The billions should always be put in numbers not letters. More impact.
Not sure that's true.
I was shocked recently when someone I know who is very clever, graduate, professional career etc. asked me how many million there are in a billion. I think many people see £million, £billion, £trillion as all the same - a lot.
1,000,000 - 1,000,000,000 - 1,000,000.000,000 - it's my point.
It's in your link and is the last one of my numbers - 1,000,000.000,000
I have always been comfortable with millions, billions and trillions. You have to be in the oil and gas industry. Tcf or trillion cubic feet of gas is a standard measure of reserves. When it comes to the North Dome between Qatar and Iran, you are talking 1.8 quadrillion cubic feet.
So how many double-decker buses is that? You with your fancy-dan "cubic feet"
It's how many Olympic swimming pools you can fit into Wales.
16,588,000 unstacked.
Numeric trick for you politicians: If you want a number to sound big use a length comparison, if you want a number to sound small use a volume 220 million :that's the number of people you need to reach the moon end to end, about the population of Pakistan. 7.5 billion, the number of people in the world: everyone can fit into to the Grand Canyon (about the size of a coffin for everyone).
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
That assumes that the Labour Brexit position makes sense to anyone other than Richard "IQ" Burgon. Out in the campaign the Labour position is *derided*. In opposition the LibDems would put The Deal - whatever it is - in a referendum vs remain. And have proposed that repeatedly only for Labour repeatedly not to support such a referendum.
Where perhaps she went wrong was the suggestion that "I can be Prime Minister". She can*, in a scenario where its an absurdly hung parliament and her 100 seats provides stability against a collapsing Labour partner or something. A LibDem Majority government? Don't be silly Jo.
However, there is a democratic deficit at play. Every poll shows a now decent and consistent majority for remain. We have a hard leave party, two soft leave parties. Are we really saying there shouldn't be a party speaking for remain? Despite said consistent majority support for it?
I've said before that Vince Cable should have stood aside at least a year earlier, to give Jo Swinson some time to grow into the role of leader. She might not have made some of the mistakes she has with some more time in post. This election came too soon for her.
An election candidate standing in the same seat as Anna Soubry has been found guilty of harassing her and banned from campaigning in the constituency.
English Democrat candidate Amy Dalla Mura is standing in Broxtowe, Nottinghamshire, which Ms Soubry has represented since 2010.
Westminster Magistrates' Court heard the defendant repeatedly targeted the Independent Group for Change candidate and called her a traitor on television.
The billions should always be put in numbers not letters. More impact.
Not sure that's true.
I was shocked recently when someone I know who is very clever, graduate, professional career etc. asked me how many million there are in a billion. I think many people see £million, £billion, £trillion as all the same - a lot.
1,000,000 - 1,000,000,000 - 1,000,000.000,000 - it's my point.
It's in your link and is the last one of my numbers - 1,000,000.000,000
I have always been comfortable with millions, billions and trillions. You have to be in the oil and gas industry. Tcf or trillion cubic feet of gas is a standard measure of reserves. When it comes to the North Dome between Qatar and Iran, you are talking 1.8 quadrillion cubic feet.
So how many double-decker buses is that? You with your fancy-dan "cubic feet"
It's how many Olympic swimming pools you can fit into Wales.
16,588,000 unstacked.
Numeric trick for you politicians: If you want a number to sound big use a length comparison, if you want a number to sound small use a volume 220 million :that's the number of people you need to reach the moon end to end, about the population of Pakistan. 7.5 billion, the number of people in the world: everyone can fit into to the Grand Canyon (about the size of a coffin for everyone).
Looking out at a sea of coffins would really bugger up the hotels at the Grand Canyon though...
The billions should always be put in numbers not letters. More impact.
Not sure that's true.
I was shocked recently when someone I know who is very clever, graduate, professional career etc. asked me how many million there are in a billion. I think many people see £million, £billion, £trillion as all the same - a lot.
1,000,000 - 1,000,000,000 - 1,000,000.000,000 - it's my point.
It's in your link and is the last one of my numbers - 1,000,000.000,000
I have always been comfortable with millions, billions and trillions. You have to be in the oil and gas industry. Tcf or trillion cubic feet of gas is a standard measure of reserves. When it comes to the North Dome between Qatar and Iran, you are talking 1.8 quadrillion cubic feet.
So how many double-decker buses is that? You with your fancy-dan "cubic feet"
It's how many Olympic swimming pools you can fit into Wales.
16,588,000 unstacked.
Numeric trick for you politicians: If you want a number to sound big use a length comparison, if you want a number to sound small use a volume 220 million :that's the number of people you need to reach the moon end to end, about the population of Pakistan. 7.5 billion, the number of people in the world: everyone can fit into to the Grand Canyon (about the size of a coffin for everyone).
20 Swimming pools length ways in a kilometre, 800 in a square kilometre and assuming 2.5 metre depth, 320000 in a cubic kilometre.
They're not exactly profit centres are they? A business built on dealing with open ended demand with no opportunity to charge needs a bit of work. If you go on a pay as you go model the government loses all control of what is spent in one of their largest areas of expenditure. It's a pretty ludicrous idea all round.
The contractor services are, plus locally we have a contractor for what were once described as out-patient services.
Exactly, there are lots of pieces of the pie that are 'profitable'. And then there's the risk element - in practice the private sector can get out of its obligations, the state can't. E.g. the ambulance service near me - company has cocked it up, but state has to step in because obviously we need an ambulance service.
I don't know too much about what's happened in Portugal in the past few years, but I do know there's not hundreds of murders and attempted murders in Lisbon every year by rival gangs of youths trying to control their drug trade.
I hope Swinson thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when she was enjoying puffing her weed.
Nah, thought not.
Drug gang-related knife deaths have nothing to do with consumption, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
I am not seeing any sign that Swinson is cutting through in this election campaign at all. The "girly swot" thing was juvenile and the continuous surplus except for capital spending really ties their hands and their legs behind their back in the "who can produce the most credible spending splurge" game that the others are playing.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I actually like that policy and thought Ed Davey sounded very like Conservative Chancellors of old with his pitch but it is more puritanical than even Hammond ever was with deeply uncomfortable short term implications.
I also agree with their legalisation policy for pot although it is very much a work in progress.
But they are not so much struggling to get a hearing as failing to persuade. Their position on Brexit has a very definite ceiling and it is turning out that ceiling is somewhat lower than many might have thought. Getting squeezed by something as dysfunctional and, frankly, repellent as Corbyn's Labour party is just embarrassing. It is a frustration to me that the appetite for a sane alternative seems so limited.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
BiB - Do you think that would have been to the Lib Dems' benefit? I'm not so sure. It's their clear Brexit policy that has brought back to life the Lab/Lib Dem front.
Personally, I think they've made the right policy calls. Where I think they're finding it tough is that Tory remainers are thinking that it is a risk to vote Lib Dem as it probably leads to Corbyn in Downing Street.
I don't know too much about what's happened in Portugal in the past few years, but I do know there's not hundreds of murders and attempted murders in Lisbon every year by rival gangs of youths trying to control their drug trade.
I hope Swinson thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when she was enjoying puffing her weed.
Nah, thought not.
Drug gang-related knife deaths have nothing to do with consumption, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
I don't know much about this topic, if anything, but one thing I'm reasonably sure of is that the gangs won't just meekly disband if pot gets legalised and is freely available.
I am not seeing any sign that Swinson is cutting through in this election campaign at all. The "girly swot" thing was juvenile and the continuous surplus except for capital spending really ties their hands and their legs behind their back in the "who can produce the most credible spending splurge" game that the others are playing.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I actually like that policy and thought Ed Davey sounded very like Conservative Chancellors of old with his pitch but it is more puritanical than even Hammond ever was with deeply uncomfortable short term implications.
I also agree with their legalisation policy for pot although it is very much a work in progress.
But they are not so much struggling to get a hearing as failing to persuade. Their position on Brexit has a very definite ceiling and it is turning out that ceiling is somewhat lower than many might have thought. Getting squeezed by something as dysfunctional and, frankly, repellent as Corbyn's Labour party is just embarrassing. It is a frustration to me that the appetite for a sane alternative seems so limited.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
BiB - Do you think that would have been to the Lib Dems' benefit? I'm not so sure. It's their clear Brexit policy that has brought back to life the Lab/Lib Dem front.
Personally, I think they've made the right policy calls. Where I think they're finding it tough is that Tory remainers are thinking that it is a risk to vote Lib Dem as it probably leads to Corbyn in Downing Street.
They could have had a clear Brexit policy of "we want a second referendum and we will campaign to remain" they had no need to go for immediate revoke under Prime Minister Swinson that is absurd and undemocratic and laughed at.
On DOO, scrapping it is a truly dumb idea. In fact, it should be extended.
DOO is part of automatic train operation and moving to a future digital railway. It’s why Thameslink, London Overground and C2C can operate trains so precisely at such a high frequency rate as software can pump trains through a section at very high intervals using moving block technology. It also lowers costs to both the farepayer and the taxpayer by lowering the costs of operating the franchise, and increasing its reliability.
The issue the Unions have isn’t that all operators want to scrap a *staffing presence* on their services, most still want a ‘customer services’ agent on their trains and at busy times you’ll also see staff on platforms, it’s that this individual won’t be a union member (“a railway person”) as their safety critical duties to open and close the doors are no longer necessary.
There’s a couple of reasons why this is an issue for Unions. Firstly, they lose the membership subscriptions and fees. And secondly, it makes it harder for them to control train services and strike for their members in future as a driver can be more easily substituted.
On the Operator side they want to be able to retain the option to dispatch a DOO train *without* a customer services agent in the event of a severely degraded or perturbed service. Every been frustrated by a stranded train where you’re told you’re waiting for a guard (train crew) because they’re in the wrong place, so you have to sit there delayed? This is why. Operators having this option will increase the overall PPM reliability of the franchise and aid service recovery times when that happens. Which it does.
It’s a classic 70s example of Unions defending a restricted working practice in order to protect their control over an industry. It will cost us more money, lead to a less reliable service and a lower capacity of train services and it’s remarkable they’re pulling the wool over so many people’s eyes with their “safety” argument.
We have one of the toughest and most pedantic regulators in the world, the ORR. They don’t touch DOO unless it’s totally and completely safe and it has to go through several independent bodies before it even gets to them too.
I am not seeing any sign that Swinson is cutting through in this election campaign at all. The "girly swot" thing was juvenile and the continuous surplus except for capital spending really ties their hands and their legs behind their back in the "who can produce the most credible spending splurge" game that the others are playing.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I actually like that policy and thought Ed Davey sounded very like Conservative Chancellors of old with his pitch but it is more puritanical than even Hammond ever was with deeply uncomfortable short term implications.
I also agree with their legalisation policy for pot although it is very much a work in progress.
But they are not so much struggling to get a hearing as failing to persuade. Their position on Brexit has a very definite ceiling and it is turning out that ceiling is somewhat lower than many might have thought. Getting squeezed by something as dysfunctional and, frankly, repellent as Corbyn's Labour party is just embarrassing. It is a frustration to me that the appetite for a sane alternative seems so limited.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
BiB - Do you think that would have been to the Lib Dems' benefit? I'm not so sure. It's their clear Brexit policy that has brought back to life the Lab/Lib Dem front.
And the ITV Debate neatly framed the absurdity of the duopoly. Johnson and Corbyn arguing over whose leave deal was best. Imagine if the LibDems had adopted a similar position to Labour - who would be representing the majority remain voters? The Greens and the SNP?
Does anyone have a list of roughly which seats will likely finish their counts first on the 12th? Am figure out which seats will actually give a clue about national outcome at what time in the evening so that I can enjoy as much as my office Christmas party as I can without being stuck to my phone permanently post 10pm...
I don't know too much about what's happened in Portugal in the past few years, but I do know there's not hundreds of murders and attempted murders in Lisbon every year by rival gangs of youths trying to control their drug trade.
I hope Swinson thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when she was enjoying puffing her weed.
Nah, thought not.
Drug gang-related knife deaths have nothing to do with consumption, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
The drug gangs fight over turf to supply just the nice middle and upper class weekend dinner party set that wrings its hands about how terrible it is that all these kids are dying in street crime.
PS I don't take drugs either. Their deaths aren't directly of my causing.
Does anyone have a list of roughly which seats will likely finish their counts first on the 12th? Am figure out which seats will actually give a clue about national outcome at what time in the evening so that I can enjoy as much as my office Christmas party as I can without being stuck to my phone permanently post 10pm...
Also, this is an excellent thread header. The previous LD offer of being a moderating influence was pragmatic, the current strategy of vagueness about who they would support/avoid opposing is tough to explain.
I am not seeing any sign that Swinson is cutting through in this election campaign at all. The "girly swot" thing was juvenile and the continuous surplus except for capital spending really ties their hands and their legs behind their back in the "who can produce the most credible spending splurge" game that the others are playing.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I actually like that policy and thought Ed Davey sounded very like Conservative Chancellors of old with his pitch but it is more puritanical than even Hammond ever was with deeply uncomfortable short term implications.
I also agree with their legalisation policy for pot although it is very much a work in progress.
But they are not so much struggling to get a hearing as failing to persuade. Their position on Brexit has a very definite ceiling and it is turning out that ceiling is somewhat lower than many might have thought. Getting squeezed by something as dysfunctional and, frankly, repellent as Corbyn's Labour party is just embarrassing. It is a frustration to me that the appetite for a sane alternative seems so limited.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
BiB - Do you think that would have been to the Lib Dems' benefit? I'm not so sure. It's their clear Brexit policy that has brought back to life the Lab/Lib Dem front.
And the ITV Debate neatly framed the absurdity of the duopoly. Johnson and Corbyn arguing over whose leave deal was best. Imagine if the LibDems had adopted a similar position to Labour - who would be representing the majority remain voters? The Greens and the SNP?
I understand your point but I don’t think the Lib Dems needed to go to revoke . Everyone knew they were the strongest party for Remain .
It’s put some Remainers in a very uncomfortable position because to be blunt it’s just not very democratic . You’ll not find many people more pro EU than me but I have deep reservations about revoke .
The billions should always be put in numbers not letters. More impact.
Not sure that's true.
I was shocked recently when someone I know who is very clever, graduate, professional career etc. asked me how many million there are in a billion. I think many people see £million, £billion, £trillion as all the same - a lot.
1,000,000 - 1,000,000,000 - 1,000,000.000,000 - it's my point.
It's in your link and is the last one of my numbers - 1,000,000.000,000
I have always been comfortable with millions, billions and trillions. You have to be in the oil and gas industry. Tcf or trillion cubic feet of gas is a standard measure of reserves. When it comes to the North Dome between Qatar and Iran, you are talking 1.8 quadrillion cubic feet.
So how many double-decker buses is that? You with your fancy-dan "cubic feet"
It's how many Olympic swimming pools you can fit into Wales.
16,588,000 unstacked.
Numeric trick for you politicians: If you want a number to sound big use a length comparison, if you want a number to sound small use a volume 220 million :that's the number of people you need to reach the moon end to end, about the population of Pakistan. 7.5 billion, the number of people in the world: everyone can fit into to the Grand Canyon (about the size of a coffin for everyone).
20 Swimming pools length ways in a kilometre, 800 in a square kilometre and assuming 2.5 metre depth, 320000 in a cubic kilometre.
All of which is an object lesson on the usefulness of SI units and expressing big numbers using standard form.
Speaking of which, several of you were talking about broadband speeds of 30mb per second. That is less than the Voyager craft can now manage. I hope you meant 30Mb per second. The difference in magnitude between m (milli, as in mm) and M (mega or 1,000,000) is a billion or 10^9. I also find it depressing that I can show a number of different emojis on this, but not the sub and super scripts required for expressing scientific terms correctly.
Does anyone have a list of roughly which seats will likely finish their counts first on the 12th? Am figure out which seats will actually give a clue about national outcome at what time in the evening so that I can enjoy as much as my office Christmas party as I can without being stuck to my phone permanently post 10pm...
The first marginal to declare for the past couple of elections has been Nuneaton, at around 12:30.
Sunderland seats will probably be first, around 11pm. They have an army of students running around with ballot boxes to get them to the count quickly.
Do Labour realise that council houses are not aspirational ?
And that few home owners want more council houses being built anywhere near where they live.
I'm not sure that's true. I live in a very expensive area and middle-class families worry about their kids having to move away if they move out. I was elected in a decidedly middle-class home-owning ward after campaigning almost exclusively on "more social housing". I do think that "council housing" has an old-fashioned ring to it, though. And contempt for the idea of "affordable housing" (houses for sale at 85% of market rates) is almost universal, including all the Tory councillors tyhat I've talked to - round here that means £300K.
Does anyone have a list of roughly which seats will likely finish their counts first on the 12th? Am figure out which seats will actually give a clue about national outcome at what time in the evening so that I can enjoy as much as my office Christmas party as I can without being stuck to my phone permanently post 10pm...
The first marginal to declare for the past couple of elections has been Nuneaton, at around 12:30.
Sunderland seats will probably be first, around 11pm. They have an army of students running around with ballot boxes to get them to the count quickly.
Pretty astonishing effort from Prince Andrew. Not many people can say they’ve held most of the front pages for five days in the middle of a general election campaign.
The Queen has been very good, throughout her reign, at moving quickly to shut down threats to the monarchy.
This wasn’t serious but it did threaten to escalate and drag others in if she hadn’t acted due to Andrew’s crass stupidity and pomposity.
It’s also made (and I surprise myself in saying this) Charles look good by comparison. He’s been more statesmanlike and decisive behind the scenes (without at all making it about him) than I’ve seen before which bodes well for the future.
There has long been talk of Charles wanting a “slimmed down” monarchy with the rest of the Queens children firmly taking a back seat when he ascends to the throne. If this is true then this gives him a very good excuse to move to sideline Andrew and his clan. Edward has already, for whatever reason, taken a lower profile in recent times. As for Anne, she’s never really been a source of controversy in recent times and has taken on a ‘dutiful’ persona in the background so no real issues there.
Does anyone have a list of roughly which seats will likely finish their counts first on the 12th? Am figure out which seats will actually give a clue about national outcome at what time in the evening so that I can enjoy as much as my office Christmas party as I can without being stuck to my phone permanently post 10pm...
Sunderland and Swindon seats?
Newcastle is around the same time as Sunderland these days. Northern held urban Labour seats tend to come in earlier than anything else. The papers/TV stations will all publish rough timings closer to the election.
I don't know too much about what's happened in Portugal in the past few years, but I do know there's not hundreds of murders and attempted murders in Lisbon every year by rival gangs of youths trying to control their drug trade.
I hope Swinson thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when she was enjoying puffing her weed.
Nah, thought not.
Drug gang-related knife deaths have nothing to do with consumption, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
The drug gangs fight over turf to supply just the nice middle and upper class weekend dinner party set that wrings its hands about how terrible it is that all these kids are dying in street crime.
PS I don't take drugs either. Their deaths aren't directly of my causing.
So legalise drugs then. What other solution do you have besides moralising? Also your claim is not true. If it was true the gang deaths wouldn't be concentrated in certain areas.
Drug consumption is universal across the country but gang deaths are not, in many middle class areas there are no gang deaths but plenty of drug consumption.
I think it comes from an unconscious acknowledgment by the Left that the NHS is in crisis, a crisis to which they have no answer except the fairy tale belief that they can tax a vast army of billionaires who will do nothing but stay put and be taxed into oblivion. But if that doesn't work - well, it requires a level of surgery that only the Right could ever sanction. So just believe in the fairy tale.
The NHS has grown too complex, too expensive, too all-encompassing to be sustained in its current form by taxation of the private sector by the State. Yet it is a national religion, so it is easier to burn heretics who point this out than consider a Reformation.
But despite the Spanish Inquisition of the Left, the Conservatives themselves aren't heretics. They still keep insisting that it can be saved in its current form. It is a thinking that has led to promoting the Bus of Brexit as the major answer to a funding gap. A gap that cannot be bridged.
Failure to be honest on the NHS is a facet of the failure of politics and of politicians in this country.
The only answer? A cross-party supported Royal Commission of the brightest in the land, with a remit to think the unthinkable on the NHS. But whatever that is, wherever that goes, it needs to have a plan to keep health and social care functioning for the next 40 years. And it needs a pledge by politicians to implement their findings, however toxic they might seem today.
I profoundly disagree, as you'd perhaps expect. The NHS was working quite well in 2010 - two weeks for cancer treatment, 18 weeks for non-urgent ops, max 4-hour waits in A&E. Occasionally the targets would get broken but it was the normal experience. To chuck away the targets, allow the system to decay and then say oh dear, it's not working, we must try something quite different is Tory cynicism at its worst.
I understand your point but I don’t think the Lib Dems needed to go to revoke . Everyone knew they were the strongest party for Remain .
It’s put some Remainers in a very uncomfortable position because to be blunt it’s just not very democratic . You’ll not find many people more pro EU than me but I have deep reservations about revoke .
I struggle with the rationale on this. We had an advisory referendum in the 2015 parliament. We've since had a General Election. We're having another General Election. The actions of the 2015 parliament do not bind successor parliaments - and in the albeit unlikely event of a majority LibDem government elected on a clear mandate of revoke how is that undemocratic?
A significant part of our problem is that voters don't understand the system. They didn't understand the referendum was advisory. They don't understand that they vote for the named candidate not the party not the leader. They don't understand that no laws are sacrosanct and can't be changed in future. A dumb electorate kept in their place by the Establishment doesn't work in an era of 24 hour tinterweb news and social media.
Whatever we decide on Brexit. Remain. Leave with the Deal. Leave with no Deal. Every future parliament is entirely at liberty to revise and rip up whatever was agreed by a previous parliament. Boris wins, gets his deal through and we leave. The 2024 parliament can rejoin. Or Corbyn wins negotiates his deal which gets rejected. The 2024 parliament can No Deal. This never ends.
Does anyone have a list of roughly which seats will likely finish their counts first on the 12th? Am figure out which seats will actually give a clue about national outcome at what time in the evening so that I can enjoy as much as my office Christmas party as I can without being stuck to my phone permanently post 10pm...
This is my running totals spreadsheet for the last election night which also includes the declaration times from 2015 as well as 2017:
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
That assumes that the Labour Brexit position makes sense to anyone other than Richard "IQ" Burgon. Out in the campaign the Labour position is *derided*. In opposition the LibDems would put The Deal - whatever it is - in a referendum vs remain. And have proposed that repeatedly only for Labour repeatedly not to support such a referendum.
Where perhaps she went wrong was the suggestion that "I can be Prime Minister". She can*, in a scenario where its an absurdly hung parliament and her 100 seats provides stability against a collapsing Labour partner or something. A LibDem Majority government? Don't be silly Jo.
However, there is a democratic deficit at play. Every poll shows a now decent and consistent majority for remain. We have a hard leave party, two soft leave parties. Are we really saying there shouldn't be a party speaking for remain? Despite said consistent majority support for it?
I've said before that Vince Cable should have stood aside at least a year earlier, to give Jo Swinson some time to grow into the role of leader. She might not have made some of the mistakes she has with some more time in post. This election came too soon for her.
Jo had a baby in June 2018. It would have been very difficult for her to take over a year earlier i.e. in July 2018. Even now, she has a punishing role with 17 month old son and a six year old son.
O/T Labour spending £10bn pa on building 100,000 council houses a year sounds a lot... until you start to compare it with £88bn for HS2 or £18bn for Crossrail.
An election candidate standing in the same seat as Anna Soubry has been found guilty of harassing her and banned from campaigning in the constituency.
English Democrat candidate Amy Dalla Mura is standing in Broxtowe, Nottinghamshire, which Ms Soubry has represented since 2010.
Westminster Magistrates' Court heard the defendant repeatedly targeted the Independent Group for Change candidate and called her a traitor on television.
I think it comes from an unconscious acknowledgment by the Left that the NHS is in crisis, a crisis to which they have no answer except the fairy tale belief that they can tax a vast army of billionaires who will do nothing but stay put and be taxed into oblivion. But if that doesn't work - well, it requires a level of surgery that only the Right could ever sanction. So just believe in the fairy tale.
The NHS has grown too complex, too expensive, too all-encompassing to be sustained in its current form by taxation of the private sector by the State. Yet it is a national religion, so it is easier to burn heretics who point this out than consider a Reformation.
But despite the Spanish Inquisition of the Left, the Conservatives themselves aren't heretics. They still keep insisting that it can be saved in its current form. It is a thinking that has led to promoting the Bus of Brexit as the major answer to a funding gap. A gap that cannot be bridged.
Failure to be honest on the NHS is a facet of the failure of politics and of politicians in this country.
The only answer? A cross-party supported Royal Commission of the brightest in the land, with a remit to think the unthinkable on the NHS. But whatever that is, wherever that goes, it needs to have a plan to keep health and social care functioning for the next 40 years. And it needs a pledge by politicians to implement their findings, however toxic they might seem today.
I profoundly disagree, as you'd perhaps expect. The NHS was working quite well in 2010 - two weeks for cancer treatment, 18 weeks for non-urgent ops, max 4-hour waits in A&E. Occasionally the targets would get broken but it was the normal experience. To chuck away the targets, allow the system to decay and then say oh dear, it's not working, we must try something quite different is Tory cynicism at its worst.
Maybe, but the point about it being a national religion and that being a barrier to solutions is I think true. I feel like my whole life I've been told it's in crisis, and my whole working life I've been told by people I trust that the NHS is more frustrating to deal with even than Whitehall.
I'm not one for advocating root and branch reform, but I definitely get the impression doing more than minor reforms and throwing money at the NHS is off limits and that they are afraid of even suggesting anything else - which stops a lot of bad ideas, but possibly also some good ones. I get that impression from the overdone praise, talk if loving it and so on.
I accept most dont think this way, but I never vote based on the NHS. It'll get a bit better or a bit worse, but either way it'll be talk of crisis every winter, of needing more money, that it might get sold off.
I have decided to buy Lib Dem seats. The reason is simple. Their strategy is the easiest to allow us to go back to the slumber we were previously in politically. I don’t want more of Corbyn or Johnson and I don’t think the general population does either. Radical change is overrated. Everyone I spoke to who saw the itv debate was unenthusiastic about it. If a bunch of people never vote again if we revoke so be it. Their problem not mine.
Do Labour realise that council houses are not aspirational ?
And that few home owners want more council houses being built anywhere near where they live.
I'm not sure that's true. I live in a very expensive area and middle-class families worry about their kids having to move away if they move out. I was elected in a decidedly middle-class home-owning ward after campaigning almost exclusively on "more social housing". I do think that "council housing" has an old-fashioned ring to it, though. And contempt for the idea of "affordable housing" (houses for sale at 85% of market rates) is almost universal, including all the Tory councillors tyhat I've talked to - round here that means £300K.
Affordable housing policies would be great if they were linked to local salaries instead of market rates. That would be affordable. The problem with affordable housing (certainly in London and the SE) is that it is not affordable to the vast majority of local workers.
It is just yet another lie, pretending that the govt are interested in helping local people buy homes when all they care about is increasing the value of houses which has the knock on effect of workers not being able to buy homes in an economy with low productivity and wage rises.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
Does anyone have a list of roughly which seats will likely finish their counts first on the 12th? Am figure out which seats will actually give a clue about national outcome at what time in the evening so that I can enjoy as much as my office Christmas party as I can without being stuck to my phone permanently post 10pm...
This is my running totals spreadsheet for the last election night which also includes the declaration times from 2015 as well as 2017:
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
O/T Labour spending £10bn pa on building 100,000 council houses a year sounds a lot... until you start to compare it with £88bn for HS2 or £18bn for Crossrail.
I don’t have a problem with building more houses full stop.
Is the problem not that they are adding more to the chequebook though? Any new announcement now adds to the perception that they are spending like it’s going out of business.
I don’t think it’s an election winning strategy, it’s a try and tempt back northern voters strategy to try and deny the Tories a majority. It’s a gamble.
I don't know too much about what's happened in Portugal in the past few years, but I do know there's not hundreds of murders and attempted murders in Lisbon every year by rival gangs of youths trying to control their drug trade.
I hope Swinson thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when she was enjoying puffing her weed.
Nah, thought not.
Drug gang-related knife deaths have nothing to do with consumption, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
I don't know much about this topic, if anything, but one thing I'm reasonably sure of is that the gangs won't just meekly disband if pot gets legalised and is freely available.
Of course they wont just disband but they will become weaker and smaller. One of the main drivers of gang recruitment is the ability to earn lots of money very quickly. If the gangs earn less money through drugs, less people will be tempted to join. There is also a network effect, once fewer people are joining, the gangs have less power and control over the local estate, more people are willing to resist, resulting in even fewer reasons to join the less powerful and less wealthy gang.
People just don't like Swinson. I'll suprised if the libdems get more than 20 seats.
They'll be a bit disappointed by any result after their optimism, but I think they'll be hugely disappointed with anything below 20, and very happy if they can get to 30.
I am not seeing any sign that Swinson is cutting through in this election campaign at all. I mean, don't get me wrong, I actually like that policy and thought Ed Davey sounded very like Conservative Chancellors of old with his pitch but it is more puritanical than even Hammond ever was with deeply uncomfortable short term implications.
I also agree with their legalisation policy for pot although it is very much a work in progress.
But they are not so much struggling to get a hearing as failing to persuade. Their position on Brexit has a very definite ceiling and it is turning out that ceiling is somewhat lower than many might have thought. Getting squeezed by something as dysfunctional and, frankly, repellent as Corbyn's Labour party is just embarrassing. It is a frustration to me that the appetite for a sane alternative seems so limited.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
BiB - Do you think that would have been to the Lib Dems' benefit? I'm not so sure. It's their clear Brexit policy that has brought back to life the Lab/Lib Dem front.
And the ITV Debate neatly framed the absurdity of the duopoly. Johnson and Corbyn arguing over whose leave deal was best. Imagine if the LibDems had adopted a similar position to Labour - who would be representing the majority remain voters? The Greens and the SNP?
I understand your point but I don’t think the Lib Dems needed to go to revoke . Everyone knew they were the strongest party for Remain .
It’s put some Remainers in a very uncomfortable position because to be blunt it’s just not very democratic . You’ll not find many people more pro EU than me but I have deep reservations about revoke .
+ 1
BTW off topic, I watched the first 2 episodes of the Crown. A bit disappointing. Very good production values but Olivia Coleman was disappointing and the script was incredibly clunky and unsubtle in places, with a very poor rip off of Alan Bennett in the Queen/Blunt scenes.
An election candidate standing in the same seat as Anna Soubry has been found guilty of harassing her and banned from campaigning in the constituency.
English Democrat candidate Amy Dalla Mura is standing in Broxtowe, Nottinghamshire, which Ms Soubry has represented since 2010.
Westminster Magistrates' Court heard the defendant repeatedly targeted the Independent Group for Change candidate and called her a traitor on television.
I am not seeing any sign that Swinson is cutting through in this election campaign at all. I mean, don't get me wrong, I actually like that policy and thought Ed Davey sounded very like Conservative Chancellors of old with his pitch but it is more puritanical than even Hammond ever was with deeply uncomfortable short term implications.
I also agree with their legalisation policy for pot although it is very much a work in progress.
But they are not so much struggling to get a hearing as failing to persuade. Their position on Brexit has a very definite ceiling and it is turning out that ceiling is somewhat lower than many might have thought. Getting squeezed by something as dysfunctional and, frankly, repellent as Corbyn's Labour party is just embarrassing. It is a frustration to me that the appetite for a sane alternative seems so limited.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
BiB - Do you think that would have been to the Lib Dems' benefit? I'm not so sure. It's their clear Brexit policy that has brought back to life the Lab/Lib Dem front.
And the ITV Debate neatly framed the absurdity of the duopoly. Johnson and Corbyn arguing over whose leave deal was best. Imagine if the LibDems had adopted a similar position to Labour - who would be representing the majority remain voters? The Greens and the SNP?
I understand your point but I don’t think the Lib Dems needed to go to revoke . Everyone knew they were the strongest party for Remain .
It’s put some Remainers in a very uncomfortable position because to be blunt it’s just not very democratic . You’ll not find many people more pro EU than me but I have deep reservations about revoke .
+ 1
BTW off topic, I watched the first 2 episodes of the Crown. A bit disappointing. Very good production values but Olivia Coleman was disappointing and the script was incredibly clunky and unsubtle in places, with a very poor rip off of Alan Bennett in the Queen/Blunt scenes.
Morning all and I just spotted the reference to Social Housing. Personally I think ALL politicians are so obsessed with building affordable housing that they have failed to realise what we need all across the UK is a major expansion of the social housing portfolio.
I may be a right-wing Tory but I feel very strongly that every person has the right to a warm, dry, comfortable and safe home of their own, whether they own it or rent it. Personally I would suggest that any government should commit to building 100,000 new social houses ranging from solo flats in inner cities to 3/4 bedroom semi detached houses in suburban and rural areas. No more multi-storey social housing should be built anywhere in the UK, even with the pressure on land use because all they constitute are the future ghettos in the sky which facilitate so many anti-societal evils in the modern world. For every council house sold, two new ones should be built.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
BiB - Do you think that would have been to the Lib Dems' benefit? I'm not so sure. It's their clear Brexit policy that has brought back to life the Lab/Lib Dem front.
And the ITV Debate neatly framed the absurdity of the duopoly. Johnson and Corbyn arguing over whose leave deal was best. Imagine if the LibDems had adopted a similar position to Labour - who would be representing the majority remain voters? The Greens and the SNP?
I understand your point but I don’t think the Lib Dems needed to go to revoke . Everyone knew they were the strongest party for Remain .
It’s put some Remainers in a very uncomfortable position because to be blunt it’s just not very democratic . You’ll not find many people more pro EU than me but I have deep reservations about revoke .
Funny old world. I'm a leaver and have no problems with a government revoking A50 post the GE if they're in a position to do so. Democracy never stops and if the people don't like it, they can vote in someone else next time.
But then, deep down, I always knew that to get Brexit done would require the election of a majority government promising to deliver on the result of the referendum. Given FPTP, that really ought not to be too much of a stretch to achieve.
I am not seeing any sign that Swinson is cutting through in this election campaign at all. I mean, don't get me wrong, I actually like that policy and thought Ed Davey sounded very like Conservative Chancellors of old with his pitch but it is more puritanical than even Hammond ever was with deeply uncomfortable short term implications.
I also agree with their legalisation policy for pot although it is very much a work
But they are not so much struggling to get a hearing as failing to persuade. Their position on Brexit has a very definite ceiling and it is turning out that ceiling is somewhat lower than many might have thought. Getting squeezed by something as dysfunctional and, frankly, repellent as Corbyn's Labour party is just embarrassing. It is a frustration to me that the appetite for a sane alternative seems so limited.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
BiB - Do you think that would have been to the Lib Dems' benefit? I'm not so sure. It's their clear Brexit policy that has brought back to life the Lab/Lib Dem front.
And the ITV Debate neatly framed the absurdity of the duopoly. Johnson and Corbyn arguing over whose leave deal was best. Imagine if the LibDems had adopted a similar position to Labour - who would be representing the majority remain voters? The Greens and the SNP?
I understand your point but I don’t think the Lib Dems needed to go to revoke . Everyone knew they were the strongest party for Remain .
It’s put some Remainers in a very uncomfortable position because to be blunt it’s just not very democratic . You’ll not find many people more pro EU than me but I have deep reservations about revoke .
+ 1
BTW off topic, I watched the first 2 episodes of the Crown. A bit disappointing. Very good production values but Olivia Coleman was disappointing and the script was incredibly clunky and unsubtle in places, with a very poor rip off of Alan Bennett in the Queen/Blunt scenes.
My Facebook feed is rife with pro-Corbyn and anti-Tory propaganda.
Momentum need a lot of credit for the way they conduct their social-media game. It is pretty hard hitting stuff and will win over a lot of younger voters.
O/T Labour spending £10bn pa on building 100,000 council houses a year sounds a lot... until you start to compare it with £88bn for HS2 or £18bn for Crossrail.
I don’t have a problem with building more houses full stop.
Is the problem not that they are adding more to the chequebook though? Any new announcement now adds to the perception that they are spending like it’s going out of business.
I don’t think it’s an election winning strategy, it’s a try and tempt back northern voters strategy to try and deny the Tories a majority. It’s a gamble.
We have probably got to the point where politics, news and social media is so polarised most of the centre and all of the right will assume Labour policies are spending like its going out of business, regardless of what they say or do.
The Tories are clear that honesty is not important any more so whatever Labour did, they would portray Labour in that light.
At that point, the best options for Labour are either change the Labour leadership and brand back to a credible centrist, or actually go over the top on spending pledges, promising a bit of everything.
I don't know too much about what's happened in Portugal in the past few years, but I do know there's not hundreds of murders and attempted murders in Lisbon every year by rival gangs of youths trying to control their drug trade.
I hope Swinson thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when she was enjoying puffing her weed.
Nah, thought not.
Drug gang-related knife deaths have nothing to do with consumption, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
I don't know much about this topic, if anything, but one thing I'm reasonably sure of is that the gangs won't just meekly disband if pot gets legalised and is freely available.
Of course they wont just disband but they will become weaker and smaller. One of the main drivers of gang recruitment is the ability to earn lots of money very quickly. If the gangs earn less money through drugs, less people will be tempted to join. There is also a network effect, once fewer people are joining, the gangs have less power and control over the local estate, more people are willing to resist, resulting in even fewer reasons to join the less powerful and less wealthy gang.
So, two questions:
1) how much gang revenue is derived from pot, as opposed to other drugs or non-drug related activity? 2) to what extent would legalisation of one drug push people towards stronger, illegal versions of the same drug, or other substances?
My uninformed guesses would be: low; and difficult to say. I suspect we may be past the point that freely available or prescription based cannabis has much of an impact.
Does anyone have a list of roughly which seats will likely finish their counts first on the 12th? Am figure out which seats will actually give a clue about national outcome at what time in the evening so that I can enjoy as much as my office Christmas party as I can without being stuck to my phone permanently post 10pm...
This is my running totals spreadsheet for the last election night which also includes the declaration times from 2015 as well as 2017:
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
Cannabis is the only drug I've ever taken that has made me go home crying to my Mam.
I'm an inveterate pisshead and I've been a bit naughty on the recerational drugs over the years but I can't handle weed. It doesn't agree with me at all. Head-spinning, paranoia inducing. Horrible.
I would legalise it though. My sister is a copper and said the police don't bother even stopping youngsters for smoking it.
I don't know too much about what's happened in Portugal in the past few years, but I do know there's not hundreds of murders and attempted murders in Lisbon every year by rival gangs of youths trying to control their drug trade.
I hope Swinson thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when she was enjoying puffing her weed.
Nah, thought not.
Drug gang-related knife deaths have nothing to do with consumption, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
I don't know much about this topic, if anything, but one thing I'm reasonably sure of is that the gangs won't just meekly disband if pot gets legalised and is freely available.
Of course they wont just disband but they will become weaker and smaller. One of the main drivers of gang recruitment is the ability to earn lots of money very quickly. If the gangs earn less money through drugs, less people will be tempted to join. There is also a network effect, once fewer people are joining, the gangs have less power and control over the local estate, more people are willing to resist, resulting in even fewer reasons to join the less powerful and less wealthy gang.
So, two questions:
1) how much gang revenue is derived from pot, as opposed to other drugs or non-drug related activity? 2) to what extent would legalisation of one drug push people towards stronger, illegal versions of the same drug, or other substances?
My uninformed guesses would be: low; and difficult to say. I suspect we may be past the point that freely available or prescription based cannabis has much of an impact.
Don't know about those specific questions, but seems like legalisation makes policing better.
Gut thinking would be if resources aren't spent jailing people selling weed, something most people don't care about any more but is easy to do and allows police to have good looking arrest numbers and hit targets and whatnot, police can put resources into dealing with more impactful crime.
It’s also made (and I surprise myself in saying this) Charles look good by comparison. He’s been more statesmanlike and decisive behind the scenes (without at all making it about him) than I’ve seen before which bodes well for the future.
I don't know much about the monarchy but I do know it won't survive King Gobshite. Unless he has the grace to die soon after coronation and they plant the crown on William's shiny pate.
I am not seeing any sign that Swinson is cutting through in this election campaign at all. The "girly swot" thing was juvenile and the continuous surplus except for capital spending really ties their hands and their legs behind their back in the "who can produce the most credible spending splurge" game that the others are playing.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I actually like that policy and thought Ed Davey sounded very like Conservative Chancellors of old with his pitch but it is more puritanical than even Hammond ever was with deeply uncomfortable short term implications.
I also agree with their legalisation policy for pot although it is very much a work in progress.
But they are not so much struggling to get a hearing as failing to persuade. Their position on Brexit has a very definite ceiling and it is turning out that ceiling is somewhat lower than many might have thought. Getting squeezed by something as dysfunctional and, frankly, repellent as Corbyn's Labour party is just embarrassing. It is a frustration to me that the appetite for a sane alternative seems so limited.
They could - should - have mirrored Labour on Brexit. By two parties suggesting it might in itself have made the renegotiate -> revote seem less muddled. But it would have done what Labour did to the Tories in 2017: left not a fag paper between the two parties on Brexit, so highlighting the differences on all other policies. And those differences would have been that Labour is Loony Marxit Left, the LibDems are sensible Left, with a sensible Budget being proposed by a sensible Chancellor in waiting - our price for a Coalition, Labour.
Instead, Swinson has fucked it up.
BiB - Do you think that would have been to the Lib Dems' benefit? I'm not so sure. It's their clear Brexit policy that has brought back to life the Lab/Lib Dem front.
Personally, I think they've made the right policy calls. Where I think they're finding it tough is that Tory remainers are thinking that it is a risk to vote Lib Dem as it probably leads to Corbyn in Downing Street.
They could have had a clear Brexit policy of "we want a second referendum and we will campaign to remain" they had no need to go for immediate revoke under Prime Minister Swinson that is absurd and undemocratic and laughed at.
I have certainly heard a few people (LD target voters and strong remainers) say that the LD stance is undemocratic, that a referendum needs to be reversed by another referendum.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
Cannabis is the only drug I've ever taken that has made me go home crying to my Mam.
I'm an inveterate pisshead and I've been a bit naughty on the recerational drugs over the years but I can't handle weed. It doesn't agree with me at all. Head-spinning, paranoia inducing. Horrible.
I would legalise it though. My sister is a copper and said the police don't bother even stopping youngsters for smoking it.
If the Lib Dem policy became law, the police would have to start enforcing it. There would be absolutely no excuses for smoking it illegally.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
I don't know too much about what's happened in Portugal in the past few years, but I do know there's not hundreds of murders and attempted murders in Lisbon every year by rival gangs of youths trying to control their drug trade.
I hope Swinson thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when she was enjoying puffing her weed.
Nah, thought not.
Drug gang-related knife deaths have nothing to do with consumption, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
I don't know much about this topic, if anything, but one thing I'm reasonably sure of is that the gangs won't just meekly disband if pot gets legalised and is freely available.
Of course they wont just disband but they will become weaker and smaller. One of the main drivers of gang recruitment is the ability to earn lots of money very quickly. If the gangs earn less money through drugs, less people will be tempted to join. There is also a network effect, once fewer people are joining, the gangs have less power and control over the local estate, more people are willing to resist, resulting in even fewer reasons to join the less powerful and less wealthy gang.
So, two questions:
1) how much gang revenue is derived from pot, as opposed to other drugs or non-drug related activity? 2) to what extent would legalisation of one drug push people towards stronger, illegal versions of the same drug, or other substances?
My uninformed guesses would be: low; and difficult to say. I suspect we may be past the point that freely available or prescription based cannabis has much of an impact.
Also uninformed guesses but
1) It will vary massively by area and particular gang. This study has cannabis as 37% share of the EU drugs market by value. No idea which drugs are higher margin for the dealers, guess cannabis is at the lower end as it is the most prevalent. So maybe 25% of gang drug profits?
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
I have seen Peter Hitchens talk on the subject; he also says alcohol should be illegal too because he can't deny the science showing that alcohol is just as bad if not worse for health and communities. It is interesting he doesn't spend much time on that... (Peter Hitchens also is pretty wobbly on his belief that evolution is a thing and has pandered towards creationism, so I don't really trust him on science...)
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
I have seen Peter Hitchens talk on the subject; he also says alcohol should be illegal too because he can't deny the science showing that alcohol is just as bad if not worse for health and communities. It is interesting he doesn't spend much time on that... (Peter Hitchens also is pretty wobbly on his belief that evolution is a thing and has pandered towards creationism, so I don't really trust him on science...)
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
I have seen Peter Hitchens talk on the subject; he also says alcohol should be illegal too because he can't deny the science showing that alcohol is just as bad if not worse for health and communities. It is interesting he doesn't spend much time on that... (Peter Hitchens also is pretty wobbly on his belief that evolution is a thing and has pandered towards creationism, so I don't really trust him on science...)
Not much of an argument - you could say the same thing about sugar or fructose syrup. Or deep fried Mars Bars.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
I have seen Peter Hitchens talk on the subject; he also says alcohol should be illegal too because he can't deny the science showing that alcohol is just as bad if not worse for health and communities. It is interesting he doesn't spend much time on that... (Peter Hitchens also is pretty wobbly on his belief that evolution is a thing and has pandered towards creationism, so I don't really trust him on science...)
It’s also made (and I surprise myself in saying this) Charles look good by comparison. He’s been more statesmanlike and decisive behind the scenes (without at all making it about him) than I’ve seen before which bodes well for the future.
I don't know much about the monarchy but I do know it won't survive King Gobshite. Unless he has the grace to die soon after coronation and they plant the crown on William's shiny pate.
I wouldn't bet the farm on him outliving his mother, being that red in the face all the time can't be good.
It’s also made (and I surprise myself in saying this) Charles look good by comparison. He’s been more statesmanlike and decisive behind the scenes (without at all making it about him) than I’ve seen before which bodes well for the future.
I don't know much about the monarchy but I do know it won't survive King Gobshite. Unless he has the grace to die soon after coronation and they plant the crown on William's shiny pate.
Your royalist sympathies are clear from your avatar
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
I have seen Peter Hitchens talk on the subject; he also says alcohol should be illegal too because he can't deny the science showing that alcohol is just as bad if not worse for health and communities. It is interesting he doesn't spend much time on that... (Peter Hitchens also is pretty wobbly on his belief that evolution is a thing and has pandered towards creationism, so I don't really trust him on science...)
Not much of an argument - you could say the same thing about sugar or fructose syrup. Or deep fried Mars Bars.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
Cannabis is the only drug I've ever taken that has made me go home crying to my Mam.
I'm an inveterate pisshead and I've been a bit naughty on the recerational drugs over the years but I can't handle weed. It doesn't agree with me at all. Head-spinning, paranoia inducing. Horrible.
I would legalise it though. My sister is a copper and said the police don't bother even stopping youngsters for smoking it.
If the Lib Dem policy became law, the police would have to start enforcing it. There would be absolutely no excuses for smoking it illegally.
The police have to choose which laws to enforce as we keep adding new ones, in growing complexity, without removing or simplifying old ones.
On topic I think the LDs would be in danger of a 2010 repeat if there is a hung parliament. The timescales are such that they probably couldnt both stop Corbyn becoming PM and avoid a no deal Jan Brexit. So they will obviously allow Corbyn to be PM even if they dont give any c&s or go into a coalition.
(Some of) their voters will see them as reneging on the promise to not do a deal with Corbyn. They will protest that they didnt do any deal, but I doubt that message would get through properly.
Another election would probably follow a 2nd ref campaign in less than a year, so little time for them to recover.
Drug gang-related knife deaths have nothing to do with consumption, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
I don't know much about this topic, if anything, but one thing I'm reasonably sure of is that the gangs won't just meekly disband if pot gets legalised and is freely available.
Of course they wont just disband but they will become weaker and smaller. One of the main drivers of gang recruitment is the ability to earn lots of money very quickly. If the gangs earn less money through drugs, less people will be tempted to join. There is also a network effect, once fewer people are joining, the gangs have less power and control over the local estate, more people are willing to resist, resulting in even fewer reasons to join the less powerful and less wealthy gang.
So, two questions:
1) how much gang revenue is derived from pot, as opposed to other drugs or non-drug related activity? 2) to what extent would legalisation of one drug push people towards stronger, illegal versions of the same drug, or other substances?
My uninformed guesses would be: low; and difficult to say. I suspect we may be past the point that freely available or prescription based cannabis has much of an impact.
Also uninformed guesses but
1) It will vary massively by area and particular gang. This study has cannabis as 37% share of the EU drugs market by value. No idea which drugs are higher margin for the dealers, guess cannabis is at the lower end as it is the most prevalent. So maybe 25% of gang drug profits?
2) The US experience of liberalising drugs should guide us on this. (and other countries doing similar)
Liberalising and legalising are not the same thing.
Starting with the obvious, prohibition doesn't work.
With a black market criminality is rife, deaths occur, police time is swallowed wholesale, addicts with problems are outside 'the system' and have little to no protection.
I would legalise drugs. All of them.
There would have to be controls, limitations on usage and lots of other controls. The supply or use of illegal drugs would be punished,
I don't know too mucal gangs of youths trying to control their drug trade.
I hopehen she was enjoying puffing her weed.
Nah, thought not.
Drug, it has to do with the fact its against the law.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
I don't know much about this topic, if anything, but one thing I'm reasonably sure of is that the gangs won't just meekly disband if pot gets legalised and is freely available.
Of course they wont just disband but they will becogang.
So, two questions:
1) how much gang revenue is derived from pot, as opposed to other drugs or non-drug related activity? 2) to what extent would legalisation of one drug push people towards stronger, illegal versions of the same drug, or other substances?
My uninformed guesses would be: low; and difficult to say. I suspect we may be past the point that freely available or prescription based cannabis has much of an impact.
Also uninformed guesses but
1) It will vary massively by area and particular gang. This study has cannabis as 37% share of the EU drugs market by value. No idea which drugs are higher margin for the dealers, guess cannabis is at the lower end as it is the most prevalent. So maybe 25% of gang drug profits?
2) The US experience of liberalising drugs should guide us on this. (and other countries doing similar)
As is almost always the case in the US the success or otherwise of legalising cannabis (in some States) will depend on if the known effects lead to litigation against the (legal) growers and distributors.
The vaping market is facing complete collapse in the US due to ever increasing legal action against the manufacturers, with insurers subsequently pulling their product liability cover left right and centre.
In a few years it’s not unlikely that cannabis manufacturers, distributors and retailers will be in the same position - being sued for adverse effects, mental illness etc.
Vaping - a perceived relatively harmless activity - is close to prohibition. Even before that happens, without any liability cover the industry will collapse without the means to defend against suits.
Do Labour realise that council houses are not aspirational ?
And that few home owners want more council houses being built anywhere near where they live.
I'm not sure that's true. I live in a very expensive area and middle-class families worry about their kids having to move away if they move out. I was elected in a decidedly middle-class home-owning ward after campaigning almost exclusively on "more social housing". I do think that "council housing" has an old-fashioned ring to it, though. And contempt for the idea of "affordable housing" (houses for sale at 85% of market rates) is almost universal, including all the Tory councillors tyhat I've talked to - round here that means £300K.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
Can you give a link? Because I googled 'Peter Hitchens on cannabis' and he was replying to comparisons with alcohol and said prohibition wouldn't work with alcohol. Guess what, prohibition hasn't worked with cannabis either.
I'm not endorsing cannabis, I think its bad as I think tobacco is. But I want it legalised, regulated and taxed. Sell it like tobacco behind the counter, no adverts permitted, Challenge 25 ID required to buy it. Tax it and put the funds raised into tackling health issues and encouraging people to quit like we do with tobacco.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
I have seen Peter Hitchens talk on the subject; he also says alcohol should be illegal too because he can't deny the science showing that alcohol is just as bad if not worse for health and communities. It is interesting he doesn't spend much time on that... (Peter Hitchens also is pretty wobbly on his belief that evolution is a thing and has pandered towards creationism, so I don't really trust him on science...)
What do you trust him on!?
When he used to be on QT he did always give me righteous indignation energy. A few times I remember being pretty lethargic and then watching QT and being riled to action. I remember once he was on alongside Will Self, who I really like, and that was fun to watch.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
In both cases the biggest argument for legalising it is strength (and quality) control..
the reason the market is making it stronger all the time is because there is no control over that market.
True. But if the legal stuff is the weak stuff which does no harm then the risk is that there is still an illegal market for the strong stuff which does do harm. So how does one deal with that? Those who want decriminalisation need to have a good answer to that.
Or the other risk is that we make legal something which does cause harm - especially to the young - which does not seem to me to be a particularly moral or sensible thing to do. It’s an odd society which makes a fuss about smoking cigarettes (rightly) or eating too much sugar (again rightly) but is ok about smoking cannabis, regardless of whether it causes problems.
So there needs to be more study about the effects of different types of cannabis, the consequences of decriminalisation and how one enforces effectively against those peddling the stuff we don’t want. Rather than a rush to legalisation on the basis of “Well I smoked some at university 20 years ago and it did me no harm”.
A proper Royal Commission looking at all the evidence properly is needed here. Not rushed through and I’ll-thought out policies.
It’s also made (and I surprise myself in saying this) Charles look good by comparison. He’s been more statesmanlike and decisive behind the scenes (without at all making it about him) than I’ve seen before which bodes well for the future.
I don't know much about the monarchy but I do know it won't survive King Gobshite. Unless he has the grace to die soon after coronation and they plant the crown on William's shiny pate.
Your royalist sympathies are clear from your avatar
I only have it because it's the closest thing to my IRL beard I could find. Otherwise mort aux rois...
On topic I think the LDs would be in danger of a 2010 repeat if there is a hung parliament. The timescales are such that they probably couldnt both stop Corbyn becoming PM and avoid a no deal Jan Brexit. So they will obviously allow Corbyn to be PM even if they dont give any c&s or go into a coalition.
(Some of) their voters will see them as reneging on the promise to not do a deal with Corbyn. They will protest that they didnt do any deal, but I doubt that message would get through properly.
Another election would probably follow a 2nd ref campaign in less than a year, so little time for them to recover.
I think the LibDems would co-operate with other parties to achieve a second referendum, just as they co-operated to avoid no deal. I don't think that would be unexpected or controversial.
I agree there would be another general election later next year. Labour couldn't govern 80+ short of a majority.
I don't think the LibDems would be damaged by co-operating to get a second referendum, revocation of A50 and moving on to domestic policies. They would benefit from being in second place in many more constituencies for an effective squeeze. They could go from 30 to 60 seats.
It’s also made (and I surprise myself in saying this) Charles look good by comparison. He’s been more statesmanlike and decisive behind the scenes (without at all making it about him) than I’ve seen before which bodes well for the future.
I don't know much about the monarchy but I do know it won't survive King Gobshite. Unless he has the grace to die soon after coronation and they plant the crown on William's shiny pate.
Your royalist sympathies are clear from your avatar
I only have it because it's the closest thing to my IRL beard I could find. Otherwise mort aux rois...
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
I have seen Peter Hitchens talk on the subject; he also says alcohol should be illegal too because he can't deny the science showing that alcohol is just as bad if not worse for health and communities. It is interesting he doesn't spend much time on that... (Peter Hitchens also is pretty wobbly on his belief that evolution is a thing and has pandered towards creationism, so I don't really trust him on science...)
What do you trust him on!?
When he used to be on QT he did always give me righteous indignation energy. A few times I remember being pretty lethargic and then watching QT and being riled to action. I remember once he was on alongside Will Self, who I really like, and that was fun to watch.
I am sure there will be someone more obnoxious than him on the UK political scene but I can't think of anyone off hand.
Test. Hope it works - I am hopeless at pasting links etc.
OK - That did seem to work (surprisingly). The chart shows the forecast swing away from different parties, with both main parties losing support in their heartlands.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
In both cases the biggest argument for legalising it is strength (and quality) control..
the reason the market is making it stronger all the time is because there is no control over that market.
True. But if the legal stuff is the weak stuff which does no harm then the risk is that there is still an illegal market for the strong stuff which does do harm. So how does one deal with that? Those who want decriminalisation need to have a good answer to that.
Or the other risk is that we make legal something which does cause harm - especially to the young - which does not seem to me to be a particularly moral or sensible thing to do. It’s an odd society which makes a fuss about smoking cigarettes (rightly) or eating too much sugar (again rightly) but is ok about smoking cannabis, regardless of whether it causes problems.
So there needs to be more study about the effects of different types of cannabis, the consequences of decriminalisation and how one enforces effectively against those peddling the stuff we don’t want. Rather than a rush to legalisation on the basis of “Well I smoked some at university 20 years ago and it did me no harm”.
A proper Royal Commission looking at all the evidence properly is needed here. Not rushed through and I’ll-thought out policies.
Didn't the last report (forget who did it - I think it was by a female (sex noted for ease of google search) health or social bigwig) - get ignored because the answer want against the wishes of the government?
On topic I think the LDs would be in danger of a 2010 repeat if there is a hung parliament. The timescales are such that they probably couldnt both stop Corbyn becoming PM and avoid a no deal Jan Brexit. So they will obviously allow Corbyn to be PM even if they dont give any c&s or go into a coalition.
(Some of) their voters will see them as reneging on the promise to not do a deal with Corbyn. They will protest that they didnt do any deal, but I doubt that message would get through properly.
Another election would probably follow a 2nd ref campaign in less than a year, so little time for them to recover.
If there is a hung parliament, the best course of action for LDs would be to table a revoke bill, when that fails, another extension forcing bill that takes us to at least 2021. Then they should just agitate for another GE asap. Their best strategy is attrition against Lab under Corbyn and Cons under Johnson, if they give either party enough time to change leadership post failure (hung parliament is arguably more of a failure of Johnson than Corbyn, but the noise is if Labour isn't the largest party / can't form a government, Corbyn and McDonnell resign). As long as Johnson and Corbyn are leaders of their parties, LDs have a chance at gains. If Emily Thornberry becomes Lab leader, for example, they start feeling squeezed again.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
In both cases the biggest argument for legalising it is strength (and quality) control..
the reason the market is making it stronger all the time is because there is no control over that market.
True. But if the legal stuff is the weak stuff which does no harm then the risk is that there is still an illegal market for the strong stuff which does do harm. So how does one deal with that? Those who want decriminalisation need to have a good answer to that.
Or the other risk is that we make legal something which does cause harm - especially to the young - which does not seem to me to be a particularly moral or sensible thing to do. It’s an odd society which makes a fuss about smoking cigarettes (rightly) or eating too much sugar (again rightly) but is ok about smoking cannabis, regardless of whether it causes problems.
So there needs to be more study about the effects of different types of cannabis, the consequences of decriminalisation and how one enforces effectively against those peddling the stuff we don’t want. Rather than a rush to legalisation on the basis of “Well I smoked some at university 20 years ago and it did me no harm”.
A proper Royal Commission looking at all the evidence properly is needed here. Not rushed through and I’ll-thought out policies.
Surely your two examples (cigarettes and sugar - you could add alcohol of course) illustrate exactly why legalisation and regulation are the best approach.
Imagine if sugar was an illegal substance - there'd be criminal gangs producing, distributing and selling it. If cigarettes were not regulated there'd be no control at all of the strength ot toxins in them.
Finally, look what happened in prohibition America - we have a similar situation now with drugs.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
It is, but it tackles the issue from the wrong angle. At the start it assumes we are debating whether cannabis is benign or not, which we're not. Let me make myself clear: cannabis is a bad drug and I don't want people taking it. Having said that as admitted in the article we have already de facto decriminalised it and the leap implied to saying that de jure doing so would mean we are endorsing it is a logical fallacy.
There is no reason why we can't logically say that we are legalising the drug to get it out of the hands of drug lords but put out health campaigns emphasising how bad it is and encouraging people to quit - as we have done with tobacco. Is anyone under the misapprehension that because tobacco is legal we endorse it as safe? I don't think so.
Once we acknowledge that prohibition has failed we need to ask ourselves if 'sending a message' cannabis is bad by keeping it illegal but with a law no longer really enforced or taken seriously anyway is worth the price it inflicts on society by putting it in the hands of gangs and drug lords? Is it worth the price of leaving it unregulated and untaxed?
Either we need to go down the Singaporean route of zero tolerance, harsh sentences, properly stamp it out . . . or we need to end prohibition, take it out of the hands of gangs and sell it via legitimate taxed businesses.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
In both cases the biggest argument for legalising it is strength (and quality) control..
the reason the market is making it stronger all the time is because there is no control over that market.
True. But if the legal stuff is the weak stuff which does no harm then the risk is that there is still an illegal market for the strong stuff which does do harm. So how does one deal with that? Those who want decriminalisation need to have a good answer to that.
Or the other risk is that we make legal something which does cause harm - especially to the young - which does not seem to me to be a particularly moral or sensible thing to do. It’s an odd society which makes a fuss about smoking cigarettes (rightly) or eating too much sugar (again rightly) but is ok about smoking cannabis, regardless of whether it causes problems.
So there needs to be more study about the effects of different types of cannabis, the consequences of decriminalisation and how one enforces effectively against those peddling the stuff we don’t want. Rather than a rush to legalisation on the basis of “Well I smoked some at university 20 years ago and it did me no harm”.
A proper Royal Commission looking at all the evidence properly is needed here. Not rushed through and I’ll-thought out policies.
Didn't the last report (forget who did it - I think it was by a female (sex noted for ease of google search) health or social bigwig) - get ignored because the answer want against the wishes of the government?
No idea. This is one area where proper evidence is needed and an open mind. There are financial and other interests pushing all sorts of lines (pun not intended) on this. We really need to understand what sort of illegal drugs are out there, the harm they do and then work out the best way of minimising that. Evidence and facts first then opinions.
We are getting far too much of opinions first with only those facts which support the favoured opinion following on as a very distant second, if at all.
Test. Hope it works - I am hopeless at pasting links etc.
So this just shows swings, not seats won? The colours don't seem to match the tallies... am confused.
It's a chart showing the most significant negative swing in each seat (the party losing most support), and it is shaded by the extent of each swing (paler indicates smaller swing) - but you are right, the seat tally in the box at the side is showing the 1st place result (seats won by each party)
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
In both cases the biggest argument for legalising it is strength (and quality) control..
the reason the market is making it stronger all the time is because there is no control over that market.
True. But if the legal stuff is the weak stuff which does no harm then the risk is that there is still an illegal market for the strong stuff which does do harm. So how does one deal with that? Those who want decriminalisation need to have a good answer to that.
Or the other risk is that we make legal something which does cause harm - especially to the young - which does not seem to me to be a particularly moral or sensible thing to do. It’s an odd society which makes a fuss about smoking cigarettes (rightly) or eating too much sugar (again rightly) but is ok about smoking cannabis, regardless of whether it causes problems.
So there needs to be more study about the effects of different types of cannabis, the consequences of decriminalisation and how one enforces effectively against those peddling the stuff we don’t want. Rather than a rush to legalisation on the basis of “Well I smoked some at university 20 years ago and it did me no harm”.
A proper Royal Commission looking at all the evidence properly is needed here. Not rushed through and I’ll-thought out policies.
Speaking personally I would legalise both the strong and weak stuff and sell it through legal mechanisms and not gangs. And let HMRC join the fight against any illegal, unregulated and untaxed sales.
Lets compare with alcohol. I don't know any alcoholics who abuse low strength beer, though that may be what they started drinking. It is high strength drinks, sometimes beer or wine but most especially spirits which are the biggest problem. But we don't criminalise spirits - and we offer education and health services to those who struggle.
I don't see anyone arguing to legalise because it did them no harm, I see arguments to legalise because prohibition has failed miserably and is leading to drug gangs.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
In both cases the biggest argument for legalising it is strength (and quality) control..
the reason the market is making it stronger all the time is because there is no control over that market.
True. But if the legal stuff is the weak stuff which does no harm then the risk is that there is still an illegal market for the strong stuff which does do harm. So how does one deal with that? Those who want decriminalisation need to have a good answer to that.
Or the other risk is that we make legal something which does cause harm - especially to the young - which does not seem to me to be a particularly moral or sensible thing to do. It’s an odd society which makes a fuss about smoking cigarettes (rightly) or eating too much sugar (again rightly) but is ok about smoking cannabis, regardless of whether it causes problems.
So there needs to be more study about the effects of different types of cannabis, the consequences of decriminalisation and how one enforces effectively against those peddling the stuff we don’t want. Rather than a rush to legalisation on the basis of “Well I smoked some at university 20 years ago and it did me no harm”.
A proper Royal Commission looking at all the evidence properly is needed here. Not rushed through and I’ll-thought out policies.
Surely your two examples (cigarettes and sugar - you could add alcohol of course) illustrate exactly why legalisation and regulation are the best approach.
Imagine if sugar was an illegal substance - there'd be criminal gangs producing, distributing and selling it. If cigarettes were not regulated there'd be no control at all of the strength ot toxins in them.
Finally, look what happened in prohibition America - we have a similar situation now with drugs.
We need evidence. Simply describing the inconsistencies with other products or what happened a century ago in the US is not evidence about what is on offer today, its effects and what the right course of action should be now.
Test. Hope it works - I am hopeless at pasting links etc.
OK - That did seem to work (surprisingly). The chart shows the forecast swing away from different parties, with both main parties losing support in their heartlands.
Ps @MarqueeMark I disagree with Undemocratic Swinson on a lot but one thing she is not doing is just "wringing her hands on drugs". She has proposed a rational evidence based solution unlike others.
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
I would suggest you read Peter Hitchens on cannabis. He makes a convincing case for why it should never be legalised.
In both cases the biggest argument for legalising it is strength (and quality) control..
the reason the market is making it stronger all the time is because there is no control over that market.
True. But if the legal stuff is the weak stuff which does no harm then the risk is that there is still an illegal market for the strong stuff which does do harm. So how does one deal with that? Those who want decriminalisation need to have a good answer to that.
Or the other risk is that we make legal something which does cause harm - especially to the young - which does not seem to me to be a particularly moral or sensible thing to do. It’s an odd society which makes a fuss about smoking cigarettes (rightly) or eating too much sugar (again rightly) but is ok about smoking cannabis, regardless of whether it causes problems...
The proposal is a regulated market with a minimum age limit for sales - the current market is outside of all regulation, the law is patchily and arbitrarily enforced, and its consumers are marketed to from primary school on.
If legalised, as with tobacco, those selling it will have to make very clear the possible/likely health problems associated with smoking it. And as with alcohol there will be regulations on strength, labelling etc.
We are not talking about introducing a harmful product to the young; rather the mitigation of what is a public health and law enforcement problem. The solution will not be ideal, but is highly likely to be an improvement on the status quo.
And there will perhaps be fewer kids who openly tell their teachers their ambition is to be a professional footballer, and if that fails, a drug dealer.
On topic I think the LDs would be in danger of a 2010 repeat if there is a hung parliament. The timescales are such that they probably couldnt both stop Corbyn becoming PM and avoid a no deal Jan Brexit. So they will obviously allow Corbyn to be PM even if they dont give any c&s or go into a coalition.
(Some of) their voters will see them as reneging on the promise to not do a deal with Corbyn. They will protest that they didnt do any deal, but I doubt that message would get through properly.
Another election would probably follow a 2nd ref campaign in less than a year, so little time for them to recover.
If there is a hung parliament, the best course of action for LDs would be to table a revoke bill, when that fails, another extension forcing bill that takes us to at least 2021. Then they should just agitate for another GE asap. Their best strategy is attrition against Lab under Corbyn and Cons under Johnson, if they give either party enough time to change leadership post failure (hung parliament is arguably more of a failure of Johnson than Corbyn, but the noise is if Labour isn't the largest party / can't form a government, Corbyn and McDonnell resign). As long as Johnson and Corbyn are leaders of their parties, LDs have a chance at gains. If Emily Thornberry becomes Lab leader, for example, they start feeling squeezed again.
There wont be a majority for an extension without a plan let alone revoke in a hung parliament. There will (probably) be a wafer thin majority for a 2nd referendum, which will require Corbyn as PM. It is perfectly realistic that there is no majority for anything and we crash out no deal on Jan 31st.
No deal is more likely Jan 31st than it ever was on Mar 31 or Oct 31.
Surely your two examples (cigarettes and sugar - you could add alcohol of course) illustrate exactly why legalisation and regulation are the best approach.
Imagine if sugar was an illegal substance - there'd be criminal gangs producing, distributing and selling it. If cigarettes were not regulated there'd be no control at all of the strength ot toxins in them.
Finally, look what happened in prohibition America - we have a similar situation now with drugs.
We need evidence. Simply describing the inconsistencies with other products or what happened a century ago in the US is not evidence about what is on offer today, its effects and what the right course of action should be now.
What's happening now with gangs on our streets is literally consistent with what happened in the US a century ago. We have abundant evidence prohibition has failed - again! If you want evidence then evidence do we have prohibition is working?
Quite aside from the health issues I detest the all-pervasive funk of cannabis which permeates into neighbours gardens and homes whenever anyone smokes in within 80yds.
We haven’t achieved the success of largely eliminating tobacco stench from the public realm (which is more toxic in smell but far more localised) only to see it replaced by the sickly-sweet and decadently unpleasant stench of cannabis.
I have no issues with resins, biscuits, tablets or other orally ingested or injected versions.
Comments
If you want a number to sound big use a length comparison,
if you want a number to sound small use a volume
220 million :that's the number of people you need to reach the moon end to end, about the population of Pakistan.
7.5 billion, the number of people in the world: everyone can fit into to the Grand Canyon (about the size of a coffin for everyone).
And then there's the risk element - in practice the private sector can get out of its obligations, the state can't. E.g. the ambulance service near me - company has cocked it up, but state has to step in because obviously we need an ambulance service.
If you want rid of the drug gangs, get rid of the absurd failed laws putting the drugs in the hands of gangs.
I hope you thought long and hard on the drug gang-related knife deaths when you were enjoying climbing on your high horse.
PS I don't take drugs.
Personally, I think they've made the right policy calls. Where I think they're finding it tough is that Tory remainers are thinking that it is a risk to vote Lib Dem as it probably leads to Corbyn in Downing Street.
PS I don't take drugs either. Their deaths aren't directly of my causing.
It’s put some Remainers in a very uncomfortable position because to be blunt it’s just not very democratic . You’ll not find many people more pro EU than me but I have deep reservations about revoke .
Speaking of which, several of you were talking about broadband speeds of 30mb per second. That is less than the Voyager craft can now manage. I hope you meant 30Mb per second.
The difference in magnitude between m (milli, as in mm) and M (mega or 1,000,000) is a billion or 10^9.
I also find it depressing that I can show a number of different emojis on this, but not the sub and super scripts required for expressing scientific terms correctly.
Sunderland seats will probably be first, around 11pm. They have an army of students running around with ballot boxes to get them to the count quickly.
Here's a list of estimated times from last election:
https://millionconnections.blogspot.com/2017/06/a-list-of-estimated-declaration-times.html
Drug consumption is universal across the country but gang deaths are not, in many middle class areas there are no gang deaths but plenty of drug consumption.
Coldplay won’t be touring with their next album.
A significant part of our problem is that voters don't understand the system. They didn't understand the referendum was advisory. They don't understand that they vote for the named candidate not the party not the leader. They don't understand that no laws are sacrosanct and can't be changed in future. A dumb electorate kept in their place by the Establishment doesn't work in an era of 24 hour tinterweb news and social media.
Whatever we decide on Brexit. Remain. Leave with the Deal. Leave with no Deal. Every future parliament is entirely at liberty to revise and rip up whatever was agreed by a previous parliament. Boris wins, gets his deal through and we leave. The 2024 parliament can rejoin. Or Corbyn wins negotiates his deal which gets rejected. The 2024 parliament can No Deal. This never ends.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19pjmPA5bAYievt7plp9SOKce4EbXBeamLmww2Ba2GCA/edit#gid=0
If you don't want gangs fighting over drugs legalise the drugs. Prohibition has failed.
But I’m not comfortable with a court telling a candidate that they can’t campaign in the constituency in which they are standing
I'm not one for advocating root and branch reform, but I definitely get the impression doing more than minor reforms and throwing money at the NHS is off limits and that they are afraid of even suggesting anything else - which stops a lot of bad ideas, but possibly also some good ones. I get that impression from the overdone praise, talk if loving it and so on.
I accept most dont think this way, but I never vote based on the NHS. It'll get a bit better or a bit worse, but either way it'll be talk of crisis every winter, of needing more money, that it might get sold off.
It is just yet another lie, pretending that the govt are interested in helping local people buy homes when all they care about is increasing the value of houses which has the knock on effect of workers not being able to buy homes in an economy with low productivity and wage rises.
People just don't like Swinson.
I'll suprised if the libdems get more than 20 seats.
Is the problem not that they are adding more to the chequebook though? Any new announcement now adds to the perception that they are spending like it’s going out of business.
I don’t think it’s an election winning strategy, it’s a try and tempt back northern voters strategy to try and deny the Tories a majority. It’s a gamble.
BTW off topic, I watched the first 2 episodes of the Crown. A bit disappointing. Very good production values but Olivia Coleman was disappointing and the script was incredibly clunky and unsubtle in places, with a very poor rip off of Alan Bennett in the Queen/Blunt scenes.
Hope it gets better.
https://twitter.com/joswinson/status/1186956577699446784?lang=en
They've reacted accordingly. And so have their wives.
I may be a right-wing Tory but I feel very strongly that every person has the right to a warm, dry, comfortable and safe home of their own, whether they own it or rent it. Personally I would suggest that any government should commit to building 100,000 new social houses ranging from solo flats in inner cities to 3/4 bedroom semi detached houses in suburban and rural areas. No more multi-storey social housing should be built anywhere in the UK, even with the pressure on land use because all they constitute are the future ghettos in the sky which facilitate so many anti-societal evils in the modern world. For every council house sold, two new ones should be built.
But then, deep down, I always knew that to get Brexit done would require the election of a majority government promising to deliver on the result of the referendum. Given FPTP, that really ought not to be too much of a stretch to achieve.
Momentum need a lot of credit for the way they conduct their social-media game. It is pretty hard hitting stuff and will win over a lot of younger voters.
The Tories are clear that honesty is not important any more so whatever Labour did, they would portray Labour in that light.
At that point, the best options for Labour are either change the Labour leadership and brand back to a credible centrist, or actually go over the top on spending pledges, promising a bit of everything.
You may as well get hung for a sheep as a lamb.
1) how much gang revenue is derived from pot, as opposed to other drugs or non-drug related activity?
2) to what extent would legalisation of one drug push people towards stronger, illegal versions of the same drug, or other substances?
My uninformed guesses would be: low; and difficult to say. I suspect we may be past the point that freely available or prescription based cannabis has much of an impact.
I'm an inveterate pisshead and I've been a bit naughty on the recerational drugs over the years but I can't handle weed. It doesn't agree with me at all. Head-spinning, paranoia inducing. Horrible.
I would legalise it though. My sister is a copper and said the police don't bother even stopping youngsters for smoking it.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/07/180724110031.htm
Gut thinking would be if resources aren't spent jailing people selling weed, something most people don't care about any more but is easy to do and allows police to have good looking arrest numbers and hit targets and whatnot, police can put resources into dealing with more impactful crime.
1) It will vary massively by area and particular gang. This study has cannabis as 37% share of the EU drugs market by value. No idea which drugs are higher margin for the dealers, guess cannabis is at the lower end as it is the most prevalent. So maybe 25% of gang drug profits?
http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/system/files/publications/2373/downloads/Technical report_Estimating the size of main drug markets.pdf
2) The US experience of liberalising drugs should guide us on this. (and other countries doing similar)
the reason the market is making it stronger all the time is because there is no control over that market.
Legalise, regulate and tax.
(Some of) their voters will see them as reneging on the promise to not do a deal with Corbyn. They will protest that they didnt do any deal, but I doubt that message would get through properly.
Another election would probably follow a 2nd ref campaign in less than a year, so little time for them to recover.
Starting with the obvious, prohibition doesn't work.
With a black market criminality is rife, deaths occur, police time is swallowed wholesale, addicts with problems are outside 'the system' and have little to no protection.
I would legalise drugs. All of them.
There would have to be controls, limitations on usage and lots of other controls. The supply or use of illegal drugs would be punished,
The vaping market is facing complete collapse in the US due to ever increasing legal action against the manufacturers, with insurers subsequently pulling their product liability cover left right and centre.
In a few years it’s not unlikely that cannabis manufacturers, distributors and retailers will be in the same position - being sued for adverse effects, mental illness etc.
Vaping - a perceived relatively harmless activity - is close to prohibition. Even before that happens, without any liability cover the industry will collapse without the means to defend against suits.
I'm not endorsing cannabis, I think its bad as I think tobacco is. But I want it legalised, regulated and taxed. Sell it like tobacco behind the counter, no adverts permitted, Challenge 25 ID required to buy it. Tax it and put the funds raised into tackling health issues and encouraging people to quit like we do with tobacco.
Or the other risk is that we make legal something which does cause harm - especially to the young - which does not seem to me to be a particularly moral or sensible thing to do. It’s an odd society which makes a fuss about smoking cigarettes (rightly) or eating too much sugar (again rightly) but is ok about smoking cannabis, regardless of whether it causes problems.
So there needs to be more study about the effects of different types of cannabis, the consequences of decriminalisation and how one enforces effectively against those peddling the stuff we don’t want. Rather than a rush to legalisation on the basis of “Well I smoked some at university 20 years ago and it did me no harm”.
A proper Royal Commission looking at all the evidence properly is needed here. Not rushed through and I’ll-thought out policies.
I agree there would be another general election later next year. Labour couldn't govern 80+ short of a majority.
I don't think the LibDems would be damaged by co-operating to get a second referendum, revocation of A50 and moving on to domestic policies. They would benefit from being in second place in many more constituencies for an effective squeeze. They could go from 30 to 60 seats.
OK - That did seem to work (surprisingly). The chart shows the forecast swing away from different parties, with both main parties losing support in their heartlands.
Imagine if sugar was an illegal substance - there'd be criminal gangs producing, distributing and selling it. If cigarettes were not regulated there'd be no control at all of the strength ot toxins in them.
Finally, look what happened in prohibition America - we have a similar situation now with drugs.
There is no reason why we can't logically say that we are legalising the drug to get it out of the hands of drug lords but put out health campaigns emphasising how bad it is and encouraging people to quit - as we have done with tobacco. Is anyone under the misapprehension that because tobacco is legal we endorse it as safe? I don't think so.
Once we acknowledge that prohibition has failed we need to ask ourselves if 'sending a message' cannabis is bad by keeping it illegal but with a law no longer really enforced or taken seriously anyway is worth the price it inflicts on society by putting it in the hands of gangs and drug lords? Is it worth the price of leaving it unregulated and untaxed?
Either we need to go down the Singaporean route of zero tolerance, harsh sentences, properly stamp it out . . . or we need to end prohibition, take it out of the hands of gangs and sell it via legitimate taxed businesses.
We are getting far too much of opinions first with only those facts which support the favoured opinion following on as a very distant second, if at all.
Lets compare with alcohol. I don't know any alcoholics who abuse low strength beer, though that may be what they started drinking. It is high strength drinks, sometimes beer or wine but most especially spirits which are the biggest problem. But we don't criminalise spirits - and we offer education and health services to those who struggle.
I don't see anyone arguing to legalise because it did them no harm, I see arguments to legalise because prohibition has failed miserably and is leading to drug gangs.
If legalised, as with tobacco, those selling it will have to make very clear the possible/likely health problems associated with smoking it. And as with alcohol there will be regulations on strength, labelling etc.
We are not talking about introducing a harmful product to the young; rather the mitigation of what is a public health and law enforcement problem.
The solution will not be ideal, but is highly likely to be an improvement on the status quo.
And there will perhaps be fewer kids who openly tell their teachers their ambition is to be a professional footballer, and if that fails, a drug dealer.
No deal is more likely Jan 31st than it ever was on Mar 31 or Oct 31.
We haven’t achieved the success of largely eliminating tobacco stench from the public realm (which is more toxic in smell but far more localised) only to see it replaced by the sickly-sweet and decadently unpleasant stench of cannabis.
I have no issues with resins, biscuits, tablets or other orally ingested or injected versions.