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Wholly Unacceptable Behaviour – politicalbetting.com

SystemSystem Posts: 12,562
edited 6:28AM in General
Wholly Unacceptable Behaviour – politicalbetting.com

'The picture in my report is profoundly disturbing'Chair of the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry, Sir Wyn Williams, speaks as a public inquiry into the Post Office scandal finds at least 13 postmasters may have taken their own lives.https://t.co/iEfMAYAD1v? Sky 501/YT pic.twitter.com/tnjx0mEiFd

Read the full story here

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Comments

  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 10,336
    Yay!
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 7,089
    Some people should be in handcuffs for what happened.
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 24,803
    edited 6:32AM
    Great to see Cyclefree's stamp on this matter. I concur. We couldn't even get it right after Mr Bates vs The Post Office became most watched.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 79,091
    For those who don't wade through long headers, Cyclefree's last two paragraphs make the essential point of the article.

    I agree with every word.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 39,197
    @bencollins.bsky.social‬

    Just to accurately lay out the course of events, people were yelling at him because his auto-responding robot that was trained on Twitter’s userbase still displayed — against all odds — a modicum of empathy. He then made the robot speak like him and within hours it was calling itself Mechahitler.

    @colincarlson.bsky.social‬

    when i have to listen to other academics talking about how AI is changing the world, a fun game i like to play by myself is to substitute "pro-hitler chatbot" into every sentence

    Paging LEON
  • MattWMattW Posts: 28,172
    edited 6:44AM
    Good morning everyone.

    Thanks for the header, Miss Cyclefree, but I'm going OT as I'm off for my walk.

    I'll be listening to yesterday's bizarre sounding Daily T podcast, entitled (not entirely neutrally): Starmer's Brexit Surrender Summit: King Charles welcomes Macron to London | The Daily T

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftDxinGUkqc

    It sounds as if will be a bit "All Aboard the Sky Lark", or as if they are all Perkin Flump when he had his personal Rain Cloud, in a hole and resolutely digging for Australia. I'll let you all know !

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Wh64XSkwwM
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 79,091

    Nigelb said:

    For those who don't wade through long headers, Cyclefree's last two paragraphs make the essential point of the article.

    I agree with every word.

    Isn't the not being willing to read something "long" (i.e. takes five minutes instead of one) part of the problem. Read the thing in full, it really won't hurt.
    I did; some won't.

  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 122,677
    Nigelb said:

    For those who don't wade through long headers, Cyclefree's last two paragraphs make the essential point of the article.

    I agree with every word.

    Same, I would have died of shame if I was part of the Post Office legal team.
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 19,080

    It’s all part of the shift from principles-based regulation to a rules-based approach.

    Principles-based is hard work. It requires integrity, trust and judgement from both the regulator and the regulated. But when it works it’s so much better.

    I remember being told once about the bank of England’s regulatory approach: rock up to a meeting with senior management of a bank every quarter and spend the meeting asking about management’s concerns about their competitors… they believed it gave a much clearer view of systemic risk

    I'm not sure it's even that.

    I'd diagnose the issue as "reality doesn't matter, as long as you can keep telling the right story."

    Principles are better than rules, sure. They give better answers in edge cases and when something unexpected comes up. But when those in charge are able to compartmentalise their brains enough, so that words and reality are independent things, we're in trouble.

    Once the structures measure and reward the words, irrespective of what the reality shows, that trouble is double. And because it's easier to change words than reality, that's where we have ended up.
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 24,803

    It’s all part of the shift from principles-based regulation to a rules-based approach.

    Principles-based is hard work. It requires integrity, trust and judgement from both the regulator and the regulated. But when it works it’s so much better.

    I remember being told once about the bank of England’s regulatory approach: rock up to a meeting with senior management of a bank every quarter and spend the meeting asking about management’s concerns about their competitors… they believed it gave a much clearer view of systemic risk

    I'm not sure it's even that.

    I'd diagnose the issue as "reality doesn't matter, as long as you can keep telling the right story."

    Principles are better than rules, sure. They give better answers in edge cases and when something unexpected comes up. But when those in charge are able to compartmentalise their brains enough, so that words and reality are independent things, we're in trouble.

    Once the structures measure and reward the words, irrespective of what the reality shows, that trouble is double. And because it's easier to change words than reality, that's where we have ended up.
    We are only a sliver of the way there, look how far ahead the US is on this, competing with North Korea for world leading.
  • TazTaz Posts: 19,578
    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 24,803
    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 52,057

    Before I book this, I have to ask, how immersive?


    It leaves me cold...
  • LeonLeon Posts: 62,645

    Before I book this, I have to ask, how immersive?


    Just being in Cincinnati is like being on a doomed vessel, in itself
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 19,080

    It’s all part of the shift from principles-based regulation to a rules-based approach.

    Principles-based is hard work. It requires integrity, trust and judgement from both the regulator and the regulated. But when it works it’s so much better.

    I remember being told once about the bank of England’s regulatory approach: rock up to a meeting with senior management of a bank every quarter and spend the meeting asking about management’s concerns about their competitors… they believed it gave a much clearer view of systemic risk

    I'm not sure it's even that.

    I'd diagnose the issue as "reality doesn't matter, as long as you can keep telling the right story."

    Principles are better than rules, sure. They give better answers in edge cases and when something unexpected comes up. But when those in charge are able to compartmentalise their brains enough, so that words and reality are independent things, we're in trouble.

    Once the structures measure and reward the words, irrespective of what the reality shows, that trouble is double. And because it's easier to change words than reality, that's where we have ended up.
    We are only a sliver of the way there, look how far ahead the US is on this, competing with North Korea for world leading.
    If we're talking national government, yes. There is still a sufficiently independent news system to push back against top-tier politicians who deny reality too much. It's not perfect, but it's mostly a decent enough defence.

    The problem is all the quangos, pseudo-businesses and actual businesses which get minimal external scrutiny. The rewards for lying to each other are just too great. And all you need to do to claim them are to cauterise your self-awareness and conscience.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 52,094

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    The previous government clearly wasn’t rushing to find the money, with an election looming, and wasn’t one of their junior ministers evidenced as having directed officials to go slowly on the compensation?
  • MattWMattW Posts: 28,172

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    Are not the police also thought to be a seriously compromised institution?
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 55,531

    Some people should be in handcuffs for what happened.

    No. Lots of people should be in prison for what happened.

    Lawyers orchestrated the lying. Which included planned, deliberate lying to the courts and Parliament.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 52,094
    edited 7:10AM
    It looks like it is going to be another decent day here up at 66 1/3 degrees north. Here’s the view from breakfast (dog is inside the hut):


    The Træna music festival - Norway’s Glastonbury - is on this week on that humpy island horizon left. This year, for once, they’re not getting drenched.
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 24,803
    MattW said:

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    Are not the police also thought to be a seriously compromised institution?
    Sure, but that doesn't mean we can't do any policing.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 79,091
    edited 7:10AM

    It’s all part of the shift from principles-based regulation to a rules-based approach.

    Principles-based is hard work. It requires integrity, trust and judgement from both the regulator and the regulated. But when it works it’s so much better.

    I remember being told once about the bank of England’s regulatory approach: rock up to a meeting with senior management of a bank every quarter and spend the meeting asking about management’s concerns about their competitors… they believed it gave a much clearer view of systemic risk

    I'm not sure it's even that.

    I'd diagnose the issue as "reality doesn't matter, as long as you can keep telling the right story."

    Principles are better than rules, sure. They give better answers in edge cases and when something unexpected comes up. But when those in charge are able to compartmentalise their brains enough, so that words and reality are independent things, we're in trouble.

    Once the structures measure and reward the words, irrespective of what the reality shows, that trouble is double. And because it's easier to change words than reality, that's where we have ended up.
    One rule that helped start off the whole chain of disaster was that brought in by the Blair administration, which instructed courts to assume computer evidence was true.

    In the age of AI, the injustice of shifting the burden of proof in that manner looks even more outrageous now than it did then.
  • TazTaz Posts: 19,578
    MattW said:

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    Are not the police also thought to be a seriously compromised institution?
    Yes

    Just more agents of the state more focussed on managing us than protecting us
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 52,094
    Nigelb said:

    It’s all part of the shift from principles-based regulation to a rules-based approach.

    Principles-based is hard work. It requires integrity, trust and judgement from both the regulator and the regulated. But when it works it’s so much better.

    I remember being told once about the bank of England’s regulatory approach: rock up to a meeting with senior management of a bank every quarter and spend the meeting asking about management’s concerns about their competitors… they believed it gave a much clearer view of systemic risk

    I'm not sure it's even that.

    I'd diagnose the issue as "reality doesn't matter, as long as you can keep telling the right story."

    Principles are better than rules, sure. They give better answers in edge cases and when something unexpected comes up. But when those in charge are able to compartmentalise their brains enough, so that words and reality are independent things, we're in trouble.

    Once the structures measure and reward the words, irrespective of what the reality shows, that trouble is double. And because it's easier to change words than reality, that's where we have ended up.
    One rule that helped start off the whole chain of disaster was that brought in by the Blair administration, which instructed courts to assume computer evidence was true.
    Done because people kept challenging speed cameras, as I recall?
  • There is only one significant figure who was involved with this scandal who still holds signifcant minor public office. He should consider his position, which is not at all good. His present colleagues need to consider whether they are prepared to work with him. People of honour would not.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 62,645
    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 55,531

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    It’s the Process State.

    The PM requests that compensation is paid. This does not cause compensation to be paid. Instead, it cause another branch in the labyrinth of files and communications.

    A request for it to be expedited, again, will create another tide of paperwork. No action.

    The purpose of the Process State is more process. This is because

    - action is dangerous.
    - a quick, bare action with clear responsibility is doubly so.
    - creating 100k pages of nonsense is safe. It is hard to read. It looks professional. It means having lots of underlings - promotion? It means not upsetting other people in the Process State. Indeed, they will se you as a Safe Pair If Hands. A Team Player.
  • TazTaz Posts: 19,578

    There is only one significant figure who was involved with this scandal who still holds signifcant minor public office. He should consider his position, which is not at all good. His present colleagues need to consider whether they are prepared to work with him. People of honour would not.

    But you’re talking about Lib Dem’s so, of course, they’ll work with him
  • kjhkjh Posts: 12,877
    edited 7:14AM
    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    Sadly you are absolutely right and it isn't just those two. There are several other high profile cases and some others that are much smaller so don't have any attention. I am involved in helping a group of one of these scandals. I don't want to go into details here but @Cyclefree and @NickPalmer are aware of it who have given a little help in the past.

    Politicians often quote 'It must never happen again' and it always does.

    In the case I am helping on it is 12 years on so the Tories, Labour and the LDs all have a hand in it. Finally at the end of the last Govt we got an admission of liability from the Govt and now that has been backtracked on. Because most impacted are in their 80s many have died or will die without resolution.

    Our impression is it is mainly civil servants who block progress. This has been clear from FOIs carried out and ministers change so often you go around the loop over and over again. It has all party support.

    Just to give you some idea of the pain (and the campaign for justice, as with the PO, is often more painful than the original event, or at least makes it much worse) our campaign has had both the NAO and PAC find in our favour, 2 parliamentary debates and two blocked bills.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 55,531
    As usual, an excellent header.

    The substitution of process for humanity is at the heart of what ails the country, I think.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 79,091
    Not a bad context in which to discuss this proposal.
    Will the benefits of speedier justice outweigh the serious risk done to it by dispensing with juries ?

    Jury-free trials proposed to save criminal justice system from collapse
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/jul/09/jury-trials-must-be-limited-to-save-criminal-justice-system-from-collapse-inquiry-finds
  • TazTaz Posts: 19,578
    kjh said:

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    Sadly you are absolutely right and it isn't just those two. There are several other high profile cases and some others that are much smaller so don't have any attention. I am involved in helping a group of one of these scandals. I don't want to go into details here but @Cyclefree and @NickPalmer are aware of it who have given a little help in the past.

    Politicians often quote 'It must never happen again' and it always does.

    In the case I am helping on it is 12 years on so the Tories, Labour and the LDs all have a hand in it. Finally at the end of the last Govt we got an admission of liability from the Govt and now that has been backtracked on. Because most impacted are in their 80s many have died or will die without resolution.

    Our impression is it is mainly civil servants who block progress. This has been clear from FOIs carried out and ministers change so often you go around the loop over and over again. It has all party support.

    Just to give you some idea of the pain (and the campaign for justice, as with the PO, is often more painful than the original event, or at least makes it much worse) our campaign has had both the NAO and PAC find in our favour, 2 parliamentary debates and two blocked bills.
    The process is as punishing as the original ordeal

    I guess we only get to hear of the high profile ones. There must be dozens
  • But, the major role in all this, and the crowning error is NOT the Post Office or the minions in government. It is the Courts. THE COURTS.

    Their role is to discriminate between right and wrong. THEY were presented with evidence which a bright 14 yo reader of Computer Weekly, the sort of lad dispised as a nerd could have seen was WRONG IN FACT.

    They say there were directed to accept the veracity of the evidence of the Horizons software and make their decisions accordingly. If this is any different from the defences offered by those acting in a judical capacity in Nazi Germany, in what way does it differ, except in magnitude.

    This is probably the greatest miscarriage of justice probably since 1689 in this country. Those who condemned the victims of this crime are criminals themselves and they should not be sleeping easily in their beds. Nor should Ed Davey.
  • AugustusCarp2AugustusCarp2 Posts: 393
    A genuinely thought-provoking header article - thanks, Cyclefree. Your re-examination of the religious concept of guilt, and the need for it, reminds me of something once said by a clergyman whose name now escapes me. Being of a modern, twentieth century frame of mind, he said that he wasn't sure if people could be possessed by demons - but he was in no doubt whatsoever that many institutions, and their actions, could only be explained in terms of demonic posession.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 66,693
    As @Cyclefree says it is "appalling". Absolutely.

    Personally, I'd like to see jail sentences for those most responsible. Seems quite a list from CEO downwards from what she writes above.
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 44,254
    This not-entirely-agenda-free tweet ended up in a strange place.

    https://x.com/j_bambrick/status/1942721376005091688

    Jamie Bambrick
    @j_bambrick
    7h
    Don’t worry, by that time I will have convinced people to leave behind the sinking ships of the UK and the Republic of Ireland and established an independent Christian state of Ulster which will be prosperous and God-fearing.

    https://x.com/j_bambrick/status/1942739162047889714


    At least HYUFD will have a place to spend his twilight years.
  • oniscoidoniscoid Posts: 35

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    absolutely -- in fact it seems obvious to me that the political benefits for any post tv series Government sorting it out once and for all, without quibbles, safe-guards and conditions, would have been huge
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 52,094

    There is only one significant figure who was involved with this scandal who still holds signifcant minor public office. He should consider his position, which is not at all good. His present colleagues need to consider whether they are prepared to work with him. People of honour would not.

    As kjh says, the blocking originates from officials, who are prepared to feed their ministers selective, or unreasonably definitive, advice, to shore up their own position, per Yes Minister. The test of the minister is how hard they push back against said advice and what questions they ask or action they take. In that regard, Davey comes out well ahead of Swinson and the collection of hapless Tories; at least, despite being advised not to, he did a bit of digging and went to actually met the guy. What did our Kemi do?
  • kjhkjh Posts: 12,877
    Taz said:

    kjh said:

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    Sadly you are absolutely right and it isn't just those two. There are several other high profile cases and some others that are much smaller so don't have any attention. I am involved in helping a group of one of these scandals. I don't want to go into details here but @Cyclefree and @NickPalmer are aware of it who have given a little help in the past.

    Politicians often quote 'It must never happen again' and it always does.

    In the case I am helping on it is 12 years on so the Tories, Labour and the LDs all have a hand in it. Finally at the end of the last Govt we got an admission of liability from the Govt and now that has been backtracked on. Because most impacted are in their 80s many have died or will die without resolution.

    Our impression is it is mainly civil servants who block progress. This has been clear from FOIs carried out and ministers change so often you go around the loop over and over again. It has all party support.

    Just to give you some idea of the pain (and the campaign for justice, as with the PO, is often more painful than the original event, or at least makes it much worse) our campaign has had both the NAO and PAC find in our favour, 2 parliamentary debates and two blocked bills.
    The process is as punishing as the original ordeal

    I guess we only get to hear of the high profile ones. There must be dozens
    I am sure there are. I doubt you will be aware of the one I am involved in and it has a relatively cheap simple solution and for many the process is far worse than the original issue. Of the original campaign committee, half have died even though the National Audit Office and Parliamentary Accounts Committee found the Govt liable.

    I help this campaign because I am aware of people impacted and it makes me very angry.
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 39,065

    As usual, an excellent header.

    The substitution of process for humanity is at the heart of what ails the country, I think.

    CS Lewis nailed the Process State.

    The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid “dens of crime” that Dickens loved to paint. It is not done even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed, and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voice. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the offices of a thoroughly nasty business concern.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 99,095

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    It’s the Process State.

    The PM requests that compensation is paid. This does not cause compensation to be paid. Instead, it cause another branch in the labyrinth of files and communications.

    A request for it to be expedited, again, will create another tide of paperwork. No action.

    The purpose of the Process State is more process. This is because

    - action is dangerous.
    - a quick, bare action with clear responsibility is doubly so.
    - creating 100k pages of nonsense is safe. It is hard to read. It looks professional. It means having lots of underlings - promotion? It means not upsetting other people in the Process State. Indeed, they will se you as a Safe Pair If Hands. A Team Player.
    And no problems were ever had again.
  • TazTaz Posts: 19,578
    kjh said:

    Taz said:

    kjh said:

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    Sadly you are absolutely right and it isn't just those two. There are several other high profile cases and some others that are much smaller so don't have any attention. I am involved in helping a group of one of these scandals. I don't want to go into details here but @Cyclefree and @NickPalmer are aware of it who have given a little help in the past.

    Politicians often quote 'It must never happen again' and it always does.

    In the case I am helping on it is 12 years on so the Tories, Labour and the LDs all have a hand in it. Finally at the end of the last Govt we got an admission of liability from the Govt and now that has been backtracked on. Because most impacted are in their 80s many have died or will die without resolution.

    Our impression is it is mainly civil servants who block progress. This has been clear from FOIs carried out and ministers change so often you go around the loop over and over again. It has all party support.

    Just to give you some idea of the pain (and the campaign for justice, as with the PO, is often more painful than the original event, or at least makes it much worse) our campaign has had both the NAO and PAC find in our favour, 2 parliamentary debates and two blocked bills.
    The process is as punishing as the original ordeal

    I guess we only get to hear of the high profile ones. There must be dozens
    I am sure there are. I doubt you will be aware of the one I am involved in and it has a relatively cheap simple solution and for many the process is far worse than the original issue. Of the original campaign committee, half have died even though the National Audit Office and Parliamentary Accounts Committee found the Govt liable.

    I help this campaign because I am aware of people impacted and it makes me very angry.
    We need more people getting angry
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 55,531
    IanB2 said:

    Nigelb said:

    It’s all part of the shift from principles-based regulation to a rules-based approach.

    Principles-based is hard work. It requires integrity, trust and judgement from both the regulator and the regulated. But when it works it’s so much better.

    I remember being told once about the bank of England’s regulatory approach: rock up to a meeting with senior management of a bank every quarter and spend the meeting asking about management’s concerns about their competitors… they believed it gave a much clearer view of systemic risk

    I'm not sure it's even that.

    I'd diagnose the issue as "reality doesn't matter, as long as you can keep telling the right story."

    Principles are better than rules, sure. They give better answers in edge cases and when something unexpected comes up. But when those in charge are able to compartmentalise their brains enough, so that words and reality are independent things, we're in trouble.

    Once the structures measure and reward the words, irrespective of what the reality shows, that trouble is double. And because it's easier to change words than reality, that's where we have ended up.
    One rule that helped start off the whole chain of disaster was that brought in by the Blair administration, which instructed courts to assume computer evidence was true.
    Done because people kept challenging speed cameras, as I recall?
    That was a separate issue. Caused by the police not calibrating and maintaining speed guns. Which made the evidence suspect. Not much computation involved.

    The reason for the computer law has to with a number of cases where the defendants challenged such things as the reliability of ATMs.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 99,095
    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    It seems to be an inevitability that, however well intentioned, every institution eventually prioritises its own existence over its purported mission. The post office, oxfam, the church of england, schools, hospitals, governments, and more, no crime or outrage does not ultimately end up subordinated to 'protecting' the institution.

    And so no lessons are learned until, on rare occasions, a lot of time is passed, new people brought in to clean sweep the organisation, and very few people are actually punished.

  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 32,776
    edited 7:35AM
    Someone needs to be held accountable for this disgusting miscarriage of justice. @Cyclefree made a compelling case the other day that Blair was uniquely responsible.
  • kjhkjh Posts: 12,877
    IanB2 said:

    There is only one significant figure who was involved with this scandal who still holds signifcant minor public office. He should consider his position, which is not at all good. His present colleagues need to consider whether they are prepared to work with him. People of honour would not.

    As kjh says, the blocking originates from officials, who are prepared to feed their ministers selective, or unreasonably definitive, advice, to shore up their own position, per Yes Minister. The test of the minister is how hard they push back against said advice and what questions they ask or action they take. In that regard, Davey comes out well ahead of Swinson and the collection of hapless Tories; at least, despite being advised not to, he did a bit of digging and went to actually met the guy. What did our Kemi do?
    Agree. I wasn't going to respond as I didn't want to make it political. We did a FOI on our whole case. In that it had every single ministers letter together with the supporting evidence and draft letter from the civil servants.

    The supporting evidence drafted by the civil servants was often very wrong and biased. In every single case the minister sent out an identical letter to the draft and there was no written record of the minister asking questions of the civil servants evidence. It was accepted as fact.

    To give you one example someone asked a question about event A that happened in 19XX. The minister replied about an entirely different event that happened some 16 years later.

    I wrote pointing out they had answered the wrong question and unbelievably they gave the same answer.

    My MP at the time then wrote to the minister pointing this out and the answer given was that they had answered the question!

    That minister was Jo Johnson, my MP was Paul Beresford so no party animosity there. Jo Johnson had clearly just signed letters prepared by civil servants without reading anything and the civil servants obviously didn't want to answer the question.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 99,095
    Sean_F said:

    As usual, an excellent header.

    The substitution of process for humanity is at the heart of what ails the country, I think.

    CS Lewis nailed the Process State.

    The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid “dens of crime” that Dickens loved to paint. It is not done even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed, and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voice. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the offices of a thoroughly nasty business concern.
    It can be hard to get people to do directly nasty things, it takes training and exposing them to horrible things to bring it out as people are generally good. But set up an impersonal indirect way of making things awful and its easier for anyone to act as a cog in that machine.

    And i say that as a believer in the good that well ordered process can do.
  • wooliedyedwooliedyed Posts: 12,564
    edited 7:36AM
    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6
  • LeonLeon Posts: 62,645
    Nigelb said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Shorter Leon: "why aren't we discussing my hobbyhorse ?"
    And yet, I’m entirely right. As you know
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 99,095
    kjh said:

    IanB2 said:

    There is only one significant figure who was involved with this scandal who still holds signifcant minor public office. He should consider his position, which is not at all good. His present colleagues need to consider whether they are prepared to work with him. People of honour would not.

    As kjh says, the blocking originates from officials, who are prepared to feed their ministers selective, or unreasonably definitive, advice, to shore up their own position, per Yes Minister. The test of the minister is how hard they push back against said advice and what questions they ask or action they take. In that regard, Davey comes out well ahead of Swinson and the collection of hapless Tories; at least, despite being advised not to, he did a bit of digging and went to actually met the guy. What did our Kemi do?
    Agree. I wasn't going to respond as I didn't want to make it political. We did a FOI on our whole case. In that it had every single ministers letter together with the supporting evidence and draft letter from the civil servants.

    The supporting evidence drafted by the civil servants was often very wrong and biased. In every single case the minister sent out an identical letter to the draft and there was no written record of the minister asking questions of the civil servants evidence. It was accepted as fact.

    To give you one example someone asked a question about event A that happened in 19XX. The minister replied about an entirely different event that happened some 16 years later.

    I wrote pointing out they had answered the wrong question and unbelievably they gave the same answer.

    My MP at the time then wrote to the minister pointing this out and the answer given was that they had answered the question!

    That minister was Jo Johnson, my MP was Paul Beresford so no party animosity there. Jo Johnson had clearly just signed letters prepared by civil servants without reading anything and the civil servants obviously didn't want to answer the question.
    Good civil servants want politicians who are engaged without seeking to micromanage. Bad ones want a rubberstamper, and there are advantages to politicians and senior cuvil servants to rubberstamping.

    Be Bernard, not Humphrey.
  • kjhkjh Posts: 12,877
    Taz said:

    kjh said:

    Taz said:

    kjh said:

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    Sadly you are absolutely right and it isn't just those two. There are several other high profile cases and some others that are much smaller so don't have any attention. I am involved in helping a group of one of these scandals. I don't want to go into details here but @Cyclefree and @NickPalmer are aware of it who have given a little help in the past.

    Politicians often quote 'It must never happen again' and it always does.

    In the case I am helping on it is 12 years on so the Tories, Labour and the LDs all have a hand in it. Finally at the end of the last Govt we got an admission of liability from the Govt and now that has been backtracked on. Because most impacted are in their 80s many have died or will die without resolution.

    Our impression is it is mainly civil servants who block progress. This has been clear from FOIs carried out and ministers change so often you go around the loop over and over again. It has all party support.

    Just to give you some idea of the pain (and the campaign for justice, as with the PO, is often more painful than the original event, or at least makes it much worse) our campaign has had both the NAO and PAC find in our favour, 2 parliamentary debates and two blocked bills.
    The process is as punishing as the original ordeal

    I guess we only get to hear of the high profile ones. There must be dozens
    I am sure there are. I doubt you will be aware of the one I am involved in and it has a relatively cheap simple solution and for many the process is far worse than the original issue. Of the original campaign committee, half have died even though the National Audit Office and Parliamentary Accounts Committee found the Govt liable.

    I help this campaign because I am aware of people impacted and it makes me very angry.
    We need more people getting angry
    We need to change the system of Government. We have ministers who get appointed to briefs that they have no expertise on whatsoever, who are utterly overloaded and who move on before they get to grasp their brief.

    I find that @Richard_Tyndall has some similar views to me on this I recall. Also @Luckyguy1983, with whom I rarely agree also has some interesting views in my opinion.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 99,095
    Taz said:

    Irony is we have many MPs and public figures queuing up to demand compensation for the WASPE women who don’t deserve a penny.

    Have they not just gone away yet? Bloody heck.
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 44,254
    MACRON MUST APOLOGISE

    John Redwood
    @johnredwood
    ·
    2h
    Offering us a loan of the Bayeux embroidery reminds us of the invasion and the way so many English were forced into serfdom by the Normans. It depicts the violent deaths of English soldiers.

    https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1942807774389256453
  • LeonLeon Posts: 62,645
    edited 7:43AM

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    The curious incident….

    Labour might actually be relived by these polls. It seems that the welfare climbdown has not hurt them - or it has hurt them politically but not electorally (so far). Put it another way, they are already in the toilet but they’re not even further down the toilet = “phew”

  • Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 4,712
    IanB2 said:

    There is only one significant figure who was involved with this scandal who still holds signifcant minor public office. He should consider his position, which is not at all good. His present colleagues need to consider whether they are prepared to work with him. People of honour would not.

    As kjh says, the blocking originates from officials, who are prepared to feed their ministers selective, or unreasonably definitive, advice, to shore up their own position, per Yes Minister. The test of the minister is how hard they push back against said advice and what questions they ask or action they take. In that regard, Davey comes out well ahead of Swinson and the collection of hapless Tories; at least, despite being advised not to, he did a bit of digging and went to actually met the guy. What did our Kemi do?
    Agreed, though I was wondering when Cumbria would stick his patently biased comment in. I often wonder whether a libdem councillor or MP pissed on his chips sometime ago?
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 32,776
    Leon said:

    Nigelb said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Shorter Leon: "why aren't we discussing my hobbyhorse ?"
    And yet, I’m entirely right. As you know
    Is this post another failed attempt at comedic irony?
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 99,095
    oniscoid said:

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    absolutely -- in fact it seems obvious to me that the political benefits for any post tv series Government sorting it out once and for all, without quibbles, safe-guards and conditions, would have been huge
    Seems obvious yet its been so dragged out it is bizarre.
  • Pagan2Pagan2 Posts: 12,167
    Greetings to PB,

    I have joined the latest ranks of PB's fallen wounded and had a close up of the NHS.

    I mention this not sympathy but the excuse increase in spelling errors and miswordings in give me a break on it please as it causing chaos with language centres.

    Anyway NHS

    The good

    A1 for ambulance crew and response time
    A1 for A and E
    definitely A for nursing staff when they attended a patient
    however C for response for attending a patient, a couple a times had to give out a bed to attract the attention to a patient in difficulty
    The doctors on ward though rarely ventured from behind computer monitors when the rare tames they went to see a patient information given the patient seemed minimal.

    Caveat I admit I wasnt however a model patient and discharged myself on tuesday other admittance on monday in fact giving my doctor a time a leaving by first thing tueday morning (5pm).
  • boulayboulay Posts: 6,484

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    It’s the Process State.

    The PM requests that compensation is paid. This does not cause compensation to be paid. Instead, it cause another branch in the labyrinth of files and communications.

    A request for it to be expedited, again, will create another tide of paperwork. No action.

    The purpose of the Process State is more process. This is because

    - action is dangerous.
    - a quick, bare action with clear responsibility is doubly so.
    - creating 100k pages of nonsense is safe. It is hard to read. It looks professional. It means having lots of underlings - promotion? It means not upsetting other people in the Process State. Indeed, they will se you as a Safe Pair If Hands. A Team Player.
    It’s not just the state though, it’s almost a national disease. I speak to friends who are in the finance industry who have had long successful careers and their will to carry on is crushed.

    It’s not crushed by not enough pay, no clients left - it’s crushed by process. The unstoppable rise of compliance and HR has led to a common complaint by my friends that their role, bringing in business and managing the relationships, is an inconvenient distraction for compliance and HR from their “essential roles”.

    Over their careers, these people managed not to help launder money, goose the PAs in a cupboard or make any accidental errors that people also make today and yet every move, action and issue is covered by, governed by and restricted by teams of people who never have to face the clients/public and don’t understand how the industry works because they don’t have to, their world revolves around a raft of rules and regulations and all they are doing is robotically matching actions to rules and regulations.

    What these corporate equivalents of civil servants don’t seem to understand is that if you tie up the private bankers etc in red tape, it makes it infinitely harder for them to get business and if that business leaves or can’t be fought in there ultimately is no money to pay for these huge HR and compliance departments.

    Most front office people are aware of the regs and rules, they do the courses etc but that is never enough, it is constant courses and tightening of rules because risk cannot be tolerated. Added to that is HR’s incessant bs to justify their growing empires.

    It seems like the civil service is like compliance and HR in that they are all necessary but they have lost the idea that they are support and not the governors. Business and progress has to be made and can’t be if the support systems stifle the actors who ultimately have to do the business.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 32,776

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    RefCon 48 is looking good for you guys.
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 62,723
    Good morning, everyone.

    For everyone who has a perverse fetish for returning things to 'where they belong', the Bayeux Tapestry was made in England.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 99,095

    MACRON MUST APOLOGISE

    John Redwood
    @johnredwood
    ·
    2h
    Offering us a loan of the Bayeux embroidery reminds us of the invasion and the way so many English were forced into serfdom by the Normans. It depicts the violent deaths of English soldiers.

    https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1942807774389256453

    Trying to get people outraged or emotionally invested in the outcome of events 1000 years ago is a bold move.

    I often think society can be weirdly specific about which historic sins we are supposed to still feel guilty about on an individual level and which not, but that one may be a stretch.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 62,645
    Cyclefree said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Talking bollocks again I see.

    I have written quite a few headers on even more serious scandals and there have also been TV dramas about them and they share with this one the same essential elements which cause them to happen, to continue and to involve cruelty to the victims.

    What I wrote here could and does apply to every other scandal. I am writing about it today because a report came out and to remind those with goldfish memories that nothing has changed. I have written in my book about Grenfell and blood contamination and many others and if I included every single scandal pointing out the depressing similarities it wouldn't be so much a book as a bloody enormous encyclopaedia - Cyclefree's Big Book of British Scandals.

    The people mentioned in the case studies are not chaff. (The last time I heard that word used so dismissively it was by an MP in a Select Committee aimed at Dr David Kelly. He committed suicide shortly after.)

    They are people like us. One of them is your age and at about the age you stopped taking drugs and turned your life around, he had a good business, a family and was looking forward to doing even better. Instead, he was wrongly convicted, had his reputation trashed, lost everything and has never been able to find employment again. He lives on charity from his family and friends. His name is Harjinder Butoy.

    Don't you fucking dare call him and everyone like him and what happened to them all "chaff".

    For shame, @Leon. For shame.
    It’s chaff. Sorry. That’s what I honestly think and I’m not going to pander to you, because you have recently had a horrible time (tho I sympathise enormously)

    I respect your intelligence too much for that; and you’d hate it if I did anything else
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 66,068
    Good morning

    Many individuals should face criminal trials over this scandal, but do we think any will ?

    And on more depressing news both labour and the conservatives make solemn pledges to retain the triple lock which shows just how much serious trouble we are when neither are fit to govern when they put their popularity before doing the right thing

    Where on earth is the leader we need to take the difficult decisions, wean us off spending and borrowing, and take the country away from an inevitable debt crisis
  • wooliedyedwooliedyed Posts: 12,564
    Leon said:

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    The curious incident….

    Labour might actually be relived by these polls. It seems that the welfare climbdown has not hurt them - or it has hurt them politically but not electorally (so far). Put it another way, they are already in the toilet but they’re not even further down the toilet = “phew”

    Labour will feel they can still win the next election. Tories will feel they are not dead in the water yet, LDs and Greens that progress can be protected and advanced.
    Hayward quoted in the Indy today saying he thinks Reform have topped out and that local by elections are a better or as good an indicator of where we are compared to VI polling. In which case, JL Partners get your finger out and update the Polaris model!
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 99,095
    boulay said:

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    I can kind of understand why earlier governments tried to hide the situation and hope it went away, however morally wrong that was. But post the tv series there are zero excuses for Starmer and Sunak. There is now absolutely no political advantage in hoping this goes away, just get it done quickly and if that means the compo is a couple of hundred mil higher so be it. Drop the inquiries and go straight to police with instructions to focus only on the most culpable to streamline the process.
    It’s the Process State.

    The PM requests that compensation is paid. This does not cause compensation to be paid. Instead, it cause another branch in the labyrinth of files and communications.

    A request for it to be expedited, again, will create another tide of paperwork. No action.

    The purpose of the Process State is more process. This is because

    - action is dangerous.
    - a quick, bare action with clear responsibility is doubly so.
    - creating 100k pages of nonsense is safe. It is hard to read. It looks professional. It means having lots of underlings - promotion? It means not upsetting other people in the Process State. Indeed, they will se you as a Safe Pair If Hands. A Team Player.
    It’s not just the state though, it’s almost a national disease. I speak to friends who are in the finance industry who have had long successful careers and their will to carry on is crushed.

    It’s not crushed by not enough pay, no clients left - it’s crushed by process. The unstoppable rise of compliance and HR has led to a common complaint by my friends that their role, bringing in business and managing the relationships, is an inconvenient distraction for compliance and HR from their “essential roles”.

    Over their careers, these people managed not to help launder money, goose the PAs in a cupboard or make any accidental errors that people also make today and yet every move, action and issue is covered by, governed by and restricted by teams of people who never have to face the clients/public and don’t understand how the industry works because they don’t have to, their world revolves around a raft of rules and regulations and all they are doing is robotically matching actions to rules and regulations.

    What these corporate equivalents of civil servants don’t seem to understand is that if you tie up the private bankers etc in red tape, it makes it infinitely harder for them to get business and if that business leaves or can’t be fought in there ultimately is no money to pay for these huge HR and compliance departments.

    Most front office people are aware of the regs and rules, they do the courses etc but that is never enough, it is constant courses and tightening of rules because risk cannot be tolerated. Added to that is HR’s incessant bs to justify their growing empires.

    It seems like the civil service is like compliance and HR in that they are all necessary but they have lost the idea that they are support and not the governors. Business and progress has to be made and can’t be if the support systems stifle the actors who ultimately have to do the business.
    I think you are spot on the last paragraph. Its a misfocus and misunderstanding of role and probably ends up being counterproductive as people workaround tick box requirements to get anything done and things get missed.
  • CyclefreeCyclefree Posts: 25,691
    Leon said:

    Nigelb said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Shorter Leon: "why aren't we discussing my hobbyhorse ?"
    And yet, I’m entirely right. As you know
    No you aren't. And the more you tiresomely insist you are, the more I know you know you aren't. I can recognise a toddler's tantrum in my sleep, even when the toddler is wearing long trousers.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 52,094

    IanB2 said:

    Nigelb said:

    It’s all part of the shift from principles-based regulation to a rules-based approach.

    Principles-based is hard work. It requires integrity, trust and judgement from both the regulator and the regulated. But when it works it’s so much better.

    I remember being told once about the bank of England’s regulatory approach: rock up to a meeting with senior management of a bank every quarter and spend the meeting asking about management’s concerns about their competitors… they believed it gave a much clearer view of systemic risk

    I'm not sure it's even that.

    I'd diagnose the issue as "reality doesn't matter, as long as you can keep telling the right story."

    Principles are better than rules, sure. They give better answers in edge cases and when something unexpected comes up. But when those in charge are able to compartmentalise their brains enough, so that words and reality are independent things, we're in trouble.

    Once the structures measure and reward the words, irrespective of what the reality shows, that trouble is double. And because it's easier to change words than reality, that's where we have ended up.
    One rule that helped start off the whole chain of disaster was that brought in by the Blair administration, which instructed courts to assume computer evidence was true.
    Done because people kept challenging speed cameras, as I recall?
    That was a separate issue. Caused by the police not calibrating and maintaining speed guns. Which made the evidence suspect. Not much computation involved.

    The reason for the computer law has to with a number of cases where the defendants challenged such things as the reliability of ATMs.
    The recommendation came originally from the law commission - and this short abstract of a longer piece of work suggests that lawyers are once again in the frame:

    https://journals.sas.ac.uk/deeslr/article/view/5642

    Also examined more fully in a legal journal here:

    https://www.counselmagazine.co.uk/articles/the-presumption-that-computers-are-reliable

    Evidence used in speeding cases does appear to have been part of the debate, as here:

    https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld199798/ldselect/ldsctech/064v/st0503.htm
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 32,776
    edited 7:51AM
    Cyclefree said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Talking bollocks again I see.

    I have written quite a few headers on even more serious scandals and there have also been TV dramas about them and they share with this one the same essential elements which cause them to happen, to continue and to involve cruelty to the victims.

    What I wrote here could and does apply to every other scandal. I am writing about it today because a report came out and to remind those with goldfish memories that nothing has changed. I have written in my book about Grenfell and blood contamination and many others and if I included every single scandal pointing out the depressing similarities it wouldn't be so much a book as a bloody enormous encyclopaedia - Cyclefree's Big Book of British Scandals.

    The people mentioned in the case studies are not chaff. (The last time I heard that word used so dismissively it was by an MP in a Select Committee aimed at Dr David Kelly. He committed suicide shortly after.)

    They are people like us. One of them is your age and at about the age you stopped taking drugs and turned your life around, he had a good business, a family and was looking forward to doing even better. Instead, he was wrongly convicted, had his reputation trashed, lost everything and has never been able to find employment again. He lives on charity from his family and friends. His name is Harjinder Butoy.

    Don't you fucking dare call him and everyone like him and what happened to them all "chaff".

    For shame, @Leon. For shame.
    Leon was I am sure being "edgy".

    It is not easy to see appropriate retributive justice when many of the potentially guilty are politicians from Labour and the Tories plus possibly a LD lady.

    Maybe one of the very few bonuses of a Farage Government is he will have no qualms about throwing political opponents to the wolves.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 99,095

    Good morning

    Many individuals should face criminal trials over this scandal, but do we think any will ?

    And on more depressing news both labour and the conservatives make solemn pledges to retain the triple lock which shows just how much serious trouble we are when neither are fit to govern when they put their popularity before doing the right thing

    Where on earth is the leader we need to take the difficult decisions, wean us off spending and borrowing, and take the country away from an inevitable debt crisis

    Either in a dream or someone's ovaries.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 128,768
    edited 7:57AM

    Good morning

    Many individuals should face criminal trials over this scandal, but do we think any will ?

    And on more depressing news both labour and the conservatives make solemn pledges to retain the triple lock which shows just how much serious trouble we are when neither are fit to govern when they put their popularity before doing the right thing

    Where on earth is the leader we need to take the difficult decisions, wean us off spending and borrowing, and take the country away from an inevitable debt crisis

    'Farage fails to guarantee pensions triple lock but vows to axe benefits cap'
    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/nigel-farage-keir-starmer-reform-uk-kemi-badenoch-conservatives-b2758529.html

    'Tories will consider means testing pension triple-lock, Badenoch says'
    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/jan/16/kemi-badenoch-uk-getting-poorer

    Labour have not committed to the triple lock beyond this parliament
    https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/money/labour-issues-new-statement-future-32022276

    Only the LDs of the main UK parties are committed to permanently keeping the triple lock in full
    https://www.libdems.org.uk/news/article/default-f4d399b80ea579afb9686280d29a77d0
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 55,531
    kjh said:

    IanB2 said:

    There is only one significant figure who was involved with this scandal who still holds signifcant minor public office. He should consider his position, which is not at all good. His present colleagues need to consider whether they are prepared to work with him. People of honour would not.

    As kjh says, the blocking originates from officials, who are prepared to feed their ministers selective, or unreasonably definitive, advice, to shore up their own position, per Yes Minister. The test of the minister is how hard they push back against said advice and what questions they ask or action they take. In that regard, Davey comes out well ahead of Swinson and the collection of hapless Tories; at least, despite being advised not to, he did a bit of digging and went to actually met the guy. What did our Kemi do?
    Agree. I wasn't going to respond as I didn't want to make it political. We did a FOI on our whole case. In that it had every single ministers letter together with the supporting evidence and draft letter from the civil servants.

    The supporting evidence drafted by the civil servants was often very wrong and biased. In every single case the minister sent out an identical letter to the draft and there was no written record of the minister asking questions of the civil servants evidence. It was accepted as fact.

    To give you one example someone asked a question about event A that happened in 19XX. The minister replied about an entirely different event that happened some 16 years later.

    I wrote pointing out they had answered the wrong question and unbelievably they gave the same answer.

    My MP at the time then wrote to the minister pointing this out and the answer given was that they had answered the question!

    That minister was Jo Johnson, my MP was Paul Beresford so no party animosity there. Jo Johnson had clearly just signed letters prepared by civil servants without reading anything and the civil servants obviously didn't want to answer the question.
    It is considered hostile for a minister to question the briefings of civil servants.

    When Rory Stewart repeatedly exposed the lies of officials, to him, complaints were made via the Cabinet Office that he was being difficult and unpleasant.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 32,776
    edited 7:55AM
    HYUFD said:

    Good morning

    Many individuals should face criminal trials over this scandal, but do we think any will ?

    And on more depressing news both labour and the conservatives make solemn pledges to retain the triple lock which shows just how much serious trouble we are when neither are fit to govern when they put their popularity before doing the right thing

    Where on earth is the leader we need to take the difficult decisions, wean us off spending and borrowing, and take the country away from an inevitable debt crisis

    'Farage fails to guarantee pensions triple lock but vows to axe benefits cap'
    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/nigel-farage-keir-starmer-reform-uk-kemi-badenoch-conservatives-b2758529.html
    Sold again! To the man with the donkey avatar.
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 14,882
    Taz said:

    Irony is we have many MPs and public figures queuing up to demand compensation for the WASPE women who don’t deserve a penny.

    The Waspy women thing was entirely without merit but had the politically critical quality of being easy to understand. Hence the number of MPs and others lining up behind it. And hence the fondness for issues involving calculable amounts of free money to a readily identifiable group. See also WFA and last week's benefits shambles and two child cap which have the same quality.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 15,582
    Cyclefree said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Talking bollocks again I see.

    I have written quite a few headers on even more serious scandals and there have also been TV dramas about them and they share with this one the same essential elements which cause them to happen, to continue and to involve cruelty to the victims.

    What I wrote here could and does apply to every other scandal. I am writing about it today because a report came out and to remind those with goldfish memories that nothing has changed. I have written in my book about Grenfell and blood contamination and many others and if I included every single scandal pointing out the depressing similarities it wouldn't be so much a book as a bloody enormous encyclopaedia - Cyclefree's Big Book of British Scandals.

    The people mentioned in the case studies are not chaff. (The last time I heard that word used so dismissively it was by an MP in a Select Committee aimed at Dr David Kelly. He committed suicide shortly after.)

    They are people like us. One of them is your age and at about the age you stopped taking drugs and turned your life around, he had a good business, a family and was looking forward to doing even better. Instead, he was wrongly convicted, had his reputation trashed, lost everything and has never been able to find employment again. He lives on charity from his family and friends. His name is Harjinder Butoy.

    Don't you fucking dare call him and everyone like him and what happened to them all "chaff".

    For shame, @Leon. For shame.
    I must admit, for reasons I find hard to understand, I have also found it hard to get too exercised about this scandal. Perhaps it is too technical, too hard to follow.
    But for that reason I am very grateful that there are others like Cyclefree who do. Because I'm exercised about it now.
    It's the casual trashing of people's reputations which really rankles. "Thou shalt not bear false witness" is one of the less fashionable commandments, but it's the biggie, really. Most people have nothing more valuable.

    Good header, anyway. I liked the attempt to broaden the scope to 'all scandals' and the thought that those in charge consider themselves virtuous because they are in charge. Never trust people whise starting point is that they are the good guys, because all sorts of dubious conclusions flow from that.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 62,645

    Leon said:

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    The curious incident….

    Labour might actually be relived by these polls. It seems that the welfare climbdown has not hurt them - or it has hurt them politically but not electorally (so far). Put it another way, they are already in the toilet but they’re not even further down the toilet = “phew”

    Labour will feel they can still win the next election. Tories will feel they are not dead in the water yet, LDs and Greens that progress can be protected and advanced.
    Hayward quoted in the Indy today saying he thinks Reform have topped out and that local by elections are a better or as good an indicator of where we are compared to VI polling. In which case, JL Partners get your finger out and update the Polaris model!
    It’s really hard to know. Farage has made some errors recently, and Reform are looking fissiparous

    And yet the electoral direction of the country still points firmly towards polarisation - some going hard left and green and more going hard right and ??

    I see on X that Farage is predicting that Jenrick will take over the Tories and then Jenrick will try and outflank reform by going FURTHER to the right on migration, asylum and woke

    A fascinating analysis
  • wooliedyedwooliedyed Posts: 12,564

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    RefCon 48 is looking good for you guys.
    NOTHING HAS CHANGED!
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 55,531
    Cookie said:

    Cyclefree said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Talking bollocks again I see.

    I have written quite a few headers on even more serious scandals and there have also been TV dramas about them and they share with this one the same essential elements which cause them to happen, to continue and to involve cruelty to the victims.

    What I wrote here could and does apply to every other scandal. I am writing about it today because a report came out and to remind those with goldfish memories that nothing has changed. I have written in my book about Grenfell and blood contamination and many others and if I included every single scandal pointing out the depressing similarities it wouldn't be so much a book as a bloody enormous encyclopaedia - Cyclefree's Big Book of British Scandals.

    The people mentioned in the case studies are not chaff. (The last time I heard that word used so dismissively it was by an MP in a Select Committee aimed at Dr David Kelly. He committed suicide shortly after.)

    They are people like us. One of them is your age and at about the age you stopped taking drugs and turned your life around, he had a good business, a family and was looking forward to doing even better. Instead, he was wrongly convicted, had his reputation trashed, lost everything and has never been able to find employment again. He lives on charity from his family and friends. His name is Harjinder Butoy.

    Don't you fucking dare call him and everyone like him and what happened to them all "chaff".

    For shame, @Leon. For shame.
    I must admit, for reasons I find hard to understand, I have also found it hard to get too exercised about this scandal. Perhaps it is too technical, too hard to follow.
    But for that reason I am very grateful that there are others like Cyclefree who do. Because I'm exercised about it now.
    It's the casual trashing of people's reputations which really rankles. "Thou shalt not bear false witness" is one of the less fashionable commandments, but it's the biggie, really. Most people have nothing more valuable.

    Good header, anyway. I liked the attempt to broaden the scope to 'all scandals' and the thought that those in charge consider themselves virtuous because they are in charge. Never trust people whise starting point is that they are the good guys, because all sorts of dubious conclusions flow from that.
    It’s really simple. The Horizon computer system made shit up. They prosecuted people. When they found out, early on, that it was bollocks, they lied to cover it up. And kept on prosecuting people.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 52,094
    Cyclefree said:

    Leon said:

    Nigelb said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Shorter Leon: "why aren't we discussing my hobbyhorse ?"
    And yet, I’m entirely right. As you know
    No you aren't. And the more you tiresomely insist you are, the more I know you know you aren't. I can recognise a toddler's tantrum in my sleep, even when the toddler is wearing long trousers.
    His post doesn’t arise from anything relating to the scandal, but is simply an answer to his perpetual question “how can I make myself the focus of this thread today?”. Ignore.
  • TazTaz Posts: 19,578
    kle4 said:

    Taz said:

    Irony is we have many MPs and public figures queuing up to demand compensation for the WASPE women who don’t deserve a penny.

    Have they not just gone away yet? Bloody heck.
    Some have but it’s a sorry story of factionalism and differing views. Some want the compo, some want full restitution, others want mediation with the govt.

    There’ll be a crowdfunder or two as well.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 128,768
    HYUFD said:

    Good morning

    Many individuals should face criminal trials over this scandal, but do we think any will ?

    And on more depressing news both labour and the conservatives make solemn pledges to retain the triple lock which shows just how much serious trouble we are when neither are fit to govern when they put their popularity before doing the right thing

    Where on earth is the leader we need to take the difficult decisions, wean us off spending and borrowing, and take the country away from an inevitable debt crisis

    'Farage fails to guarantee pensions triple lock but vows to axe benefits cap'
    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/nigel-farage-keir-starmer-reform-uk-kemi-badenoch-conservatives-b2758529.html

    'Tories will consider means testing pension triple-lock, Badenoch says'
    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/jan/16/kemi-badenoch-uk-getting-poorer

    Labour have not committed to the triple lock beyond this parliament
    https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/money/labour-issues-new-statement-future-32022276

    Only the LDs of the main UK parties are committed to permanently keeping the triple lock in full
    https://www.libdems.org.uk/news/article/default-f4d399b80ea579afb9686280d29a77d0
    So ironically if Labour win the next election propped up by the LDs the triple lock stays, if Farage wins with a majority or propped up by the Tories the triple lock ends as is and is likely at least means tested
  • TazTaz Posts: 19,578

    Good morning

    Many individuals should face criminal trials over this scandal, but do we think any will ?

    And on more depressing news both labour and the conservatives make solemn pledges to retain the triple lock which shows just how much serious trouble we are when neither are fit to govern when they put their popularity before doing the right thing

    Where on earth is the leader we need to take the difficult decisions, wean us off spending and borrowing, and take the country away from an inevitable debt crisis

    Are they currently making those pledges on the triple lock ?

    If so that’s mad.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 62,645

    Cyclefree said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Talking bollocks again I see.

    I have written quite a few headers on even more serious scandals and there have also been TV dramas about them and they share with this one the same essential elements which cause them to happen, to continue and to involve cruelty to the victims.

    What I wrote here could and does apply to every other scandal. I am writing about it today because a report came out and to remind those with goldfish memories that nothing has changed. I have written in my book about Grenfell and blood contamination and many others and if I included every single scandal pointing out the depressing similarities it wouldn't be so much a book as a bloody enormous encyclopaedia - Cyclefree's Big Book of British Scandals.

    The people mentioned in the case studies are not chaff. (The last time I heard that word used so dismissively it was by an MP in a Select Committee aimed at Dr David Kelly. He committed suicide shortly after.)

    They are people like us. One of them is your age and at about the age you stopped taking drugs and turned your life around, he had a good business, a family and was looking forward to doing even better. Instead, he was wrongly convicted, had his reputation trashed, lost everything and has never been able to find employment again. He lives on charity from his family and friends. His name is Harjinder Butoy.

    Don't you fucking dare call him and everyone like him and what happened to them all "chaff".

    For shame, @Leon. For shame.
    Leon was I am sure being "edgy".

    It is not easy to see appropriate retributive justice when many of the potentially guilty are politicians from Labour and the Tories plus possibly a LD lady.

    Maybe one of the very few bonuses of a Farage Government is he will have no qualms about throwing political opponents to the wolves.
    I wasn’t being edgy at all. As I say I respect @cyclefree too much to casually troll her for bantz

    I think this scandal is now being overdone. Far greater evils - of all kinds - are happening right now - and getting worse

    It is therefore emotionally easier to distract ourselves with this relatively minor affair which has gratifyingly acceptable villains (the system, evil managers) and satisfyingly humble victims - poor Mr Bates

    It’s a bit like the Salt Path (tho of course this scandal is true not fiction and real people have died and suffered)
  • kjhkjh Posts: 12,877

    Cyclefree said:

    Leon said:

    Given how this scandal is so utterly dwarfed by other vaster scandals, I find it hard to get exercised by it. Indeed I have suspicions of those that do. This one is so much easier to take - the villains are nasty managers - so let’s make tv dramas about it and write 5000 word essays about it and ventilate about it endlessly

    Rather than focusing on much greater and more troubling problems

    In short: this is chaff

    Talking bollocks again I see.

    I have written quite a few headers on even more serious scandals and there have also been TV dramas about them and they share with this one the same essential elements which cause them to happen, to continue and to involve cruelty to the victims.

    What I wrote here could and does apply to every other scandal. I am writing about it today because a report came out and to remind those with goldfish memories that nothing has changed. I have written in my book about Grenfell and blood contamination and many others and if I included every single scandal pointing out the depressing similarities it wouldn't be so much a book as a bloody enormous encyclopaedia - Cyclefree's Big Book of British Scandals.

    The people mentioned in the case studies are not chaff. (The last time I heard that word used so dismissively it was by an MP in a Select Committee aimed at Dr David Kelly. He committed suicide shortly after.)

    They are people like us. One of them is your age and at about the age you stopped taking drugs and turned your life around, he had a good business, a family and was looking forward to doing even better. Instead, he was wrongly convicted, had his reputation trashed, lost everything and has never been able to find employment again. He lives on charity from his family and friends. His name is Harjinder Butoy.

    Don't you fucking dare call him and everyone like him and what happened to them all "chaff".

    For shame, @Leon. For shame.
    Leon was I am sure being "edgy".

    It is not easy to see appropriate retributive justice when many of the potentially guilty are politicians from Labour and the Tories plus possibly a LD lady.

    Maybe one of the very few bonuses of a Farage Government is he will have no qualms about throwing political opponents to the wolves.
    It is not often I defend politicians, but as I have said they get overwhelmed and can't see the wood for the trees and rely on their civil servants. if they spend time on issue A, issue ZZZ gets ignored and blows up.

    Having said that I do want to know if any of them have actually stood there and shouted at their civil servants 'I want this fixed, I want it fixed now and I don't want any excuses'.

    It is noticeable that in the campaign I am involved in people spend vastly more time and cost in finding a reason not to do something rather than just fixing the problem. I guess they hope some will just go away, as I am sure they do sadly.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 32,776

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    RefCon 48 is looking good for you guys.
    NOTHING HAS CHANGED!
    Still looking good on just shy of 50%. Still 24 (X2) points ahead of Labour.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 128,768
    edited 8:04AM
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    The curious incident….

    Labour might actually be relived by these polls. It seems that the welfare climbdown has not hurt them - or it has hurt them politically but not electorally (so far). Put it another way, they are already in the toilet but they’re not even further down the toilet = “phew”

    Labour will feel they can still win the next election. Tories will feel they are not dead in the water yet, LDs and Greens that progress can be protected and advanced.
    Hayward quoted in the Indy today saying he thinks Reform have topped out and that local by elections are a better or as good an indicator of where we are compared to VI polling. In which case, JL Partners get your finger out and update the Polaris model!
    It’s really hard to know. Farage has made some errors recently, and Reform are looking fissiparous

    And yet the electoral direction of the country still points firmly towards polarisation - some going hard left and green and more going hard right and ??

    I see on X that Farage is predicting that Jenrick will take over the Tories and then Jenrick will try and outflank reform by going FURTHER to the right on migration, asylum and woke

    A fascinating analysis
    You can't out Farage Farage, the Tories would be better off going for say Mel Stride if they removed Kemi in this parliament and focusing mainly on the economy at the next GE and balancing the books and placing themselves as sensible fiscal conservatives as an alternative to both Labour and Reform.

    Badenoch has proved she can't out war on woke Nigel and Jenrick couldn't out Farage on sending back the boats and immigrants either.

    If Farage lost the next GE and left the Reform leadership then Jenrick would have a better chance as leader and to scoop up Farage's supporters on the right
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 14,882
    Thank you once again to Cyclefree.

    Only one comment really; putting a culture right has to start at the top. It is not routine for the top - PM downwards - to openly tell 'the lie direct', but it is routine, so much so we hardly notice, to not answer questions, not admit to the reality of things, to select numbers and facts so as to lie in effect, to transfer blame and to make unfulfillable claims about the future.

    I listen daily, including this morning, on R4 Today (Nick Thomas-Symonds) to ministers doing all of these things. I will listen to another tomorrow.

    That is the place to start putting it right.
  • TazTaz Posts: 19,578
    kjh said:

    Taz said:

    kjh said:

    Taz said:

    kjh said:

    Taz said:

    It’s the same with the victims of the tainted blood scandal.

    Politicians and the political classes more concerned about protecting themselves and their institutions.

    They all talk a good game but don’t deliver. I doubt compensation will be sorted this Parliament and this is not really a Labour thing, yet another shit legacy from the past govts.

    Plenty of sympathetic warm words and half apologies, ‘I’m sorry I was misled’, however no hard cash or restitution and I doubt the likes of Vennels will ever face a court over this.

    Sadly you are absolutely right and it isn't just those two. There are several other high profile cases and some others that are much smaller so don't have any attention. I am involved in helping a group of one of these scandals. I don't want to go into details here but @Cyclefree and @NickPalmer are aware of it who have given a little help in the past.

    Politicians often quote 'It must never happen again' and it always does.

    In the case I am helping on it is 12 years on so the Tories, Labour and the LDs all have a hand in it. Finally at the end of the last Govt we got an admission of liability from the Govt and now that has been backtracked on. Because most impacted are in their 80s many have died or will die without resolution.

    Our impression is it is mainly civil servants who block progress. This has been clear from FOIs carried out and ministers change so often you go around the loop over and over again. It has all party support.

    Just to give you some idea of the pain (and the campaign for justice, as with the PO, is often more painful than the original event, or at least makes it much worse) our campaign has had both the NAO and PAC find in our favour, 2 parliamentary debates and two blocked bills.
    The process is as punishing as the original ordeal

    I guess we only get to hear of the high profile ones. There must be dozens
    I am sure there are. I doubt you will be aware of the one I am involved in and it has a relatively cheap simple solution and for many the process is far worse than the original issue. Of the original campaign committee, half have died even though the National Audit Office and Parliamentary Accounts Committee found the Govt liable.

    I help this campaign because I am aware of people impacted and it makes me very angry.
    We need more people getting angry
    We need to change the system of Government. We have ministers who get appointed to briefs that they have no expertise on whatsoever, who are utterly overloaded and who move on before they get to grasp their brief.

    I find that @Richard_Tyndall has some similar views to me on this I recall. Also @Luckyguy1983, with whom I rarely agree also has some interesting views in my opinion.
    I don’t disagree but I can never see it happening. These people are not going to rule themselves out of a job.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 66,068
    edited 8:02AM
    HYUFD said:

    Good morning

    Many individuals should face criminal trials over this scandal, but do we think any will ?

    And on more depressing news both labour and the conservatives make solemn pledges to retain the triple lock which shows just how much serious trouble we are when neither are fit to govern when they put their popularity before doing the right thing

    Where on earth is the leader we need to take the difficult decisions, wean us off spending and borrowing, and take the country away from an inevitable debt crisis

    'Farage fails to guarantee pensions triple lock but vows to axe benefits cap'
    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/nigel-farage-keir-starmer-reform-uk-kemi-badenoch-conservatives-b2758529.html

    'Tories will consider means testing pension triple-lock, Badenoch says'
    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/jan/16/kemi-badenoch-uk-getting-poorer

    Labour have not committed to the triple lock beyond this parliament
    https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/money/labour-issues-new-statement-future-32022276

    Only the LDs of the main UK parties are committed to permanently keeping the triple lock in full
    https://www.libdems.org.uk/news/article/default-f4d399b80ea579afb9686280d29a77d0
    You need to keep up

    Robert Jenrick on Sky this morning gave an undertaking the conservatives will keep the triple lock
  • wooliedyedwooliedyed Posts: 12,564
    edited 8:03AM
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    The curious incident….

    Labour might actually be relived by these polls. It seems that the welfare climbdown has not hurt them - or it has hurt them politically but not electorally (so far). Put it another way, they are already in the toilet but they’re not even further down the toilet = “phew”

    Labour will feel they can still win the next election. Tories will feel they are not dead in the water yet, LDs and Greens that progress can be protected and advanced.
    Hayward quoted in the Indy today saying he thinks Reform have topped out and that local by elections are a better or as good an indicator of where we are compared to VI polling. In which case, JL Partners get your finger out and update the Polaris model!
    It’s really hard to know. Farage has made some errors recently, and Reform are looking fissiparous

    And yet the electoral direction of the country still points firmly towards polarisation - some going hard left and green and more going hard right and ??

    I see on X that Farage is predicting that Jenrick will take over the Tories and then Jenrick will try and outflank reform by going FURTHER to the right on migration, asylum and woke

    A fascinating analysis
    Its all moot until the 'disinterested between votes' come back into the picture and we are polling for a GE and not registering disapproval/NOTA etc
    We get a broad idea only right now and its not that relevant unless an 'event' happens - Reform lose the average lead, Labour fall to third, Tories fall to fourth, Dried Fruitists score 10% plus regularly, LDs back into single figures etc in which case the movement might become more self fulfilling as it were
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 52,094
    HYUFD said:

    Good morning

    Many individuals should face criminal trials over this scandal, but do we think any will ?

    And on more depressing news both labour and the conservatives make solemn pledges to retain the triple lock which shows just how much serious trouble we are when neither are fit to govern when they put their popularity before doing the right thing

    Where on earth is the leader we need to take the difficult decisions, wean us off spending and borrowing, and take the country away from an inevitable debt crisis

    'Farage fails to guarantee pensions triple lock but vows to axe benefits cap'
    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/nigel-farage-keir-starmer-reform-uk-kemi-badenoch-conservatives-b2758529.html

    'Tories will consider means testing pension triple-lock, Badenoch says'
    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/jan/16/kemi-badenoch-uk-getting-poorer

    Labour have not committed to the triple lock beyond this parliament
    https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/money/labour-issues-new-statement-future-32022276

    Only the LDs of the main UK parties are committed to permanently keeping the triple lock in full
    https://www.libdems.org.uk/news/article/default-f4d399b80ea579afb9686280d29a77d0
    In a couple of years or so, the triple lock will take the state pension up to the level of the basic tax allowance, the latter being frozen (with the freeze hotly expected to be extended). At that point, I suggest something will have to change, to avoid the scenario whereby millions of pensioners whose only income is the state pension suddenly starting to pay tax. Somehow, the state pension and the basic tax allowance will have to be harmonised, and while it might be good news if the tax allowance were indexed to the triple lock, I suspect this will prove unaffordable and therefore the triple lock will have to go.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 32,776
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    The curious incident….

    Labour might actually be relived by these polls. It seems that the welfare climbdown has not hurt them - or it has hurt them politically but not electorally (so far). Put it another way, they are already in the toilet but they’re not even further down the toilet = “phew”

    Labour will feel they can still win the next election. Tories will feel they are not dead in the water yet, LDs and Greens that progress can be protected and advanced.
    Hayward quoted in the Indy today saying he thinks Reform have topped out and that local by elections are a better or as good an indicator of where we are compared to VI polling. In which case, JL Partners get your finger out and update the Polaris model!
    It’s really hard to know. Farage has made some errors recently, and Reform are looking fissiparous

    And yet the electoral direction of the country still points firmly towards polarisation - some going hard left and green and more going hard right and ??

    I see on X that Farage is predicting that Jenrick will take over the Tories and then Jenrick will try and outflank reform by going FURTHER to the right on migration, asylum and woke

    A fascinating analysis
    And then when he is returned as PM he can revert to his natural hug-a-hoodie Cameroonian wokery.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 20,670

    MACRON MUST APOLOGISE

    John Redwood
    @johnredwood
    ·
    2h
    Offering us a loan of the Bayeux embroidery reminds us of the invasion and the way so many English were forced into serfdom by the Normans. It depicts the violent deaths of English soldiers.

    https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1942807774389256453

    I wonder if it’s possible to be more of an utter fanny
  • LeonLeon Posts: 62,645
    HYUFD said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Morning all.
    Polling start to the morning today from More In Common. As you were figures. We are still in the holding pattern that emerged after the May locals with minor noise moves week to week.
    None of the 'scandals' or dramas are moving the dial. The creation of the Dried Fruits will likely be the next mover, weird black swans or Trussery notwithstanding

    ➡️ REF UK 29% (nc)
    🌹 LAB 24% (nc)
    🌳 CON 19% (nc)
    🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2)
    🌍 GREEN 7% (-2)
    🟡 SNP 3% (nc)

    N = 2,084 | Dates:4 - 7/7 | Change w 30/6

    The curious incident….

    Labour might actually be relived by these polls. It seems that the welfare climbdown has not hurt them - or it has hurt them politically but not electorally (so far). Put it another way, they are already in the toilet but they’re not even further down the toilet = “phew”

    Labour will feel they can still win the next election. Tories will feel they are not dead in the water yet, LDs and Greens that progress can be protected and advanced.
    Hayward quoted in the Indy today saying he thinks Reform have topped out and that local by elections are a better or as good an indicator of where we are compared to VI polling. In which case, JL Partners get your finger out and update the Polaris model!
    It’s really hard to know. Farage has made some errors recently, and Reform are looking fissiparous

    And yet the electoral direction of the country still points firmly towards polarisation - some going hard left and green and more going hard right and ??

    I see on X that Farage is predicting that Jenrick will take over the Tories and then Jenrick will try and outflank reform by going FURTHER to the right on migration, asylum and woke

    A fascinating analysis
    You can't out Farage Farage, the Tories would be better off going for say Mel Stride if they removed Kemi and focusing solely on the economy and balancing the books and placing themselves as sensible fiscal conservatives as an alternative to both Labour and Reform.

    Badenock has proved she can't out war on woke Nigel and Jenrick couldn't out Farage on sending back the boats and immigrants either.

    If Farage lost the next GE and left the Reform leadership then Jenrick would have a better chance as leader and to scoop up Farage's supporters on the right
    Ahahahahahaha

    As someone once nearly put it, “if ‘Mel Stride’ is the answer, what in the name of God’s Holy Testicles is the question??”
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