More Unionist tactical voting as last week in Clackmannanshire (though this time on later preferences), Scottish Conservatives voting LD on second preferences enabled the LDs to take the seat from the SNP
WE will see when it comes to a real election and not just a diddy councillor.
Not due til 2024, Malc. Quite a wait.
Unsurprising that a SCon thinks a general election to the Scottish parliament isn't a real election. You need to have a word with your leader as he seems to think voting for your lot in that election is the only way of stopping indy ref II.
neck and neck through four rounds, SCON transfers tipping the final result:
Only half of Tory vote transferring to LibDems. Weird not to use your second and further preferences. Is that on principle or do people just not understand the system?
About half of Unionist voters can be enough if it cuts both ways - in the 2017 by election, 54% of LibDem transfers went to SCON ay count 6, making them the winner. In this by-election, 42% of SCON votes went to the LibDem at count 5, giving them the last-ditch victory.
Thgis is why Better Together is the tactic that will persist, regardless of the damage it will to to SLab.
Looks like the EU has blinked though. And "controlling" our waters is not incompatible with letting other people fish in them.
#bringonthedeal
It'll be interesting to see what we'll be offering in return.
I think the attention on fishing is something of a red herring. I doubt that it's something the EU is prepared to die in a ditch for, notwithstanding the protests of French and Spanish fishermen. No, they are using it primarily as a negotiating tool and, knowing how politically important it is for the British, to give Boris something he can use to declare victory at home.
Where they won't bend, though, is on governance and the level playing field. These are critical to the integrity of the EU. Unless the British accept these (using the fish as cover), there will be no deal.
But contrary to what 90%+ of the commentary says both the EU and UK are bending all the time.
It's a negotiation.
Indeed, the EU bend on fishing, 0.1% of our economy, we bend on the other 99.9%. This was always the most likely deal politically. The other political "win" for the Tories will be a review/renegotiation in late 2024 which will allow him to frame that election as get Brexit done as well. Those who hope the topic will drift away after these talks should prepare to be disappointed.
I'm afraid that isn't true either. The EU have bended on a role for the ECJ, following their state aid regime, how state aid is applied and having no change to the fishing quotas. They've also moved on things like data sharing and energy.
I've said this about eighteen times - the UK and EU have negotiating advantage in the ratio of 35:65 on average with some issues higher and some lower - it's not 0/100 and nor is it 100/0.
Don't take anyone who says otherwise seriously.
Sure of course my post is exaggerating. But because Brexit is primarily a political exercise in the UK and primarily an economic one for the EU, we are going to get small political wins like fishing, and they get the big economic wins. The long term outcome will not be good for us, but we have little choice but to do the deal now and see what can be improved in the future.
Ha Ha Ha , they get 15% of the fish back , what a victory. Worth the 40 billion we ponied up and the absolute mullering we are going to get going forward.
Notice even Remainers like Vivienne Stern say "Now, even we think that doesn’t look fair, and we’ve been saying to our European counterparts."
Vivienne Stern spent 2 years bleating that No Deal would be hugely damaging -- and now she has her deal, she has discovered she does not like it. Her European friends are not ... errr ... really friends.
It is a hugely exploitative deal.
In my opinion, it is way better for UK science not to accept this deal, but to use the money to support .... err .... science in the UK.
I'm a UK scientist and I've been involved in several FP7 projects - now working in a slightly different field and mostly UK (in fact UK charity, rather than government) funded, so I don't directly have an interest.
The main selling point of FP7, H2020 etc funding compared to domestic funding was that it made it easy to put together a research team with the best people across a wide number of countries. That was why other countries were willing to be net contributors because it gave their academics the chance to be part of projects that they simply didn't have the expertise or capacity to undertake themselves. A nice side effect was that the UK used to get more than it contributed, particularly because other countries' academics wanted UK-based people in their research collaborations because they were often at the top of the field (UK-based, not necessarily UK nationals) so UK-based researchers got onto a disproportionate number of successful bids.
Simply replacing the lost money is not the same - it will keep academics in work, but it will be more complicated to bring together the best expertise into a research project. That would require either being able to use the UK funding to fund collaborators in the EU (in which case we'll become net contributors anyway) or for those other countries to be able to raise their own funds for a project at the same time - effectively two funding bids, one on the UK side and one on the EU side, both of which have to come off (funders also think about risk, so that's not ideal, in itself).
There may be some positives, building up UK centres of excellence - possibly poaching some of the leading researchers to come to the UK - rather than just collaborating with the best team in Germany, France, wherever, but the research return for x amount spent may be lower. Poaching the best to come over here will be expensive, although if there is a local boost in capacity it may have long term benefits.
There are also many other funding streams of course, many international, which won't be directly affected. There is also of course a point at which Horizon Europe becomes too expensive and not worth it. That may be at the proposed level, but it's hard to precisely assess the costs and benefits of being in or out. One thing is sure, it looks like the position will be worse post-transition than before (either we'll be paying more or we won't be involved).
I am a UK Scientist and I have also had plenty of money off the EU in my time.
However, I am extremely critical of EU science policy, which has largely destroyed the scientific institutes of the former Eastern Bloc countries. It has given to those countries that are strong in science (primarily the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands), and ruthlessly taken away from those that had little. One could have imagined a policy in which the scientific strengths of Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary had been protected and strengthened. That was very far from the effect of the EU's science policy.
Horizon 2020 is extremely wasteful, when the proportion of funding that goes to science versus that going to administration of the schemes is considered. Just compare the money spent on administration to national schemes in the UK or the US. (Although, at a personal level, I found that advising the EU on a matter of science policy is always highly profitable -- in the end I stopped doing it as it made me feel unclean).
The strongest Universities in Europe are not in the the EU. They are in the UK & Switzerland. ETH Zurich is the highest ranked University on the European mainland when it comes to the sciences. The UK (and also Switrzerland) are being shafted by these deals. If we agree to them, it will lead to less science done in the Uk, and less scientists employed in the UK.
The deal (which is not worth taking) shows a complete lack of confidence in UK science by those ostensibly in charge. The top of UK science is filled with normally uncritical admirers of the EU & they have been completely shafted by "their friends".
We all need to learn rcs's famous mantra. "Countries do not have friends, they have interests."
This science deal is in the interests of Germany, the Netherlands and France, who will be the principal beneficiaries.
Why are you surprised that the EU is looking after its own interests?
I am not surprised. I expected it.
It is the leaders of Universities UK or the Royal Society or Scientists for the EU who are surprised that -- as they see it -- "their friends" are shafting them.
As you would discover, if you read the original link. Here it is again:
Of course BJ didn't mean Devolution was a disaster, what he was trying to say was that it was an act of foolish, constitutional vandalism that has made all of the UK suffer.
More Unionist tactical voting as last week in Clackmannanshire (though this time on later preferences), Scottish Conservatives voting LD on second preferences enabled the LDs to take the seat from the SNP
WE will see when it comes to a real election and not just a diddy councillor.
Not due til 2024, Malc. Quite a wait.
Unsurprising that a SCon thinks a general election to the Scottish parliament isn't a real election. You need to have a word with your leader as he seems to think voting for your lot in that election is the only way of stopping indy ref II.
A Unionist majority next year led by the Tories will force Sturgeon to concentrate on domestic policy not indyref2, the Tory majority at Westminster will of course ban indyref2 regardless but a Unionist majority means she will not be able to squawk about it
It had less than 30% turnout, South had almost 50% turnout, the loss of a key marginal seat by the SNP to a Unionist Party on a high turnout is far more significant than them holding a safe seat on a low turnout
SCON successful candidate in 2017 Council elections resigned after pleading guilty to possession of indecent imagesvote - in the by-election the SCON vote was reduced, so it's a reversion to the norm, not a sign of recovery.
AS if the Tories would ever propose a fair share, they can keep THEIR debt, unless they pony up the share of the UK assets to go with it, which will never happen.
How did that approach to EU debt work out for the UK?
Of course BJ didn't mean Devolution was a disaster, what he was trying to say was that it was an act of foolish, constitutional vandalism that has made all of the UK suffer.
Looks like the EU has blinked though. And "controlling" our waters is not incompatible with letting other people fish in them.
#bringonthedeal
This will have publicly leaked for a reason. And my guess is anchoring.
The EU will want to settle in the 25-30 range rather than the 35-40 range.
Having said that not all fishing grounds are created equal - it be the UK is more generous to the French in the Channel in exchange for a massive increase in quotas of catches off the east coast of Scotland.
That would accord with the political objectives of both.
My guess is that he has been putting pressure on the Fishing Ministers to compromise to get a deal and needs to ramp that pressure up a bit. But its always good tactics to make it clear how hard you are having to work to get your client to go even this far and to anchor expectations in that way.
The problem for Barnier is that this is the one area where we literally do have all the cards. We can ban all EU fishing in our waters if we want and there is nothing they can do about it. That would be the consequence of no deal.
The question is what price we are willing to accept for not doing that. Of course the balance of power is very much the other way around in other areas, hence the trade offs. I just wish they would stop mucking about and cut a deal.
It's not really one sided. Afaicr the UK exports c.50% of its catch to the EU, hence a more frequent No deal sceptic tone from fishing leaders, even the east coast 'British fish for British boats' lads.
We mostly export the species we don't eat (herring, mackeral, shellfish and crustaceans) and import the ones we do (cod, haddock)
I love herring, mackerel, and pretty much all shellfish other than crab. I really don't understand why we don't eat more of these domestically.
Mackerel is probably my favourite fish but it has to be really, REALLY fresh, preferably freshly line caught in Bayble Bay. The cling filmed supermarket boys in plastic trays in a slick of their own bloody oil don't really appeal.
I remember sailing down the Sound of Sleat - one of us with the line and lure, the next with the gutting knife, and the third popping down into the galley as the fillets fried, and passed to the next person in turn sitting with fork and knife at the ready, and so on round the circle ...
And coming back to the B&B on Unst and seeing a chap come in on his little yole with mackerel aplenty and begging a couple from him to take back for tea ...
A nuclear scientist dubbed 'father of the Iranian bomb' has been injured in an assassination attempt, state-run media reports.
Mohsen Fakhrizadeh-Mahabadi - a professor of physics and former officer in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard - was the target of a 'terrorist operation' near Tehran, sources told state-controlled news agency IRIB.
Of course BJ didn't mean Devolution was a disaster, what he was trying to say was that it was an act of foolish, constitutional vandalism that has made all of the UK suffer.
Seems to me, looking at the ONS figures, that week 22-week 46 of 2020 is quite comparable to 2015, 2016, & 2017 in terms of deaths vs to the previous 5 year average, that being 4% higher. 2018 was 1% higher and 2019 2% higher. I guess the next few weeks will be worse still though, (the last 4 have been 10% 10% 14% and 18% higher)
So we can weigh the cost to the economy of the restrictions against the lives saved pretty easily - it cost whatever it has to keep things relatively normal in the second wave, so far. The argument is whether fewer restrictions would have meant lots more deaths (sceptics say they didnt make much difference) and made the economy better off (fans of restrictions would say people self restricting/deaths would have damaged it just as badly I suppose?)
But more restrictions would probably have meant fewer deaths than normal at more cost to the economy, so I don't think people can say the govt didn't quickly enough or were too lax in the second wave
Time to seal Wales off like the leper colony it is.
Send in 7 Armoured Brigade to patrol the border.
.. and, er, you do know it doesn't have CR2s any more??
We've still got the MLRS trucks haven't we?
Not organic to what is now a mere infantry brigade, I should think.
I was about to write some smart arse comment (unlike me, I know) about the 7th Armoured Brigade being, an armoured and therefore a cavalry brigade but thank the lord of PB I googled it first.
Findings by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal of sexual misconduct arising from inebriated actions by a male boss in relation to a female junior quashed. the #meToo movement are not going to like this.
Notice even Remainers like Vivienne Stern say "Now, even we think that doesn’t look fair, and we’ve been saying to our European counterparts."
Vivienne Stern spent 2 years bleating that No Deal would be hugely damaging -- and now she has her deal, she has discovered she does not like it. Her European friends are not ... errr ... really friends.
It is a hugely exploitative deal.
In my opinion, it is way better for UK science not to accept this deal, but to use the money to support .... err .... science in the UK.
I'm a UK scientist and I've been involved in several FP7 projects - now working in a slightly different field and mostly UK (in fact UK charity, rather than government) funded, so I don't directly have an interest.
The main selling point of FP7, H2020 etc funding compared to domestic funding was that it made it easy to put together a research team with the best people across a wide number of countries. That was why other countries were willing to be net contributors because it gave their academics the chance to be part of projects that they simply didn't have the expertise or capacity to undertake themselves. A nice side effect was that the UK used to get more than it contributed, particularly because other countries' academics wanted UK-based people in their research collaborations because they were often at the top of the field (UK-based, not necessarily UK nationals) so UK-based researchers got onto a disproportionate number of successful bids.
Simply replacing the lost money is not the same - it will keep academics in work, but it will be more complicated to bring together the best expertise into a research project. That would require either being able to use the UK funding to fund collaborators in the EU (in which case we'll become net contributors anyway) or for those other countries to be able to raise their own funds for a project at the same time - effectively two funding bids, one on the UK side and one on the EU side, both of which have to come off (funders also think about risk, so that's not ideal, in itself).
There may be some positives, building up UK centres of excellence - possibly poaching some of the leading researchers to come to the UK - rather than just collaborating with the best team in Germany, France, wherever, but the research return for x amount spent may be lower. Poaching the best to come over here will be expensive, although if there is a local boost in capacity it may have long term benefits.
There are also many other funding streams of course, many international, which won't be directly affected. There is also of course a point at which Horizon Europe becomes too expensive and not worth it. That may be at the proposed level, but it's hard to precisely assess the costs and benefits of being in or out. One thing is sure, it looks like the position will be worse post-transition than before (either we'll be paying more or we won't be involved).
I am a UK Scientist and I have also had plenty of money off the EU in my time.
However, I am extremely critical of EU science policy, which has largely destroyed the scientific institutes of the former Eastern Bloc countries. It has given to those countries that are strong in science (primarily the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands), and ruthlessly taken away from those that had little. One could have imagined a policy in which the scientific strengths of Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary had been protected and strengthened. That was very far from the effect of the EU's science policy.
Horizon 2020 is extremely wasteful, when the proportion of funding that goes to science versus that going to administration of the schemes is considered. Just compare the money spent on administration to national schemes in the UK or the US. (Although, at a personal level, I found that advising the EU on a matter of science policy is always highly profitable -- in the end I stopped doing it as it made me feel unclean).
The strongest Universities in Europe are not in the the EU. They are in the UK & Switzerland. ETH Zurich is the highest ranked University on the European mainland when it comes to the sciences. The UK (and also Switrzerland) are being shafted by these deals. If we agree to them, it will lead to less science done in the Uk, and less scientists employed in the UK.
The deal (which is not worth taking) shows a complete lack of confidence in UK science by those ostensibly in charge. The top of UK science is filled with normally uncritical admirers of the EU & they have been completely shafted by "their friends".
We all need to learn rcs's famous mantra. "Countries do not have friends, they have interests."
This science deal is in the interests of Germany, the Netherlands and France, who will be the principal beneficiaries.
Why are you surprised that the EU is looking after its own interests?
I am not surprised. I expected it.
It is the leaders of Universities UK or the Royal Society or Scientists for the EU who are surprised that -- as they see it -- "their friends" are shafting them.
As you would discover, if you read the original link. Here it is again:
The phrase "their friends" doesn't appear in the article, and it is blindingly obvious that the shafting is being done by our own government in withdrawing from the EU in the first place.
It was evident from the start that Brexit would be a disaster for British science, which is why the overwhelming majority of scientists were remainers. Your attempts to blame those who campaigned to stay in the EU for the inevitable consequences of leaving the EU are, frankly, bizarre.
Of course BJ didn't mean Devolution was a disaster, what he was trying to say was that it was an act of foolish, constitutional vandalism that has made all of the UK suffer.
Of course BJ didn't mean Devolution was a disaster, what he was trying to say was that it was an act of foolish, constitutional vandalism that has made all of the UK suffer.
Yes, as I said yesterday it`s a punishment beating for having to give us Xmas off.
And all of it driven by a model that is one of the worst in the world.
"The Imperial model had larger errors, about 5-fold higher than other models by six weeks. This appears to be largely driven by the aforementioned tendency to overestimate mortality."
Time to seal Wales off like the leper colony it is.
Send in 7 Armoured Brigade to patrol the border.
.. and, er, you do know it doesn't have CR2s any more??
We've still got the MLRS trucks haven't we?
Not organic to what is now a mere infantry brigade, I should think.
I was about to write some smart arse comment (unlike me, I know) about the 7th Armoured Brigade being, an armoured and therefore a cavalry brigade but thank the lord of PB I googled it first.
It is indeed now an infantry brigade.
And I've never seen an MLRS if that helps.
Yes, I had thought the 7th Armd had been cancelled completely myself! I was a bit surprised to find it was infantry now.
MLRS and its Russian-built equivalents are absolutely terrifying. I'm not sure we should even joke about that sort of thing, actually. But the decline in UK forces is quite something. Only 42 vehicles - as many as, say, Egypt it seems. The Americans have about 20-25 as many ...
No just the correct point they allowed the SNP to gain a powerbase in Scotland that was not there before
I don't wholly agree. The swing from Conservative to Labour across Scotland in 1997 was nearly 7.5%. The SNP and the LDs benefitted from the Conservative collapse in terms of seats but not votes. The Conservative collapse put the SNP into second place on 22% of the vote.
Of the 72 seats, Labour won 56, the LDs 10 and the SNP 6.
The Scottish Parliament offered the Conservatives a way back and given their long-held tradition of being either the first or second party in Scottish politics, it might have been reasonable to argue that, while not perhaps winning a majority, there was likely to be a strong Conservative presence in any Scottish Parliament.
Instead, it was the SNP who emerged as the primary anti-Labour voice in Scotland so why was this? Was it because the Scottish Conservatives were still suffering from the perception of being wholly controlled and led by London and had campaigned against the very establishment of the Parliament to which they were now trying to win seats?
25% had voted against the Parliament but 75% had voted for it so what did the Conservatives at that point have to say to them? The SNP filled the anti-Labour gap in Scottish opinion from which the Conservatives had abdicated.
I'd argue the Conservative unwillingness to accept even the most basic of devolution in the late 90s opened the door for the SNP to emerge primarily as a vehicle for anti-Labour opinion but it was able to build on it and become the dominant force in Scottish politics.
Findings by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal of sexual misconduct arising from inebriated actions by a male boss in relation to a female junior quashed. the #meToo movement are not going to like this.
They're not happy with this six month suspension either.
neck and neck through four rounds, SCON transfers tipping the final result:
Only half of Tory vote transferring to LibDems. Weird not to use your second and further preferences. Is that on principle or do people just not understand the system?
About half of Unionist voters can be enough if it cuts both ways - in the 2017 by election, 54% of LibDem transfers went to SCON ay count 6, making them the winner. In this by-election, 42% of SCON votes went to the LibDem at count 5, giving them the last-ditch victory.
Thgis is why Better Together is the tactic that will persist, regardless of the damage it will to to SLab.
neck and neck through four rounds, SCON transfers tipping the final result:
Only half of Tory vote transferring to LibDems. Weird not to use your second and further preferences. Is that on principle or do people just not understand the system?
About half of Unionist voters can be enough if it cuts both ways - in the 2017 by election, 54% of LibDem transfers went to SCON ay count 6, making them the winner. In this by-election, 42% of SCON votes went to the LibDem at count 5, giving them the last-ditch victory.
Thgis is why Better Together is the tactic that will persist, regardless of the damage it will to to SLab.
Yes, as I said yesterday it`s a punishment beating for having to give us Xmas off.
And all of it driven by a model that is one of the worst in the world.
"The Imperial model had larger errors, about 5-fold higher than other models by six weeks. This appears to be largely driven by the aforementioned tendency to overestimate mortality."
Just glance, I don't believe they included the University of Washington one...now when it comes to being WROOOOOOONNNGGGGGG...and that is the one that was (initially) relied on by the US government.
No just the correct point they allowed the SNP to gain a powerbase in Scotland that was not there before
I don't wholly agree. The swing from Conservative to Labour across Scotland in 1997 was nearly 7.5%. The SNP and the LDs benefitted from the Conservative collapse in terms of seats but not votes. The Conservative collapse put the SNP into second place on 22% of the vote.
Of the 72 seats, Labour won 56, the LDs 10 and the SNP 6.
The Scottish Parliament offered the Conservatives a way back and given their long-held tradition of being either the first or second party in Scottish politics, it might have been reasonable to argue that, while not perhaps winning a majority, there was likely to be a strong Conservative presence in any Scottish Parliament.
Instead, it was the SNP who emerged as the primary anti-Labour voice in Scotland so why was this? Was it because the Scottish Conservatives were still suffering from the perception of being wholly controlled and led by London and had campaigned against the very establishment of the Parliament to which they were now trying to win seats?
25% had voted against the Parliament but 75% had voted for it so what did the Conservatives at that point have to say to them? The SNP filled the anti-Labour gap in Scottish opinion from which the Conservatives had abdicated.
I'd argue the Conservative unwillingness to accept even the most basic of devolution in the late 90s opened the door for the SNP to emerge primarily as a vehicle for anti-Labour opinion but it was able to build on it and become the dominant force in Scottish politics.
It's quite ironic that the Tories rely on a Labour-LD gerrymandered PR system to have any real presence in Scotland above the scaffies and schools level of government (and conversely that the SNP have benefited hugely from FPTP at Westminster despite being against it as a matter of principle). In particular, the list system has enabled some very unpopular cainddiates to cling on in Holyrood year in year out at a level of support which would see them erased in Westminster.
Tch! The state of Geography teaching across the pond - or I better say Atlantic Ocean in case any yanks are listening in!
I suppose you could argue that Bozza is England PM for the point of this story given that he has no jurisdiction over the Celtic nations in terms of lockdown?
(But I doubt that has crossed the Post's mind TBH)
No just the correct point they allowed the SNP to gain a powerbase in Scotland that was not there before
I don't wholly agree. The swing from Conservative to Labour across Scotland in 1997 was nearly 7.5%. The SNP and the LDs benefitted from the Conservative collapse in terms of seats but not votes. The Conservative collapse put the SNP into second place on 22% of the vote.
Of the 72 seats, Labour won 56, the LDs 10 and the SNP 6.
The Scottish Parliament offered the Conservatives a way back and given their long-held tradition of being either the first or second party in Scottish politics, it might have been reasonable to argue that, while not perhaps winning a majority, there was likely to be a strong Conservative presence in any Scottish Parliament.
Instead, it was the SNP who emerged as the primary anti-Labour voice in Scotland so why was this? Was it because the Scottish Conservatives were still suffering from the perception of being wholly controlled and led by London and had campaigned against the very establishment of the Parliament to which they were now trying to win seats?
25% had voted against the Parliament but 75% had voted for it so what did the Conservatives at that point have to say to them? The SNP filled the anti-Labour gap in Scottish opinion from which the Conservatives had abdicated.
I'd argue the Conservative unwillingness to accept even the most basic of devolution in the late 90s opened the door for the SNP to emerge primarily as a vehicle for anti-Labour opinion but it was able to build on it and become the dominant force in Scottish politics.
It's quite ironic that the Tories rely on a Labour-LD gerrymandered PR system to have any real presence in Scotland above the scaffies and schools level of government (and conversely that the SNP have benefited hugely from FPTP at Westminster despite being against it as a matter of principle). In particular, the list system has enabled some very unpopular cainddiates to cling on in Holyrood year in year out at a level of support which would see them erased in Westminster.
In 2016 the Tories won 7 constituency MSPs, the LDs 4 and Labour only 3
No just the correct point they allowed the SNP to gain a powerbase in Scotland that was not there before
I don't wholly agree. The swing from Conservative to Labour across Scotland in 1997 was nearly 7.5%. The SNP and the LDs benefitted from the Conservative collapse in terms of seats but not votes. The Conservative collapse put the SNP into second place on 22% of the vote.
Of the 72 seats, Labour won 56, the LDs 10 and the SNP 6.
The Scottish Parliament offered the Conservatives a way back and given their long-held tradition of being either the first or second party in Scottish politics, it might have been reasonable to argue that, while not perhaps winning a majority, there was likely to be a strong Conservative presence in any Scottish Parliament.
Instead, it was the SNP who emerged as the primary anti-Labour voice in Scotland so why was this? Was it because the Scottish Conservatives were still suffering from the perception of being wholly controlled and led by London and had campaigned against the very establishment of the Parliament to which they were now trying to win seats?
25% had voted against the Parliament but 75% had voted for it so what did the Conservatives at that point have to say to them? The SNP filled the anti-Labour gap in Scottish opinion from which the Conservatives had abdicated.
I'd argue the Conservative unwillingness to accept even the most basic of devolution in the late 90s opened the door for the SNP to emerge primarily as a vehicle for anti-Labour opinion but it was able to build on it and become the dominant force in Scottish politics.
It's quite ironic that the Tories rely on a Labour-LD gerrymandered PR system to have any real presence in Scotland above the scaffies and schools level of government (and conversely that the SNP have benefited hugely from FPTP at Westminster despite being against it as a matter of principle). In particular, the list system has enabled some very unpopular cainddiates to cling on in Holyrood year in year out at a level of support which would see them erased in Westminster.
In 2016 the Tories won 7 constituency MSPs, the LDs 4 and Labour only 3
Boris Johnson faces a Tory cronyism revolt after trying to secure a £90,000-a-year party post for a 'political novice' who is one of fiancée Carrie Symonds's best friends.
The Prime Minister wants to appoint former TalkRadio journalist Ross Kempsell, 28, as Conservative director of research despite angry protests from senior Tories, the Daily Mail has been told.
It would mean ousting current research director Iain Carter, who was Miss Symonds's boss when she was forced to resign as the party's communications director in 2018 after being accused of abusing her expenses.
Notice even Remainers like Vivienne Stern say "Now, even we think that doesn’t look fair, and we’ve been saying to our European counterparts."
Vivienne Stern spent 2 years bleating that No Deal would be hugely damaging -- and now she has her deal, she has discovered she does not like it. Her European friends are not ... errr ... really friends.
It is a hugely exploitative deal.
In my opinion, it is way better for UK science not to accept this deal, but to use the money to support .... err .... science in the UK.
I'm a UK scientist and I've been involved in several FP7 projects - now working in a slightly different field and mostly UK (in fact UK charity, rather than government) funded, so I don't directly have an interest.
The main selling point of FP7, H2020 etc funding compared to domestic funding was that it made it easy to put together a research team with the best people across a wide number of countries. That was why other countries were willing to be net contributors because it gave their academics the chance to be part of projects that they simply didn't have the expertise or capacity to undertake themselves. A nice side effect was that the UK used to get more than it contributed, particularly because other countries' academics wanted UK-based people in their research collaborations because they were often at the top of the field (UK-based, not necessarily UK nationals) so UK-based researchers got onto a disproportionate number of successful bids.
Simply replacing the lost money is not the same - it will keep academics in work, but it will be more complicated to bring together the best expertise into a research project. That would require either being able to use the UK funding to fund collaborators in the EU (in which case we'll become net contributors anyway) or for those other countries to be able to raise their own funds for a project at the same time - effectively two funding bids, one on the UK side and one on the EU side, both of which have to come off (funders also think about risk, so that's not ideal, in itself).
There may be some positives, building up UK centres of excellence - possibly poaching some of the leading researchers to come to the UK - rather than just collaborating with the best team in Germany, France, wherever, but the research return for x amount spent may be lower. Poaching the best to come over here will be expensive, although if there is a local boost in capacity it may have long term benefits.
There are also many other funding streams of course, many international, which won't be directly affected. There is also of course a point at which Horizon Europe becomes too expensive and not worth it. That may be at the proposed level, but it's hard to precisely assess the costs and benefits of being in or out. One thing is sure, it looks like the position will be worse post-transition than before (either we'll be paying more or we won't be involved).
I am a UK Scientist and I have also had plenty of money off the EU in my time.
However, I am extremely critical of EU science policy, which has largely destroyed the scientific institutes of the former Eastern Bloc countries. It has given to those countries that are strong in science (primarily the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands), and ruthlessly taken away from those that had little. One could have imagined a policy in which the scientific strengths of Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary had been protected and strengthened. That was very far from the effect of the EU's science policy.
Horizon 2020 is extremely wasteful, when the proportion of funding that goes to science versus that going to administration of the schemes is considered. Just compare the money spent on administration to national schemes in the UK or the US. (Although, at a personal level, I found that advising the EU on a matter of science policy is always highly profitable -- in the end I stopped doing it as it made me feel unclean).
The strongest Universities in Europe are not in the the EU. They are in the UK & Switzerland. ETH Zurich is the highest ranked University on the European mainland when it comes to the sciences. The UK (and also Switrzerland) are being shafted by these deals. If we agree to them, it will lead to less science done in the Uk, and less scientists employed in the UK.
The deal (which is not worth taking) shows a complete lack of confidence in UK science by those ostensibly in charge. The top of UK science is filled with normally uncritical admirers of the EU & they have been completely shafted by "their friends".
We all need to learn rcs's famous mantra. "Countries do not have friends, they have interests."
This science deal is in the interests of Germany, the Netherlands and France, who will be the principal beneficiaries.
Why are you surprised that the EU is looking after its own interests?
I am not surprised. I expected it.
It is the leaders of Universities UK or the Royal Society or Scientists for the EU who are surprised that -- as they see it -- "their friends" are shafting them.
As you would discover, if you read the original link. Here it is again:
The phrase "their friends" doesn't appear in the article, and it is blindingly obvious that the shafting is being done by our own government in withdrawing from the EU in the first place.
It was evident from the start that Brexit would be a disaster for British science, which is why the overwhelming majority of scientists were remainers. Your attempts to blame those who campaigned to stay in the EU for the inevitable consequences of leaving the EU are, frankly, bizarre.
I have merely said that if a science deal transfers a net 3 billion pounds of the UK science budget to Europe, it is a bad deal for UK science.
That is a net loss of 3 billion pounds to UK science. That is many, many UK science jobs lost.
Better than signing that deal is to organise our own schemes for collaboration with Europe (or Asia or the US). It could be done easily, and administered cheaply (much more cheaply than the EU's scheme).
As a scientist, I try not to use blustering phrases like ... "blindingly obvious" ... or "evident from the start" ... without providing some proof.
You have to prove "the obvious" and "the evident" time and time again. That is the very essence of this thing that we call science.
No just the correct point they allowed the SNP to gain a powerbase in Scotland that was not there before
I don't wholly agree. The swing from Conservative to Labour across Scotland in 1997 was nearly 7.5%. The SNP and the LDs benefitted from the Conservative collapse in terms of seats but not votes. The Conservative collapse put the SNP into second place on 22% of the vote.
Of the 72 seats, Labour won 56, the LDs 10 and the SNP 6.
The Scottish Parliament offered the Conservatives a way back and given their long-held tradition of being either the first or second party in Scottish politics, it might have been reasonable to argue that, while not perhaps winning a majority, there was likely to be a strong Conservative presence in any Scottish Parliament.
Instead, it was the SNP who emerged as the primary anti-Labour voice in Scotland so why was this? Was it because the Scottish Conservatives were still suffering from the perception of being wholly controlled and led by London and had campaigned against the very establishment of the Parliament to which they were now trying to win seats?
25% had voted against the Parliament but 75% had voted for it so what did the Conservatives at that point have to say to them? The SNP filled the anti-Labour gap in Scottish opinion from which the Conservatives had abdicated.
I'd argue the Conservative unwillingness to accept even the most basic of devolution in the late 90s opened the door for the SNP to emerge primarily as a vehicle for anti-Labour opinion but it was able to build on it and become the dominant force in Scottish politics.
So the SNP were not even second on seats in 1997 at Westminster with Labour first and the LDs second, by 1999 the SNP were second in terms of MSPs to Scottish Labour, so thanks for confirming I was right
Of course BJ didn't mean Devolution was a disaster, what he was trying to say was that it was an act of foolish, constitutional vandalism that has made all of the UK suffer.
neck and neck through four rounds, SCON transfers tipping the final result:
Only half of Tory vote transferring to LibDems. Weird not to use your second and further preferences. Is that on principle or do people just not understand the system?
About half of Unionist voters can be enough if it cuts both ways - in the 2017 by election, 54% of LibDem transfers went to SCON ay count 6, making them the winner. In this by-election, 42% of SCON votes went to the LibDem at count 5, giving them the last-ditch victory.
Thgis is why Better Together is the tactic that will persist, regardless of the damage it will to to SLab.
90 or so SCon transfers to SNP!
Or third preferences?
Interesting thought: Green>Tory>SNP or SLab>Tory>SNP.
Something like the Battle of Tehran with massive tank battle with the US 3rd Infantry and 1st Armored (sic) Divisions versus the IRGC.
A massive airborne drop and air assault in Qom.
That sort of stuff.
Objectively the most succesful part of the Trump presidency is the path to normalisation of relations between Israel and sunni muslim countries in the ME.
A common fear, hatred & loathing of Iran must have been a big part of that diplomacy. Whatever it was Jared Kushner clearly has decent diplomatic skills.
Some interesting links and rather tenuous links in there, his wife owns less than 1% of a company that is involved in selling stuff on Amazon in India, therefore a conflict of interest for any possible decision Sunak could make over Amazon in the UK.
Findings by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal of sexual misconduct arising from inebriated actions by a male boss in relation to a female junior quashed. the #meToo movement are not going to like this.
They're not happy with this six month suspension either.
Yes, that is rather more academic. But the SDT had costs of over £350K in the Beckworth case of which they had been awarded £200k and have now lost both that and the costs of a High Court case. I suspect there will be very limited enthusiasm for going down this road again.
Of course BJ didn't mean Devolution was a disaster, what he was trying to say was that it was an act of foolish, constitutional vandalism that has made all of the UK suffer.
Notice even Remainers like Vivienne Stern say "Now, even we think that doesn’t look fair, and we’ve been saying to our European counterparts."
Vivienne Stern spent 2 years bleating that No Deal would be hugely damaging -- and now she has her deal, she has discovered she does not like it. Her European friends are not ... errr ... really friends.
It is a hugely exploitative deal.
In my opinion, it is way better for UK science not to accept this deal, but to use the money to support .... err .... science in the UK.
I'm a UK scientist and I've been involved in several FP7 projects - now working in a slightly different field and mostly UK (in fact UK charity, rather than government) funded, so I don't directly have an interest.
The main selling point of FP7, H2020 etc funding compared to domestic funding was that it made it easy to put together a research team with the best people across a wide number of countries. That was why other countries were willing to be net contributors because it gave their academics the chance to be part of projects that they simply didn't have the expertise or capacity to undertake themselves. A nice side effect was that the UK used to get more than it contributed, particularly because other countries' academics wanted UK-based people in their research collaborations because they were often at the top of the field (UK-based, not necessarily UK nationals) so UK-based researchers got onto a disproportionate number of successful bids.
Simply replacing the lost money is not the same - it will keep academics in work, but it will be more complicated to bring together the best expertise into a research project. That would require either being able to use the UK funding to fund collaborators in the EU (in which case we'll become net contributors anyway) or for those other countries to be able to raise their own funds for a project at the same time - effectively two funding bids, one on the UK side and one on the EU side, both of which have to come off (funders also think about risk, so that's not ideal, in itself).
There may be some positives, building up UK centres of excellence - possibly poaching some of the leading researchers to come to the UK - rather than just collaborating with the best team in Germany, France, wherever, but the research return for x amount spent may be lower. Poaching the best to come over here will be expensive, although if there is a local boost in capacity it may have long term benefits.
There are also many other funding streams of course, many international, which won't be directly affected. There is also of course a point at which Horizon Europe becomes too expensive and not worth it. That may be at the proposed level, but it's hard to precisely assess the costs and benefits of being in or out. One thing is sure, it looks like the position will be worse post-transition than before (either we'll be paying more or we won't be involved).
I am a UK Scientist and I have also had plenty of money off the EU in my time.
However, I am extremely critical of EU science policy, which has largely destroyed the scientific institutes of the former Eastern Bloc countries. It has given to those countries that are strong in science (primarily the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands), and ruthlessly taken away from those that had little. One could have imagined a policy in which the scientific strengths of Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary had been protected and strengthened. That was very far from the effect of the EU's science policy.
Horizon 2020 is extremely wasteful, when the proportion of funding that goes to science versus that going to administration of the schemes is considered. Just compare the money spent on administration to national schemes in the UK or the US. (Although, at a personal level, I found that advising the EU on a matter of science policy is always highly profitable -- in the end I stopped doing it as it made me feel unclean).
The strongest Universities in Europe are not in the the EU. They are in the UK & Switzerland. ETH Zurich is the highest ranked University on the European mainland when it comes to the sciences. The UK (and also Switrzerland) are being shafted by these deals. If we agree to them, it will lead to less science done in the Uk, and less scientists employed in the UK.
The deal (which is not worth taking) shows a complete lack of confidence in UK science by those ostensibly in charge. The top of UK science is filled with normally uncritical admirers of the EU & they have been completely shafted by "their friends".
We all need to learn rcs's famous mantra. "Countries do not have friends, they have interests."
This science deal is in the interests of Germany, the Netherlands and France, who will be the principal beneficiaries.
Why are you surprised that the EU is looking after its own interests?
I am not surprised. I expected it.
It is the leaders of Universities UK or the Royal Society or Scientists for the EU who are surprised that -- as they see it -- "their friends" are shafting them.
As you would discover, if you read the original link. Here it is again:
The phrase "their friends" doesn't appear in the article, and it is blindingly obvious that the shafting is being done by our own government in withdrawing from the EU in the first place.
It was evident from the start that Brexit would be a disaster for British science, which is why the overwhelming majority of scientists were remainers. Your attempts to blame those who campaigned to stay in the EU for the inevitable consequences of leaving the EU are, frankly, bizarre.
I have merely said that if a science deal transfers a net 3 billion pounds of the UK science budget to Europe, it is a bad deal for UK science.
That is a net loss of 3 billion pounds to UK science. That is many, many UK science jobs lost.
Better than signing that deal is to organise our own schemes for collaboration with Europe (or Asia or the US). It could be done easily, and administered cheaply (much more cheaply than the EU's scheme).
As a scientist, I try not to use blustering phrases like ... "blindingly obvious" ... or "evident from the start" ... without providing some proof.
You have to prove "the obvious" and "the evident" time and time again. That is the very essence of this thing that we call science.
Depends. If the value of networking and easy collaboration with the Euroscience ecosystem is more than 3 billion pounds, then it's an expensive deal, but not a bad one. And I'm not in a position to judge whether that's the case or not. My guess is that it's right at the top of the range of plausible valuations, but not off the top of the scale.
But it parallels what we've seen with the trade negotiations. The EU values access to their market highly, and are expecting the UK to pay full whack. What did we expect them to do?
Notice even Remainers like Vivienne Stern say "Now, even we think that doesn’t look fair, and we’ve been saying to our European counterparts."
Vivienne Stern spent 2 years bleating that No Deal would be hugely damaging -- and now she has her deal, she has discovered she does not like it. Her European friends are not ... errr ... really friends.
It is a hugely exploitative deal.
In my opinion, it is way better for UK science not to accept this deal, but to use the money to support .... err .... science in the UK.
I'm a UK scientist and I've been involved in several FP7 projects - now working in a slightly different field and mostly UK (in fact UK charity, rather than government) funded, so I don't directly have an interest.
The main selling point of FP7, H2020 etc funding compared to domestic funding was that it made it easy to put together a research team with the best people across a wide number of countries. That was why other countries were willing to be net contributors because it gave their academics the chance to be part of projects that they simply didn't have the expertise or capacity to undertake themselves. A nice side effect was that the UK used to get more than it contributed, particularly because other countries' academics wanted UK-based people in their research collaborations because they were often at the top of the field (UK-based, not necessarily UK nationals) so UK-based researchers got onto a disproportionate number of successful bids.
Simply replacing the lost money is not the same - it will keep academics in work, but it will be more complicated to bring together the best expertise into a research project. That would require either being able to use the UK funding to fund collaborators in the EU (in which case we'll become net contributors anyway) or for those other countries to be able to raise their own funds for a project at the same time - effectively two funding bids, one on the UK side and one on the EU side, both of which have to come off (funders also think about risk, so that's not ideal, in itself).
There may be some positives, building up UK centres of excellence - possibly poaching some of the leading researchers to come to the UK - rather than just collaborating with the best team in Germany, France, wherever, but the research return for x amount spent may be lower. Poaching the best to come over here will be expensive, although if there is a local boost in capacity it may have long term benefits.
There are also many other funding streams of course, many international, which won't be directly affected. There is also of course a point at which Horizon Europe becomes too expensive and not worth it. That may be at the proposed level, but it's hard to precisely assess the costs and benefits of being in or out. One thing is sure, it looks like the position will be worse post-transition than before (either we'll be paying more or we won't be involved).
I am a UK Scientist and I have also had plenty of money off the EU in my time.
However, I am extremely critical of EU science policy, which has largely destroyed the scientific institutes of the former Eastern Bloc countries. It has given to those countries that are strong in science (primarily the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands), and ruthlessly taken away from those that had little. One could have imagined a policy in which the scientific strengths of Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary had been protected and strengthened. That was very far from the effect of the EU's science policy.
Horizon 2020 is extremely wasteful, when the proportion of funding that goes to science versus that going to administration of the schemes is considered. Just compare the money spent on administration to national schemes in the UK or the US. (Although, at a personal level, I found that advising the EU on a matter of science policy is always highly profitable -- in the end I stopped doing it as it made me feel unclean).
The strongest Universities in Europe are not in the the EU. They are in the UK & Switzerland. ETH Zurich is the highest ranked University on the European mainland when it comes to the sciences. The UK (and also Switrzerland) are being shafted by these deals. If we agree to them, it will lead to less science done in the Uk, and less scientists employed in the UK.
The deal (which is not worth taking) shows a complete lack of confidence in UK science by those ostensibly in charge. The top of UK science is filled with normally uncritical admirers of the EU & they have been completely shafted by "their friends".
We all need to learn rcs's famous mantra. "Countries do not have friends, they have interests."
This science deal is in the interests of Germany, the Netherlands and France, who will be the principal beneficiaries.
Why are you surprised that the EU is looking after its own interests?
I am not surprised. I expected it.
It is the leaders of Universities UK or the Royal Society or Scientists for the EU who are surprised that -- as they see it -- "their friends" are shafting them.
As you would discover, if you read the original link. Here it is again:
The phrase "their friends" doesn't appear in the article, and it is blindingly obvious that the shafting is being done by our own government in withdrawing from the EU in the first place.
It was evident from the start that Brexit would be a disaster for British science, which is why the overwhelming majority of scientists were remainers. Your attempts to blame those who campaigned to stay in the EU for the inevitable consequences of leaving the EU are, frankly, bizarre.
I have merely said that if a science deal transfers a net 3 billion pounds of the UK science budget to Europe, it is a bad deal for UK science.
That is a net loss of 3 billion pounds to UK science. That is many, many UK science jobs lost.
Better than signing that deal is to organise our own schemes for collaboration with Europe (or Asia or the US). It could be done easily, and administered cheaply (much more cheaply than the EU's scheme).
As a scientist, I try not to use blustering phrases like ... "blindingly obvious" ... or "evident from the start" ... without providing some proof.
You have to prove "the obvious" and "the evident" time and time again. That is the very essence of this thing that we call science.
If you were really a scientist, you'd know that there is no such thing as proof in science. You sound more like a bullshitter to me.
The next stage in the progression will be people being lectured to by staff to finish their meals in a set period of time.
I doubt we'll see that in the guidance. This is just the same as before, has to be with a substantial meal.
Won't stop loads of places / people being dickheads and trying to bend the rules...rather than just accept that we need to walk a fine balance between not totally killing restaurants and pubs while trying to put a lid on massive spread.
Of course BJ didn't mean Devolution was a disaster, what he was trying to say was that it was an act of foolish, constitutional vandalism that has made all of the UK suffer.
In summary: the proportion of us with cross-reactive T-cells is even higher than previously imagined - near universal. But, and here's the kicker: they don't do much good in actually fighting Covid. Which, I suppose, is an unavoidable conclusion from that particular finding, as it would imply that most people who came down with covid had actually had these cross-reactive T-cells already and they hadn't helped.
Although CCCoV cross-reactive memory cells were present in unexposed donors, they did not significantly contribute to the immune reaction against SARS-CoV-2.
... and even...
Although we do not know the pre-infection status, patients with severe COVID-19 also displayed an enlarged CD4+ memory compartment compared to patients with mild disease. At least in unexposed individuals this parameter correlated with pre-existing memory and is also associated with higher age, as discussed previously. Thus, we hypothesize that pre-existing memory may contribute to the reduced avidity and higher diversity of TCRs in severe COVID-19, and it is tempting to speculate that this may contribute to the increased risk for severe COVID-19 in the elderly population.
(ie that it's possible the cross-reactive T-cell memory might end up reducing the response of our immune system, and too much such memory, such as that from years and years of exposure to the common cold coronaviruses and their various mutations over the years, might help explain why older patients tend to have such a higher rate of severe and fatal outcomes.
Notice even Remainers like Vivienne Stern say "Now, even we think that doesn’t look fair, and we’ve been saying to our European counterparts."
Vivienne Stern spent 2 years bleating that No Deal would be hugely damaging -- and now she has her deal, she has discovered she does not like it. Her European friends are not ... errr ... really friends.
It is a hugely exploitative deal.
In my opinion, it is way better for UK science not to accept this deal, but to use the money to support .... err .... science in the UK.
I'm a UK scientist and I've been involved in several FP7 projects - now working in a slightly different field and mostly UK (in fact UK charity, rather than government) funded, so I don't directly have an interest.
The main selling point of FP7, H2020 etc funding compared to domestic funding was that it made it easy to put together a research team with the best people across a wide number of countries. That was why other countries were willing to be net contributors because it gave their academics the chance to be part of projects that they simply didn't have the expertise or capacity to undertake themselves. A nice side effect was that the UK used to get more than it contributed, particularly because other countries' academics wanted UK-based people in their research collaborations because they were often at the top of the field (UK-based, not necessarily UK nationals) so UK-based researchers got onto a disproportionate number of successful bids.
Simply replacing the lost money is not the same - it will keep academics in work, but it will be more complicated to bring together the best expertise into a research project. That would require either being able to use the UK funding to fund collaborators in the EU (in which case we'll become net contributors anyway) or for those other countries to be able to raise their own funds for a project at the same time - effectively two funding bids, one on the UK side and one on the EU side, both of which have to come off (funders also think about risk, so that's not ideal, in itself).
There may be some positives, building up UK centres of excellence - possibly poaching some of the leading researchers to come to the UK - rather than just collaborating with the best team in Germany, France, wherever, but the research return for x amount spent may be lower. Poaching the best to come over here will be expensive, although if there is a local boost in capacity it may have long term benefits.
There are also many other funding streams of course, many international, which won't be directly affected. There is also of course a point at which Horizon Europe becomes too expensive and not worth it. That may be at the proposed level, but it's hard to precisely assess the costs and benefits of being in or out. One thing is sure, it looks like the position will be worse post-transition than before (either we'll be paying more or we won't be involved).
I am a UK Scientist and I have also had plenty of money off the EU in my time.
However, I am extremely critical of EU science policy, which has largely destroyed the scientific institutes of the former Eastern Bloc countries. It has given to those countries that are strong in science (primarily the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands), and ruthlessly taken away from those that had little. One could have imagined a policy in which the scientific strengths of Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary had been protected and strengthened. That was very far from the effect of the EU's science policy.
Horizon 2020 is extremely wasteful, when the proportion of funding that goes to science versus that going to administration of the schemes is considered. Just compare the money spent on administration to national schemes in the UK or the US. (Although, at a personal level, I found that advising the EU on a matter of science policy is always highly profitable -- in the end I stopped doing it as it made me feel unclean).
The strongest Universities in Europe are not in the the EU. They are in the UK & Switzerland. ETH Zurich is the highest ranked University on the European mainland when it comes to the sciences. The UK (and also Switrzerland) are being shafted by these deals. If we agree to them, it will lead to less science done in the Uk, and less scientists employed in the UK.
The deal (which is not worth taking) shows a complete lack of confidence in UK science by those ostensibly in charge. The top of UK science is filled with normally uncritical admirers of the EU & they have been completely shafted by "their friends".
We all need to learn rcs's famous mantra. "Countries do not have friends, they have interests."
This science deal is in the interests of Germany, the Netherlands and France, who will be the principal beneficiaries.
Why are you surprised that the EU is looking after its own interests?
I am not surprised. I expected it.
It is the leaders of Universities UK or the Royal Society or Scientists for the EU who are surprised that -- as they see it -- "their friends" are shafting them.
As you would discover, if you read the original link. Here it is again:
The phrase "their friends" doesn't appear in the article, and it is blindingly obvious that the shafting is being done by our own government in withdrawing from the EU in the first place.
It was evident from the start that Brexit would be a disaster for British science, which is why the overwhelming majority of scientists were remainers. Your attempts to blame those who campaigned to stay in the EU for the inevitable consequences of leaving the EU are, frankly, bizarre.
I have merely said that if a science deal transfers a net 3 billion pounds of the UK science budget to Europe, it is a bad deal for UK science.
That is a net loss of 3 billion pounds to UK science. That is many, many UK science jobs lost.
Better than signing that deal is to organise our own schemes for collaboration with Europe (or Asia or the US). It could be done easily, and administered cheaply (much more cheaply than the EU's scheme).
As a scientist, I try not to use blustering phrases like ... "blindingly obvious" ... or "evident from the start" ... without providing some proof.
You have to prove "the obvious" and "the evident" time and time again. That is the very essence of this thing that we call science.
Depends. If the value of networking and easy collaboration with the Euroscience ecosystem is more than 3 billion pounds, then it's an expensive deal, but not a bad one. And I'm not in a position to judge whether that's the case or not. My guess is that it's right at the top of the range of plausible valuations, but not off the top of the scale.
But it parallels what we've seen with the trade negotiations. The EU values access to their market highly, and are expecting the UK to pay full whack. What did we expect them to do?
I would say say that there is some value to networking with European Union countries, but we could organise some of the networks ourselves.
There are many, many premier science countries outwith the EU (Japan, China, South Korea, Australia, the US, Canada, Switzerland).
We are where we are -- the job of UK science leaders is not to mourn over the lost referendum, but to plan the future trajectory for the greatest good of UK science..
If the EU set the cost as high as 3 billion, then we are better off looking to build connections with the wealthiest global science communities -- the US & increasingly China.
Of course BJ didn't mean Devolution was a disaster, what he was trying to say was that it was an act of foolish, constitutional vandalism that has made all of the UK suffer.
The next stage in the progression will be people being lectured to by staff to finish their meals in a set period of time.
I doubt we'll see that in the guidance. This is just the same as before, has to be with a substantial meal.
Won't stop loads of places / people being dickheads and trying to bend the rules...rather than just accept that we need to walk a fine balance between not totally killing restaurants and pubs while trying to put a lid on massive spread.
No just the correct point they allowed the SNP to gain a powerbase in Scotland that was not there before
I'm not sure my previous confirmed you were right - I don't think it did.
The SNP polled 22% in the 1997 Westminster election, overtaking the Conservatives who fell back to 17.5%. The SNP won just 6 seats for its vote, the Conservatives none at all while the LDs got 10 seats with just 13% of the vote - the vagaries of FPTP at work there.
Had the Scottish Parliament been chosen strictly by FPTP constituencies, the 73 constituencies went 53 Labour, 12 LD, 7 SNP and one other (Dennis Canavan in Falkirk West). The SNP vote rose from 22% to 28.7% while the Conservatives won no constituencies on 15.6%.
However, as we both know, the Scottish Parliament contained 56 additional MSPs chosen by a List system based on PR and that enabled the SNP's 28.7% vote to win an additional 28 MSPs making them the opposition. It's also worth pointing out the Conservatives won all their MSPs via the List in that election.
The price therefore of short-circuiting the SNP's "power base", and I think we can call nearly 29% a reasonable base of support, would have been to exclude the Conservatives completely from the first Parliament. PR allowed the Conservatives to achieve a representation which FPTP would have prevented.
FPTP would have provided Labour with a solid majority - how long that would have lasted I don't know but it's possible as we have seen at some point the SNP would have managed to overhaul the Labour strength.
The point is BOTH the Conservatives and the SNP benefitted from a system of electing MSPs which, had FPTP been followed, would have seen the former completely excluded and the latter reduced to a minor role. To argue there was no SNP power base is absurd - FPTP masked it and kept it out of Holyrood but the PR List system released the potential of the vote to provide representation as it did for the Scottish Conservatives.
Opinion polling on the US civil rights movement in the 1960s was very similar. Most respondents thought that demonstrations, boycotts and sit-ins did more harm than good and that they were organised by communists. The judgement of history has been somewhat different. I support BLM.
Maybe Martin Luther King was right, that we should look at people based on the content of their character rather than the colour of their skin.
Do you think Martin Luther King would be (i) out protesting against racist policing or (ii) arguing against such protests on the grounds they are inflammatory?
2020 started off Shi'ite and it is now going to end Shi'ite.
Will Paddy Power price it up ?
CIA, Mossad, Saudi, ISIS, Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, Russia, Turkey all in the running here.
Side bet - False flag operation for any of the above
I was amused at the BBC article not making any explicit comment as to who may had done it, but ending with an apparent non-sequitur on Netanyahu having mentioned the scientist by name in a 2018 speech about Iran's nuclear program.
No just the correct point they allowed the SNP to gain a powerbase in Scotland that was not there before
I'm not sure my previous confirmed you were right - I don't think it did.
The SNP polled 22% in the 1997 Westminster election, overtaking the Conservatives who fell back to 17.5%. The SNP won just 6 seats for its vote, the Conservatives none at all while the LDs got 10 seats with just 13% of the vote - the vagaries of FPTP at work there.
Had the Scottish Parliament been chosen strictly by FPTP constituencies, the 73 constituencies went 53 Labour, 12 LD, 7 SNP and one other (Dennis Canavan in Falkirk West). The SNP vote rose from 22% to 28.7% while the Conservatives won no constituencies on 15.6%.
However, as we both know, the Scottish Parliament contained 56 additional MSPs chosen by a List system based on PR and that enabled the SNP's 28.7% vote to win an additional 28 MSPs making them the opposition. It's also worth pointing out the Conservatives won all their MSPs via the List in that election.
The price therefore of short-circuiting the SNP's "power base", and I think we can call nearly 29% a reasonable base of support, would have been to exclude the Conservatives completely from the first Parliament. PR allowed the Conservatives to achieve a representation which FPTP would have prevented.
FPTP would have provided Labour with a solid majority - how long that would have lasted I don't know but it's possible as we have seen at some point the SNP would have managed to overhaul the Labour strength.
The point is BOTH the Conservatives and the SNP benefitted from a system of electing MSPs which, had FPTP been followed, would have seen the former completely excluded and the latter reduced to a minor role. To argue there was no SNP power base is absurd - FPTP masked it and kept it out of Holyrood but the PR List system released the potential of the vote to provide representation as it did for the Scottish Conservatives.
The SNP got just 22% in Scotland in the 1997 UK general election and 6 MPs but 29% at Holyrood in 1999 and 35 MSPs.
So devolution enabled the SNP to increase their voteshare and presence in Scotland via Holyrood which they would not otherwise have had at Westminster had devolution never happened, the help the Tories got on the list is largely irrelevant as in 2015 and 2019 the Tories would still have won a UK wide majority even had they not won a single Scottish seat
Notice even Remainers like Vivienne Stern say "Now, even we think that doesn’t look fair, and we’ve been saying to our European counterparts."
Vivienne Stern spent 2 years bleating that No Deal would be hugely damaging -- and now she has her deal, she has discovered she does not like it. Her European friends are not ... errr ... really friends.
It is a hugely exploitative deal.
In my opinion, it is way better for UK science not to accept this deal, but to use the money to support .... err .... science in the UK.
I'm a UK scientist and I've been involved in several FP7 projects - now working in a slightly different field and mostly UK (in fact UK charity, rather than government) funded, so I don't directly have an interest.
The main selling point of FP7, H2020 etc funding compared to domestic funding was that it made it easy to put together a research team with the best people across a wide number of countries. That was why other countries were willing to be net contributors because it gave their academics the chance to be part of projects that they simply didn't have the expertise or capacity to undertake themselves. A nice side effect was that the UK used to get more than it contributed, particularly because other countries' academics wanted UK-based people in their research collaborations because they were often at the top of the field (UK-based, not necessarily UK nationals) so UK-based researchers got onto a disproportionate number of successful bids.
Simply replacing the lost money is not the same - it will keep academics in work, but it will be more complicated to bring together the best expertise into a research project. That would require either being able to use the UK funding to fund collaborators in the EU (in which case we'll become net contributors anyway) or for those other countries to be able to raise their own funds for a project at the same time - effectively two funding bids, one on the UK side and one on the EU side, both of which have to come off (funders also think about risk, so that's not ideal, in itself).
There may be some positives, building up UK centres of excellence - possibly poaching some of the leading researchers to come to the UK - rather than just collaborating with the best team in Germany, France, wherever, but the research return for x amount spent may be lower. Poaching the best to come over here will be expensive, although if there is a local boost in capacity it may have long term benefits.
There are also many other funding streams of course, many international, which won't be directly affected. There is also of course a point at which Horizon Europe becomes too expensive and not worth it. That may be at the proposed level, but it's hard to precisely assess the costs and benefits of being in or out. One thing is sure, it looks like the position will be worse post-transition than before (either we'll be paying more or we won't be involved).
I am a UK Scientist and I have also had plenty of money off the EU in my time.
However, I am extremely critical of EU science policy, which has largely destroyed the scientific institutes of the former Eastern Bloc countries. It has given to those countries that are strong in science (primarily the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands), and ruthlessly taken away from those that had little. One could have imagined a policy in which the scientific strengths of Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary had been protected and strengthened. That was very far from the effect of the EU's science policy.
Horizon 2020 is extremely wasteful, when the proportion of funding that goes to science versus that going to administration of the schemes is considered. Just compare the money spent on administration to national schemes in the UK or the US. (Although, at a personal level, I found that advising the EU on a matter of science policy is always highly profitable -- in the end I stopped doing it as it made me feel unclean).
The strongest Universities in Europe are not in the the EU. They are in the UK & Switzerland. ETH Zurich is the highest ranked University on the European mainland when it comes to the sciences. The UK (and also Switrzerland) are being shafted by these deals. If we agree to them, it will lead to less science done in the Uk, and less scientists employed in the UK.
The deal (which is not worth taking) shows a complete lack of confidence in UK science by those ostensibly in charge. The top of UK science is filled with normally uncritical admirers of the EU & they have been completely shafted by "their friends".
We all need to learn rcs's famous mantra. "Countries do not have friends, they have interests."
This science deal is in the interests of Germany, the Netherlands and France, who will be the principal beneficiaries.
Why are you surprised that the EU is looking after its own interests?
I am not surprised. I expected it.
It is the leaders of Universities UK or the Royal Society or Scientists for the EU who are surprised that -- as they see it -- "their friends" are shafting them.
As you would discover, if you read the original link. Here it is again:
The phrase "their friends" doesn't appear in the article, and it is blindingly obvious that the shafting is being done by our own government in withdrawing from the EU in the first place.
It was evident from the start that Brexit would be a disaster for British science, which is why the overwhelming majority of scientists were remainers. Your attempts to blame those who campaigned to stay in the EU for the inevitable consequences of leaving the EU are, frankly, bizarre.
I have merely said that if a science deal transfers a net 3 billion pounds of the UK science budget to Europe, it is a bad deal for UK science.
That is a net loss of 3 billion pounds to UK science. That is many, many UK science jobs lost.
Better than signing that deal is to organise our own schemes for collaboration with Europe (or Asia or the US). It could be done easily, and administered cheaply (much more cheaply than the EU's scheme).
As a scientist, I try not to use blustering phrases like ... "blindingly obvious" ... or "evident from the start" ... without providing some proof.
You have to prove "the obvious" and "the evident" time and time again. That is the very essence of this thing that we call science.
Depends. If the value of networking and easy collaboration with the Euroscience ecosystem is more than 3 billion pounds, then it's an expensive deal, but not a bad one. And I'm not in a position to judge whether that's the case or not. My guess is that it's right at the top of the range of plausible valuations, but not off the top of the scale.
But it parallels what we've seen with the trade negotiations. The EU values access to their market highly, and are expecting the UK to pay full whack. What did we expect them to do?
I would say say that there is some value to networking with European Union countries, but we could organise some of the networks ourselves.
There are many, many premier science countries outwith the EU (Japan, China, South Korea, Australia, the US, Canada, Switzerland).
We are where we are -- the job of UK science leaders is not to mourn over the lost referendum, but to plan the future trajectory for the greatest good of UK science..
If the EU set the cost as high as 3 billion, then we are better off looking to build connections with the wealthiest global science communities -- the US & increasingly China.
Will it be possible to do leading edge science with both the US & China? I'd assume we have to choose?
Maybe Martin Luther King was right, that we should look at people based on the content of their character rather than the colour of their skin.
Do you think Martin Luther King would be (i) out protesting against racist policing or (ii) arguing against such protests on the grounds they are inflammatory?
Folk trying to retrospectively portray MLK as some kind of centrist concilliator are weird.
A. He wasn't.
B. Even if he was, the James Earl Ray factor doesn't really suggest that that was a fruitful path to take.
Well of course it has, I thought that was the point? Marxists believe change comes via conflict, so they set out to cause conflict
Yes. But most of those who took part in the mass protests following the George Floyd murder were not driven by a burning ideological attachment to Karl Marx. They were driven by disgust at the event and what it yet again highlighted. The conflation of the fight against racism with far left extremism is a palpably false one and is imo attempted mainly by those whose motives for doing so do not bear close examination.
Notice even Remainers like Vivienne Stern say "Now, even we think that doesn’t look fair, and we’ve been saying to our European counterparts."
Vivienne Stern spent 2 years bleating that No Deal would be hugely damaging -- and now she has her deal, she has discovered she does not like it. Her European friends are not ... errr ... really friends.
It is a hugely exploitative deal.
In my opinion, it is way better for UK science not to accept this deal, but to use the money to support .... err .... science in the UK.
I'm a UK scientist and I've been involved in several FP7 projects - now working in a slightly different field and mostly UK (in fact UK charity, rather than government) funded, so I don't directly have an interest.
The main selling point of FP7, H2020 etc funding compared to domestic funding was that it made it easy to put together a research team with the best people across a wide number of countries. That was why other countries were willing to be net contributors because it gave their academics the chance to be part of projects that they simply didn't have the expertise or capacity to undertake themselves. A nice side effect was that the UK used to get more than it contributed, particularly because other countries' academics wanted UK-based people in their research collaborations because they were often at the top of the field (UK-based, not necessarily UK nationals) so UK-based researchers got onto a disproportionate number of successful bids.
Simply replacing the lost money is not the same - it will keep academics in work, but it will be more complicated to bring together the best expertise into a research project. That would require either being able to use the UK funding to fund collaborators in the EU (in which case we'll become net contributors anyway) or for those other countries to be able to raise their own funds for a project at the same time - effectively two funding bids, one on the UK side and one on the EU side, both of which have to come off (funders also think about risk, so that's not ideal, in itself).
There may be some positives, building up UK centres of excellence - possibly poaching some of the leading researchers to come to the UK - rather than just collaborating with the best team in Germany, France, wherever, but the research return for x amount spent may be lower. Poaching the best to come over here will be expensive, although if there is a local boost in capacity it may have long term benefits.
There are also many other funding streams of course, many international, which won't be directly affected. There is also of course a point at which Horizon Europe becomes too expensive and not worth it. That may be at the proposed level, but it's hard to precisely assess the costs and benefits of being in or out. One thing is sure, it looks like the position will be worse post-transition than before (either we'll be paying more or we won't be involved).
I am a UK Scientist and I have also had plenty of money off the EU in my time.
However, I am extremely critical of EU science policy, which has largely destroyed the scientific institutes of the former Eastern Bloc countries. It has given to those countries that are strong in science (primarily the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands), and ruthlessly taken away from those that had little. One could have imagined a policy in which the scientific strengths of Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary had been protected and strengthened. That was very far from the effect of the EU's science policy.
Horizon 2020 is extremely wasteful, when the proportion of funding that goes to science versus that going to administration of the schemes is considered. Just compare the money spent on administration to national schemes in the UK or the US. (Although, at a personal level, I found that advising the EU on a matter of science policy is always highly profitable -- in the end I stopped doing it as it made me feel unclean).
The strongest Universities in Europe are not in the the EU. They are in the UK & Switzerland. ETH Zurich is the highest ranked University on the European mainland when it comes to the sciences. The UK (and also Switrzerland) are being shafted by these deals. If we agree to them, it will lead to less science done in the Uk, and less scientists employed in the UK.
The deal (which is not worth taking) shows a complete lack of confidence in UK science by those ostensibly in charge. The top of UK science is filled with normally uncritical admirers of the EU & they have been completely shafted by "their friends".
We all need to learn rcs's famous mantra. "Countries do not have friends, they have interests."
This science deal is in the interests of Germany, the Netherlands and France, who will be the principal beneficiaries.
Why are you surprised that the EU is looking after its own interests?
I am not surprised. I expected it.
It is the leaders of Universities UK or the Royal Society or Scientists for the EU who are surprised that -- as they see it -- "their friends" are shafting them.
As you would discover, if you read the original link. Here it is again:
The phrase "their friends" doesn't appear in the article, and it is blindingly obvious that the shafting is being done by our own government in withdrawing from the EU in the first place.
It was evident from the start that Brexit would be a disaster for British science, which is why the overwhelming majority of scientists were remainers. Your attempts to blame those who campaigned to stay in the EU for the inevitable consequences of leaving the EU are, frankly, bizarre.
I have merely said that if a science deal transfers a net 3 billion pounds of the UK science budget to Europe, it is a bad deal for UK science.
That is a net loss of 3 billion pounds to UK science. That is many, many UK science jobs lost.
Better than signing that deal is to organise our own schemes for collaboration with Europe (or Asia or the US). It could be done easily, and administered cheaply (much more cheaply than the EU's scheme).
As a scientist, I try not to use blustering phrases like ... "blindingly obvious" ... or "evident from the start" ... without providing some proof.
You have to prove "the obvious" and "the evident" time and time again. That is the very essence of this thing that we call science.
Depends. If the value of networking and easy collaboration with the Euroscience ecosystem is more than 3 billion pounds, then it's an expensive deal, but not a bad one. And I'm not in a position to judge whether that's the case or not. My guess is that it's right at the top of the range of plausible valuations, but not off the top of the scale.
But it parallels what we've seen with the trade negotiations. The EU values access to their market highly, and are expecting the UK to pay full whack. What did we expect them to do?
I would say say that there is some value to networking with European Union countries, but we could organise some of the networks ourselves.
There are many, many premier science countries outwith the EU (Japan, China, South Korea, Australia, the US, Canada, Switzerland).
We are where we are -- the job of UK science leaders is not to mourn over the lost referendum, but to plan the future trajectory for the greatest good of UK science..
If the EU set the cost as high as 3 billion, then we are better off looking to build connections with the wealthiest global science communities -- the US & increasingly China.
Perhaps. And maybe the UK should actually walk, rather than just going on about it.
But if I were working for the other side, one of the questions I'd want to understand is "how much would it cost the other side to walk away?" I don't know the numbers any more than I suspect you do- but if you told me that the cost of that (reconfiguring our science networks to other countries) was more than the cost of continuing with Horizon, I wouldn't be shocked.
Notice even Remainers like Vivienne Stern say "Now, even we think that doesn’t look fair, and we’ve been saying to our European counterparts."
Vivienne Stern spent 2 years bleating that No Deal would be hugely damaging -- and now she has her deal, she has discovered she does not like it. Her European friends are not ... errr ... really friends.
It is a hugely exploitative deal.
In my opinion, it is way better for UK science not to accept this deal, but to use the money to support .... err .... science in the UK.
I'm a UK scientist and I've been involved in several FP7 projects - now working in a slightly different field and mostly UK (in fact UK charity, rather than government) funded, so I don't directly have an interest.
The main selling point of FP7, H2020 etc funding compared to domestic funding was that it made it easy to put together a research team with the best people across a wide number of countries. That was why other countries were willing to be net contributors because it gave their academics the chance to be part of projects that they simply didn't have the expertise or capacity to undertake themselves. A nice side effect was that the UK used to get more than it contributed, particularly because other countries' academics wanted UK-based people in their research collaborations because they were often at the top of the field (UK-based, not necessarily UK nationals) so UK-based researchers got onto a disproportionate number of successful bids.
Simply replacing the lost money is not the same - it will keep academics in work, but it will be more complicated to bring together the best expertise into a research project. That would require either being able to use the UK funding to fund collaborators in the EU (in which case we'll become net contributors anyway) or for those other countries to be able to raise their own funds for a project at the same time - effectively two funding bids, one on the UK side and one on the EU side, both of which have to come off (funders also think about risk, so that's not ideal, in itself).
There may be some positives, building up UK centres of excellence - possibly poaching some of the leading researchers to come to the UK - rather than just collaborating with the best team in Germany, France, wherever, but the research return for x amount spent may be lower. Poaching the best to come over here will be expensive, although if there is a local boost in capacity it may have long term benefits.
There are also many other funding streams of course, many international, which won't be directly affected. There is also of course a point at which Horizon Europe becomes too expensive and not worth it. That may be at the proposed level, but it's hard to precisely assess the costs and benefits of being in or out. One thing is sure, it looks like the position will be worse post-transition than before (either we'll be paying more or we won't be involved).
I am a UK Scientist and I have also had plenty of money off the EU in my time.
However, I am extremely critical of EU science policy, which has largely destroyed the scientific institutes of the former Eastern Bloc countries. It has given to those countries that are strong in science (primarily the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands), and ruthlessly taken away from those that had little. One could have imagined a policy in which the scientific strengths of Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary had been protected and strengthened. That was very far from the effect of the EU's science policy.
Horizon 2020 is extremely wasteful, when the proportion of funding that goes to science versus that going to administration of the schemes is considered. Just compare the money spent on administration to national schemes in the UK or the US. (Although, at a personal level, I found that advising the EU on a matter of science policy is always highly profitable -- in the end I stopped doing it as it made me feel unclean).
The strongest Universities in Europe are not in the the EU. They are in the UK & Switzerland. ETH Zurich is the highest ranked University on the European mainland when it comes to the sciences. The UK (and also Switrzerland) are being shafted by these deals. If we agree to them, it will lead to less science done in the Uk, and less scientists employed in the UK.
The deal (which is not worth taking) shows a complete lack of confidence in UK science by those ostensibly in charge. The top of UK science is filled with normally uncritical admirers of the EU & they have been completely shafted by "their friends".
We all need to learn rcs's famous mantra. "Countries do not have friends, they have interests."
This science deal is in the interests of Germany, the Netherlands and France, who will be the principal beneficiaries.
Thank you for the detailed reply. I don't have experience of Polish or Czech collaborations, but worked on some projects with Hungarian and Slovakian collaborators. They were positive (but of course, they'd successfully won grants - there will have been winners and losers, no doubt).
I agree about admin/paperwork. The EU projects always had a lot more paper shuffling/reports than the domestically funded ones. There are also some largely parasitical 'technology transfer' companies that contract consultants on projects and take a nice cut off the top (I was a consultant on one project via one of those - I thought I was getting well paid until I found out what they were getting paid to pay me).
I disagree a bit on the strongest universities, it's not quite that clear cut on a project by project basis - yes, ETH Zurich is excellent and many UK universities are too, but there are also very strong universities in Germany in particular. As with anything, the strongest departments are scattered - for one project we absolutely wanted to work with Stockholm, mainly because of one person, but I'm not sure they're big hitters generally (neither are we, in many areas).
I agree that countries do not have friends, they have interests. It's no surprise to me that there's an attempt to shaft the UK, the EU negotiating side would be a bit rubbish if they didn't try that. As with everything else, it's a judgement on how much we need them versus how much they need us (and possibly a misjudgement, we will see). The UK does have a relatively strong hand here, so I hope it plays it well.
Comments
Organisers of BLM say findings show movement has exposed pre-existing fault lines"
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/nov/27/black-lives-matter-has-increased-racial-tension-55-say-in-uk-poll?CMP=share_btn_tw
Thgis is why Better Together is the tactic that will persist, regardless of the damage it will to to SLab.
https://twitter.com/TimDee4/status/1332314773342593025?s=20
It is the leaders of Universities UK or the Royal Society or Scientists for the EU who are surprised that -- as they see it -- "their friends" are shafting them.
As you would discover, if you read the original link. Here it is again:
https://tinyurl.com/y5yd2nfd
And coming back to the B&B on Unst and seeing a chap come in on his little yole with mackerel aplenty and begging a couple from him to take back for tea ...
Maybe Martin Luther King was right, that we should look at people based on the content of their character rather than the colour of their skin.
So we can weigh the cost to the economy of the restrictions against the lives saved pretty easily - it cost whatever it has to keep things relatively normal in the second wave, so far. The argument is whether fewer restrictions would have meant lots more deaths (sceptics say they didnt make much difference) and made the economy better off (fans of restrictions would say people self restricting/deaths would have damaged it just as badly I suppose?)
But more restrictions would probably have meant fewer deaths than normal at more cost to the economy, so I don't think people can say the govt didn't quickly enough or were too lax in the second wave
We need a good, epic war.
Something like the Battle of Tehran with massive tank battle with the US 3rd Infantry and 1st Armored (sic) Divisions versus the IRGC.
A massive airborne drop and air assault in Qom.
That sort of stuff.
(Serious question - whoever it was who raised 1.2m on the back of "Black Lives Matter" still haven't explained who they are.)
Tier 1 - Pints
Tier 2 - Pints with chips
Tiers 3 - No pints
Findings by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal of sexual misconduct arising from inebriated actions by a male boss in relation to a female junior quashed. the #meToo movement are not going to like this.
It was evident from the start that Brexit would be a disaster for British science, which is why the overwhelming majority of scientists were remainers. Your attempts to blame those who campaigned to stay in the EU for the inevitable consequences of leaving the EU are, frankly, bizarre.
CIA, Mossad, Saudi, ISIS, Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, Russia, Turkey all in the running here.
Side bet - False flag operation for any of the above
I fear that truncheoning grannies and garrotting play an increasing part in the HYUFD 'unifying' fantasies.
"The Imperial model had larger errors, about 5-fold higher than other models by six weeks. This appears to be largely driven by the aforementioned tendency to overestimate mortality."
Predictive performance of international COVID-19 mortality forecasting models
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.13.20151233v5.full
MLRS and its Russian-built equivalents are absolutely terrifying. I'm not sure we should even joke about that sort of thing, actually. But the decline in UK forces is quite something. Only 42 vehicles - as many as, say, Egypt it seems. The Americans have about 20-25 as many ...
Of the 72 seats, Labour won 56, the LDs 10 and the SNP 6.
The Scottish Parliament offered the Conservatives a way back and given their long-held tradition of being either the first or second party in Scottish politics, it might have been reasonable to argue that, while not perhaps winning a majority, there was likely to be a strong Conservative presence in any Scottish Parliament.
Instead, it was the SNP who emerged as the primary anti-Labour voice in Scotland so why was this? Was it because the Scottish Conservatives were still suffering from the perception of being wholly controlled and led by London and had campaigned against the very establishment of the Parliament to which they were now trying to win seats?
25% had voted against the Parliament but 75% had voted for it so what did the Conservatives at that point have to say to them? The SNP filled the anti-Labour gap in Scottish opinion from which the Conservatives had abdicated.
I'd argue the Conservative unwillingness to accept even the most basic of devolution in the late 90s opened the door for the SNP to emerge primarily as a vehicle for anti-Labour opinion but it was able to build on it and become the dominant force in Scottish politics.
https://www.rollonfriday.com/news-content/upskirting-barrister-banned-six-months
(A bit moot, as he's lost it all.)
Any suggestions on routes to get the oil out of that region without going through the Straits of Hormuz?
(But I doubt that has crossed the Post's mind TBH)
There is a Kansas City, Kansas – on the other side of the river to Kansas City, Missouri
The Prime Minister wants to appoint former TalkRadio journalist Ross Kempsell, 28, as Conservative director of research despite angry protests from senior Tories, the Daily Mail has been told.
It would mean ousting current research director Iain Carter, who was Miss Symonds's boss when she was forced to resign as the party's communications director in 2018 after being accused of abusing her expenses.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8991781/No10-faces-cronyism-row-bid-Carrie-Johnsons-novice-friend-90-000-job.html
That is a net loss of 3 billion pounds to UK science. That is many, many UK science jobs lost.
Better than signing that deal is to organise our own schemes for collaboration with Europe (or Asia or the US). It could be done easily, and administered cheaply (much more cheaply than the EU's scheme).
As a scientist, I try not to use blustering phrases like ... "blindingly obvious" ... or "evident from the start" ... without providing some proof.
You have to prove "the obvious" and "the evident" time and time again. That is the very essence of this thing that we call science.
A common fear, hatred & loathing of Iran must have been a big part of that diplomacy. Whatever it was Jared Kushner clearly has decent diplomatic skills.
Huge wealth of Rishi Sunak's family not declared in ministerial register
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/nov/27/huge-wealth-of-sunaks-family-not-declared-in-ministerial-register
Some interesting links and rather tenuous links in there, his wife owns less than 1% of a company that is involved in selling stuff on Amazon in India, therefore a conflict of interest for any possible decision Sunak could make over Amazon in the UK.
It always tickles me that I've been a far right Tory and a leftie on here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4T4Qb_t4j-s
But it parallels what we've seen with the trade negotiations. The EU values access to their market highly, and are expecting the UK to pay full whack. What did we expect them to do?
https://www.cell.com/immunity/fulltext/S1074-7613(20)30503-3
In summary: the proportion of us with cross-reactive T-cells is even higher than previously imagined - near universal. But, and here's the kicker: they don't do much good in actually fighting Covid. Which, I suppose, is an unavoidable conclusion from that particular finding, as it would imply that most people who came down with covid had actually had these cross-reactive T-cells already and they hadn't helped.
Although CCCoV cross-reactive memory cells were present in unexposed donors, they did not significantly contribute to the immune reaction against SARS-CoV-2.
... and even...
Although we do not know the pre-infection status, patients with severe COVID-19 also displayed an enlarged CD4+ memory compartment compared to patients with mild disease. At least in unexposed individuals this parameter correlated with pre-existing memory and is also associated with higher age, as discussed previously. Thus, we hypothesize that pre-existing memory may contribute to the reduced avidity and higher diversity of TCRs in severe COVID-19, and it is tempting to speculate that this may contribute to the increased risk for severe COVID-19 in the elderly population.
(ie that it's possible the cross-reactive T-cell memory might end up reducing the response of our immune system, and too much such memory, such as that from years and years of exposure to the common cold coronaviruses and their various mutations over the years, might help explain why older patients tend to have such a higher rate of severe and fatal outcomes.
There are many, many premier science countries outwith the EU (Japan, China, South Korea, Australia, the US, Canada, Switzerland).
We are where we are -- the job of UK science leaders is not to mourn over the lost referendum, but to plan the future trajectory for the greatest good of UK science..
If the EU set the cost as high as 3 billion, then we are better off looking to build connections with the wealthiest global science communities -- the US & increasingly China.
https://covid19.gov.gg/sites/default/files/2020-11/Guide for returning Students.pdf
The SNP polled 22% in the 1997 Westminster election, overtaking the Conservatives who fell back to 17.5%. The SNP won just 6 seats for its vote, the Conservatives none at all while the LDs got 10 seats with just 13% of the vote - the vagaries of FPTP at work there.
Had the Scottish Parliament been chosen strictly by FPTP constituencies, the 73 constituencies went 53 Labour, 12 LD, 7 SNP and one other (Dennis Canavan in Falkirk West). The SNP vote rose from 22% to 28.7% while the Conservatives won no constituencies on 15.6%.
However, as we both know, the Scottish Parliament contained 56 additional MSPs chosen by a List system based on PR and that enabled the SNP's 28.7% vote to win an additional 28 MSPs making them the opposition. It's also worth pointing out the Conservatives won all their MSPs via the List in that election.
The price therefore of short-circuiting the SNP's "power base", and I think we can call nearly 29% a reasonable base of support, would have been to exclude the Conservatives completely from the first Parliament. PR allowed the Conservatives to achieve a representation which FPTP would have prevented.
FPTP would have provided Labour with a solid majority - how long that would have lasted I don't know but it's possible as we have seen at some point the SNP would have managed to overhaul the Labour strength.
The point is BOTH the Conservatives and the SNP benefitted from a system of electing MSPs which, had FPTP been followed, would have seen the former completely excluded and the latter reduced to a minor role. To argue there was no SNP power base is absurd - FPTP masked it and kept it out of Holyrood but the PR List system released the potential of the vote to provide representation as it did for the Scottish Conservatives.
https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.crmvet.org/docs/60s_crm_public-opinion.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwjUmfODiKPtAhUVQkEAHdX_DGoQFjADegQIHhAB&usg=AOvVaw3LCpYR9HkqJeI3morFZ3gJ
This is what happens to the virus when you frighten it away with a substantial meal.
https://twitter.com/lewis_goodall/status/1332349686049607681?s=20
All part of the stage management I'm sure.
So devolution enabled the SNP to increase their voteshare and presence in Scotland via Holyrood which they would not otherwise have had at Westminster had devolution never happened, the help the Tories got on the list is largely irrelevant as in 2015 and 2019 the Tories would still have won a UK wide majority even had they not won a single Scottish seat
A. He wasn't.
B. Even if he was, the James Earl Ray factor doesn't really suggest that that was a fruitful path to take.
But if I were working for the other side, one of the questions I'd want to understand is "how much would it cost the other side to walk away?" I don't know the numbers any more than I suspect you do- but if you told me that the cost of that (reconfiguring our science networks to other countries) was more than the cost of continuing with Horizon, I wouldn't be shocked.
I agree about admin/paperwork. The EU projects always had a lot more paper shuffling/reports than the domestically funded ones. There are also some largely parasitical 'technology transfer' companies that contract consultants on projects and take a nice cut off the top (I was a consultant on one project via one of those - I thought I was getting well paid until I found out what they were getting paid to pay me).
I disagree a bit on the strongest universities, it's not quite that clear cut on a project by project basis - yes, ETH Zurich is excellent and many UK universities are too, but there are also very strong universities in Germany in particular. As with anything, the strongest departments are scattered - for one project we absolutely wanted to work with Stockholm, mainly because of one person, but I'm not sure they're big hitters generally (neither are we, in many areas).
I agree that countries do not have friends, they have interests. It's no surprise to me that there's an attempt to shaft the UK, the EU negotiating side would be a bit rubbish if they didn't try that. As with everything else, it's a judgement on how much we need them versus how much they need us (and possibly a misjudgement, we will see). The UK does have a relatively strong hand here, so I hope it plays it well.