probably, less than economically helpful.
Focusing on gouging individuals and corporations with as high a rate as possible instead of recognising lower rates can yield higher revenues (which is what matters for spending) is a stereotypical leftwing failing. We'll see it soon, I suspect.
Russia does spread discord and misinformation in our country, including by supporting environmental groups, as well as supporting Brexit (to try to be on topic for the thread) and alt right groups. I agree with you there. At the same time, one of the things that we have that Russia doesn't is democracy, including the right to protest.
Activists! Fifth columnists!! Distinct threat to the country!!!
Harrumph!!!!
Yesterday was brutal, and I need to go and walk around a lake in the woods before it gets up to the 29C forecast for here. I also need a sunhat, because the wide brim cricket hat I picked up at Grace Road in the noughties has reached the end of the road.
Currently 21C, so it's time to move.
The British contribution to the wartime bomb is often under-acknowledged, particular in comparison with the rightly celebrated Hungarians.
Hope IDS enjoys his biking anyway
Or is it to damage military aircraft?
I get confused as to which violence is AOK and which is bad manners.
*Sorry, ex-hotels.
Immigrants that come and then go again mean lower net immigration. I wasn't deeming them better or worse, just noting that.
The highlights I do know of were:
A new income-related tax, the Universal Social Charge.
Across the board cuts in public sector pay (this also cuts salary-related pension entitlements).
A new local property tax (charged as a percentage of self-assessed property value)
Water charges (which is where the limit of public acquiescence was reached and this was ultimately reversed)
- most people can afford a huge spike in energy bills, including me.
- there is a huge European war on between one country that grows loads of food and another that produces huge volumes of gas and oil. It's reasonable that prices go up, and it's not the fault of the government.
- We now have an entitlement society that doesn't just extend to a few council tenants but rather the entire population, in particular those owning property outright. The WFP histrionics is directly caused by this.
- we have an extensive and highly effective safety net. Sure, there are minor issues with it like weird tax incentives that require harsh sanctions to get people off the couch, but on the whole it's pretty good. It did not require a universal energy supplement on top. A top up to UC and Pension Credit? Maybe.
- there is now a complete disassociation between personal finances and the world economy, war and diplomacy, energy policy and so on. No one really cares about these things because they know politicians will buy their votes, and damn the long term consequences.
- Another example is COVID, where people at the bottom were protected from unemployment and rich people simply WFH and generated gigantic savings which fired inflation in the following years
Basically, I think we learn to take stuff on the chin again. Savings aren't just for holidays, but also global pandemics and war.It's not enough to condemn wrongthink. Those who are guilty of it must publicly repudiate their doubleplusungood opinions before they can become respected members of society again.
Or, instead of trying to force apologies, we could stop fixating on the EU and start trying to actually mend our economic situation.
So long, of course, as the cut off is a bit above my income!
But whenever this comes up, there is always a fan club for the protestors, who say things like "Protest without inconvenience for others is meaningless".
Hold on, you're minted. Just book an air-conditioned hotel room next time.
Also, the right to protest is not unlimited. Rightly so. Do you defend what those people did at Brize Norton?
Now we're no longer in the EU, we blame anybody involved in brexit.
What's that saying about if you meet arseholes all day, you're the arsehole?
We're at the point where we're looking in the mirror and there's an arsehole looking back.
Two primary drivers why our economy is struggling this badly - energy-price driven inflation and housing costs.
The UK is preposterously expensive on energy costs, with that price chosen by us to be set based on the commodity price of a commodity we use increasingly little of.
That means that everything we buy costs more because energy prices increase the cost to produce. And costs are so high that the UK is now a poor place to invest for manufacturing.
Decouple energy costs from gas prices and we can turbocharge economic performance.
London Underground drivers are already comfortably inside top 10pc of all salaried employees in Britain"
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/06/20/tube-drivers-threaten-strike-if-pay-demand-is-refused/
The Helsinki Commission, for example, identified 150 known or suspected attacks since 2022 on NATO countries, including in the UK. Some of these are large and significant. I would not think it unreasonable, for example, to wonder whether there is a Russian element in the recent attacks on supermarket IT infrastructure.
To visualize the breadth of the Kremlin’s efforts, Helsinki Commission staff have mapped nearly 150 hybrid operations executed in NATO territory occurring since the outset of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine that have been attributed to or suspected of Russia (see Figure 1). The identified hybrid operations fall into four categories: critical infrastructure attacks, violence campaigns, weaponized migration, and election interference and information campaigns.
chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.csce.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Spotlight-on-the-Shadow-War-Website.pdf
But as a shrewdie put it,
Britain's political and media classes are way out of date (and out of touch) when it comes to opinion about Brexit.
Leave has comprehensively lost the argument. However, possession is nine-tenths of the law here and the status quo isn't going to change with Reform so strong in the polls.
https://bsky.app/profile/davidherdson.bsky.social/post/3lrzmqrgls222
The interesting questions are how big the blocking minority on change really is, and what happens while the blockage remains?
I do not do well in heat.
The post war stuff is actually more screwed up.
A lot of authors followed the line that the UK was blundering around, trying to get an H Bomb working (and failing), when the Americans stepped in and took us back on board.
In fact the UK was trying to figure out spherical implosion of the secondary. Which is much, much harder. The Americans went for the simple cylindrical implosion (initially) to simplify the design and increase margins. When they found out that the UK had gone straight to spherical secondaries, they were somewhere between impressed and appalled. The tests were very much hope - calculation was close to impossible in the 50s for such designs.
The fact that the UK got them to work in the end was quite interesting.
Until it doesn't. And the driver has to make split second decisions.
Albany Stakes: IPANEMA QUEEN (each way)
Commonwealth Cup: BABOUCHE (win), WHISTLEJACKET (each way)
Cornonation Stakes: FALAKEYAH (win), SIMMERING (each way)
KIng Edward VII Stakes: WIMBLEDON HAWKEYE (win)
Nevertheless the Tories might as well apologise. They are not doing well as it is.
The 2029 GE is the inflection point. Any remotely stable LAB-LIB-SNP coalition will mean more of the same until 2034. By then Farage will be 70 (or hopefully dead) and the Turquoise Taliban will have been trying to maintain (lower case 'm') momentum in opposition for 10 years.
Another three plane loads of either negotiators or defectors just heading to Oman.