Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
That 2nd question really is quite damning on the two main parties of the left.
Especially Labour, 69% of Labour voters would raise taxes on the rich even if it lost revenue for public services, showing Labour is really at heart about class war. At least LD voters are near split in that scenario
Nonsense.
You are the most prolific class warrior on here, what with your elite schools, elitist universities and taxation free inheritance for the wealthiest families.
All those things can legitimately be held to benefit the national in totality. Deliberately hitting the economy because you think it will hurt your 'enemies' more is quite a different kettle of fish.
My point was specifically about HY's class warfare hypocrisy. He fights harder for his perceived "class" than Scargill ever did for the peasantry.
I dispute your point that educating "Tim Nice But Dim" or Donald Trump or Boris Johnson because of their parental wealth, whilst being wholly unemployable in any role that wasn't organised on their behalf by their entitled parents, is more appropriate and beneficial to the nation than a gifted son or daughter of a street cleaner having the opportunity to become Governor of the Bank of England or DPP.
Plenty did when we had more grammar schools, even 'son of a toolmaker' Sir Keir went to a grammar school for most of his secondary education and then DPP head and PM
Grammar schools brought with them their own intrinsic unfairness.
What about a fully funded universal education system like Mrs Thatcher promoted in the 1970s when as Education Minister she replaced Grammar Schools with top quality, meritocratic Comprehensives?
Comprehensives explicitly were NOT meritocratic. ISTR the term 'meritocracy' was coined pejoratively to describe the horror of 'the clever' rising to the top. (Sounds daft, but bad news for the non-clever majority). Comprehensives were an outcome of this point of view. (To be clear, I'm arguing with your use of the word 'meritocratic' rather than your position on grammar schools/comprehensives, on which my position is very much an essay question seeing both sides, even now not reaching a clear conclusion, despite most of my daughters being at grammar schools.)
I know there is some debate regarding Michael Young's notion of promotion by merit. And to an extent the Grammar School fulfilled that idea, but it came with so much other baggage I am in principle against them.
My Comprehensive was a raging success. With proper funding and support by the community, almost everyone, irrespective of social status attended. Yes, some tried to get into King Edward's and Camp Hill but failed, but people I was at school with became High Commissioners to Chile. CFOs of EE, Vice Presidents at Reckitt Benkeiser and rock stars. I'd say it was very merit based in it's levels of achievement.
These days it is a run of the mill academy, with social climbing parents bussing their children into Warwickshire's Alcester Grammar School.
Reform are now going to be voting against the welfare bill, so that's all of the oppo Tories excepted, and Rupert Lowe is i think on board as he's firmly in the cut welfare camp. By my reckoning Starmer has three choices 1) bend the knee to Kemi and beg her for the votes and hope there aren't 50 or so more silent rebels who will strike if he bends the knee or 2) delay and compromise knowing he'll need to buy off 50 or more rebels 3) scrap the bill entirely and face the market reaction to a 5 billion deficit black hole and yet another u turn
Sometimes you get your beliefs and views challenged head on and last evening, at a local meeting, I had the rare opportunity to meet and have a prolonged 1-to-1 conversation with a property developer or rather a senior planner at one of the big developers.
They are looking to redevelop a brownfield site near us (the site has a gasholder, electricity pylons and high pressure gas pipes running across it and is designated Metropolitan Open Land (MoL) in the Newham Local Plan).
The two big problems from the developer side were first the cost of decontamination. Removing a foot of topsoil across a 22 acre site isn't cheap or easy - deconstructing and cleaning a gasholder isn't easy or cheap with decades of accumulated and highly toxic sludge at the bottom.
On top of that, the second problem was the cost of construction - the cost of labour and materials had spiked in the past 3-5 years but that was exacerbated by Section 106 payments, community infrastructure levy payments and the carbon off-set tax. In other words, London was, in his view, the most expensive place in the world to build.
All that was further compounded by the fact flats and houses weren't being sold at the prices developers needed to make even a small profit so the argument very often came down to economics rather than NIMBY-ism. Could the site be developed - was it viable as a development opportunity?
The paradox, he said, was that the places where people most needed houses and the places most people wanted to live were the ones where the costs of construction were at their highest - specifically, Inner London brownfield sites. Newham isn't replete with Green Belt - the MoL was meant to be a form of urban green belt to provide some green space and prevent complete urban sprawl.
He also told me (and I don't know if it's true) in Q1 in London, 4,000 new dwellings were started and 3,000 completed but the requirement is 88,000 new dwellings per year which in his view was wholly unachievable.
I left the meeting frustrated and depressed - the housing problem has been widely portrayed as a struggle between developers and locals but it's nothing like that - it's a series of economic paradoxes which make sensible development economically unviable and force developers into over-dense applications simply in order to make the sums add up.
It may be there are special issues with brownfield and contaminated sites and the costs of their remediation which need to be mitigated "somehow" (and I've no idea how) but the fact the scarcity of alternatives mean such sites now have to be considered speaks volumes as to the size of the problems and the paucity of other solutions.
Yes, this is indeed the case. Developers have no interest in developing where they can't make money (and nor should they). And yet, yes, sites like the one you describe are absolutely the ones where people want to live and where the UK as a whole is best off if it gets developed. My view is that the answer to this is state-led development: the state acquires the land, does the remediation and delivers the site (or develops it itself, or a mix of the two). Certainly this has a public cost - but there is also a public cost in putting more and more people on peripheral greenfield sites with poor connections. More broadly, we all have to live with the consequences of development - visual impact, traffic impact, environmental impact, societal impact. Development done badly imposes costs on us which need either sucking up or spending money on to address. My belief is that spending money on doing development right is both the right thing to do and the cost-effective solution.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
Nah. Without the spiv they sink to low teens and then disappear. Nobody is queueing up to see Tice and Yusuf on the campaign trail. They'd particularly lose the Boris Granny votes
Sometimes you get your beliefs and views challenged head on and last evening, at a local meeting, I had the rare opportunity to meet and have a prolonged 1-to-1 conversation with a property developer or rather a senior planner at one of the big developers.
They are looking to redevelop a brownfield site near us (the site has a gasholder, electricity pylons and high pressure gas pipes running across it and is designated Metropolitan Open Land (MoL) in the Newham Local Plan).
The two big problems from the developer side were first the cost of decontamination. Removing a foot of topsoil across a 22 acre site isn't cheap or easy - deconstructing and cleaning a gasholder isn't easy or cheap with decades of accumulated and highly toxic sludge at the bottom.
On top of that, the second problem was the cost of construction - the cost of labour and materials had spiked in the past 3-5 years but that was exacerbated by Section 106 payments, community infrastructure levy payments and the carbon off-set tax. In other words, London was, in his view, the most expensive place in the world to build.
All that was further compounded by the fact flats and houses weren't being sold at the prices developers needed to make even a small profit so the argument very often came down to economics rather than NIMBY-ism. Could the site be developed - was it viable as a development opportunity?
The paradox, he said, was that the places where people most needed houses and the places most people wanted to live were the ones where the costs of construction were at their highest - specifically, Inner London brownfield sites. Newham isn't replete with Green Belt - the MoL was meant to be a form of urban green belt to provide some green space and prevent complete urban sprawl.
He also told me (and I don't know if it's true) in Q1 in London, 4,000 new dwellings were started and 3,000 completed but the requirement is 88,000 new dwellings per year which in his view was wholly unachievable.
I left the meeting frustrated and depressed - the housing problem has been widely portrayed as a struggle between developers and locals but it's nothing like that - it's a series of economic paradoxes which make sensible development economically unviable and force developers into over-dense applications simply in order to make the sums add up.
It may be there are special issues with brownfield and contaminated sites and the costs of their remediation which need to be mitigated "somehow" (and I've no idea how) but the fact the scarcity of alternatives mean such sites now have to be considered speaks volumes as to the size of the problems and the paucity of other solutions.
That was roughly why the Olympics site was available, wasn't it? Which points to a solution, albeit one that doesn't scale well.
Suspect the problem lies in trying to do the financial maths across too small a unit. If each development has to cover the costs of its own remediation, some sites will never make sense to develop, even if the alternative is hanging round as a bit of wasteland. The key bad choice (pollute the soil to a mad degree) has already been taken.
See also the food shops from the last thread. (Thanks, @Jim_Miller for the local detail.) It's in nobody's individual interests to be the ones to solve that problem. Or the wider question of providing services to people who cost a lot, or paying taxes.
I don't have much of an answer, beyond reheated Butskellism.
What would happen if the State paid to decontaminate sites across London and then auctioned them as prime development land with outline planning permission?
They probably don't care if they leave the country either, even if it makes the country poorer.
Ah, the rich "plastic patriots"
"Do what we want or we'll skream and skream and run away."
Yes, many of them will. But if they do, they've got no effing right to screech about the quality of services in the UK. The sad thing is, they seem to want it both ways: to pay eff-all tax, and yet not have to see any poor people. They don't *mind* poor people; it's just that they should remain out of sight...
Quite a lot of rich people in the U.K. are immigrants. To them, the quality of life vs tax burden is quite transactional.
It also goes down the scale. Why should my Indian colleague (in the country 4 years) stay in London vs move to Berlin?
It’s almost as if saying that there is no such thing as (or it’s evil there is) a British identity has a downside.
Indeed. We need to attract people. But as ever, it is a balance - and my point is about plastic patriots: people who talk about their love of the country, but threaten to move away the moment something goes against them. And who, almost always, use public services. And often comment from abroad anyway...
Just to clarify, did your wife love Turkey, did she move away when she found a better option for her life and did she use Turkish public services?
She loves Turkey, yes. She does not love Turkey's attitude to women and women's rights, and decided her life might best be spent in a more enlightened country. For her, it was not about money, but lifestyle.
Now, please tell us all about your wife so we can ask you about her motivations in life...
If I had a wife I would however I just wondered if you saw the hypocrisy of criticising people you don’t know for their motivations in leaving a country, one which they might claim to love and have benefited from through public services when your wife was in the same position.
These people aren’t leaving for something as one-dimensional as “money”, it is in fact, like with your wife a lifestyle choice. They can live in the UK, enduring the shitty weather and people envying them whilst the fiscal set up works for them and they don’t feel they are handing over too much of their money, and when the fiscal set up changes to be unfavourable they choose a new lifestyle of being somewhere with better weather and a less envious society wanting more of their money.
I totally understand you will never get this sort of situation, you have your position on the wealthy and that’s your choice but your envy really does shine through and maybe, when you are boiling with distaste for these sorts of people, remember that you are married to someone who loves a country they left, whose public services they enjoyed and benefited from, because they could get a life that worked better for them and because they didn’t like the attitudes and laws in that country.
It’s really no different in essence, it’s just the fact these people have so much wealth that gets to you.
Had a look at the detail of that MRP and some of the results are eye opening:
-Lab facing complete wipe out in Birmingham (guess the bin strike doesn't help). -Reform picking up seats like Luton N and Slough suggesting they are getting some votes from working class ethnic minority voters (both places voted for Brexit) - Reform 24 points ahead in Yvette Cooper's seat - Reform only 2 points behind in Bootle - Reform winning Birmingham Ladywood with only 23% of the vote (and Lab 3rd behind Gaza Indie)
The overall seats prediction might be correct but these individual predictions are not believable. Reform aren't going to win B'ham Ladywood.
Reform are now going to be voting against the welfare bill, so that's all of the oppo Tories excepted, and Rupert Lowe is i think on board as he's firmly in the cut welfare camp. By my reckoning Starmer has three choices 1) bend the knee to Kemi and beg her for the votes and hope there aren't 50 or so more silent rebels who will strike if he bends the knee or 2) delay and compromise knowing he'll need to buy off 50 or more rebels 3) scrap the bill entirely and face the market reaction to a 5 billion deficit black hole and yet another u turn
Do 3), acknowledge the black hole it has left us in, and choose another route that would have the same rebels howling; if not more.
Labour are now in power, not opposition. Their MPs need to understand that there are hard decisions to be made, and their own pet views are not sacrosanct.
Reform are now going to be voting against the welfare bill, so that's all of the oppo Tories excepted, and Rupert Lowe is i think on board as he's firmly in the cut welfare camp. By my reckoning Starmer has three choices 1) bend the knee to Kemi and beg her for the votes and hope there aren't 50 or so more silent rebels who will strike if he bends the knee or 2) delay and compromise knowing he'll need to buy off 50 or more rebels 3) scrap the bill entirely and face the market reaction to a 5 billion deficit black hole and yet another u turn
Knowing Starmer, is there potential value bet in him doing all three?
Sometimes you get your beliefs and views challenged head on and last evening, at a local meeting, I had the rare opportunity to meet and have a prolonged 1-to-1 conversation with a property developer or rather a senior planner at one of the big developers.
They are looking to redevelop a brownfield site near us (the site has a gasholder, electricity pylons and high pressure gas pipes running across it and is designated Metropolitan Open Land (MoL) in the Newham Local Plan).
The two big problems from the developer side were first the cost of decontamination. Removing a foot of topsoil across a 22 acre site isn't cheap or easy - deconstructing and cleaning a gasholder isn't easy or cheap with decades of accumulated and highly toxic sludge at the bottom.
On top of that, the second problem was the cost of construction - the cost of labour and materials had spiked in the past 3-5 years but that was exacerbated by Section 106 payments, community infrastructure levy payments and the carbon off-set tax. In other words, London was, in his view, the most expensive place in the world to build.
All that was further compounded by the fact flats and houses weren't being sold at the prices developers needed to make even a small profit so the argument very often came down to economics rather than NIMBY-ism. Could the site be developed - was it viable as a development opportunity?
The paradox, he said, was that the places where people most needed houses and the places most people wanted to live were the ones where the costs of construction were at their highest - specifically, Inner London brownfield sites. Newham isn't replete with Green Belt - the MoL was meant to be a form of urban green belt to provide some green space and prevent complete urban sprawl.
He also told me (and I don't know if it's true) in Q1 in London, 4,000 new dwellings were started and 3,000 completed but the requirement is 88,000 new dwellings per year which in his view was wholly unachievable.
I left the meeting frustrated and depressed - the housing problem has been widely portrayed as a struggle between developers and locals but it's nothing like that - it's a series of economic paradoxes which make sensible development economically unviable and force developers into over-dense applications simply in order to make the sums add up.
It may be there are special issues with brownfield and contaminated sites and the costs of their remediation which need to be mitigated "somehow" (and I've no idea how) but the fact the scarcity of alternatives mean such sites now have to be considered speaks volumes as to the size of the problems and the paucity of other solutions.
That was roughly why the Olympics site was available, wasn't it? Which points to a solution, albeit one that doesn't scale well.
Suspect the problem lies in trying to do the financial maths across too small a unit. If each development has to cover the costs of its own remediation, some sites will never make sense to develop, even if the alternative is hanging round as a bit of wasteland. The key bad choice (pollute the soil to a mad degree) has already been taken.
See also the food shops from the last thread. (Thanks, @Jim_Miller for the local detail.) It's in nobody's individual interests to be the ones to solve that problem. Or the wider question of providing services to people who cost a lot, or paying taxes.
I don't have much of an answer, beyond reheated Butskellism.
What would happen if the State paid to decontaminate sites across London and then auctioned them as prime development land with outline planning permission?
That would tip Britain's economy even further towards London. Our economy is uniquely unbalanced among our peer nations and also our history. We need to build new towns, with new jobs, away from the capital.
Reform are now going to be voting against the welfare bill, so that's all of the oppo Tories excepted, and Rupert Lowe is i think on board as he's firmly in the cut welfare camp. By my reckoning Starmer has three choices 1) bend the knee to Kemi and beg her for the votes and hope there aren't 50 or so more silent rebels who will strike if he bends the knee or 2) delay and compromise knowing he'll need to buy off 50 or more rebels 3) scrap the bill entirely and face the market reaction to a 5 billion deficit black hole and yet another u turn
I probably won't be supporting Reform now they've endorsed cake-ism.
They probably don't care if they leave the country either, even if it makes the country poorer.
Ah, the rich "plastic patriots"
"Do what we want or we'll skream and skream and run away."
Yes, many of them will. But if they do, they've got no effing right to screech about the quality of services in the UK. The sad thing is, they seem to want it both ways: to pay eff-all tax, and yet not have to see any poor people. They don't *mind* poor people; it's just that they should remain out of sight...
Quite a lot of rich people in the U.K. are immigrants. To them, the quality of life vs tax burden is quite transactional.
It also goes down the scale. Why should my Indian colleague (in the country 4 years) stay in London vs move to Berlin?
It’s almost as if saying that there is no such thing as (or it’s evil there is) a British identity has a downside.
Indeed. We need to attract people. But as ever, it is a balance - and my point is about plastic patriots: people who talk about their love of the country, but threaten to move away the moment something goes against them. And who, almost always, use public services. And often comment from abroad anyway...
Just to clarify, did your wife love Turkey, did she move away when she found a better option for her life and did she use Turkish public services?
She loves Turkey, yes. She does not love Turkey's attitude to women and women's rights, and decided her life might best be spent in a more enlightened country. For her, it was not about money, but lifestyle.
Now, please tell us all about your wife so we can ask you about her motivations in life...
If I had a wife I would however I just wondered if you saw the hypocrisy of criticising people you don’t know for their motivations in leaving a country, one which they might claim to love and have benefited from through public services when your wife was in the same position.
These people aren’t leaving for something as one-dimensional as “money”. (Snip)
Yes, that's exactly what the plastic patriots complain about. Tax.
As for my position on 'the wealthy': I am intensely relaxed on the wealthy. I think a certain amount of income disparity is healthy for a country. If you use your skills, and take calculated risks, and make money, good. Especially if you employ people in the process.
But I've never met a wealthy person who has not had a certain amount of luck, either in birth or opportunity. And I wish more wealthy people would consider how their life would be if those dice had not rolled them three-sixes.
A Tube passenger who killed a 'gentle' commuter with one punch after he brushed past him on an escalator will serve less than six years in jail.
Rakeem Miles, 23, grabbed AI engineer Samuel Winter, 28, from behind and ripped his top at Southwark underground station at 9.30pm on August 22 last year.
Miles then viciously knocked out Mr Winter with a powerful punch to the head before fleeing.
Had a look at the detail of that MRP and some of the results are eye opening:
-Lab facing complete wipe out in Birmingham (guess the bin strike doesn't help). -Reform picking up seats like Luton N and Slough suggesting they are getting some votes from working class ethnic minority voters (both places voted for Brexit) - Reform 24 points ahead in Yvette Cooper's seat - Reform only 2 points behind in Bootle - Reform winning Birmingham Ladywood with only 23% of the vote (and Lab 3rd behind Gaza Indie)
The overall seats prediction might be correct but these individual predictions are not believable. Reform aren't going to win B'ham Ladywood.
The seat prediction relies on (as an example) the LDs maintaining a weirdly efficient vote on the same vote share. Which means they are 1) making no progress nationally 2) the votes they lent to Labour in 24 arent coming back (but going where??) Because 3) they are almost fully retaining the tactical votes that won them 72 seats despite there being no impetus to GTTO this time The LDs have to make national progress to stand any chance of retaining 70 seats imo
Fptp cannot cope with the rise of Reform the same way it struggled with the Alliance and with UKIP 2015
Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
Nah. Without the spiv they sink to low teens and then disappear. Nobody is queueing up to see Tice and Yusuf on the campaign trail. They'd particularly lose the Boris Granny votes
But nobody is going to admit that.
One of the stories we tell ourselves is that we are all highly rational political calculating machines, thoughtfully considering the various manifestoes. Certainly not going for something as superficial and shallow as "I like politician X". That is very rarely true- most of us (me included) get no further than some inherited prejudices, whether we like the current state of the nation, and what we think of the cut of people's jib.
It's a mad system, but better than the alternatives.
Reform are now going to be voting against the welfare bill, so that's all of the oppo Tories excepted, and Rupert Lowe is i think on board as he's firmly in the cut welfare camp. By my reckoning Starmer has three choices 1) bend the knee to Kemi and beg her for the votes and hope there aren't 50 or so more silent rebels who will strike if he bends the knee or 2) delay and compromise knowing he'll need to buy off 50 or more rebels 3) scrap the bill entirely and face the market reaction to a 5 billion deficit black hole and yet another u turn
I probably won't be supporting Reform now they've endorsed cake-ism.
This is a gift to Badenoch as she supports the cuts, not least it is good politics but how on earth could the conservatives make the case for substantial cuts to the future benefit bill if they voted against this measure
Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
Nah. Without the spiv they sink to low teens and then disappear. Nobody is queueing up to see Tice and Yusuf on the campaign trail. They'd particularly lose the Boris Granny votes
But nobody is going to admit that.
One of the stories we tell ourselves is that we are all highly rational political calculating machines, thoughtfully considering the various manifestoes. Certainly not going for something as superficial and shallow as "I like politician X". That is very rarely true- most of us (me included) get no further than some inherited prejudices, whether we like the current state of the nation, and what we think of the cut of people's jib.
It's a mad system, but better than the alternatives.
Exactly, so hypothetical polling won't pick up the very very obvious reality that Reform ARE Farage and Farage almost exclusively. They'd have no seats in parliament but for his return
Sometimes you get your beliefs and views challenged head on and last evening, at a local meeting, I had the rare opportunity to meet and have a prolonged 1-to-1 conversation with a property developer or rather a senior planner at one of the big developers.
They are looking to redevelop a brownfield site near us (the site has a gasholder, electricity pylons and high pressure gas pipes running across it and is designated Metropolitan Open Land (MoL) in the Newham Local Plan).
The two big problems from the developer side were first the cost of decontamination. Removing a foot of topsoil across a 22 acre site isn't cheap or easy - deconstructing and cleaning a gasholder isn't easy or cheap with decades of accumulated and highly toxic sludge at the bottom.
On top of that, the second problem was the cost of construction - the cost of labour and materials had spiked in the past 3-5 years but that was exacerbated by Section 106 payments, community infrastructure levy payments and the carbon off-set tax. In other words, London was, in his view, the most expensive place in the world to build.
All that was further compounded by the fact flats and houses weren't being sold at the prices developers needed to make even a small profit so the argument very often came down to economics rather than NIMBY-ism. Could the site be developed - was it viable as a development opportunity?
The paradox, he said, was that the places where people most needed houses and the places most people wanted to live were the ones where the costs of construction were at their highest - specifically, Inner London brownfield sites. Newham isn't replete with Green Belt - the MoL was meant to be a form of urban green belt to provide some green space and prevent complete urban sprawl.
He also told me (and I don't know if it's true) in Q1 in London, 4,000 new dwellings were started and 3,000 completed but the requirement is 88,000 new dwellings per year which in his view was wholly unachievable.
I left the meeting frustrated and depressed - the housing problem has been widely portrayed as a struggle between developers and locals but it's nothing like that - it's a series of economic paradoxes which make sensible development economically unviable and force developers into over-dense applications simply in order to make the sums add up.
It may be there are special issues with brownfield and contaminated sites and the costs of their remediation which need to be mitigated "somehow" (and I've no idea how) but the fact the scarcity of alternatives mean such sites now have to be considered speaks volumes as to the size of the problems and the paucity of other solutions.
That was roughly why the Olympics site was available, wasn't it? Which points to a solution, albeit one that doesn't scale well.
Suspect the problem lies in trying to do the financial maths across too small a unit. If each development has to cover the costs of its own remediation, some sites will never make sense to develop, even if the alternative is hanging round as a bit of wasteland. The key bad choice (pollute the soil to a mad degree) has already been taken.
See also the food shops from the last thread. (Thanks, @Jim_Miller for the local detail.) It's in nobody's individual interests to be the ones to solve that problem. Or the wider question of providing services to people who cost a lot, or paying taxes.
I don't have much of an answer, beyond reheated Butskellism.
What would happen if the State paid to decontaminate sites across London and then auctioned them as prime development land with outline planning permission?
Probably the best way forward. But it would likely lead to Expanding The State and Making A Loss (the point is that these sites cost more to remediate than a developer can reasonably make back), and the nation isn't in the mood for those things.
The best answer is to not let polluting factories pollute the land we live on, but it's too late for that.
Reform are now going to be voting against the welfare bill, so that's all of the oppo Tories excepted, and Rupert Lowe is i think on board as he's firmly in the cut welfare camp. By my reckoning Starmer has three choices 1) bend the knee to Kemi and beg her for the votes and hope there aren't 50 or so more silent rebels who will strike if he bends the knee or 2) delay and compromise knowing he'll need to buy off 50 or more rebels 3) scrap the bill entirely and face the market reaction to a 5 billion deficit black hole and yet another u turn
Do 3), acknowledge the black hole it has left us in, and choose another route that would have the same rebels howling; if not more.
Labour are now in power, not opposition. Their MPs need to understand that there are hard decisions to be made, and their own pet views are not sacrosanct.
Yes they are but they are also not mere functionaries, you govern according to your principles. The rebels have some on this matter, the government absolutely do not and that's why they are failing. They don't believe in any of the things they are doing, its all just 'stuff to do'
Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
Nah. Without the spiv they sink to low teens and then disappear. Nobody is queueing up to see Tice and Yusuf on the campaign trail. They'd particularly lose the Boris Granny votes
But nobody is going to admit that.
One of the stories we tell ourselves is that we are all highly rational political calculating machines, thoughtfully considering the various manifestoes. Certainly not going for something as superficial and shallow as "I like politician X". That is very rarely true- most of us (me included) get no further than some inherited prejudices, whether we like the current state of the nation, and what we think of the cut of people's jib.
It's a mad system, but better than the alternatives.
Exactly, so hypothetical polling won't pick up the very very obvious reality that Reform ARE Farage and Farage almost exclusively. They'd have no seats in parliament but for his return
Except my family is voting Reform DESPITE Farage. They don’t like him very much but they feel they have no choice now but to roll the dice
Trump on NATO Chief calling him daddy: "He did it very affectionately. Daddy—you're my daddy."
Deborah Haynes is a fantastic asset to Sky on her defence role and is simply showing up the crass fawning of Rutte (and others) as I reported at the time
That 2nd question really is quite damning on the two main parties of the left.
Especially Labour, 69% of Labour voters would raise taxes on the rich even if it lost revenue for public services, showing Labour is really at heart about class war. At least LD voters are near split in that scenario
Nonsense.
You are the most prolific class warrior on here, what with your elite schools, elitist universities and taxation free inheritance for the wealthiest families.
All those things can legitimately be held to benefit the national in totality. Deliberately hitting the economy because you think it will hurt your 'enemies' more is quite a different kettle of fish.
My point was specifically about HY's class warfare hypocrisy. He fights harder for his perceived "class" than Scargill ever did for the peasantry.
I dispute your point that educating "Tim Nice But Dim" or Donald Trump or Boris Johnson because of their parental wealth, whilst being wholly unemployable in any role that wasn't organised on their behalf by their entitled parents, is more appropriate and beneficial to the nation than a gifted son or daughter of a street cleaner having the opportunity to become Governor of the Bank of England or DPP.
Plenty did when we had more grammar schools, even 'son of a toolmaker' Sir Keir went to a grammar school for most of his secondary education and then DPP head and PM
Grammar schools brought with them their own intrinsic unfairness.
What about a fully funded universal education system like Mrs Thatcher promoted in the 1970s when as Education Minister she replaced Grammar Schools with top quality, meritocratic Comprehensives?
Comprehensives explicitly were NOT meritocratic. ISTR the term 'meritocracy' was coined pejoratively to describe the horror of 'the clever' rising to the top. (Sounds daft, but bad news for the non-clever majority). Comprehensives were an outcome of this point of view. (To be clear, I'm arguing with your use of the word 'meritocratic' rather than your position on grammar schools/comprehensives, on which my position is very much an essay question seeing both sides, even now not reaching a clear conclusion, despite most of my daughters being at grammar schools.)
I know there is some debate regarding Michael Young's notion of promotion by merit. And to an extent the Grammar School fulfilled that idea, but it came with so much other baggage I am in principle against them.
My Comprehensive was a raging success. With proper funding and support by the community, almost everyone, irrespective of social status attended. Yes, some tried to get into King Edward's and Camp Hill but failed, but people I was at school with became High Commissioners to Chile. CFOs of EE, Vice Presidents at Reckitt Benkeiser and rock stars. I'd say it was very merit based in it's levels of achievement.
These days it is a run of the mill academy, with social climbing parents bussing their children into Warwickshire's Alcester Grammar School.
It sounds like you had the good fortune to attend a 'good' comprehensive, and that the 'social status' mix was rather further up the spectrum than average (though at the time it may not have felt like it!). Not that that is necessarily an argument for grammar schools - creaming off the most motivated 20% in poorer areas will result in the non-grammars being even worse - but your experience of a comprehensive isn't necessarily representative!
I don't have strong feelings about grammar schools (actually I do, but in both directions!) - but I think there are dozens of more important issues to address in education than whether to have more or fewer grammars.
Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
Nah. Without the spiv they sink to low teens and then disappear. Nobody is queueing up to see Tice and Yusuf on the campaign trail. They'd particularly lose the Boris Granny votes
But nobody is going to admit that.
One of the stories we tell ourselves is that we are all highly rational political calculating machines, thoughtfully considering the various manifestoes. Certainly not going for something as superficial and shallow as "I like politician X". That is very rarely true- most of us (me included) get no further than some inherited prejudices, whether we like the current state of the nation, and what we think of the cut of people's jib.
It's a mad system, but better than the alternatives.
Exactly, so hypothetical polling won't pick up the very very obvious reality that Reform ARE Farage and Farage almost exclusively. They'd have no seats in parliament but for his return
Except my family is voting Reform DESPITE Farage. They don’t like him very much but they feel they have no choice now but to roll the dice
Lots of people are like this
Saying that Reform would be nowhere without Farage is one of the favourite beliefs of supporters of the other parties and I've always thought it's nonsense. They believe it because they're secretly hoping Farage might leave politics for some reason and then Reform's vote would collapse.
Hint to SKS, dismissing opposition to your plans as “noises off” when 120+ of your parliamentary party opposes them is - not the best way of winning friends and influencing people.
This is turning into a car crash for the government.
Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
Nah. Without the spiv they sink to low teens and then disappear. Nobody is queueing up to see Tice and Yusuf on the campaign trail. They'd particularly lose the Boris Granny votes
But nobody is going to admit that.
One of the stories we tell ourselves is that we are all highly rational political calculating machines, thoughtfully considering the various manifestoes. Certainly not going for something as superficial and shallow as "I like politician X". That is very rarely true- most of us (me included) get no further than some inherited prejudices, whether we like the current state of the nation, and what we think of the cut of people's jib.
It's a mad system, but better than the alternatives.
Exactly, so hypothetical polling won't pick up the very very obvious reality that Reform ARE Farage and Farage almost exclusively. They'd have no seats in parliament but for his return
Except my family is voting Reform DESPITE Farage. They don’t like him very much but they feel they have no choice now but to roll the dice
Lots of people are like this
But would they still despite him leaving? Reform without him is a complete mystery box, what does Dubai Tice know about anything? Or Slugger Anderson? People may not like Farage but Reform is the current answer, in large part, due to his presence. That was obvious in the election. They will retain a chunk of vote without him but no chance they are largest party and very possible they drop back to 2024 levels. Ukip without Farage........ they are a 0.1% party now
Interesting (again) how closely aligned RUK and CON voters are. How does this square with the notion that RUK are picking up a lot of LAB's traditional vote in working class areas? Were those voters always closet Tories or something?
Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
Nah. Without the spiv they sink to low teens and then disappear. Nobody is queueing up to see Tice and Yusuf on the campaign trail. They'd particularly lose the Boris Granny votes
But nobody is going to admit that.
One of the stories we tell ourselves is that we are all highly rational political calculating machines, thoughtfully considering the various manifestoes. Certainly not going for something as superficial and shallow as "I like politician X". That is very rarely true- most of us (me included) get no further than some inherited prejudices, whether we like the current state of the nation, and what we think of the cut of people's jib.
It's a mad system, but better than the alternatives.
Exactly, so hypothetical polling won't pick up the very very obvious reality that Reform ARE Farage and Farage almost exclusively. They'd have no seats in parliament but for his return
Except my family is voting Reform DESPITE Farage. They don’t like him very much but they feel they have no choice now but to roll the dice
Lots of people are like this
Saying that Reform would be nowhere without Farage is one of the favourite beliefs of supporters of the other parties and I've always thought it's nonsense. They believe it because they're secretly hoping Farage might leave politics for some reason and then Reform's vote would collapse.
They werent winning seats till he returned, they fall back without him. Its how much that's debatable. Usual non voters may roll the dice for Farage, but for Richard Tice? And without those usual non voters Reform are not largest Party challengers
Interesting (again) how closely aligned RUK and CON voters are. How does this square with the notion that RUK are picking up a lot of LAB's traditional vote in working class areas? Were those voters always closet Tories or something?
You'd need to go back in time and ask the same demographics in the 80s or 90s. The realignment was already well underway before the rise of Reform.
Interesting (again) how closely aligned RUK and CON voters are. How does this square with the notion that RUK are picking up a lot of LAB's traditional vote in working class areas? Were those voters always closet Tories or something?
Boris Red Wall Brexiteers? Yeah they were, but with decades of 'you don't vote for the enemy/working class is labour innit' entrenchment
An asylum seeker from Tajikistan has been allowed to stay in the UK because he would have had to shave his beard off if he was deported.
The unnamed man won an appeal after arguing that he could be tortured and have his facial hair forcibly removed if he was sent back home. The Home Office tried to deport him back to the Central Asian state, but an asylum court has now ruled that he may be entitled to international protection in the UK because of his beard.
Is there some massive jackpot prize for who can come up with the most ridiculous reason not to deport somebody?
Yes.
I am punting on “If I am sent home, I will be sent to The Hague to face a War Crimes trial. Which means that I can’t spend time with the adopted children I kidnapped to make a family. Which was the war crime.”
Interesting (again) how closely aligned RUK and CON voters are. How does this square with the notion that RUK are picking up a lot of LAB's traditional vote in working class areas? Were those voters always closet Tories or something?
I think they probably were. My late father always voted Labour but he had some pretty Presbyterian views. Perhaps (on topic) social status related prejudices prevented him from voting Tory, but would he have been more inclined towards Nigel's National Socialists?
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
You joke but this is inevitable
Consideration is needed to the NHS and pension's spending with means testing the highest rate tax payers, and wealthy asset holders, required to support themselves much more
Would someone like to explain why the basic pension should be paid to everyone, no matter their circumstances, and why shouldn't the better off have to contribute more to the NHS ?
These are the difficult questions that the country has to face because we are hugely overtaxed, borrowed and spent
The ridiculous decision by Starmer to reverse the WFP ironically will not improve his poll ratings and he looks more haunted every day
He braggs about the triple lock, promises 5% defence spending, announces the purchase of 12 x F35 which can carry nuclear warheads subject to, (yes you guessed it) Trumps approval, without having any idea how to pay for them
Nobody gets the basic pension, if they have no other income they get pension credit and that then gets them free everything
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Sometimes you get your beliefs and views challenged head on and last evening, at a local meeting, I had the rare opportunity to meet and have a prolonged 1-to-1 conversation with a property developer or rather a senior planner at one of the big developers.
They are looking to redevelop a brownfield site near us (the site has a gasholder, electricity pylons and high pressure gas pipes running across it and is designated Metropolitan Open Land (MoL) in the Newham Local Plan).
The two big problems from the developer side were first the cost of decontamination. Removing a foot of topsoil across a 22 acre site isn't cheap or easy - deconstructing and cleaning a gasholder isn't easy or cheap with decades of accumulated and highly toxic sludge at the bottom.
On top of that, the second problem was the cost of construction - the cost of labour and materials had spiked in the past 3-5 years but that was exacerbated by Section 106 payments, community infrastructure levy payments and the carbon off-set tax. In other words, London was, in his view, the most expensive place in the world to build.
All that was further compounded by the fact flats and houses weren't being sold at the prices developers needed to make even a small profit so the argument very often came down to economics rather than NIMBY-ism. Could the site be developed - was it viable as a development opportunity?
The paradox, he said, was that the places where people most needed houses and the places most people wanted to live were the ones where the costs of construction were at their highest - specifically, Inner London brownfield sites. Newham isn't replete with Green Belt - the MoL was meant to be a form of urban green belt to provide some green space and prevent complete urban sprawl.
He also told me (and I don't know if it's true) in Q1 in London, 4,000 new dwellings were started and 3,000 completed but the requirement is 88,000 new dwellings per year which in his view was wholly unachievable.
I left the meeting frustrated and depressed - the housing problem has been widely portrayed as a struggle between developers and locals but it's nothing like that - it's a series of economic paradoxes which make sensible development economically unviable and force developers into over-dense applications simply in order to make the sums add up.
It may be there are special issues with brownfield and contaminated sites and the costs of their remediation which need to be mitigated "somehow" (and I've no idea how) but the fact the scarcity of alternatives mean such sites now have to be considered speaks volumes as to the size of the problems and the paucity of other solutions.
That was roughly why the Olympics site was available, wasn't it? Which points to a solution, albeit one that doesn't scale well.
Suspect the problem lies in trying to do the financial maths across too small a unit. If each development has to cover the costs of its own remediation, some sites will never make sense to develop, even if the alternative is hanging round as a bit of wasteland. The key bad choice (pollute the soil to a mad degree) has already been taken.
See also the food shops from the last thread. (Thanks, @Jim_Miller for the local detail.) It's in nobody's individual interests to be the ones to solve that problem. Or the wider question of providing services to people who cost a lot, or paying taxes.
I don't have much of an answer, beyond reheated Butskellism.
What would happen if the State paid to decontaminate sites across London and then auctioned them as prime development land with outline planning permission?
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
There is a third possibility. Those who are susceptible to such conditions, cannabis induces this / makes it far worse, for those who aren't, it is relatively harmless.
I am not saying that is what I believe, just that it is a possibility.
Hint to SKS, dismissing opposition to your plans as “noises off” when 120+ of your parliamentary party opposes them is - not the best way of winning friends and influencing people.
This is turning into a car crash for the government.
Any foreigner who commits a sexual or violent crime in this country, and who comes from a poorer, harsher country, can surely claim they will suffer WORSE treatment if they are sent home. Because they probably will
Ergo, we cannot deport any of these people as long as we are in the ECHR and we have a judicial class entirely composed of Woke fools
We need to quit the ECHR and purge ALL the lawyers. We need a revolution, in essence
Idiot.
Even Trump worked out you *change the lawyers*
Scene : 2029, first Reform Government
“Today, Chief Justice Jeffries of the Supreme Court announced the unanimous ruling that hanging, drawing and quartering people for looking a bit Furrin’ is mandatory to protect their rights under the Human Rights Acts.
He further explained that the ruling was unanimous, since those who objected were impelled under the Saloon Bar Opinions Act of 2028”
The trouble with this poll is that there is no idea who is being targeted by the question - wtf is "super rich"?
AIUI at present HNWI is something like assets of £5-25 million assets, and VHNWI is something like £25m+ . Make it liquid assets if you wish. On that basis, I'd start super-rich at £100m.
£5m is roughly a 3000 sqft semi-detached freehold place in Kensington.
The Sunday Times UK Rich List starts at £350m (equal 345th), with several equals including Euan Blair.
Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
Nah. Without the spiv they sink to low teens and then disappear. Nobody is queueing up to see Tice and Yusuf on the campaign trail. They'd particularly lose the Boris Granny votes
But nobody is going to admit that.
One of the stories we tell ourselves is that we are all highly rational political calculating machines, thoughtfully considering the various manifestoes. Certainly not going for something as superficial and shallow as "I like politician X". That is very rarely true- most of us (me included) get no further than some inherited prejudices, whether we like the current state of the nation, and what we think of the cut of people's jib.
It's a mad system, but better than the alternatives.
Exactly, so hypothetical polling won't pick up the very very obvious reality that Reform ARE Farage and Farage almost exclusively. They'd have no seats in parliament but for his return
Except my family is voting Reform DESPITE Farage. They don’t like him very much but they feel they have no choice now but to roll the dice
Lots of people are like this
Saying that Reform would be nowhere without Farage is one of the favourite beliefs of supporters of the other parties and I've always thought it's nonsense. They believe it because they're secretly hoping Farage might leave politics for some reason and then Reform's vote would collapse.
Interesting (again) how closely aligned RUK and CON voters are. How does this square with the notion that RUK are picking up a lot of LAB's traditional vote in working class areas? Were those voters always closet Tories or something?
You'd need to go back in time and ask the same demographics in the 80s or 90s. The realignment was already well underway before the rise of Reform.
Yes, this is a good point. There has been a rightward drift in unfashionable parts of working class Britain for some time* - reaching its zenith in 2019. It's those once-Lab-but-by-2019-Con-or-at-least-Con-curious which are shuffling over to Reform.
So many of them are Lab's traditional vote - but much of that traditional vote had already left. That's not to say there are no more wwc Lab voters for Reform to poach - but that no longer forms Lab's core vote.
*of course, this is also explained by those areas becoming less traditionally working class - see big new private estates close to motorways in places like Doncaster.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
There is a third possibility. Those who are susceptible to such conditions, cannabis induces this / makes it far worse, for those who aren't, it is relatively harmless.
I am not saying that is what I believe, just that it is a possibility.
I think that is quite probable. It certainly fits with what the apparent evidence is - vast numbers of people use cannabis, and a very small number seem to end up like this.
That 2nd question really is quite damning on the two main parties of the left.
Especially Labour, 69% of Labour voters would raise taxes on the rich even if it lost revenue for public services, showing Labour is really at heart about class war. At least LD voters are near split in that scenario
Nonsense.
You are the most prolific class warrior on here, what with your elite schools, elitist universities and taxation free inheritance for the wealthiest families.
All those things can legitimately be held to benefit the national in totality. Deliberately hitting the economy because you think it will hurt your 'enemies' more is quite a different kettle of fish.
My point was specifically about HY's class warfare hypocrisy. He fights harder for his perceived "class" than Scargill ever did for the peasantry.
I dispute your point that educating "Tim Nice But Dim" or Donald Trump or Boris Johnson because of their parental wealth, whilst being wholly unemployable in any role that wasn't organised on their behalf by their entitled parents, is more appropriate and beneficial to the nation than a gifted son or daughter of a street cleaner having the opportunity to become Governor of the Bank of England or DPP.
Plenty did when we had more grammar schools, even 'son of a toolmaker' Sir Keir went to a grammar school for most of his secondary education and then DPP head and PM
Grammar schools brought with them their own intrinsic unfairness.
What about a fully funded universal education system like Mrs Thatcher promoted in the 1970s when as Education Minister she replaced Grammar Schools with top quality, meritocratic Comprehensives?
Comprehensives explicitly were NOT meritocratic. ISTR the term 'meritocracy' was coined pejoratively to describe the horror of 'the clever' rising to the top. (Sounds daft, but bad news for the non-clever majority). Comprehensives were an outcome of this point of view. (To be clear, I'm arguing with your use of the word 'meritocratic' rather than your position on grammar schools/comprehensives, on which my position is very much an essay question seeing both sides, even now not reaching a clear conclusion, despite most of my daughters being at grammar schools.)
I know there is some debate regarding Michael Young's notion of promotion by merit. And to an extent the Grammar School fulfilled that idea, but it came with so much other baggage I am in principle against them.
My Comprehensive was a raging success. With proper funding and support by the community, almost everyone, irrespective of social status attended. Yes, some tried to get into King Edward's and Camp Hill but failed, but people I was at school with became High Commissioners to Chile. CFOs of EE, Vice Presidents at Reckitt Benkeiser and rock stars. I'd say it was very merit based in it's levels of achievement.
These days it is a run of the mill academy, with social climbing parents bussing their children into Warwickshire's Alcester Grammar School.
It sounds like you had the good fortune to attend a 'good' comprehensive, and that the 'social status' mix was rather further up the spectrum than average (though at the time it may not have felt like it!). Not that that is necessarily an argument for grammar schools - creaming off the most motivated 20% in poorer areas will result in the non-grammars being even worse - but your experience of a comprehensive isn't necessarily representative!
I don't have strong feelings about grammar schools (actually I do, but in both directions!) - but I think there are dozens of more important issues to address in education than whether to have more or fewer grammars.
This was at the inception of the comprehensive experiment. It worked under strict circumstances, particularly subject ability streaming.
When politicians wanted comprehensive education to work it worked. I don't think the chattering classes have been particularly keen to see it thrive for several decades now.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
There is a third possibility. Those who are susceptible to such conditions, cannabis induces this / makes it far worse, for those who aren't, it is relatively harmless.
I am not saying that is what I believe, just that it is a possibility.
See also alcoholism. Most people can drink alcohol and not become alcoholics. Some cannot.
I don't think that cannabis is a totally safe drug and there is no doubt that the cannabis available now has far higher levels of active components than the 'wacky baccy' smoked by our current 40-60 year olds in their youth.
I'd be interested in the converse question too: If you thought raising taxes on the rich would increase total revenue would you still oppose it?
Let's get a proper 360 on this public of ours.
Only if 'the rich' is defined as people who earn more than me...
IIRC, many years ago, the Economist did a survey. They worked out that a fairly reliable definition of “rich” (as in needs to pay more taxes) was something like double the salary (is was 2.2? times or something like that) of the person you asked.
So people on 80k said Rich Bastards start at 200K etc…
Biggest example of the politics of envy impacting politics is that Obama has a Nobel Peace Prize and Trump doesn't.
For the first time, using massive bunker-buster bombs have been used to try to secure one.
I think it may highlight the ineffectiveness of Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOPs). AIUI there are about one a month made, under 100 in stock, and they used about 14. I wonder if they are filled by hand a bucket at a time, as were Grand Slams?
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
There is a third possibility. Those who are susceptible to such conditions, cannabis induces this / makes it far worse, for those who aren't, it is relatively harmless.
I am not saying that is what I believe, just that it is a possibility.
See also alcoholism. Most people can drink alcohol and not become alcoholics. Some cannot.
I don't think that cannabis is a totally safe drug and there is no doubt that the cannabis available now has far higher levels of active components than the 'wacky baccy' smoked by our current 40-60 year olds in their youth.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Far more importantly was he a home owner? If so how much is it worth? Or is he in social housing? In which case, what zone? This article is useless without the most basic facts.
Any foreigner who commits a sexual or violent crime in this country, and who comes from a poorer, harsher country, can surely claim they will suffer WORSE treatment if they are sent home. Because they probably will
Ergo, we cannot deport any of these people as long as we are in the ECHR and we have a judicial class entirely composed of Woke fools
We need to quit the ECHR and purge ALL the lawyers. We need a revolution, in essence
Hint to SKS, dismissing opposition to your plans as “noises off” when 120+ of your parliamentary party opposes them is - not the best way of winning friends and influencing people.
This is turning into a car crash for the government.
Thatcher and Blair had plenty of train wrecks and survived. Granted, not a year long slow motion train wreck.
To be fair to Millfield, which I very rarely am, millions more Millfields should equal millions more Olympic medals.
I think one thing that perhaps the state system can learn from Millfield is they are brilliant at taking Tim Nice But Dims and finding them a profession, be it making Tampax ads or chasing egg-shaped balls around a field.
Interesting (again) how closely aligned RUK and CON voters are. How does this square with the notion that RUK are picking up a lot of LAB's traditional vote in working class areas? Were those voters always closet Tories or something?
I think they probably were. My late father always voted Labour but he had some pretty Presbyterian views. Perhaps (on topic) social status related prejudices prevented him from voting Tory, but would he have been more inclined towards Nigel's National Socialists?
Perhaps RUK = the working man's Tories for those who recoil from that word.
I just hope they know what they're voting for. I hate to think of people getting conned, esp working men.
Interesting (again) how closely aligned RUK and CON voters are. How does this square with the notion that RUK are picking up a lot of LAB's traditional vote in working class areas? Were those voters always closet Tories or something?
Boris Red Wall Brexiteers? Yeah they were, but with decades of 'you don't vote for the enemy/working class is labour innit' entrenchment
I do think this is the essence of what RUK are trying to do - recreate the 2019 Boris Leaver coalition.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
I think that's a potential straw in the wind.
Reform's voting coalition is highly fissiparous and full of cracks, and their penumbra could go to the Govt IF (and perhaps ONLY IF) Sir Keir delivers on nearly all of the points he identified at the election. And if it is communicated and perceived in time for the end of one term.
11 months in, I'd say that we are likely to see significant progress on NHS Waiting Lists. We are now at roughly the "shortest waiting lists for 2 years" point.
The others ... I don't think we have a scooby, never mind a chance of making an informed assessment, for quite some time.
And there are enormous numbers of political land mines lying around.
Interesting (again) how closely aligned RUK and CON voters are. How does this square with the notion that RUK are picking up a lot of LAB's traditional vote in working class areas? Were those voters always closet Tories or something?
You'd need to go back in time and ask the same demographics in the 80s or 90s. The realignment was already well underway before the rise of Reform.
Turbo-charged at GE19.
My trad Lab dad voted for Maggie as it happens. But he is not - I'm pleased and proud to say - even contemplating voting for Farage.
The BBC World Service did a programme this week about a woman escaped from North Korea, who has been running a dating agency matching NK escapees with SK men. Most escapees are female.
It took Yujin Han four attempts to defect from North Korea. Each time she was caught, she'd be sent through a re-education camp and eventually returned to her family. However, as soon as Yujin got back home, her grandmother would insist she try to flee again. Yujin had a relatively comfortable life in North Korea.
It was actually once she landed in South Korea, she says, that she endured greater hardship. In order to survive, Yujin had to work multiple jobs including as a tollgate operator, a used-car salesperson and cosmetics vendor. But when she began working at a matchmaking agency, Yujin found her calling. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3ct6x4f
That this bustling bilingual medieval port city, which was briefly the final capital of the Third Reich (which surely must be a pub quiz question?), has a long tradition of rum production, sale and consumption is perhaps both a clue and an impediment to Trump’s designs on Greenland….
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
You joke but this is inevitable
Consideration is needed to the NHS and pension's spending with means testing the highest rate tax payers, and wealthy asset holders, required to support themselves much more
Would someone like to explain why the basic pension should be paid to everyone, no matter their circumstances, and why shouldn't the better off have to contribute more to the NHS ?
These are the difficult questions that the country has to face because we are hugely overtaxed, borrowed and spent
The ridiculous decision by Starmer to reverse the WFP ironically will not improve his poll ratings and he looks more haunted every day
He braggs about the triple lock, promises 5% defence spending, announces the purchase of 12 x F35 which can carry nuclear warheads subject to, (yes you guessed it) Trumps approval, without having any idea how to pay for them
Er, I wasn't joking.
To an extent I am with Nigel ( not something you'd expect to hear) over the NHS healthcare provision . It needs rationing. It needs up front nominal payments from users to discourage frequent flyers. Free prescriptions need to go. Surcharges for unhealthy lifestyles would also be my preference. Nigel's touted USA style insurance with upper limits based on premiums paid I am not on board with.
You have just seen the back of a profligate government that you supported "spaffing" money all over the washroom walls and floors. Let's take COVID furlough. Absolutely cumbersome and open to abuse and fraud. Do you know what I would have done? A living wage for everyone and agreements with banks underwritten by government for mortgage and borrowing repayment holidays. And after COVID lockdowns were done, government would temporarily charge an extra penny on income tax and add a surcharge on benefits to repay the incurred debts on everything spent to see the nation through the pandemic.
That this bustling bilingual medieval port city, which was briefly the final capital of the Third Reich (which surely must be a pub quiz question?), has a long tradition of rum production, sale and consumption is perhaps both a clue and an impediment to Trump’s designs on Greenland….
I should know that - there are about 27 Mark Felton's about it.
Nearly Danish, may have previously been Danish, and nicked by the Germans at some stage. Where Karl Donitz and the leftovers used to have their afternoon tea.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
That this bustling bilingual medieval port city, which was briefly the final capital of the Third Reich (which surely must be a pub quiz question?), has a long tradition of rum production, sale and consumption is perhaps both a clue and an impediment to Trump’s designs on Greenland….
To get all crosswordy, in a region that generated a question without an answer?
I'd be interested in the converse question too: If you thought raising taxes on the rich would increase total revenue would you still oppose it?
Let's get a proper 360 on this public of ours.
Only if 'the rich' is defined as people who earn more than me...
What would your serious answer be as a matter of curiosity - assuming it led to a significant increase in total revenue would you support raising taxes on the wealthy?
(let's just for these purposes say wealthy = the top 5% by income plus the top 5% by net worth)
That this bustling bilingual medieval port city, which was briefly the final capital of the Third Reich (which surely must be a pub quiz question?), has a long tradition of rum production, sale and consumption is perhaps both a clue and an impediment to Trump’s designs on Greenland….
That this bustling bilingual medieval port city, which was briefly the final capital of the Third Reich (which surely must be a pub quiz question?), has a long tradition of rum production, sale and consumption is perhaps both a clue and an impediment to Trump’s designs on Greenland….
To get all crosswordy, in a region that generated a question without an answer?
That this bustling bilingual medieval port city, which was briefly the final capital of the Third Reich (which surely must be a pub quiz question?), has a long tradition of rum production, sale and consumption is perhaps both a clue and an impediment to Trump’s designs on Greenland….
Flensburg is bilingual?
The Danish minority is now apparently small, but street signs, public notices etc. are in two languages and there are a number of Danish language institutions here.
The rum arises from the former Danish West Indies, supplied to and from here, which gave Denmark and its navy a similar rum drinking tradition to the British with our Jamaica et al. The Trump encouragement is that Denmark sold its Indies to the US during WW1 (now the US Virgin Islands) and the impediment is that the same treaty contains the US’s formal recognition that Greenland is Danish.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
I think Eton’s still a great school. I worry that it has become too academically selective, I think one of its great strengths was that it had some very bright people, and also some who were really quite thick, but often they were the real characters. I hope there is still room for eccentrics – David Cameron.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
There was a BBC documentary about a similar case; a 31-year old man murdered his mum and tried to murder his dad. The police had evidence he was in contact with his drug dealer, but he claimed he was not on drugs. If the jury believed that he had committed the murder whilst on drugs, he could be found guilty of murder as it was his choice to take drugs. If it was a result of a mental illness, it would be a lesser charge.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
I think Eton’s still a great school. I worry that it has become too academically selective, I think one of its great strengths was that it had some very bright people, and also some who were really quite thick, but often they were the real characters. I hope there is still room for eccentrics – David Cameron.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
There should be a pact between the Greens and the LDs. It would be better for both.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Comments
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_a3rFSIOMY
My Comprehensive was a raging success. With proper funding and support by the community, almost everyone, irrespective of social status attended. Yes, some tried to get into King Edward's and Camp Hill but failed, but people I was at school with became High Commissioners to Chile. CFOs of EE, Vice Presidents at Reckitt Benkeiser and rock stars. I'd say it was very merit based in it's levels of achievement.
These days it is a run of the mill academy, with social climbing parents bussing their children into Warwickshire's Alcester Grammar School.
By my reckoning Starmer has three choices
1) bend the knee to Kemi and beg her for the votes and hope there aren't 50 or so more silent rebels who will strike if he bends the knee or
2) delay and compromise knowing he'll need to buy off 50 or more rebels
3) scrap the bill entirely and face the market reaction to a 5 billion deficit black hole and yet another u turn
More broadly, we all have to live with the consequences of development - visual impact, traffic impact, environmental impact, societal impact. Development done badly imposes costs on us which need either sucking up or spending money on to address. My belief is that spending money on doing development right is both the right thing to do and the cost-effective solution.
These people aren’t leaving for something as one-dimensional as “money”, it is in fact, like with your wife a lifestyle choice. They can live in the UK, enduring the shitty weather and people envying them whilst the fiscal set up works for them and they don’t feel they are handing over too much of their money, and when the fiscal set up changes to be unfavourable they choose a new lifestyle of being somewhere with better weather and a less envious society wanting more of their money.
I totally understand you will never get this sort of situation, you have your position on the wealthy and that’s your choice but your envy really does shine through and maybe, when you are boiling with distaste for these sorts of people, remember that you are married to someone who loves a country they left, whose public services they enjoyed and benefited from, because they could get a life that worked better for them and because they didn’t like the attitudes and laws in that country.
It’s really no different in essence, it’s just the fact these people have so much wealth that gets to you.
Labour are now in power, not opposition. Their MPs need to understand that there are hard decisions to be made, and their own pet views are not sacrosanct.
As for my position on 'the wealthy': I am intensely relaxed on the wealthy. I think a certain amount of income disparity is healthy for a country. If you use your skills, and take calculated risks, and make money, good. Especially if you employ people in the process.
But I've never met a wealthy person who has not had a certain amount of luck, either in birth or opportunity. And I wish more wealthy people would consider how their life would be if those dice had not rolled them three-sixes.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14845561/tube-passenger-killed-gentle-engineer-jailed.html
A Tube passenger who killed a 'gentle' commuter with one punch after he brushed past him on an escalator will serve less than six years in jail.
Rakeem Miles, 23, grabbed AI engineer Samuel Winter, 28, from behind and ripped his top at Southwark underground station at 9.30pm on August 22 last year.
Miles then viciously knocked out Mr Winter with a powerful punch to the head before fleeing.
1) making no progress nationally
2) the votes they lent to Labour in 24 arent coming back (but going where??) Because
3) they are almost fully retaining the tactical votes that won them 72 seats despite there being no impetus to GTTO this time
The LDs have to make national progress to stand any chance of retaining 70 seats imo
Fptp cannot cope with the rise of Reform the same way it struggled with the Alliance and with UKIP 2015
One of the stories we tell ourselves is that we are all highly rational political calculating machines, thoughtfully considering the various manifestoes. Certainly not going for something as superficial and shallow as "I like politician X". That is very rarely true- most of us (me included) get no further than some inherited prejudices, whether we like the current state of the nation, and what we think of the cut of people's jib.
It's a mad system, but better than the alternatives.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VISDGlpX0WI
Wow.
Trump on NATO Chief calling him daddy: "He did it very affectionately. Daddy—you're my daddy."
The best answer is to not let polluting factories pollute the land we live on, but it's too late for that.
Lots of people are like this
Not that that is necessarily an argument for grammar schools - creaming off the most motivated 20% in poorer areas will result in the non-grammars being even worse - but your experience of a comprehensive isn't necessarily representative!
I don't have strong feelings about grammar schools (actually I do, but in both directions!) - but I think there are dozens of more important issues to address in education than whether to have more or fewer grammars.
This is turning into a car crash for the government.
Ukip without Farage........ they are a 0.1% party now
Usual non voters may roll the dice for Farage, but for Richard Tice? And without those usual non voters Reform are not largest Party challengers
I am punting on “If I am sent home, I will be sent to The Hague to face a War Crimes trial. Which means that I can’t spend time with the adopted children I kidnapped to make a family. Which was the war crime.”
Anyone want to give odds on that working?
Let's get a proper 360 on this public of ours.
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
This matters, because by proving Arduini-Monzo's psychosis was the result of his own actions, our prosecutors could bring charges of murder, as opposed to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/hainault-sword-attack-marcus-monzo-guilty-murder-daniel-anjorin-b1234833.html
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
I am not saying that is what I believe, just that it is a possibility.
Even Trump worked out you *change the lawyers*
Scene : 2029, first Reform Government
“Today, Chief Justice Jeffries of the Supreme Court announced the unanimous ruling that hanging, drawing and quartering people for looking a bit Furrin’ is mandatory to protect their rights under the Human Rights Acts.
He further explained that the ruling was unanimous, since those who objected were impelled under the Saloon Bar Opinions Act of 2028”
AIUI at present HNWI is something like assets of £5-25 million assets, and VHNWI is something like £25m+ . Make it liquid assets if you wish. On that basis, I'd start super-rich at £100m.
£5m is roughly a 3000 sqft semi-detached freehold place in Kensington.
The Sunday Times UK Rich List starts at £350m (equal 345th), with several equals including Euan Blair.
Lmao, 10% think Labour are united
So many of them are Lab's traditional vote - but much of that traditional vote had already left. That's not to say there are no more wwc Lab voters for Reform to poach - but that no longer forms Lab's core vote.
*of course, this is also explained by those areas becoming less traditionally working class - see big new private estates close to motorways in places like Doncaster.
Private schools dumb down entry requirements after VAT raid exodus
Headteachers forced to widen the net to counter summer exits and low September intakes
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/consumer-affairs/private-schools-dumb-down-entry-requirements-after-vat-raid/
When politicians wanted comprehensive education to work it worked. I don't think the chattering classes have been particularly keen to see it thrive for several decades now.
I don't think that cannabis is a totally safe drug and there is no doubt that the cannabis available now has far higher levels of active components than the 'wacky baccy' smoked by our current 40-60 year olds in their youth.
So people on 80k said Rich Bastards start at 200K etc…
To clean up, they should have used Flash Liquid.
Imagine
Who knew? Except all of us, I suppose.
Or is he in social housing? In which case, what zone?
This article is useless without the most basic facts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idiocracy
I just hope they know what they're voting for. I hate to think of people getting conned, esp working men.
HomeNorth Korea.....crazy story.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7x0gvfFa0Q
Reform's voting coalition is highly fissiparous and full of cracks, and their penumbra could go to the Govt IF (and perhaps ONLY IF) Sir Keir delivers on nearly all of the points he identified at the election. And if it is communicated and perceived in time for the end of one term.
11 months in, I'd say that we are likely to see significant progress on NHS Waiting Lists. We are now at roughly the "shortest waiting lists for 2 years" point.
The others ... I don't think we have a scooby, never mind a chance of making an informed assessment, for quite some time.
And there are enormous numbers of political land mines lying around.
My trad Lab dad voted for Maggie as it happens. But he is not - I'm pleased and proud to say - even contemplating voting for Farage.
We have standards in our family.
It took Yujin Han four attempts to defect from North Korea. Each time she was caught, she'd be sent through a re-education camp and eventually returned to her family. However, as soon as Yujin got back home, her grandmother would insist she try to flee again. Yujin had a relatively comfortable life in North Korea.
It was actually once she landed in South Korea, she says, that she endured greater hardship. In order to survive, Yujin had to work multiple jobs including as a tollgate operator, a used-car salesperson and cosmetics vendor. But when she began working at a matchmaking agency, Yujin found her calling.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3ct6x4f
To an extent I am with Nigel ( not something you'd expect to hear) over the NHS healthcare provision . It needs rationing. It needs up front nominal payments from users to discourage frequent flyers. Free prescriptions need to go. Surcharges for unhealthy lifestyles would also be my preference. Nigel's touted USA style insurance with upper limits based on premiums paid I am not on board with.
You have just seen the back of a profligate government that you supported "spaffing" money all over the washroom walls and floors. Let's take COVID furlough. Absolutely cumbersome and open to abuse and fraud. Do you know what I would have done? A living wage for everyone and agreements with banks underwritten by government for mortgage and borrowing repayment holidays. And after COVID lockdowns were done, government would temporarily charge an extra penny on income tax and add a surcharge on benefits to repay the incurred debts on everything spent to see the nation through the pandemic.
Nearly Danish, may have previously been Danish, and nicked by the Germans at some stage. Where Karl Donitz and the leftovers used to have their afternoon tea.
(Unless you are playing tricks.)
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
(let's just for these purposes say wealthy = the top 5% by income plus the top 5% by net worth)
"the country should be about aspiration"
It is. We aspire to be a more equal society, at ease with itself.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1920_Schleswig_plebiscites
The rum arises from the former Danish West Indies, supplied to and from here, which gave Denmark and its navy a similar rum drinking tradition to the British with our Jamaica et al. The Trump encouragement is that Denmark sold its Indies to the US during WW1 (now the US Virgin Islands) and the impediment is that the same treaty contains the US’s formal recognition that Greenland is Danish.
"If you could vote against one party in a General Election, who would you vote FOR?"
It's really not very clear whether they want the party you are for, or the one you are against.
Food for thought?
It was this case
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c84z1j131nqo
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m002dqw9/murder-247-series-2-6-killing-in-the-family (NSFW...)
I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level