Lucy Powell. Not giving the WASPI women a handout was a ‘mistake’
Politics is infested with useless morons with over inflated opinions,of their own abilities. This whole interview with her just reeks of it. This is just one segment.
Sigh. Remember folks, before they get rid of that useless prat Starmer they really need to be sure his replacement is not even worse. Powell is worse.
She is, and it’s not just her. Hopeless as she is. Across the political spectrum it is hard to see where there are real leaders. The Tories, no, the Lib Dem’s have a twat in a wetsuit and a load of bland backbencher types. Reform, not a chance. Farage is no leader, he’s a disruptor and where is the scrutiny of their politics. The Greens are all student politics.
It’s most disheartening.
Cleverly on that basis might be good. Warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, a former Home and Foreign Secretary and more serious than Davey and more heavyweight than Kemi, more centrist than Farage and Jenrick and not as populist and anti immigrant and not a hard left ranter like Polanski
I'll give you warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, but so is a Siberian public lavatory.
Success in politics is not pure a matter of political triangulation based on current voting patterns.
Firstly, there is the issue of momentum - current momentum in British politics is rightward (with a smaller move to the exteme left), and the current failing Government is a centrist one. There is absolutely zero point in jumping on to that sinking bit of jetsom with Labour, the Lib Dems, and the nationalist partes already clinging on. What was the market for a neoliberal party before 1979? None.
Secondly there's the issue of personal qualities.
Cleverly gave Starmer a lifeline with his stupid China speech as Foreign Sec. He was a useless, lazy, supine Foreign Secretary who let his civil servants run the department, which included him negotiating the Chagos Surrender Deal, which Cameron, to give him his dues, booted into the long grass. In his own leadership campaign he was so stupid that he tried to lend votes to knock out an opponent and ended up knocking himself out.
If you want a rightwing government which is hardline on immigration you will vote Reform anyway, even if Jenrick is Tory leader. If you want an extreme left government you will vote Green.
If the Tories want to survive at the next general election they primarily need to hold most of their current MPs and maybe pick up a few from Labour in London and a few middle class patches of the home countries and areas like Altrincham they held until last year as a result of Labour's unpopularity.
To do that, they largely need Labour and LD tactical votes in Conservative held seats where Reform are the likely challengers. Labour and LD voters won't tactically vote for a Jenrick led Tories, if Kemi goes ever more culture war they likely won't vote for her candidates either. They may however tactically vote for a Cleverly led Tories to beat Farage's candidate.
Cleverly of course also set tighter visa wage requirements which has started to reduce the Boriswave, so Farage can't hit him on that
Watching you slowly work your way through the change curve from outright denial towards gradual acceptance is such a pleasure.
I expect though that if you get a very nasty Farage led Reform government at the next general election left liberals like you will soon be crying to bring back Tory governments of old led by the likes of Major, Cameron, May and Rishi, even Boris
There's not going to be a very nasty Farage led Reform government. To make a breakthrough they need to deliver at the Local Authority level, and that needs to be done by those on the ground. There isn't anyone with that level of competence in depth in Reform.
I don't think they need to deliver at a local Government level, they just need to pin the blame on Westminster while claiming that they can't fix social care until they are in power.
And all that requires is following the SNP playbook until 2029.
Now granted the buck will stop with Nigel when they end up in power and it turns out they can't fix anything and equally can't blame the EU (because we've left it) but that's a separate issue and post 2029 issue.
That only works so long and then people get fed up. Labour, when they ruled Durham with Simon Henig in charge, tried that for several years. People gave them the benefit of the doubt initially but after several years of non delivery didn’t.
The same will happen to Reform at a local level.
Although I’m sure most of us agree here that local govt funding model is broke and whoever runs a local council is fucked.
Mr Henig is the reason I joined the Conservative party... No really.
Really, why ?
I always found him quite pleasant although not caring for his brand of Durham City first politics. Especially as his seat was in N Durham.
Taz lives in N. Durham - I suspect that explains it...
I’m currently enjoying the people on local Facebook groups, many of whom hated Lumiere suddenly being converts and mourning its passing
I've never got the point of Lumiere - yes it's an interest trip round Durham seeing things in a different light (excuse the pun) but the idea that it generates generates £ms of extra sales to never made sense to me..
Me neither and the people claiming it did were those at the council who supported it.
I found it a pain in the arse. Lots of extra traffic making my journey home from work or to the Arnison a pain in the neck.
I much prefer the Xmas market they do for a trip into Durham at that time of year.
We go into Durham quite regularly. We visited Crush last week. But we avoid Lumiere
We go more often then we used to - but that's because twin A is up there so going into town for a drink and a visit to the bookshops makes sense..
It’s certainly much better than it was a few years ago. Some nice new restaurants and not as many drunks hanging around the bus station. Just needs the stack to get sorted.
We like the river walks and can always get parked in Prince Bishops.
I like going to the charity shops and the CEX shop to look for TV DVDs to rip for my collection. I also like the far Asian supermarkets for,the noodles and Soju.
Having said that Head of Steam is quite shit these days and there is no sign of the Brew dog building ever being sorted.
That Brewdog is never opening - mainly because Brewdog is currently closing pubs not opening them.
No, but the building was more than just BrewDog and it’s the building that needs sorting. It’s in a prime position and was supposed to be a flagship building. Just reflects poorly on our city. Another bar or business would simply take over from BrewDog when it opens. A top quality Spoons for example
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Met not covering themselves in glory here. I'm sure the guy was doing something he shouldn't. But none of this is relevant to police officers deciding that being Jewish is a crime.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Ming Vase strategy has been a shambles. They should have said ‘no plans’, done it, rode out the anger and hoped to win in 2029.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
A government that was willing to sort out taxes on income, which between NI and daft gradations are a shocking mess, and was willing to whack them up significantly in exchange for cutting taxes on property and spending would almost certainly not merely get away with it but get decent brownie points for trying.
Capital gains tax might be an awkward one but there are ways around that in the computer age.
Remember, people pay taxes with sorrow but rates with rage.
Lucy Powell. Not giving the WASPI women a handout was a ‘mistake’
Politics is infested with useless morons with over inflated opinions,of their own abilities. This whole interview with her just reeks of it. This is just one segment.
Sigh. Remember folks, before they get rid of that useless prat Starmer they really need to be sure his replacement is not even worse. Powell is worse.
She is, and it’s not just her. Hopeless as she is. Across the political spectrum it is hard to see where there are real leaders. The Tories, no, the Lib Dem’s have a twat in a wetsuit and a load of bland backbencher types. Reform, not a chance. Farage is no leader, he’s a disruptor and where is the scrutiny of their politics. The Greens are all student politics.
It’s most disheartening.
Cleverly on that basis might be good. Warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, a former Home and Foreign Secretary and more serious than Davey and more heavyweight than Kemi, more centrist than Farage and Jenrick and not as populist and anti immigrant and not a hard left ranter like Polanski
I'll give you warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, but so is a Siberian public lavatory.
Success in politics is not pure a matter of political triangulation based on current voting patterns.
Firstly, there is the issue of momentum - current momentum in British politics is rightward (with a smaller move to the exteme left), and the current failing Government is a centrist one. There is absolutely zero point in jumping on to that sinking bit of jetsom with Labour, the Lib Dems, and the nationalist partes already clinging on. What was the market for a neoliberal party before 1979? None.
Secondly there's the issue of personal qualities.
Cleverly gave Starmer a lifeline with his stupid China speech as Foreign Sec. He was a useless, lazy, supine Foreign Secretary who let his civil servants run the department, which included him negotiating the Chagos Surrender Deal, which Cameron, to give him his dues, booted into the long grass. In his own leadership campaign he was so stupid that he tried to lend votes to knock out an opponent and ended up knocking himself out.
If you want a rightwing government which is hardline on immigration you will vote Reform anyway, even if Jenrick is Tory leader. If you want an extreme left government you will vote Green.
If the Tories want to survive at the next general election they primarily need to hold most of their current MPs and maybe pick up a few from Labour in London and a few middle class patches of the home countries and areas like Altrincham they held until last year as a result of Labour's unpopularity.
To do that, they largely need Labour and LD tactical votes in Conservative held seats where Reform are the likely challengers. Labour and LD voters won't tactically vote for a Jenrick led Tories, if Kemi goes ever more culture war they likely won't vote for her candidates either. They may however tactically vote for a Cleverly led Tories to beat Farage's candidate.
Cleverly of course also set tighter visa wage requirements which has started to reduce the Boriswave, so Farage can't hit him on that
Watching you slowly work your way through the change curve from outright denial towards gradual acceptance is such a pleasure.
I expect though that if you get a very nasty Farage led Reform government at the next general election left liberals like you will soon be crying to bring back Tory governments of old led by the likes of Major, Cameron, May and Rishi, even Boris
There's not going to be a very nasty Farage led Reform government. To make a breakthrough they need to deliver at the Local Authority level, and that needs to be done by those on the ground. There isn't anyone with that level of competence in depth in Reform.
I don't think they need to deliver at a local Government level, they just need to pin the blame on Westminster while claiming that they can't fix social care until they are in power.
And all that requires is following the SNP playbook until 2029.
Now granted the buck will stop with Nigel when they end up in power and it turns out they can't fix anything and equally can't blame the EU (because we've left it) but that's a separate issue and post 2029 issue.
That only works so long and then people get fed up. Labour, when they ruled Durham with Simon Henig in charge, tried that for several years. People gave them the benefit of the doubt initially but after several years of non delivery didn’t.
The same will happen to Reform at a local level.
Although I’m sure most of us agree here that local govt funding model is broke and whoever runs a local council is fucked.
Mr Henig is the reason I joined the Conservative party... No really.
Really, why ?
I always found him quite pleasant although not caring for his brand of Durham City first politics. Especially as his seat was in N Durham.
Taz lives in N. Durham - I suspect that explains it...
I’m currently enjoying the people on local Facebook groups, many of whom hated Lumiere suddenly being converts and mourning its passing
I've never got the point of Lumiere - yes it's an interest trip round Durham seeing things in a different light (excuse the pun) but the idea that it generates generates £ms of extra sales to never made sense to me..
Me neither and the people claiming it did were those at the council who supported it.
I found it a pain in the arse. Lots of extra traffic making my journey home from work or to the Arnison a pain in the neck.
I much prefer the Xmas market they do for a trip into Durham at that time of year.
We go into Durham quite regularly. We visited Crush last week. But we avoid Lumiere
We go more often then we used to - but that's because twin A is up there so going into town for a drink and a visit to the bookshops makes sense..
It’s certainly much better than it was a few years ago. Some nice new restaurants and not as many drunks hanging around the bus station. Just needs the stack to get sorted.
We like the river walks and can always get parked in Prince Bishops.
I like going to the charity shops and the CEX shop to look for TV DVDs to rip for my collection. I also like the far Asian supermarkets for,the noodles and Soju.
Having said that Head of Steam is quite shit these days and there is no sign of the Brew dog building ever being sorted.
Me moving away from the area and the reduction in drunks hanging around Durham bus station are purely coincidental.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
A government that was willing to sort out taxes on income, which between NI and daft gradations are a shocking mess, and was willing to whack them up significantly in exchange for cutting taxes on property and spending would almost certainly not merely get away with it but get decent brownie points for trying.
Capital gains tax might be an awkward one but there are ways around that in the computer age.
Remember, people pay taxes with sorrow but rates with rage.
And we are back to merging employee NI with IT - simple, an actual saving on admin, raises money and equalises tax.
Put in an exemption/special rate for basic rate pensioners - so that only pensioners on over 50K pay more.
You could even claim that this isn't putting up tax - just catching more people in the tax net....
The Trump administration is just flat out murdering people.
FULL REPORT: Colombian public media reports that a U.S. military strike on a boat on September 15—the second attack on a vessel by the U.S. in the Caribbean that we’re aware of—was a Colombian boat and was in Colombian territorial waters.
At least one of the three victims extrajudicially killed in the strike was Colombian lifelong fisherman Alejandro Carranza. Alejandro’s identity is confirmed by his cousin.
The Colombian president has accused the US of committing murder
Please let him indict Trump and apply for his extradition. That would be exceedingly funny.
Trump has already withheld $740m in subsidies that pay for anti-drug activities…
(I actually think that Colombia should kick out the ambassador and close the embassy - it’s one of the most important US locations globally and the base for most of their LatAm covert operations)
One has to wonder where that much money goes, because the drug problem in Columbia isn’t getting any better. $740m buys a lot of Mercedes and Range Rovers.
Yet another US military intelligence failure if the Columbian version of the boat story stands up, although I’m sure the story that went up the line at the Department of Defence was that it was a drug running boat in international waters, so that’s what got back to SecDef and the White House.
US ambassador in Bogota is going to have an uncomfortable meeting tomorrow.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Lucy Powell. Not giving the WASPI women a handout was a ‘mistake’
Politics is infested with useless morons with over inflated opinions,of their own abilities. This whole interview with her just reeks of it. This is just one segment.
Sigh. Remember folks, before they get rid of that useless prat Starmer they really need to be sure his replacement is not even worse. Powell is worse.
She is, and it’s not just her. Hopeless as she is. Across the political spectrum it is hard to see where there are real leaders. The Tories, no, the Lib Dem’s have a twat in a wetsuit and a load of bland backbencher types. Reform, not a chance. Farage is no leader, he’s a disruptor and where is the scrutiny of their politics. The Greens are all student politics.
It’s most disheartening.
Cleverly on that basis might be good. Warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, a former Home and Foreign Secretary and more serious than Davey and more heavyweight than Kemi, more centrist than Farage and Jenrick and not as populist and anti immigrant and not a hard left ranter like Polanski
I'll give you warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, but so is a Siberian public lavatory.
Success in politics is not pure a matter of political triangulation based on current voting patterns.
Firstly, there is the issue of momentum - current momentum in British politics is rightward (with a smaller move to the exteme left), and the current failing Government is a centrist one. There is absolutely zero point in jumping on to that sinking bit of jetsom with Labour, the Lib Dems, and the nationalist partes already clinging on. What was the market for a neoliberal party before 1979? None.
Secondly there's the issue of personal qualities.
Cleverly gave Starmer a lifeline with his stupid China speech as Foreign Sec. He was a useless, lazy, supine Foreign Secretary who let his civil servants run the department, which included him negotiating the Chagos Surrender Deal, which Cameron, to give him his dues, booted into the long grass. In his own leadership campaign he was so stupid that he tried to lend votes to knock out an opponent and ended up knocking himself out.
If you want a rightwing government which is hardline on immigration you will vote Reform anyway, even if Jenrick is Tory leader. If you want an extreme left government you will vote Green.
If the Tories want to survive at the next general election they primarily need to hold most of their current MPs and maybe pick up a few from Labour in London and a few middle class patches of the home countries and areas like Altrincham they held until last year as a result of Labour's unpopularity.
To do that, they largely need Labour and LD tactical votes in Conservative held seats where Reform are the likely challengers. Labour and LD voters won't tactically vote for a Jenrick led Tories, if Kemi goes ever more culture war they likely won't vote for her candidates either. They may however tactically vote for a Cleverly led Tories to beat Farage's candidate.
Cleverly of course also set tighter visa wage requirements which has started to reduce the Boriswave, so Farage can't hit him on that
Watching you slowly work your way through the change curve from outright denial towards gradual acceptance is such a pleasure.
I expect though that if you get a very nasty Farage led Reform government at the next general election left liberals like you will soon be crying to bring back Tory governments of old led by the likes of Major, Cameron, May and Rishi, even Boris
There's not going to be a very nasty Farage led Reform government. To make a breakthrough they need to deliver at the Local Authority level, and that needs to be done by those on the ground. There isn't anyone with that level of competence in depth in Reform.
I don't think they need to deliver at a local Government level, they just need to pin the blame on Westminster while claiming that they can't fix social care until they are in power.
And all that requires is following the SNP playbook until 2029.
Now granted the buck will stop with Nigel when they end up in power and it turns out they can't fix anything and equally can't blame the EU (because we've left it) but that's a separate issue and post 2029 issue.
That only works so long and then people get fed up. Labour, when they ruled Durham with Simon Henig in charge, tried that for several years. People gave them the benefit of the doubt initially but after several years of non delivery didn’t.
The same will happen to Reform at a local level.
Although I’m sure most of us agree here that local govt funding model is broke and whoever runs a local council is fucked.
Mr Henig is the reason I joined the Conservative party... No really.
Really, why ?
I always found him quite pleasant although not caring for his brand of Durham City first politics. Especially as his seat was in N Durham.
Taz lives in N. Durham - I suspect that explains it...
I’m currently enjoying the people on local Facebook groups, many of whom hated Lumiere suddenly being converts and mourning its passing
I've never got the point of Lumiere - yes it's an interest trip round Durham seeing things in a different light (excuse the pun) but the idea that it generates generates £ms of extra sales to never made sense to me..
Me neither and the people claiming it did were those at the council who supported it.
I found it a pain in the arse. Lots of extra traffic making my journey home from work or to the Arnison a pain in the neck.
I much prefer the Xmas market they do for a trip into Durham at that time of year.
We go into Durham quite regularly. We visited Crush last week. But we avoid Lumiere
We go more often then we used to - but that's because twin A is up there so going into town for a drink and a visit to the bookshops makes sense..
It’s certainly much better than it was a few years ago. Some nice new restaurants and not as many drunks hanging around the bus station. Just needs the stack to get sorted.
We like the river walks and can always get parked in Prince Bishops.
I like going to the charity shops and the CEX shop to look for TV DVDs to rip for my collection. I also like the far Asian supermarkets for,the noodles and Soju.
Having said that Head of Steam is quite shit these days and there is no sign of the Brew dog building ever being sorted.
Me moving away from the area and the reduction in drunks hanging around Durham bus station are purely coincidental.
Eek twin A pointed out that stopping the pub that used to sell quad shots cheaply has seriously reduced the number of students who accidentally drowned.
Strangely the pub kept very quiet about stopping the sales to avoid liability....
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Ming Vase strategy has been a shambles. They should have said ‘no plans’, done it, rode out the anger and hoped to win in 2029.
Exactly. Fewer people than ever give a toss about broken manifesto promises, and he's so epically unpopular anyway. Like a sort of senioritis, there might actually be space to act...
Lucy Powell. Not giving the WASPI women a handout was a ‘mistake’
Politics is infested with useless morons with over inflated opinions,of their own abilities. This whole interview with her just reeks of it. This is just one segment.
Sigh. Remember folks, before they get rid of that useless prat Starmer they really need to be sure his replacement is not even worse. Powell is worse.
She is, and it’s not just her. Hopeless as she is. Across the political spectrum it is hard to see where there are real leaders. The Tories, no, the Lib Dem’s have a twat in a wetsuit and a load of bland backbencher types. Reform, not a chance. Farage is no leader, he’s a disruptor and where is the scrutiny of their politics. The Greens are all student politics.
It’s most disheartening.
Cleverly on that basis might be good. Warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, a former Home and Foreign Secretary and more serious than Davey and more heavyweight than Kemi, more centrist than Farage and Jenrick and not as populist and anti immigrant and not a hard left ranter like Polanski
I'll give you warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, but so is a Siberian public lavatory.
Success in politics is not pure a matter of political triangulation based on current voting patterns.
Firstly, there is the issue of momentum - current momentum in British politics is rightward (with a smaller move to the exteme left), and the current failing Government is a centrist one. There is absolutely zero point in jumping on to that sinking bit of jetsom with Labour, the Lib Dems, and the nationalist partes already clinging on. What was the market for a neoliberal party before 1979? None.
Secondly there's the issue of personal qualities.
Cleverly gave Starmer a lifeline with his stupid China speech as Foreign Sec. He was a useless, lazy, supine Foreign Secretary who let his civil servants run the department, which included him negotiating the Chagos Surrender Deal, which Cameron, to give him his dues, booted into the long grass. In his own leadership campaign he was so stupid that he tried to lend votes to knock out an opponent and ended up knocking himself out.
If you want a rightwing government which is hardline on immigration you will vote Reform anyway, even if Jenrick is Tory leader. If you want an extreme left government you will vote Green.
If the Tories want to survive at the next general election they primarily need to hold most of their current MPs and maybe pick up a few from Labour in London and a few middle class patches of the home countries and areas like Altrincham they held until last year as a result of Labour's unpopularity.
To do that, they largely need Labour and LD tactical votes in Conservative held seats where Reform are the likely challengers. Labour and LD voters won't tactically vote for a Jenrick led Tories, if Kemi goes ever more culture war they likely won't vote for her candidates either. They may however tactically vote for a Cleverly led Tories to beat Farage's candidate.
Cleverly of course also set tighter visa wage requirements which has started to reduce the Boriswave, so Farage can't hit him on that
Watching you slowly work your way through the change curve from outright denial towards gradual acceptance is such a pleasure.
I expect though that if you get a very nasty Farage led Reform government at the next general election left liberals like you will soon be crying to bring back Tory governments of old led by the likes of Major, Cameron, May and Rishi, even Boris
There's not going to be a very nasty Farage led Reform government. To make a breakthrough they need to deliver at the Local Authority level, and that needs to be done by those on the ground. There isn't anyone with that level of competence in depth in Reform.
I don't think they need to deliver at a local Government level, they just need to pin the blame on Westminster while claiming that they can't fix social care until they are in power.
And all that requires is following the SNP playbook until 2029.
Now granted the buck will stop with Nigel when they end up in power and it turns out they can't fix anything and equally can't blame the EU (because we've left it) but that's a separate issue and post 2029 issue.
That only works so long and then people get fed up. Labour, when they ruled Durham with Simon Henig in charge, tried that for several years. People gave them the benefit of the doubt initially but after several years of non delivery didn’t.
The same will happen to Reform at a local level.
Although I’m sure most of us agree here that local govt funding model is broke and whoever runs a local council is fucked.
Mr Henig is the reason I joined the Conservative party... No really.
Really, why ?
I always found him quite pleasant although not caring for his brand of Durham City first politics. Especially as his seat was in N Durham.
Taz lives in N. Durham - I suspect that explains it...
I’m currently enjoying the people on local Facebook groups, many of whom hated Lumiere suddenly being converts and mourning its passing
I've never got the point of Lumiere - yes it's an interest trip round Durham seeing things in a different light (excuse the pun) but the idea that it generates generates £ms of extra sales to never made sense to me..
Me neither and the people claiming it did were those at the council who supported it.
I found it a pain in the arse. Lots of extra traffic making my journey home from work or to the Arnison a pain in the neck.
I much prefer the Xmas market they do for a trip into Durham at that time of year.
We go into Durham quite regularly. We visited Crush last week. But we avoid Lumiere
We go more often then we used to - but that's because twin A is up there so going into town for a drink and a visit to the bookshops makes sense..
It’s certainly much better than it was a few years ago. Some nice new restaurants and not as many drunks hanging around the bus station. Just needs the stack to get sorted.
We like the river walks and can always get parked in Prince Bishops.
I like going to the charity shops and the CEX shop to look for TV DVDs to rip for my collection. I also like the far Asian supermarkets for,the noodles and Soju.
Having said that Head of Steam is quite shit these days and there is no sign of the Brew dog building ever being sorted.
That Brewdog is never opening - mainly because Brewdog is currently closing pubs not opening them.
No, but the building was more than just BrewDog and it’s the building that needs sorting. It’s in a prime position and was supposed to be a flagship building. Just reflects poorly on our city. Another bar or business would simply take over from BrewDog when it opens. A top quality Spoons for example
Oh that building is a mess because the initial contractor went bankrupt and the approval paper work has been lost... You can see why it's taking so long to get resolved.....
Lucy Powell. Not giving the WASPI women a handout was a ‘mistake’
Politics is infested with useless morons with over inflated opinions,of their own abilities. This whole interview with her just reeks of it. This is just one segment.
Sigh. Remember folks, before they get rid of that useless prat Starmer they really need to be sure his replacement is not even worse. Powell is worse.
She is, and it’s not just her. Hopeless as she is. Across the political spectrum it is hard to see where there are real leaders. The Tories, no, the Lib Dem’s have a twat in a wetsuit and a load of bland backbencher types. Reform, not a chance. Farage is no leader, he’s a disruptor and where is the scrutiny of their politics. The Greens are all student politics.
It’s most disheartening.
Cleverly on that basis might be good. Warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, a former Home and Foreign Secretary and more serious than Davey and more heavyweight than Kemi, more centrist than Farage and Jenrick and not as populist and anti immigrant and not a hard left ranter like Polanski
I'll give you warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, but so is a Siberian public lavatory.
Success in politics is not pure a matter of political triangulation based on current voting patterns.
Firstly, there is the issue of momentum - current momentum in British politics is rightward (with a smaller move to the exteme left), and the current failing Government is a centrist one. There is absolutely zero point in jumping on to that sinking bit of jetsom with Labour, the Lib Dems, and the nationalist partes already clinging on. What was the market for a neoliberal party before 1979? None.
Secondly there's the issue of personal qualities.
Cleverly gave Starmer a lifeline with his stupid China speech as Foreign Sec. He was a useless, lazy, supine Foreign Secretary who let his civil servants run the department, which included him negotiating the Chagos Surrender Deal, which Cameron, to give him his dues, booted into the long grass. In his own leadership campaign he was so stupid that he tried to lend votes to knock out an opponent and ended up knocking himself out.
If you want a rightwing government which is hardline on immigration you will vote Reform anyway, even if Jenrick is Tory leader. If you want an extreme left government you will vote Green.
If the Tories want to survive at the next general election they primarily need to hold most of their current MPs and maybe pick up a few from Labour in London and a few middle class patches of the home countries and areas like Altrincham they held until last year as a result of Labour's unpopularity.
To do that, they largely need Labour and LD tactical votes in Conservative held seats where Reform are the likely challengers. Labour and LD voters won't tactically vote for a Jenrick led Tories, if Kemi goes ever more culture war they likely won't vote for her candidates either. They may however tactically vote for a Cleverly led Tories to beat Farage's candidate.
Cleverly of course also set tighter visa wage requirements which has started to reduce the Boriswave, so Farage can't hit him on that
Watching you slowly work your way through the change curve from outright denial towards gradual acceptance is such a pleasure.
I expect though that if you get a very nasty Farage led Reform government at the next general election left liberals like you will soon be crying to bring back Tory governments of old led by the likes of Major, Cameron, May and Rishi, even Boris
There's not going to be a very nasty Farage led Reform government. To make a breakthrough they need to deliver at the Local Authority level, and that needs to be done by those on the ground. There isn't anyone with that level of competence in depth in Reform.
I don't think they need to deliver at a local Government level, they just need to pin the blame on Westminster while claiming that they can't fix social care until they are in power.
And all that requires is following the SNP playbook until 2029.
Now granted the buck will stop with Nigel when they end up in power and it turns out they can't fix anything and equally can't blame the EU (because we've left it) but that's a separate issue and post 2029 issue.
That only works so long and then people get fed up. Labour, when they ruled Durham with Simon Henig in charge, tried that for several years. People gave them the benefit of the doubt initially but after several years of non delivery didn’t.
The same will happen to Reform at a local level.
Although I’m sure most of us agree here that local govt funding model is broke and whoever runs a local council is fucked.
Mr Henig is the reason I joined the Conservative party... No really.
Really, why ?
I always found him quite pleasant although not caring for his brand of Durham City first politics. Especially as his seat was in N Durham.
Taz lives in N. Durham - I suspect that explains it...
I’m currently enjoying the people on local Facebook groups, many of whom hated Lumiere suddenly being converts and mourning its passing
I've never got the point of Lumiere - yes it's an interest trip round Durham seeing things in a different light (excuse the pun) but the idea that it generates generates £ms of extra sales to never made sense to me..
Me neither and the people claiming it did were those at the council who supported it.
I found it a pain in the arse. Lots of extra traffic making my journey home from work or to the Arnison a pain in the neck.
I much prefer the Xmas market they do for a trip into Durham at that time of year.
We go into Durham quite regularly. We visited Crush last week. But we avoid Lumiere
We go more often then we used to - but that's because twin A is up there so going into town for a drink and a visit to the bookshops makes sense..
It’s certainly much better than it was a few years ago. Some nice new restaurants and not as many drunks hanging around the bus station. Just needs the stack to get sorted.
We like the river walks and can always get parked in Prince Bishops.
I like going to the charity shops and the CEX shop to look for TV DVDs to rip for my collection. I also like the far Asian supermarkets for,the noodles and Soju.
Having said that Head of Steam is quite shit these days and there is no sign of the Brew dog building ever being sorted.
That Brewdog is never opening - mainly because Brewdog is currently closing pubs not opening them.
No, but the building was more than just BrewDog and it’s the building that needs sorting. It’s in a prime position and was supposed to be a flagship building. Just reflects poorly on our city. Another bar or business would simply take over from BrewDog when it opens. A top quality Spoons for example
Oh that building is a mess because the initial contractor went bankrupt and the approval paper work has been lost... You can see why it's taking so long to get resolved.....
Yes, Tolent, and I suspect come the next council elections it will be no different. Such a pity as the rest of Durham seems to be improving.
Lucy Powell. Not giving the WASPI women a handout was a ‘mistake’
Politics is infested with useless morons with over inflated opinions,of their own abilities. This whole interview with her just reeks of it. This is just one segment.
Sigh. Remember folks, before they get rid of that useless prat Starmer they really need to be sure his replacement is not even worse. Powell is worse.
She is, and it’s not just her. Hopeless as she is. Across the political spectrum it is hard to see where there are real leaders. The Tories, no, the Lib Dem’s have a twat in a wetsuit and a load of bland backbencher types. Reform, not a chance. Farage is no leader, he’s a disruptor and where is the scrutiny of their politics. The Greens are all student politics.
It’s most disheartening.
Cleverly on that basis might be good. Warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, a former Home and Foreign Secretary and more serious than Davey and more heavyweight than Kemi, more centrist than Farage and Jenrick and not as populist and anti immigrant and not a hard left ranter like Polanski
I'll give you warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, but so is a Siberian public lavatory.
Success in politics is not pure a matter of political triangulation based on current voting patterns.
Firstly, there is the issue of momentum - current momentum in British politics is rightward (with a smaller move to the exteme left), and the current failing Government is a centrist one. There is absolutely zero point in jumping on to that sinking bit of jetsom with Labour, the Lib Dems, and the nationalist partes already clinging on. What was the market for a neoliberal party before 1979? None.
Secondly there's the issue of personal qualities.
Cleverly gave Starmer a lifeline with his stupid China speech as Foreign Sec. He was a useless, lazy, supine Foreign Secretary who let his civil servants run the department, which included him negotiating the Chagos Surrender Deal, which Cameron, to give him his dues, booted into the long grass. In his own leadership campaign he was so stupid that he tried to lend votes to knock out an opponent and ended up knocking himself out.
If you want a rightwing government which is hardline on immigration you will vote Reform anyway, even if Jenrick is Tory leader. If you want an extreme left government you will vote Green.
If the Tories want to survive at the next general election they primarily need to hold most of their current MPs and maybe pick up a few from Labour in London and a few middle class patches of the home countries and areas like Altrincham they held until last year as a result of Labour's unpopularity.
To do that, they largely need Labour and LD tactical votes in Conservative held seats where Reform are the likely challengers. Labour and LD voters won't tactically vote for a Jenrick led Tories, if Kemi goes ever more culture war they likely won't vote for her candidates either. They may however tactically vote for a Cleverly led Tories to beat Farage's candidate.
Cleverly of course also set tighter visa wage requirements which has started to reduce the Boriswave, so Farage can't hit him on that
Watching you slowly work your way through the change curve from outright denial towards gradual acceptance is such a pleasure.
I expect though that if you get a very nasty Farage led Reform government at the next general election left liberals like you will soon be crying to bring back Tory governments of old led by the likes of Major, Cameron, May and Rishi, even Boris
There's not going to be a very nasty Farage led Reform government. To make a breakthrough they need to deliver at the Local Authority level, and that needs to be done by those on the ground. There isn't anyone with that level of competence in depth in Reform.
I don't think they need to deliver at a local Government level, they just need to pin the blame on Westminster while claiming that they can't fix social care until they are in power.
And all that requires is following the SNP playbook until 2029.
Now granted the buck will stop with Nigel when they end up in power and it turns out they can't fix anything and equally can't blame the EU (because we've left it) but that's a separate issue and post 2029 issue.
That only works so long and then people get fed up. Labour, when they ruled Durham with Simon Henig in charge, tried that for several years. People gave them the benefit of the doubt initially but after several years of non delivery didn’t.
The same will happen to Reform at a local level.
Although I’m sure most of us agree here that local govt funding model is broke and whoever runs a local council is fucked.
Mr Henig is the reason I joined the Conservative party... No really.
Really, why ?
I always found him quite pleasant although not caring for his brand of Durham City first politics. Especially as his seat was in N Durham.
Taz lives in N. Durham - I suspect that explains it...
I’m currently enjoying the people on local Facebook groups, many of whom hated Lumiere suddenly being converts and mourning its passing
I've never got the point of Lumiere - yes it's an interest trip round Durham seeing things in a different light (excuse the pun) but the idea that it generates generates £ms of extra sales to never made sense to me..
Me neither and the people claiming it did were those at the council who supported it.
I found it a pain in the arse. Lots of extra traffic making my journey home from work or to the Arnison a pain in the neck.
I much prefer the Xmas market they do for a trip into Durham at that time of year.
We go into Durham quite regularly. We visited Crush last week. But we avoid Lumiere
We go more often then we used to - but that's because twin A is up there so going into town for a drink and a visit to the bookshops makes sense..
It’s certainly much better than it was a few years ago. Some nice new restaurants and not as many drunks hanging around the bus station. Just needs the stack to get sorted.
We like the river walks and can always get parked in Prince Bishops.
I like going to the charity shops and the CEX shop to look for TV DVDs to rip for my collection. I also like the far Asian supermarkets for,the noodles and Soju.
Having said that Head of Steam is quite shit these days and there is no sign of the Brew dog building ever being sorted.
That Brewdog is never opening - mainly because Brewdog is currently closing pubs not opening them.
No, but the building was more than just BrewDog and it’s the building that needs sorting. It’s in a prime position and was supposed to be a flagship building. Just reflects poorly on our city. Another bar or business would simply take over from BrewDog when it opens. A top quality Spoons for example
Oh that building is a mess because the initial contractor went bankrupt and the approval paper work has been lost... You can see why it's taking so long to get resolved.....
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Ming Vase strategy has been a shambles. They should have said ‘no plans’, done it, rode out the anger and hoped to win in 2029.
They had a window of opportunity last year to blame the last lot for the books being terrible, and go for a temporary 2-3p on income tax rates to be removed before the next election.
Instead they went with a pile of ideological rather than revenue-maximising taxes, that upset identifiable and organised groups of people while raising very little money. So a year later the Chancellor still needs to find a big pile of money from somewhere.
The Trump administration is just flat out murdering people.
FULL REPORT: Colombian public media reports that a U.S. military strike on a boat on September 15—the second attack on a vessel by the U.S. in the Caribbean that we’re aware of—was a Colombian boat and was in Colombian territorial waters.
At least one of the three victims extrajudicially killed in the strike was Colombian lifelong fisherman Alejandro Carranza. Alejandro’s identity is confirmed by his cousin.
The Colombian president has accused the US of committing murder
Please let him indict Trump and apply for his extradition. That would be exceedingly funny.
Trump has already withheld $740m in subsidies that pay for anti-drug activities…
(I actually think that Colombia should kick out the ambassador and close the embassy - it’s one of the most important US locations globally and the base for most of their LatAm covert operations)
One has to wonder where that much money goes, because the drug problem in Columbia isn’t getting any better. $740m buys a lot of Mercedes and Range Rovers.
Yet another US military intelligence failure if the Columbian version of the boat story stands up, although I’m sure the story that went up the line at the Department of Defence was that it was a drug running boat in international waters, so that’s what got back to SecDef and the White House.
US ambassador in Bogota is going to have an uncomfortable meeting tomorrow.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
My relative in the building line was part of a "consultation"
They were told, point blank, that "They would just have to find the money" and "not to threaten job losses from taxes"
The Trump administration is just flat out murdering people.
FULL REPORT: Colombian public media reports that a U.S. military strike on a boat on September 15—the second attack on a vessel by the U.S. in the Caribbean that we’re aware of—was a Colombian boat and was in Colombian territorial waters.
At least one of the three victims extrajudicially killed in the strike was Colombian lifelong fisherman Alejandro Carranza. Alejandro’s identity is confirmed by his cousin.
The Colombian president has accused the US of committing murder
Please let him indict Trump and apply for his extradition. That would be exceedingly funny.
Trump has already withheld $740m in subsidies that pay for anti-drug activities…
(I actually think that Colombia should kick out the ambassador and close the embassy - it’s one of the most important US locations globally and the base for most of their LatAm covert operations)
One has to wonder where that much money goes, because the drug problem in Columbia isn’t getting any better. $740m buys a lot of Mercedes and Range Rovers.
Yet another US military intelligence failure if the Columbian version of the boat story stands up, although I’m sure the story that went up the line at the Department of Defence was that it was a drug running boat in international waters, so that’s what got back to SecDef and the White House.
US ambassador in Bogota is going to have an uncomfortable meeting tomorrow.
Lucy Powell. Not giving the WASPI women a handout was a ‘mistake’
Politics is infested with useless morons with over inflated opinions,of their own abilities. This whole interview with her just reeks of it. This is just one segment.
Sigh. Remember folks, before they get rid of that useless prat Starmer they really need to be sure his replacement is not even worse. Powell is worse.
She is, and it’s not just her. Hopeless as she is. Across the political spectrum it is hard to see where there are real leaders. The Tories, no, the Lib Dem’s have a twat in a wetsuit and a load of bland backbencher types. Reform, not a chance. Farage is no leader, he’s a disruptor and where is the scrutiny of their politics. The Greens are all student politics.
It’s most disheartening.
Cleverly on that basis might be good. Warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, a former Home and Foreign Secretary and more serious than Davey and more heavyweight than Kemi, more centrist than Farage and Jenrick and not as populist and anti immigrant and not a hard left ranter like Polanski
I'll give you warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, but so is a Siberian public lavatory.
Success in politics is not pure a matter of political triangulation based on current voting patterns.
Firstly, there is the issue of momentum - current momentum in British politics is rightward (with a smaller move to the exteme left), and the current failing Government is a centrist one. There is absolutely zero point in jumping on to that sinking bit of jetsom with Labour, the Lib Dems, and the nationalist partes already clinging on. What was the market for a neoliberal party before 1979? None.
Secondly there's the issue of personal qualities.
Cleverly gave Starmer a lifeline with his stupid China speech as Foreign Sec. He was a useless, lazy, supine Foreign Secretary who let his civil servants run the department, which included him negotiating the Chagos Surrender Deal, which Cameron, to give him his dues, booted into the long grass. In his own leadership campaign he was so stupid that he tried to lend votes to knock out an opponent and ended up knocking himself out.
If you want a rightwing government which is hardline on immigration you will vote Reform anyway, even if Jenrick is Tory leader. If you want an extreme left government you will vote Green.
If the Tories want to survive at the next general election they primarily need to hold most of their current MPs and maybe pick up a few from Labour in London and a few middle class patches of the home countries and areas like Altrincham they held until last year as a result of Labour's unpopularity.
To do that, they largely need Labour and LD tactical votes in Conservative held seats where Reform are the likely challengers. Labour and LD voters won't tactically vote for a Jenrick led Tories, if Kemi goes ever more culture war they likely won't vote for her candidates either. They may however tactically vote for a Cleverly led Tories to beat Farage's candidate.
Cleverly of course also set tighter visa wage requirements which has started to reduce the Boriswave, so Farage can't hit him on that
Watching you slowly work your way through the change curve from outright denial towards gradual acceptance is such a pleasure.
I expect though that if you get a very nasty Farage led Reform government at the next general election left liberals like you will soon be crying to bring back Tory governments of old led by the likes of Major, Cameron, May and Rishi, even Boris
There's not going to be a very nasty Farage led Reform government. To make a breakthrough they need to deliver at the Local Authority level, and that needs to be done by those on the ground. There isn't anyone with that level of competence in depth in Reform.
I don't think they need to deliver at a local Government level, they just need to pin the blame on Westminster while claiming that they can't fix social care until they are in power.
And all that requires is following the SNP playbook until 2029.
Now granted the buck will stop with Nigel when they end up in power and it turns out they can't fix anything and equally can't blame the EU (because we've left it) but that's a separate issue and post 2029 issue.
That only works so long and then people get fed up. Labour, when they ruled Durham with Simon Henig in charge, tried that for several years. People gave them the benefit of the doubt initially but after several years of non delivery didn’t.
The same will happen to Reform at a local level.
Although I’m sure most of us agree here that local govt funding model is broke and whoever runs a local council is fucked.
Mr Henig is the reason I joined the Conservative party... No really.
Really, why ?
I always found him quite pleasant although not caring for his brand of Durham City first politics. Especially as his seat was in N Durham.
Taz lives in N. Durham - I suspect that explains it...
I’m currently enjoying the people on local Facebook groups, many of whom hated Lumiere suddenly being converts and mourning its passing
I've never got the point of Lumiere - yes it's an interest trip round Durham seeing things in a different light (excuse the pun) but the idea that it generates generates £ms of extra sales to never made sense to me..
Me neither and the people claiming it did were those at the council who supported it.
I found it a pain in the arse. Lots of extra traffic making my journey home from work or to the Arnison a pain in the neck.
I much prefer the Xmas market they do for a trip into Durham at that time of year.
We go into Durham quite regularly. We visited Crush last week. But we avoid Lumiere
We go more often then we used to - but that's because twin A is up there so going into town for a drink and a visit to the bookshops makes sense..
It’s certainly much better than it was a few years ago. Some nice new restaurants and not as many drunks hanging around the bus station. Just needs the stack to get sorted.
We like the river walks and can always get parked in Prince Bishops.
I like going to the charity shops and the CEX shop to look for TV DVDs to rip for my collection. I also like the far Asian supermarkets for,the noodles and Soju.
Having said that Head of Steam is quite shit these days and there is no sign of the Brew dog building ever being sorted.
That Brewdog is never opening - mainly because Brewdog is currently closing pubs not opening them.
No, but the building was more than just BrewDog and it’s the building that needs sorting. It’s in a prime position and was supposed to be a flagship building. Just reflects poorly on our city. Another bar or business would simply take over from BrewDog when it opens. A top quality Spoons for example
Oh that building is a mess because the initial contractor went bankrupt and the approval paper work has been lost... You can see why it's taking so long to get resolved.....
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
My relative in the building line was part of a "consultation"
They were told, point blank, that "They would just have to find the money" and "not to threaten job losses from taxes"
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Ming Vase strategy has been a shambles. They should have said ‘no plans’, done it, rode out the anger and hoped to win in 2029.
They had a window of opportunity last year to blame the last lot for the books being terrible, and go for a temporary 2-3p on income tax rates to be removed before the next election.
Instead they went with a pile of ideological rather than revenue-maximising taxes, that upset identifiable and organised groups of people while raising very little money. So a year later the Chancellor still needs to find a big pile of money from somewhere.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
My relative in the building line was part of a "consultation"
They were told, point blank, that "They would just have to find the money" and "not to threaten job losses from taxes"
Interesting ‘consultation’ that, then !
I’m sure they appreciated that.
One attendee said he felt sorry for the "spokesperson" - put of their depth, and completely unbriefed. Just given a statement to read. The attendee wondered if it was supposed to provoke a reaction - but said on second thoughts it was just grossly mismanaged.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Ming Vase strategy has been a shambles. They should have said ‘no plans’, done it, rode out the anger and hoped to win in 2029.
They had a window of opportunity last year to blame the last lot for the books being terrible, and go for a temporary 2-3p on income tax rates to be removed before the next election.
Instead they went with a pile of ideological rather than revenue-maximising taxes, that upset identifiable and organised groups of people while raising very little money. So a year later the Chancellor still needs to find a big pile of money from somewhere.
Fiscal sanity is like planting a tree. The best time to have done it is 40 years ago, the best available time is now.
The Trump administration is just flat out murdering people.
FULL REPORT: Colombian public media reports that a U.S. military strike on a boat on September 15—the second attack on a vessel by the U.S. in the Caribbean that we’re aware of—was a Colombian boat and was in Colombian territorial waters.
At least one of the three victims extrajudicially killed in the strike was Colombian lifelong fisherman Alejandro Carranza. Alejandro’s identity is confirmed by his cousin.
The Colombian president has accused the US of committing murder
Please let him indict Trump and apply for his extradition. That would be exceedingly funny.
Trump has already withheld $740m in subsidies that pay for anti-drug activities…
(I actually think that Colombia should kick out the ambassador and close the embassy - it’s one of the most important US locations globally and the base for most of their LatAm covert operations)
One has to wonder where that much money goes, because the drug problem in Columbia isn’t getting any better. $740m buys a lot of Mercedes and Range Rovers.
Yet another US military intelligence failure if the Columbian version of the boat story stands up, although I’m sure the story that went up the line at the Department of Defence was that it was a drug running boat in international waters, so that’s what got back to SecDef and the White House.
US ambassador in Bogota is going to have an uncomfortable meeting tomorrow.
In the most part to US “contractors”
Ah yes, the Haliburtons and Blackwaters, who always seem to be in dodgy places but never actually fix the problems because that would make them redundant.
Lucy Powell. Not giving the WASPI women a handout was a ‘mistake’
Politics is infested with useless morons with over inflated opinions,of their own abilities. This whole interview with her just reeks of it. This is just one segment.
Sigh. Remember folks, before they get rid of that useless prat Starmer they really need to be sure his replacement is not even worse. Powell is worse.
She is, and it’s not just her. Hopeless as she is. Across the political spectrum it is hard to see where there are real leaders. The Tories, no, the Lib Dem’s have a twat in a wetsuit and a load of bland backbencher types. Reform, not a chance. Farage is no leader, he’s a disruptor and where is the scrutiny of their politics. The Greens are all student politics.
It’s most disheartening.
Cleverly on that basis might be good. Warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, a former Home and Foreign Secretary and more serious than Davey and more heavyweight than Kemi, more centrist than Farage and Jenrick and not as populist and anti immigrant and not a hard left ranter like Polanski
I'll give you warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, but so is a Siberian public lavatory.
Success in politics is not pure a matter of political triangulation based on current voting patterns.
Firstly, there is the issue of momentum - current momentum in British politics is rightward (with a smaller move to the exteme left), and the current failing Government is a centrist one. There is absolutely zero point in jumping on to that sinking bit of jetsom with Labour, the Lib Dems, and the nationalist partes already clinging on. What was the market for a neoliberal party before 1979? None.
Secondly there's the issue of personal qualities.
Cleverly gave Starmer a lifeline with his stupid China speech as Foreign Sec. He was a useless, lazy, supine Foreign Secretary who let his civil servants run the department, which included him negotiating the Chagos Surrender Deal, which Cameron, to give him his dues, booted into the long grass. In his own leadership campaign he was so stupid that he tried to lend votes to knock out an opponent and ended up knocking himself out.
If you want a rightwing government which is hardline on immigration you will vote Reform anyway, even if Jenrick is Tory leader. If you want an extreme left government you will vote Green.
If the Tories want to survive at the next general election they primarily need to hold most of their current MPs and maybe pick up a few from Labour in London and a few middle class patches of the home countries and areas like Altrincham they held until last year as a result of Labour's unpopularity.
To do that, they largely need Labour and LD tactical votes in Conservative held seats where Reform are the likely challengers. Labour and LD voters won't tactically vote for a Jenrick led Tories, if Kemi goes ever more culture war they likely won't vote for her candidates either. They may however tactically vote for a Cleverly led Tories to beat Farage's candidate.
Cleverly of course also set tighter visa wage requirements which has started to reduce the Boriswave, so Farage can't hit him on that
Watching you slowly work your way through the change curve from outright denial towards gradual acceptance is such a pleasure.
I expect though that if you get a very nasty Farage led Reform government at the next general election left liberals like you will soon be crying to bring back Tory governments of old led by the likes of Major, Cameron, May and Rishi, even Boris
There's not going to be a very nasty Farage led Reform government. To make a breakthrough they need to deliver at the Local Authority level, and that needs to be done by those on the ground. There isn't anyone with that level of competence in depth in Reform.
I don't think they need to deliver at a local Government level, they just need to pin the blame on Westminster while claiming that they can't fix social care until they are in power.
And all that requires is following the SNP playbook until 2029.
Now granted the buck will stop with Nigel when they end up in power and it turns out they can't fix anything and equally can't blame the EU (because we've left it) but that's a separate issue and post 2029 issue.
That only works so long and then people get fed up. Labour, when they ruled Durham with Simon Henig in charge, tried that for several years. People gave them the benefit of the doubt initially but after several years of non delivery didn’t.
The same will happen to Reform at a local level.
Although I’m sure most of us agree here that local govt funding model is broke and whoever runs a local council is fucked.
Mr Henig is the reason I joined the Conservative party... No really.
Really, why ?
I always found him quite pleasant although not caring for his brand of Durham City first politics. Especially as his seat was in N Durham.
Taz lives in N. Durham - I suspect that explains it...
I’m currently enjoying the people on local Facebook groups, many of whom hated Lumiere suddenly being converts and mourning its passing
I've never got the point of Lumiere - yes it's an interest trip round Durham seeing things in a different light (excuse the pun) but the idea that it generates generates £ms of extra sales to never made sense to me..
Me neither and the people claiming it did were those at the council who supported it.
I found it a pain in the arse. Lots of extra traffic making my journey home from work or to the Arnison a pain in the neck.
I much prefer the Xmas market they do for a trip into Durham at that time of year.
We go into Durham quite regularly. We visited Crush last week. But we avoid Lumiere
We go more often then we used to - but that's because twin A is up there so going into town for a drink and a visit to the bookshops makes sense..
It’s certainly much better than it was a few years ago. Some nice new restaurants and not as many drunks hanging around the bus station. Just needs the stack to get sorted.
We like the river walks and can always get parked in Prince Bishops.
I like going to the charity shops and the CEX shop to look for TV DVDs to rip for my collection. I also like the far Asian supermarkets for,the noodles and Soju.
Having said that Head of Steam is quite shit these days and there is no sign of the Brew dog building ever being sorted.
That Brewdog is never opening - mainly because Brewdog is currently closing pubs not opening them.
No, but the building was more than just BrewDog and it’s the building that needs sorting. It’s in a prime position and was supposed to be a flagship building. Just reflects poorly on our city. Another bar or business would simply take over from BrewDog when it opens. A top quality Spoons for example
Oh that building is a mess because the initial contractor went bankrupt and the approval paper work has been lost... You can see why it's taking so long to get resolved.....
Both sides lost it? Wow.
Same dog ate it, or two different ones?
If it is two different dogs, that's just another example of the over-manning... erm, dogging, that is making the British economy so unproductive.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
My relative in the building line was part of a "consultation"
They were told, point blank, that "They would just have to find the money" and "not to threaten job losses from taxes"
Interesting ‘consultation’ that, then !
I’m sure they appreciated that.
A few years ago a friend of mine was one of 300 people living in France who was selected to make a voluntary contribution to the treasury or have his residence permit revoked. Strangely every one of the 300 was English
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I've no idea if the figures are accurate or even representative. What struck me is the cluster of France, USA & China, and the higher 2-node cluster of Britain and Italy.
It's a load of bollocks.
In the various debunkings I've seen online, the most interesting was that the UK median worker pays less in tax than a US median earner. A bit of a mindfuck given the narrative around tax at the moment:
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
Plus compulsory Pension contributions of 3% minimum and Apprentice Levy (0.5% if your payroll bill is bigger than £3 million pa).
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
One to watch. What's amazing is that despite the massive immigration we've had over the last few years, unemployment has remained low and wages at the lower end have been floating above MW. With immigration coming down that may well remain the case.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Ming Vase strategy has been a shambles. They should have said ‘no plans’, done it, rode out the anger and hoped to win in 2029.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Ming Vase strategy has been a shambles. They should have said ‘no plans’, done it, rode out the anger and hoped to win in 2029.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Ming Vase strategy has been a shambles. They should have said ‘no plans’, done it, rode out the anger and hoped to win in 2029.
Well, they didn't have any plans.
Their plan was to not be the nasty Tories. Collection of useless tosspots.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joan therene Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Hence why special adult care is so expensive
There is also the issue of benefits being withdrawn, meaning real marginal tax rates can be pretty awful, especially for people who can only work part time.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
Shit fuck, really??! They're the best ones! They're nice people! Tell Reeves to fuck off!
I've no idea if the figures are accurate or even representative. What struck me is the cluster of France, USA & China, and the higher 2-node cluster of Britain and Italy.
It's a load of bollocks.
In the various debunkings I've seen online, the most interesting was that the UK median worker pays less in tax than a US median earner. A bit of a mindfuck given the narrative around tax at the moment:
There's a massive amount of "it depends" in there.
In the US, property tax is paid for by the owner, not the tenant. Of course, the market rent therefore includes the tax element. So, someone renting will appear not to pay that much tax... but of course a large chunk of the tax they pay is effectively paid through their rent.
And then there is the absurdity that property tax (which can be the bulk of tax paid in many cases) depends on exactly when you bought your house. (Which also leads to double absurdities, like my property tax bill dropping this year thanks to the fires. All those people overpaying to get into new houses are paying lots of tax... Meaning I can pay less.)
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I don't know?
PB high earners bemoaning peasants working 24 hours a day 365 days a year earning what they earn plus free share options, Bupa, 8 weeks holiday and a free Audi Q8 for a 36 hour week, and of course that's the lower end of the PB scale.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I don't know?
PB high earners bemoaning peasants working 24 hours a day 365 days a year earning what they earn plus free share options, Bupa, 8 weeks holiday and a free Audi Q8 for a 36 hour week, and of course that's the lower end of the PB scale.
The point, at the time was to explain why custom care, per child, might well cost £250k per year.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Hence why special adult care is so expensive
The original discussion regarded a couple of children who were getting custom 24/7 care, which the council estimated at £250k per head/per year.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
That is exactly right. And it is good news and bad news. The good news is that decent hard working couples but without necessarily being major intellects or fabulously ambitious can earn £50,000 gross between them on minimun wage.
The bad news is that it places limits of employment; but also that the gap between the lowest paid and the responsibility takers can be quite small.
The other thing is perspective. We tend to see family bloke earning £50000 while for whatever reason the partner is not working as having a pretty decent job. But he is worse off than the minimum wage couple. Especially if he is a graduate paying off a laon and the minimum wage couple are not. For all these reasons it seems to me there has been and will be in future an awful lot of what may be described in old fashioned language as 'demarcation disputes.'
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I don't know?
PB high earners bemoaning peasants working 24 hours a day 365 days a year earning what they earn plus free share options, Bupa, 8 weeks holiday and a free Audi Q8 for a 36 hour week, and of course that's the lower end of the PB scale.
The point, at the time was to explain why custom care, per child, might well cost £250k per year.
But the wider point was that the inference on here is that the minimum wage is unaffordable. My tongue in cheek point was some PB complainants wouldn't get up for half a million pounds a year let alone 14 quid an hour for wiping bottoms.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
That is exactly right. And it is good news and bad news. The good news is that decent hard working couples but without necessarily being major intellects or fabulously ambitious can earn £50,000 gross between them on minimun wage.
The bad news is that it places limits of employment; but also that the gap between the lowest paid and the responsibility takers can be quite small.
The other thing is perspective. We tend to see family bloke earning £50000 while for whatever reason the partner is not working as having a pretty decent job. But he is worse off than the minimum wage couple. Especially if he is a graduate paying off a laon and the minimum wage couple are not. For all these reasons it seems to me there has been and will be in future an awful lot of what may be described in old fashioned language as 'demarcation disputes.'
We are already seeing pay disputes on the lines of “we are only on £x per hour more than minimum wage”.
On a separate subject, don't annoy Donald as it could cost you. The Columbian President had a beef about its citizens being blasted out of the water and complained about it, so Trump has cancelled $740mn in aid to Columbia. Apart from having a point, I'm amazed at the largesse of the US taxpayer.
AS OF TODAY, THESE PAYMENTS, OR ANY OTHER FORM OF PAYMENT, OR SUBSIDIES, WILL NO LONGER BE MADE TO COLUMBIA,” Trump added in a post on Truth Social.
On day one it became clear that there was no independent policing and security operation within Gaza, without which, as a bare minimum, it was and is unthinkable that the plan can be real. This was and is no plan and no peace.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I don't know?
PB high earners bemoaning peasants working 24 hours a day 365 days a year earning what they earn plus free share options, Bupa, 8 weeks holiday and a free Audi Q8 for a 36 hour week, and of course that's the lower end of the PB scale.
The point, at the time was to explain why custom care, per child, might well cost £250k per year.
But the wider point was that the inference on here is that the minimum wage is unaffordable. My tongue in cheek point was some PB complainants wouldn't get up for half a million pounds a year let alone 14 quid an hour for wiping bottoms.
The flip side is that it encourages two things
- sub minimum wage black market jobs - reduction in employment. See the spread of the big touchscreens in various food places, reductions in floor walking staff in retail etc. - Demands for higher pay among those felling that they deserve a noticeable differential between them and minimum wage.
The government sees no direct costs in ever higher minimum wage. But they exist.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Hence why special adult care is so expensive
The original discussion regarded a couple of children who were getting custom 24/7 care, which the council estimated at £250k per head/per year.
Yes - I priced it up for the board and came up with £230k plus the cost of housing
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Phlebototmists at my local NHS hospital were on strike recently, saying they were earning less per hour than they could get doing flu injections at boots. Not entirely true, because NHS pensions and conditions are vastly superior. But wage compression is real.
On a different subject, I'm off abroad for a few days and will need to keep monitoring/working stuff including banks while I am there. Not too convinced of the wifi security where I am so was looking at a VPN. Nord seem to have a good deal on at the moment - does anyone have any thoughts on how good/safe/reliable they are?
I’ve used Nord VPN for the last year or so and find their service to be excellent. Was nothing at all to do with cycling being transferred to TNT with an increase of an order of magnitude in cost. No sirree, nothing at all.
On a separate subject, don't annoy Donald as it could cost you. The Columbian President had a beef about its citizens being blasted out of the water and complained about it, so Trump has cancelled $740mn in aid to Columbia. Apart from having a point, I'm amazed at the largesse of the US taxpayer.
AS OF TODAY, THESE PAYMENTS, OR ANY OTHER FORM OF PAYMENT, OR SUBSIDIES, WILL NO LONGER BE MADE TO COLUMBIA,” Trump added in a post on Truth Social.
On a different subject, I'm off abroad for a few days and will need to keep monitoring/working stuff including banks while I am there. Not too convinced of the wifi security where I am so was looking at a VPN. Nord seem to have a good deal on at the moment - does anyone have any thoughts on how good/safe/reliable they are?
I’ve used Nord VPN for the last year or so and find their service to be excellent. Was nothing at all to do with cycling being transferred to TNT with an increase of an order of magnitude in cost. No sirree, nothing at all.
Nord is good, and cheap if you sign up for IIRC three years. No problem watching Netflix anywhere in the world.
My bank works find from anywhere. Are you sure you need it? The bigger problem can be if you're using a foreign SIM and can't get the text message 2FA codes...
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
That is exactly right. And it is good news and bad news. The good news is that decent hard working couples but without necessarily being major intellects or fabulously ambitious can earn £50,000 gross between them on minimun wage.
The bad news is that it places limits of employment; but also that the gap between the lowest paid and the responsibility takers can be quite small.
The other thing is perspective. We tend to see family bloke earning £50000 while for whatever reason the partner is not working as having a pretty decent job. But he is worse off than the minimum wage couple. Especially if he is a graduate paying off a laon and the minimum wage couple are not. For all these reasons it seems to me there has been and will be in future an awful lot of what may be described in old fashioned language as 'demarcation disputes.'
Are we not ignoring the inflation of the last 5 years? £50 000 is no longer £50 000 specially if your biggest outlays are energy, housing, food a and a car. Its not the fault of the minimum waged that the UK's graduate wage stagnation has been so significant.
On day one it became clear that there was no independent policing and security operation within Gaza, without which, as a bare minimum, it was and is unthinkable that the plan can be real. This was and is no plan and no peace.
It always seemed a bit fantastical. Hamas were going to voluntarily disarm? Yeah right. Israel were going to back off and leave the new, unidentified administration to form? You must be joking. So many dead hostages they can't even provide bodies for. So many lorries of urgently needed aid still being held up. I really hoped it could work. The alternatives are worse. But fantastical seems a reasonable word.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Hence why special adult care is so expensive
The original discussion regarded a couple of children who were getting custom 24/7 care, which the council estimated at £250k per head/per year.
Yes - I priced it up for the board and came up with £230k plus the cost of housing
Does 24/7 mean constant work, or just constant vigilance? I mean, it would take five full time people to care for one person 24/7. But could those same five care for two or three people in adjoining rooms? Surely very few cases require genuine one-on-one?
To own Trump people are delighted at the potential end of the ceasefire. SMH
Putting the future of World security on a plan for peace written in the hand of (alleged - for the lawyers) war criminal Tony Blair wasn't Trump's finest hour was it?
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I don't know?
PB high earners bemoaning peasants working 24 hours a day 365 days a year earning what they earn plus free share options, Bupa, 8 weeks holiday and a free Audi Q8 for a 36 hour week, and of course that's the lower end of the PB scale.
I've no idea if the figures are accurate or even representative. What struck me is the cluster of France, USA & China, and the higher 2-node cluster of Britain and Italy.
It's a load of bollocks.
In the various debunkings I've seen online, the most interesting was that the UK median worker pays less in tax than a US median earner. A bit of a mindfuck given the narrative around tax at the moment:
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Hence why special adult care is so expensive
The original discussion regarded a couple of children who were getting custom 24/7 care, which the council estimated at £250k per head/per year.
Yes - I priced it up for the board and came up with £230k plus the cost of housing
Does 24/7 mean constant work, or just constant vigilance? I mean, it would take five full time people to care for one person 24/7. But could those same five care for two or three people in adjoining rooms? Surely very few cases require genuine one-on-one?
Isn't it the cost of the service broken down into what it would cost if done by one person? The reality of course is the service could be provided by hundreds of individuals over 24/7, 365 days a year.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I don't know?
PB high earners bemoaning peasants working 24 hours a day 365 days a year earning what they earn plus free share options, Bupa, 8 weeks holiday and a free Audi Q8 for a 36 hour week, and of course that's the lower end of the PB scale.
Europe really needs to get its act together, before it allows Trump to sell us down the river by default.
‘Donald Trump urged Volodymyr Zelenskyy to accept Russia’s terms for ending its war in a volatile White House meeting on Friday, warning that Vladimir Putin had said he would “destroy” Ukraine if it did not agree.
The meeting between the US and Ukrainian presidents descended many times into a “shouting match”, with Trump “cursing all the time”, people familiar with the matter said.
They added that the US president tossed aside maps of the frontline in Ukraine, insisted Zelenskyy surrender the entire Donbas region to Putin, and repeatedly echoed talking points the Russian leader had made in their call a day earlier.’ https://x.com/HoansSolo/status/1979960397445616085
On a different subject, I'm off abroad for a few days and will need to keep monitoring/working stuff including banks while I am there. Not too convinced of the wifi security where I am so was looking at a VPN. Nord seem to have a good deal on at the moment - does anyone have any thoughts on how good/safe/reliable they are?
I’ve used Nord VPN for the last year or so and find their service to be excellent. Was nothing at all to do with cycling being transferred to TNT with an increase of an order of magnitude in cost. No sirree, nothing at all.
So basically, translating from Kremlin-speak into human language:
Putin wants to be given what he has failed to conquer in 11 years (including nearly 4 years of full-scale war) -- and in return, he’ll promise not to conquer what he’s already written into his constitution as part of Russia, but has also failed to capture after almost 4 years of all-out war.
And this, apparently, is only the condition for a “ceasefire.”
After that, to reach a “peace treaty” and an “ultimate resolution of the Ukrainian question,” Ukraine would need to satisfy his “root causes of the crisis” demands: disarmament and dismantling of its defense forces, no NATO membership, replacing the legitimate Ukrainian government in Kyiv with a pro-Russian puppet one, banning all military aid, and abandoning further reforms, national revival, and alignment with the West... https://x.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1979873368523370734
Europe really needs to get its act together, before it allows Trump to sell us down the river by default.
‘Donald Trump urged Volodymyr Zelenskyy to accept Russia’s terms for ending its war in a volatile White House meeting on Friday, warning that Vladimir Putin had said he would “destroy” Ukraine if it did not agree.
The meeting between the US and Ukrainian presidents descended many times into a “shouting match”, with Trump “cursing all the time”, people familiar with the matter said.
They added that the US president tossed aside maps of the frontline in Ukraine, insisted Zelenskyy surrender the entire Donbas region to Putin, and repeatedly echoed talking points the Russian leader had made in their call a day earlier.’ https://x.com/HoansSolo/status/1979960397445616085
If I was Zelenskyy I just wouldn't go back. What is the point in expecting rational behaviour in the asylum? It reminds me of the definition of insanity.
On a different subject, I'm off abroad for a few days and will need to keep monitoring/working stuff including banks while I am there. Not too convinced of the wifi security where I am so was looking at a VPN. Nord seem to have a good deal on at the moment - does anyone have any thoughts on how good/safe/reliable they are?
I’ve used Nord VPN for the last year or so and find their service to be excellent. Was nothing at all to do with cycling being transferred to TNT with an increase of an order of magnitude in cost. No sirree, nothing at all.
On day one it became clear that there was no independent policing and security operation within Gaza, without which, as a bare minimum, it was and is unthinkable that the plan can be real. This was and is no plan and no peace.
As was said beforehand, there will be people on both sides who do not want peace, they want victory, and they will fight to provoke those extremists on the other side to resume fighting. Northern Ireland only worked because both sides agreed not to react to provocation.
Hopefully President Trump will pick up the phone again.
Next week, the Government will give the "green light" to 10 bln Euro for the GCAP, the 6th generation fighter aircraft to be developed by 2035, to replace the Eurofighter (Italy and UK) and the F2 (Japan) fleets. Italian companies involved: Leonardo AVIO Aero MBDA Elettronica https://x.com/CiroNappi6/status/1979592287953801638
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I don't know?
PB high earners bemoaning peasants working 24 hours a day 365 days a year earning what they earn plus free share options, Bupa, 8 weeks holiday and a free Audi Q8 for a 36 hour week, and of course that's the lower end of the PB scale.
The point, at the time was to explain why custom care, per child, might well cost £250k per year.
But the wider point was that the inference on here is that the minimum wage is unaffordable. My tongue in cheek point was some PB complainants wouldn't get up for half a million pounds a year let alone 14 quid an hour for wiping bottoms.
The flip side is that it encourages two things
- sub minimum wage black market jobs - reduction in employment. See the spread of the big touchscreens in various food places, reductions in floor walking staff in retail etc. - Demands for higher pay among those felling that they deserve a noticeable differential between them and minimum wage.
The government sees no direct costs in ever higher minimum wage. But they exist.
Not quite - there is a point at which the minimum wage is helpful and a point at which it becomes counter productive (a bit like the triple lock). We’ve passed that point now
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Phlebototmists at my local NHS hospital were on strike recently, saying they were earning less per hour than they could get doing flu injections at boots. Not entirely true, because NHS pensions and conditions are vastly superior. But wage compression is real.
A friend of mine used to run one of the large phlebotomy practices. The typical pay was comparable to fast food service workers
Hace the Israelis played everybody? Bibi got his hostages home, so Hamas don't have any leverage left.
Possibly. But the hostages weren't providing much leverage. If anything the opposite. They were one of the justifications for continued aggression.
I am not sure how much longer Bibi could have dragged that out. Israelis were protesting regularly about just do a deal to get them back.
Now he has the narrative of we got back all those still alive, and Hamas played silly buggers with hostage bodies and they were killing their own people / started attacking us again. We gave them a chance, but given an inch look what they did, they must disarm or be destroyed.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Phlebototmists at my local NHS hospital were on strike recently, saying they were earning less per hour than they could get doing flu injections at boots. Not entirely true, because NHS pensions and conditions are vastly superior. But wage compression is real.
A friend of mine used to run one of the large phlebotomy practices. The typical pay was comparable to fast food service workers
The thing is, a phlebotomist is highly trained to do one highly repetitive task. Not sure what the going rate should be.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Hence why special adult care is so expensive
The original discussion regarded a couple of children who were getting custom 24/7 care, which the council estimated at £250k per head/per year.
Yes - I priced it up for the board and came up with £230k plus the cost of housing
Does 24/7 mean constant work, or just constant vigilance? I mean, it would take five full time people to care for one person 24/7. But could those same five care for two or three people in adjoining rooms? Surely very few cases require genuine one-on-one?
It was a specific case but 2 staff to 1 individual is not uncommon which requires 6 full time staff (3x 8 hour shifts) - that’s 170k plus holiday cover for 30 weeks (6x5) which is another £18k.
These care packages are individually negotiated based on an assessment of need and associated staffing / housing plus a modest margin.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I don't know?
PB high earners bemoaning peasants working 24 hours a day 365 days a year earning what they earn plus free share options, Bupa, 8 weeks holiday and a free Audi Q8 for a 36 hour week, and of course that's the lower end of the PB scale.
I must be one of the PB peasants, then.
Me too.
It would be helpful in assessing the merit of comments if pbers were to state their monthly take home pay after each post.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Hence why special adult care is so expensive
The original discussion regarded a couple of children who were getting custom 24/7 care, which the council estimated at £250k per head/per year.
Yes - I priced it up for the board and came up with £230k plus the cost of housing
Does 24/7 mean constant work, or just constant vigilance? I mean, it would take five full time people to care for one person 24/7. But could those same five care for two or three people in adjoining rooms? Surely very few cases require genuine one-on-one?
Isn't it the cost of the service broken down into what it would cost if done by one person? The reality of course is the service could be provided by hundreds of individuals over 24/7, 365 days a year.
Not in these cases. Stability of caregivers is very important
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The other thing is that the employment winds are turning against the government. A lot of young people are finding it very hard to get jobs. There is something quite broken in the job market.
£14 an hour does that.... (£12.21 minimum wage + £1.80 in Employer NI).
Hang on that’s about 28 grand a year minimum wage for an unskilled worker. No wonder employers are not hiring.
I’m surprised you’re surprised. The numbers are what they are.
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
I’ve clearly not been paying attention, didn’t realise min wage had gone up so much.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
Phlebototmists at my local NHS hospital were on strike recently, saying they were earning less per hour than they could get doing flu injections at boots. Not entirely true, because NHS pensions and conditions are vastly superior. But wage compression is real.
A friend of mine used to run one of the large phlebotomy practices. The typical pay was comparable to fast food service workers
The thing is, a phlebotomist is highly trained to do one highly repetitive task. Not sure what the going rate should be.
Much the same applies tolawyers. TSE can advise on rates.
FWIW: Some months ago, Megan McArdle, writing in the WaPo, described a study that found that homelessness in the US was positively correlated with the minimum wage. The higher the minimum in an area, the higher the level of homelessness.
A likely mechanism is easy to find: As minimum wages rose, more and more workers were not worth hiring, and so they became long-term unemployed. Which in turn meant that there was no profit in building housing for them. And so, less expensive kinds of housing, for example, boarding houses, began to disappear.
Naturally, this result should be checked by other economists, but it does not seem implausible.
(Fun fact: In the early US Congresses, many congressmen stayed in boarding houses. As did Lincoln when he was 21.)
Europe really needs to get its act together, before it allows Trump to sell us down the river by default.
‘Donald Trump urged Volodymyr Zelenskyy to accept Russia’s terms for ending its war in a volatile White House meeting on Friday, warning that Vladimir Putin had said he would “destroy” Ukraine if it did not agree.
The meeting between the US and Ukrainian presidents descended many times into a “shouting match”, with Trump “cursing all the time”, people familiar with the matter said.
They added that the US president tossed aside maps of the frontline in Ukraine, insisted Zelenskyy surrender the entire Donbas region to Putin, and repeatedly echoed talking points the Russian leader had made in their call a day earlier.’ https://x.com/HoansSolo/status/1979960397445616085
If I was Zelenskyy I just wouldn't go back. What is the point in expecting rational behaviour in the asylum? It reminds me of the definition of insanity.
And, how much leverage does Trump have over Ukraine, anyway? He stopped providing assistance in January.
Hace the Israelis played everybody? Bibi got his hostages home, so Hamas don't have any leverage left.
Possibly. But the hostages weren't providing much leverage. If anything the opposite. They were one of the justifications for continued aggression.
I am not sure how much longer Bibi could have dragged that out. Now he has the narrative of Hamas played silly buggers with hostage bodies and they were killing their own people / started attacking us again. We gave them a chance, but given an inch look what they did, they must disarm or be destroyed.
They need to get the regional peacekeepers on the ground to replace Hamas, it sadly doesn’t look like they will disarm voluntarily otherwise.
Fingers crossed this is just a skirmish and not a full breakdown of the ceasefire.
Hace the Israelis played everybody? Bibi got his hostages home, so Hamas don't have any leverage left.
Possibly. But the hostages weren't providing much leverage. If anything the opposite. They were one of the justifications for continued aggression.
I am not sure how much longer Bibi could have dragged that out. Now he has the narrative of Hamas played silly buggers with hostage bodies and they were killing their own people / started attacking us again. We gave them a chance, but given an inch look what they did, they must disarm or be destroyed.
They need to get the regional peacekeepers on the ground to replace Hamas, it sadly doesn’t look like they will disarm voluntarily otherwise.
Fingers crossed this is just a skirmish and not a full breakdown of the ceasefire.
On top of holding on to power and keeping capabiities to attack Israel in the future, given all the other armed groups they would instantly be brown bread if they gave up their weapons. Just like Fatah came to a sticky end in Gaza.
So basically, translating from Kremlin-speak into human language:
Putin wants to be given what he has failed to conquer in 11 years (including nearly 4 years of full-scale war) -- and in return, he’ll promise not to conquer what he’s already written into his constitution as part of Russia, but has also failed to capture after almost 4 years of all-out war.
And this, apparently, is only the condition for a “ceasefire.”
After that, to reach a “peace treaty” and an “ultimate resolution of the Ukrainian question,” Ukraine would need to satisfy his “root causes of the crisis” demands: disarmament and dismantling of its defense forces, no NATO membership, replacing the legitimate Ukrainian government in Kyiv with a pro-Russian puppet one, banning all military aid, and abandoning further reforms, national revival, and alignment with the West... https://x.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1979873368523370734
That would be a suicide note.
And yet. It is less than he was asking for at Alaska. He is responding to the pressure of the attacks on the oil refineries.
If we can at least get Trump to keep the existing sanctions in place, then there's potential for Putin to be forced into a genuine negotiation.
I've no idea if the figures are accurate or even representative. What struck me is the cluster of France, USA & China, and the higher 2-node cluster of Britain and Italy.
It's a load of bollocks.
In the various debunkings I've seen online, the most interesting was that the UK median worker pays less in tax than a US median earner. A bit of a mindfuck given the narrative around tax at the moment:
Europe really needs to get its act together, before it allows Trump to sell us down the river by default.
‘Donald Trump urged Volodymyr Zelenskyy to accept Russia’s terms for ending its war in a volatile White House meeting on Friday, warning that Vladimir Putin had said he would “destroy” Ukraine if it did not agree.
The meeting between the US and Ukrainian presidents descended many times into a “shouting match”, with Trump “cursing all the time”, people familiar with the matter said.
They added that the US president tossed aside maps of the frontline in Ukraine, insisted Zelenskyy surrender the entire Donbas region to Putin, and repeatedly echoed talking points the Russian leader had made in their call a day earlier.’ https://x.com/HoansSolo/status/1979960397445616085
If I was Zelenskyy I just wouldn't go back. What is the point in expecting rational behaviour in the asylum? It reminds me of the definition of insanity.
And, how much leverage does Trump have over Ukraine, anyway? He stopped providing assistance in January.
The ability of Putin to play Trump seems extraordinary. But seems less extraordinary when you consider Trump's pathology and obvious admiration for the Great Dictator and his methods.
KGB commissar vs reality media celeb is really no contest.
You must be able to hear the laughing all the way across Red Square.
Betfred will close all of its 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves imposes a £3bn raid on the gambling industry, the company’s boss has warned.
Joanne Whittaker, chief executive, said the closure of Betfred’s retail business would lead to the loss of 6,800 jobs.
“The most frightening element is we’re going to lose the whole retail business,” Ms Whittaker told the Sunday Times. “We’ve got people in the Treasury who don’t understand our business.”
So that's about 400k per job. If they go through with the threat, which I suspect they won't. (And yes I know, that's a tax on a whole industry and I'm dividing by the number of jobs lost at one company. The Betting and Gaming Council claim 46 000 employees in total, so 65k per job tops. I wonder what the FT/PT split is?)
It does look like the gaming industry have got the people who did the PR for private schools against VAT in.
£65k extra cost per job would shutter quite a lot of businesses.
It’s like the raid on waste costs for building. If you charge an extra £55k per house for disposing of the soil and rubble from construction, then a bunch of houses won’t get built and prices will go up.
The rumours are that will not now go ahead.
I really wish this Government realised that there is no magic pot that can be taxed that isn't already taxed as much as possible,
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
The Ming Vase strategy has been a shambles. They should have said ‘no plans’, done it, rode out the anger and hoped to win in 2029.
Well, they didn't have any plans.
Their plan was to not be the nasty Tories. Collection of useless tosspots.
I think they genuinely thought at some level that just not being the Tories would magically unlock growth and investment into the UK.
Lucy Powell. Not giving the WASPI women a handout was a ‘mistake’
Politics is infested with useless morons with over inflated opinions,of their own abilities. This whole interview with her just reeks of it. This is just one segment.
Sigh. Remember folks, before they get rid of that useless prat Starmer they really need to be sure his replacement is not even worse. Powell is worse.
She is, and it’s not just her. Hopeless as she is. Across the political spectrum it is hard to see where there are real leaders. The Tories, no, the Lib Dem’s have a twat in a wetsuit and a load of bland backbencher types. Reform, not a chance. Farage is no leader, he’s a disruptor and where is the scrutiny of their politics. The Greens are all student politics.
It’s most disheartening.
Cleverly on that basis might be good. Warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, a former Home and Foreign Secretary and more serious than Davey and more heavyweight than Kemi, more centrist than Farage and Jenrick and not as populist and anti immigrant and not a hard left ranter like Polanski
I'll give you warmer and more charismatic than Starmer, but so is a Siberian public lavatory.
Success in politics is not pure a matter of political triangulation based on current voting patterns.
Firstly, there is the issue of momentum - current momentum in British politics is rightward (with a smaller move to the exteme left), and the current failing Government is a centrist one. There is absolutely zero point in jumping on to that sinking bit of jetsom with Labour, the Lib Dems, and the nationalist partes already clinging on. What was the market for a neoliberal party before 1979? None.
Secondly there's the issue of personal qualities.
Cleverly gave Starmer a lifeline with his stupid China speech as Foreign Sec. He was a useless, lazy, supine Foreign Secretary who let his civil servants run the department, which included him negotiating the Chagos Surrender Deal, which Cameron, to give him his dues, booted into the long grass. In his own leadership campaign he was so stupid that he tried to lend votes to knock out an opponent and ended up knocking himself out.
If you want a rightwing government which is hardline on immigration you will vote Reform anyway, even if Jenrick is Tory leader. If you want an extreme left government you will vote Green.
If the Tories want to survive at the next general election they primarily need to hold most of their current MPs and maybe pick up a few from Labour in London and a few middle class patches of the home countries and areas like Altrincham they held until last year as a result of Labour's unpopularity.
To do that, they largely need Labour and LD tactical votes in Conservative held seats where Reform are the likely challengers. Labour and LD voters won't tactically vote for a Jenrick led Tories, if Kemi goes ever more culture war they likely won't vote for her candidates either. They may however tactically vote for a Cleverly led Tories to beat Farage's candidate.
Cleverly of course also set tighter visa wage requirements which has started to reduce the Boriswave, so Farage can't hit him on that.
Kemi has 6 more months to see if her neoliberal on economics, culture wars on social issues starts to see the Conservatives rise in the polls. If not then I predict Tory MPs will remove her after losses in the May local elections and elect Cleverly to replace her
Altrincham is just the sort of seat I could see going LibDem if they could get a foot in the door. I think there will be a more nuanced vote from left and centre left voters next time. Reform are marmite and people will work out how to stop them in many seats, that’s assuming they don’t collapse in the next 3 years. Or merge with the Jenrick led Tories.
I live in the Altrincham constituency and it is and always has been a two way contest between Labour and the Tories, with third parties squeezed when the gap between the 2 main parties is small. The LDs are only strong in a couple of wards in Timperley, likewise the Greens in 3 other wards. The constituency is too middle class for Reform to gain much traction.
I've no idea if the figures are accurate or even representative. What struck me is the cluster of France, USA & China, and the higher 2-node cluster of Britain and Italy.
It's a load of bollocks.
In the various debunkings I've seen online, the most interesting was that the UK median worker pays less in tax than a US median earner. A bit of a mindfuck given the narrative around tax at the moment:
The UK in recent years has shifted to taxing the rich more and middle income earners less.
Yes. We have a remarkably progressive system of taxation of income, though coupled with a regressive tax on housing (council tax).
Progressive makes it sound like a good thing.
I don't see anything that resembles progress in pricing people out of work or the UK jobs market, even if it's politically convenient in the £30k to £80k range (if you're not a student).
FWIW: Some months ago, Megan McArdle, writing in the WaPo, described a study that found that homelessness in the US was positively correlated with the minimum wage. The higher the minimum in an area, the higher the level of homelessness.
A likely mechanism is easy to find: As minimum wages rose, more and more workers were not worth hiring, and so they became long-term unemployed. Which in turn meant that there was no profit in building housing for them. And so, less expensive kinds of housing, for example, boarding houses, began to disappear.
Naturally, this result should be checked by other economists, but it does not seem implausible.
(Fun fact: In the early US Congresses, many congressmen stayed in boarding houses. As did Lincoln when he was 21.)
Or, there's a correlation between politicians who vote for a higher minimum wage and for policies to help the homeless, the latter leading to homeless people moving to the area...?
Comments
What they are left with is Income Tax, VAT and property / council tax - and Starmer shouldn't have been so quick in saying all 3 were protected.
https://x.com/metpoliceuk/status/1979888634061873477
Capital gains tax might be an awkward one but there are ways around that in the computer age.
Remember, people pay taxes with sorrow but rates with rage.
Put in an exemption/special rate for basic rate pensioners - so that only pensioners on over 50K pay more.
You could even claim that this isn't putting up tax - just catching more people in the tax net....
Yet another US military intelligence failure if the Columbian version of the boat story stands up, although I’m sure the story that went up the line at the Department of Defence was that it was a drug running boat in international waters, so that’s what got back to SecDef and the White House.
US ambassador in Bogota is going to have an uncomfortable meeting tomorrow.
Strangely the pub kept very quiet about stopping the sales to avoid liability....
Instead they went with a pile of ideological rather than revenue-maximising taxes, that upset identifiable and organised groups of people while raising very little money. So a year later the Chancellor still needs to find a big pile of money from somewhere.
They were told, point blank, that "They would just have to find the money" and "not to threaten job losses from taxes"
I’m sure they appreciated that.
In the various debunkings I've seen online, the most interesting was that the UK median worker pays less in tax than a US median earner. A bit of a mindfuck given the narrative around tax at the moment:
https://x.com/DanNeidle/status/1979580442237170080
A little while back, IIRC, some people here calculated that a 24/7 x 365 minimum wage employee (think care for children) would cost £132k a year.
Good news for unskilled workers, and possibly for the taxpayer saving on in-work benefits, but if MW goes up too quickly then it can cause unemployment.
For your care worker, there’s 8760 hours in a 365-day year, at £14 an hour that’s £122,640.
In the US, property tax is paid for by the owner, not the tenant. Of course, the market rent therefore includes the tax element. So, someone renting will appear not to pay that much tax... but of course a large chunk of the tax they pay is effectively paid through their rent.
And then there is the absurdity that property tax (which can be the bulk of tax paid in many cases) depends on exactly when you bought your house. (Which also leads to double absurdities, like my property tax bill dropping this year thanks to the fires. All those people overpaying to get into new houses are paying lots of tax... Meaning I can pay less.)
PB high earners bemoaning peasants working 24 hours a day 365 days a year earning what they earn plus free share options, Bupa, 8 weeks holiday and a free Audi Q8 for a 36 hour week, and of course that's the lower end of the PB scale.
The bad news is that it places limits of employment; but also that the gap between the lowest paid and the responsibility takers can be quite small.
The other thing is perspective. We tend to see family bloke earning £50000 while for whatever reason the partner is not working as having a pretty decent job. But he is worse off than the minimum wage couple. Especially if he is a graduate paying off a laon and the minimum wage couple are not.
For all these reasons it seems to me there has been and will be in future an awful lot of what may be described in old fashioned language as 'demarcation disputes.'
- sub minimum wage black market jobs
- reduction in employment. See the spread of the big touchscreens in various food places, reductions in floor walking staff in retail etc.
- Demands for higher pay among those felling that they deserve a noticeable differential between them and minimum wage.
The government sees no direct costs in ever higher minimum wage. But they exist.
My bank works find from anywhere. Are you sure you need it? The bigger problem can be if you're using a foreign SIM and can't get the text message 2FA codes...
‘Donald Trump urged Volodymyr Zelenskyy to accept Russia’s terms for ending its war in a volatile White House meeting on Friday, warning that Vladimir Putin had said he would “destroy” Ukraine if it did not agree.
The meeting between the US and Ukrainian presidents descended many times into a “shouting match”, with Trump “cursing all the time”, people familiar with the matter said.
They added that the US president tossed aside maps of the frontline in Ukraine, insisted Zelenskyy surrender the entire Donbas region to Putin, and repeatedly echoed talking points the Russian leader had made in their call a day earlier.’
https://x.com/HoansSolo/status/1979960397445616085
So basically, translating from Kremlin-speak into human language:
Putin wants to be given what he has failed to conquer in 11 years (including nearly 4 years of full-scale war) -- and in return, he’ll promise not to conquer what he’s already written into his constitution as part of Russia, but has also failed to capture after almost 4 years of all-out war.
And this, apparently, is only the condition for a “ceasefire.”
After that, to reach a “peace treaty” and an “ultimate resolution of the Ukrainian question,” Ukraine would need to satisfy his “root causes of the crisis” demands: disarmament and dismantling of its defense forces, no NATO membership, replacing the legitimate Ukrainian government in Kyiv with a pro-Russian puppet one, banning all military aid, and abandoning further reforms, national revival, and alignment with the West...
https://x.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1979873368523370734
That would be a suicide note.
IDF carries out strikes in Gaza after two soldiers were killed, as Israel and Hamas accuse each other of breaching ceasefire deal.
https://bsky.app/profile/cnn.com/post/3m3kus3p6xi2r
Hopefully President Trump will pick up the phone again.
Next week, the Government will give the "green light" to 10 bln Euro for the GCAP, the 6th generation fighter aircraft to be developed by 2035, to replace the Eurofighter (Italy and UK) and the F2 (Japan) fleets.
Italian companies involved:
Leonardo
AVIO Aero
MBDA
Elettronica
https://x.com/CiroNappi6/status/1979592287953801638
The Dutch intelligence services, AIVD and MIVD, are no longer sharing everything with the United States.
https://x.com/michaeldweiss/status/1979935651937100069
Now he has the narrative of we got back all those still alive, and Hamas played silly buggers with hostage bodies and they were killing their own people / started attacking us again. We gave them a chance, but given an inch look what they did, they must disarm or be destroyed.
These care packages are individually negotiated based on an assessment of need and associated staffing / housing plus a modest margin.
A likely mechanism is easy to find: As minimum wages rose, more and more workers were not worth hiring, and so they became long-term unemployed. Which in turn meant that there was no profit in building housing for them. And so, less expensive kinds of housing, for example, boarding houses, began to disappear.
Naturally, this result should be checked by other economists, but it does not seem implausible.
(Fun fact: In the early US Congresses, many congressmen stayed in boarding houses. As did Lincoln when he was 21.)
Fingers crossed this is just a skirmish and not a full breakdown of the ceasefire.
If we can at least get Trump to keep the existing sanctions in place, then there's potential for Putin to be forced into a genuine negotiation.
KGB commissar vs reality media celeb is really no contest.
You must be able to hear the laughing all the way across Red Square.
I don't see anything that resembles progress in pricing people out of work or the UK jobs market, even if it's politically convenient in the £30k to £80k range (if you're not a student).