The great Heaney was born in Northern Ireland - part of today's commonwealth wrote in English was culturally Hiberno-British died in the most British part of Ireland, an area speaking English is buried in Northern Ireland is loved, read and admired throughout the Irish, British and English speaking world
and
is as good a reason as any I can think of why the people of these islands can get on together.
Could we respect him and read him, and not appropriate him?
Under the FTPA the latest an election can be held is the 2nd of July 2024.
Repealing the FTPA isn't as easy as assumed, it's going to be tricky trying to restore a royal prerogative power especially as the government is going to argue the prerogative powers are not judicially reviewable, that's why the government has got the Lords involved at this early stage.
Perhaps you'd care to clarify? - seems out of line with the 'five year term'.
Following the early election, in December 2019, the next election is scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024. Parliament will be dissolved on 26 March 2024.
and
There is provision for the Prime Minister to make an order to extend this date for a maximum of two months to deal with unexpected developments. He/she must set out the reasons for the delay, and such an order must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before it can be made. One precedent is the foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001 which delayed local elections by one month. (In 2001, the general election was held on the same day as the delayed local elections.)
Thanks. I hadn't appreciated that May was explicitly favoued.
Ok, so May 2024 is an even more likely date than I'd thought.
I think May 2024 will be the date for GE simply for no other reason that boundary changes recommendations will not be received until July 2023.
The primary legislation has been passed but I suspect there may be issues from the Welsh and the Tories (if the Tories look like they will win Wales) about reducing the Welsh number of MPs by 20%.
The Tories are more likely to favour the reduction in seats because it makes it plausible for them to win Wales. It’s the Valleys where the heaviest cuts will fall and although the Tories have made progress there they’re still not in serious contention to win any seats on current boundaries except possibly Gower and a very long shot at Blaenau Gwent.
Plus the changes if along the lines proposed would exterminate Labour outside the south, cut Plaid Cymru in half by costing them the current Carmarthen East and Ceredigion seats and leave Newport and Llanelli both looking vulnerable to a fairly modest Tory swing.
So I do not see that as a problem. There might be a couple of cases of two Tory MPs fighting for the same seat in the north east but actually there are enough tempting targets to go round to buy off any losers.
I was talking more about the optics, it isn't inconceivable that the Tories win* the Senedd elections next month that creates momentum for them for them in the GE, it'll be easy attack line for Labour to use about the Tories reducing Welsh influence in Parliament when they need it the most.
I do not think that will resonate outside the Cardiff/Swansea/Merthyr triangle, if I’m honest. The immediate riposte is ‘you’ve had influence for years and things keep getting worse. Let’s try influencing the other lot.’
Bear in mind, there is only one seat Labour have never held at any level in Wales. They’ve held all the others at one time or another and done fuck all with it. A trade Union exec once told me with a straight face that Nicholas Edwards had done far more for Wales than ever Peter Hain did (On the one occasion I met him, Edwards himself agreed, incidentally, and wasn’t amused when I tripped him up over one or two of his claims).
So I think there isn’t a problem for the Tories in cutting seats outside the Valleys, and there aren’t many likely to go there anyway, while inside the valleys it will make no difference anyway.
Aren't a number of seats in North Wales to go too? Labour only holds one of them.
The way the boundaries were being drawn, with Anglesey protected, that Labour seat is in effect the only one that goes.
There might be a bit of a scuffle between the MP for Montgomeryshire and one of the Clwyd seats, but elsewhere it’s as you were.
In the south west, helpfully, the redrawn seats pitch incumbent Tories against incumbent PC.
On the basis of current national polls Labour would be likely to reverse its 2019 losses in NE Wales. The idea that this area has been shifting to the Tories over time is not really supported by electoral data. To take Delyn as an example, the Tory majority there in 1987 - never mind 1983 - was bigger than achieved in 2019. Keith Raffan was then still a Tory - and the incumbent.
I wonder if they do that "employer of choice" crap
I actually feel a little for Amazon here: I know many people who have done delivery driving gigs in the past, and sometimes you need to go, and very often there isn't a public convenience around. With the US often having pretty severe laws on public urination, it's not that uncommon to pee in a bottle.
I've done it multiple times. Once when I was about to miss a plane flying out of Fort Lauderdale, Fla, and returning the car AND pulling over for a pee would have wasted too much time. I peed in a bottle
It is often more hygienic than going to some concrete corner and doing your biz, as long as you dispose of the bottle sensibly
Is there anyone who hasn't done this at some time?
Just been to my first social engagement since.... God knows. A barbecue in bouji NW London. Freezing but great fun. Quite emotional
In truth probably my first relaxed social thing for a year: the first time with a sense of real freedom, at least on the horizon
It could be a one-off, or it could be indicative, but it was notably hedonistic. Think middle aged housewives doing lines of coke off the kitchen table (from John Lewis). If it is indicative, then we are in for a rip roaring 2020s
Pathetic. I don't imagine that the drug mules who supply them with their shit get to buy many John Lewis tables. They should have their collars felt.
And they shouldn't be congregating in the kitchen either.
The great Heaney was born in Northern Ireland - part of today's commonwealth wrote in English was culturally Hiberno-British died in the most British part of Ireland, an area speaking English is buried in Northern Ireland is loved, read and admired throughout the Irish, British and English speaking world
and
is as good a reason as any I can think of why the people of these islands can get on together.
Could we respect him and read him, and not appropriate him?
So Sir Alan Duncan has improved his views on Boris Johnson, I remember this exchange from 2018.
Sir Alan Duncan – who would go to great pains to give a nuanced and balanced critique of Theresa May's ailing leadership when asked – was happy to sum up his opinion of Boris in a single word ("C*nt").
Alan Duncan is the short man's short man
You'll have to explain that one.
In this instance Duncan appears to be pretty much in line with everyone else whose dealt with Johnson.
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
What about people without smartphones? If it's 25% of the population as a whole, it must be over a third of the 40+ population.
I'm not sure how. Their candidates can't even promise action on travellers pitching camp where they oughtn't without the party's entire left flank having a collective meltdown.
That is, I know all this culture wars crap is both corrosive and a deep inconvenience, but it can't just be wished away given what kind of organisation the Labour Party has become. I'm not sure that the leadership can even propose an increase in police numbers without the Corbyn movement going into spasm. A lot of them think the police are the enemy. And stop and search is bound to come up as well before very long, too...
Eloquently put.
I feel for Starmer. He is like a doctor who entirely understands the problem, diagnoses it correctly, sees it is a bacterial infection - but is legally unable to administer anti-biotics, or he will lose his job.
So he is only allowed to make positive noises, and do non medical therapeutic interventions (drink lots of water! get lots of rest!) in the hope that Labour recovers
Meanwhile the Tories are playing drill music next door 24/7, and denying the supply of water
So Sir Alan Duncan has improved his views on Boris Johnson, I remember this exchange from 2018.
Sir Alan Duncan – who would go to great pains to give a nuanced and balanced critique of Theresa May's ailing leadership when asked – was happy to sum up his opinion of Boris in a single word ("C*nt").
Alan Duncan is the short man's short man
You'll have to explain that one.
In this instance Duncan appears to be pretty much in line with everyone else whose dealt with Johnson.
I skimmed the mail serialisation but got bored very quickly
Basically he was rude about everyone who was promoted when his undoubtedly magnificent talents (at least in his own mind) were overlooked.
He worked closely with BoZo when twit was at the FCO, so he is a pretty close witness.
That doesn't make him an unbiased observer.
Duncan is a zealous and idiotic Remoaner, who loathes Johnson and Brexit, and has striven to hide this, and has failed completely, time and again. Ignore
"Sir Alan Duncan's long campaign to destroy the career of Boris Johnson "
Just been to my first social engagement since.... God knows. A barbecue in bouji NW London. Freezing but great fun. Quite emotional
In truth probably my first relaxed social thing for a year: the first time with a sense of real freedom, at least on the horizon
It could be a one-off, or it could be indicative, but it was notably hedonistic. Think middle aged housewives doing lines of coke off the kitchen table (from John Lewis). If it is indicative, then we are in for a rip roaring 2020s
Wonder if there is more coke about in London compared to the rest of the UK
Under the FTPA the latest an election can be held is the 2nd of July 2024.
Repealing the FTPA isn't as easy as assumed, it's going to be tricky trying to restore a royal prerogative power especially as the government is going to argue the prerogative powers are not judicially reviewable, that's why the government has got the Lords involved at this early stage.
Perhaps you'd care to clarify? - seems out of line with the 'five year term'.
Following the early election, in December 2019, the next election is scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024. Parliament will be dissolved on 26 March 2024.
and
There is provision for the Prime Minister to make an order to extend this date for a maximum of two months to deal with unexpected developments. He/she must set out the reasons for the delay, and such an order must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before it can be made. One precedent is the foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001 which delayed local elections by one month. (In 2001, the general election was held on the same day as the delayed local elections.)
Thanks. I hadn't appreciated that May was explicitly favoued.
Ok, so May 2024 is an even more likely date than I'd thought.
I think May 2024 will be the date for GE simply for no other reason that boundary changes recommendations will not be received until July 2023.
The primary legislation has been passed but I suspect there may be issues from the Welsh and the Tories (if the Tories look like they will win Wales) about reducing the Welsh number of MPs by 20%.
The Tories are more likely to favour the reduction in seats because it makes it plausible for them to win Wales. It’s the Valleys where the heaviest cuts will fall and although the Tories have made progress there they’re still not in serious contention to win any seats on current boundaries except possibly Gower and a very long shot at Blaenau Gwent.
Plus the changes if along the lines proposed would exterminate Labour outside the south, cut Plaid Cymru in half by costing them the current Carmarthen East and Ceredigion seats and leave Newport and Llanelli both looking vulnerable to a fairly modest Tory swing.
So I do not see that as a problem. There might be a couple of cases of two Tory MPs fighting for the same seat in the north east but actually there are enough tempting targets to go round to buy off any losers.
I was talking more about the optics, it isn't inconceivable that the Tories win* the Senedd elections next month that creates momentum for them for them in the GE, it'll be easy attack line for Labour to use about the Tories reducing Welsh influence in Parliament when they need it the most.
I do not think that will resonate outside the Cardiff/Swansea/Merthyr triangle, if I’m honest. The immediate riposte is ‘you’ve had influence for years and things keep getting worse. Let’s try influencing the other lot.’
Bear in mind, there is only one seat Labour have never held at any level in Wales. They’ve held all the others at one time or another and done fuck all with it. A trade Union exec once told me with a straight face that Nicholas Edwards had done far more for Wales than ever Peter Hain did (On the one occasion I met him, Edwards himself agreed, incidentally, and wasn’t amused when I tripped him up over one or two of his claims).
So I think there isn’t a problem for the Tories in cutting seats outside the Valleys, and there aren’t many likely to go there anyway, while inside the valleys it will make no difference anyway.
Aren't a number of seats in North Wales to go too? Labour only holds one of them.
The way the boundaries were being drawn, with Anglesey protected, that Labour seat is in effect the only one that goes.
There might be a bit of a scuffle between the MP for Montgomeryshire and one of the Clwyd seats, but elsewhere it’s as you were.
In the south west, helpfully, the redrawn seats pitch incumbent Tories against incumbent PC.
It doesn't appear to me as if there are sufficient seats in the North to go round for the available Tory MPs, even if we assume that the successor to the current Alyn & Deeside flips Lab to Con and that one extra seat is added, relative to the 2019 proposals, since Wales is now to receive 32 rather than 29 MPs. I guess that whoever is left without a chair when the music stops will be sent to try to lift Ceredigion plus whatever gets tacked onto it from Plaid, although then again I'm not sure I'd much fancy their chances. They might actually have more luck trying to prise Llanelli away from Labour, if it ends up having some more rural hinterland tacked onto it.
Stephen Crabbe will be the candidate in Ceredigion and North Pembs unless he retires.
Edit - and I would very much fancy their chances there, on current boundaries it would be a fairly comfortable Tory hold.
Llanelli is another one the Tories might begin to challenge in.
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
What about people without smartphones? If it's 25% of the population as a whole, it must be over a third of the 40+ population.
People who work in offices - even those in the 40 to 65 cohort - are 99% likely to have smartphones.
That is also a reminder that - while we will have gotten out of this before the EU - we can't pat ourselves on the back and say that we've handled the crisis perfectly.
What this shows is that we were doing averagely, by European standards, until we got hammered by the Kentish Variant (which is now hammering others)
This does not excuse our government and our scientists their many tragic, grievous errors (eg treating it like flu, mask advice, travel quarantine, etc) but it is vital context.
What that chart tells me is that a few travel restrictions last Summer and Autumn could have saved an awful lot of lives and prevented a severe Spring lockdown.
No, the Kentish Variant was a total googly
You can tell that yourself if you like, but I remember being ridiculed on here when I forecast in September that the case rises that we were seeing in Europe were going to come to the UK too.
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
Yes, generally one tower looks better than many, or the one biggest tower has to loom over the others. This aesthetic ideal has now been lost in Canary Wharf, entirely
Imagine the Eiffel Tower surrounded by many similar towers almost as high. It would be meaningless. Despite its impressive height, all impact would be lost. It would be forgotten (as we are now forgetting the Gherkin)
However we do have one singular Eiffel Tower-like Tower: the Shard, which is a masterpiece. if Sadiq Khan can do one good thing in his mayoralty, it is this: forbid the construction of any other towers in the vicinity of The Shard.
Just been to my first social engagement since.... God knows. A barbecue in bouji NW London. Freezing but great fun. Quite emotional
In truth probably my first relaxed social thing for a year: the first time with a sense of real freedom, at least on the horizon
It could be a one-off, or it could be indicative, but it was notably hedonistic. Think middle aged housewives doing lines of coke off the kitchen table (from John Lewis). If it is indicative, then we are in for a rip roaring 2020s
Ditto, sort of. Only from a much lower base. Two-family back garden social. My first alcoholic drinks for six and a half months. You know that taste you get when beer is unexpectedly strong? When you haven't drunk for a while, that's how all beer tastes. Our host had basically built a small pub in a back garden. It was built to be the exact size needed for a pool table, plus a bar. It is a thing of joy and will become our venue of choice if you end up having to wear facemasks to go to real pubs. Oh, and not freezing at all in South Manchester - shorts and t-shirts weather. But I agree with your conclusion - the 20s will be a cascade of hedonism, if we can get through them without another pandemic, world war three or a descent into a surveillance state.
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
Change the law. These are exceptional times.
I doubt very much they will change the law. The whole point of this exercise is to force people into having the ID cards without it actually being a legal requirement. They want it all to be the fault of businesses rather than the Government. That way when it goes horribly wrong they can say it wasn't their intention for it to be enforced in that way. It is classic Johnson tactics.
I still don't understand what vaxport advocates think these things are going to accomplish in the first place. If I am vaccinated and have a vax port and catch covid I will still be mixing with them just like I would be if there was no passport.
If R shoots up despite everyone being vaccinated then we just have to live with it or accept a lockdown for evermore.
This is the fundamental point.
The vaxport brings exactly zero benefits, will cost billions (remind me how much track and trace wasted?), and impinges on civil liberties.
I'm struggling to think of a single good thing about it.
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
What about people without smartphones? If it's 25% of the population as a whole, it must be over a third of the 40+ population.
People who work in offices - even those in the 40 to 65 cohort - are 99% likely to have smartphones.
Do you know, I didn't get one until 2016 (when I was 29). And that was only because my sister insisted I have one.
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
Change the law. These are exceptional times.
I doubt very much they will change the law. The whole point of this exercise is to force people into having the ID cards without it actually being a legal requirement. They want it all to be the fault of businesses rather than the Government. That way when it goes horribly wrong they can say it wasn't their intention for it to be enforced in that way. It is classic Johnson tactics.
I still don't understand what vaxport advocates think these things are going to accomplish in the first place. If I am vaccinated and have a vax port and catch covid I will still be mixing with them just like I would be if there was no passport.
If R shoots up despite everyone being vaccinated then we just have to live with it or accept a lockdown for evermore.
This is the fundamental point.
The vaxport brings exactly zero benefits, will cost billions (remind me how much track and trace wasted?), and impinges on civil liberties.
I'm struggling to think of a single good thing about it.
It's made everyone remember the government are usually incompetent and the vaccines were an exception not the rule?
Just been to my first social engagement since.... God knows. A barbecue in bouji NW London. Freezing but great fun. Quite emotional
In truth probably my first relaxed social thing for a year: the first time with a sense of real freedom, at least on the horizon
It could be a one-off, or it could be indicative, but it was notably hedonistic. Think middle aged housewives doing lines of coke off the kitchen table (from John Lewis). If it is indicative, then we are in for a rip roaring 2020s
Ditto, sort of. Only from a much lower base. Two-family back garden social. My first alcoholic drinks for six and a half months. You know that taste you get when beer is unexpectedly strong? When you haven't drunk for a while, that's how all beer tastes. Our host had basically built a small pub in a back garden. It was built to be the exact size needed for a pool table, plus a bar. It is a thing of joy and will become our venue of choice if you end up having to wear facemasks to go to real pubs. Oh, and not freezing at all in South Manchester - shorts and t-shirts weather. But I agree with your conclusion - the 20s will be a cascade of hedonism, if we can get through them without another pandemic, world war three or a descent into a surveillance state.
Not freezing in Manc?!? London is about minus 10
The booze and the drugs masked it well, however. In the end
Under the FTPA the latest an election can be held is the 2nd of July 2024.
Repealing the FTPA isn't as easy as assumed, it's going to be tricky trying to restore a royal prerogative power especially as the government is going to argue the prerogative powers are not judicially reviewable, that's why the government has got the Lords involved at this early stage.
Perhaps you'd care to clarify? - seems out of line with the 'five year term'.
Following the early election, in December 2019, the next election is scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024. Parliament will be dissolved on 26 March 2024.
and
There is provision for the Prime Minister to make an order to extend this date for a maximum of two months to deal with unexpected developments. He/she must set out the reasons for the delay, and such an order must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before it can be made. One precedent is the foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001 which delayed local elections by one month. (In 2001, the general election was held on the same day as the delayed local elections.)
Thanks. I hadn't appreciated that May was explicitly favoued.
Ok, so May 2024 is an even more likely date than I'd thought.
I think May 2024 will be the date for GE simply for no other reason that boundary changes recommendations will not be received until July 2023.
The primary legislation has been passed but I suspect there may be issues from the Welsh and the Tories (if the Tories look like they will win Wales) about reducing the Welsh number of MPs by 20%.
The Tories are more likely to favour the reduction in seats because it makes it plausible for them to win Wales. It’s the Valleys where the heaviest cuts will fall and although the Tories have made progress there they’re still not in serious contention to win any seats on current boundaries except possibly Gower and a very long shot at Blaenau Gwent.
Plus the changes if along the lines proposed would exterminate Labour outside the south, cut Plaid Cymru in half by costing them the current Carmarthen East and Ceredigion seats and leave Newport and Llanelli both looking vulnerable to a fairly modest Tory swing.
So I do not see that as a problem. There might be a couple of cases of two Tory MPs fighting for the same seat in the north east but actually there are enough tempting targets to go round to buy off any losers.
I was talking more about the optics, it isn't inconceivable that the Tories win* the Senedd elections next month that creates momentum for them for them in the GE, it'll be easy attack line for Labour to use about the Tories reducing Welsh influence in Parliament when they need it the most.
I do not think that will resonate outside the Cardiff/Swansea/Merthyr triangle, if I’m honest. The immediate riposte is ‘you’ve had influence for years and things keep getting worse. Let’s try influencing the other lot.’
Bear in mind, there is only one seat Labour have never held at any level in Wales. They’ve held all the others at one time or another and done fuck all with it. A trade Union exec once told me with a straight face that Nicholas Edwards had done far more for Wales than ever Peter Hain did (On the one occasion I met him, Edwards himself agreed, incidentally, and wasn’t amused when I tripped him up over one or two of his claims).
So I think there isn’t a problem for the Tories in cutting seats outside the Valleys, and there aren’t many likely to go there anyway, while inside the valleys it will make no difference anyway.
Aren't a number of seats in North Wales to go too? Labour only holds one of them.
The way the boundaries were being drawn, with Anglesey protected, that Labour seat is in effect the only one that goes.
There might be a bit of a scuffle between the MP for Montgomeryshire and one of the Clwyd seats, but elsewhere it’s as you were.
In the south west, helpfully, the redrawn seats pitch incumbent Tories against incumbent PC.
On the basis of current national polls Labour would be likely to reverse its 2019 losses in NE Wales. The idea that this area has been shifting to the Tories over time is not really supported by electoral data. To take Delyn as an example, the Tory majority there in 1987 - never mind 1983 - was bigger than achieved in 2019. Keith Raffan was then still a Tory - and the incumbent.
It depends whether these kinds of seats have been subject to an easily reversible shift, or have flipped over. The five northern English seats that Theresa May's Tories managed to narrowly capture from Labour in 2017 all returned their incumbents again in 2019, that time with five-figure majorities.
Thus, it is possible that moderate nationwide swings to Labour might cause them to revert, but it's also possible that - previous allegiances and voting habits having been broken - they'll become more typical Tory territory. Time will tell.
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
Change the law. These are exceptional times.
I doubt very much they will change the law. The whole point of this exercise is to force people into having the ID cards without it actually being a legal requirement. They want it all to be the fault of businesses rather than the Government. That way when it goes horribly wrong they can say it wasn't their intention for it to be enforced in that way. It is classic Johnson tactics.
I still don't understand what vaxport advocates think these things are going to accomplish in the first place. If I am vaccinated and have a vax port and catch covid I will still be mixing with them just like I would be if there was no passport.
If R shoots up despite everyone being vaccinated then we just have to live with it or accept a lockdown for evermore.
This is the fundamental point.
The vaxport brings exactly zero benefits, will cost billions (remind me how much track and trace wasted?), and impinges on civil liberties.
I'm struggling to think of a single good thing about it.
Yes it's completely ridiculous how the whole government seems to have been captured by this idiotic thinking. The vaccines are the way out of this and we will have 90%+ adults vaccinated by the end of June and 95%+ by the end of July once the J&J "jab and go" scheme is introduced for under 25s.
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
What about people without smartphones? If it's 25% of the population as a whole, it must be over a third of the 40+ population.
People who work in offices - even those in the 40 to 65 cohort - are 99% likely to have smartphones.
Do you know, I didn't get one until 2016 (when I was 29). And that was only because my sister insisted I have one.
That was still five years ago, when the number of good, cheap smartphones was very small.
That is also a reminder that - while we will have gotten out of this before the EU - we can't pat ourselves on the back and say that we've handled the crisis perfectly.
What this shows is that we were doing averagely, by European standards, until we got hammered by the Kentish Variant (which is now hammering others)
This does not excuse our government and our scientists their many tragic, grievous errors (eg treating it like flu, mask advice, travel quarantine, etc) but it is vital context.
What that chart tells me is that a few travel restrictions last Summer and Autumn could have saved an awful lot of lives and prevented a severe Spring lockdown.
No, the Kentish Variant was a total googly
You can tell that yourself if you like, but I remember being ridiculed on here when I forecast in September that the case rises that we were seeing in Europe were going to come to the UK too.
My recollection is that it was the other way around; I was in Italy and Germany during September watching case numbers start to rise in the Uk while both of those countries had low incidence. The warmer weather left Southern Europe later.
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
Yes, generally one tower looks better than many, or the one biggest tower has to loom over the others. This aesthetic ideal has now been lost in Canary Wharf, entirely
Imagine the Eiffel Tower surrounded by many similar towers almost as high. It would be meaningless. Despite its impressive height, all impact would be lost. It would be forgotten (as we are now forgetting the Gherkin)
However we do have one singular Eiffel Tower-like Tower: the Shard, which is a masterpiece. if Sadiq Khan can do one good thing in his mayoralty, it is this: forbid the construction of any other towers in the vicinity of The Shard.
Damn right. New York would look so much better if they got rid of all but one of those stupid skyscrapers.
"Jeremy Corbyn addresses tens of thousands of London Kill the Bill activists in defiance of Covid rules - before scuffles with police break out in Parliament Square after marches across the UK"
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
Change the law. These are exceptional times.
I doubt very much they will change the law. The whole point of this exercise is to force people into having the ID cards without it actually being a legal requirement. They want it all to be the fault of businesses rather than the Government. That way when it goes horribly wrong they can say it wasn't their intention for it to be enforced in that way. It is classic Johnson tactics.
I still don't understand what vaxport advocates think these things are going to accomplish in the first place. If I am vaccinated and have a vax port and catch covid I will still be mixing with them just like I would be if there was no passport.
If R shoots up despite everyone being vaccinated then we just have to live with it or accept a lockdown for evermore.
This is the fundamental point.
The vaxport brings exactly zero benefits, will cost billions (remind me how much track and trace wasted?), and impinges on civil liberties.
I'm struggling to think of a single good thing about it.
It's made everyone remember the government are usually incompetent and the vaccines were an exception not the rule?
Good night.
The only reasonable explanation is if they are floating this stuff to get people to get vaccinated. They'll never be able to admit it, but it's the only thing that makes sense.
He worked closely with BoZo when twit was at the FCO, so he is a pretty close witness.
That doesn't make him an unbiased observer.
Duncan is a zealous and idiotic Remoaner, who loathes Johnson and Brexit, and has striven to hide this, and has failed completely, time and again. Ignore
"Sir Alan Duncan's long campaign to destroy the career of Boris Johnson "
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
What about people without smartphones? If it's 25% of the population as a whole, it must be over a third of the 40+ population.
So the possibilities. 1 The Johnson government has already reached the "in the bunker detached from reality" phase that Thatcher reached in about 1989 and none of her successors really attained.
2 They know it's a scam, it's never going to happen, but the calculation is that it's in their partisan interest to propose it. Either because it polls well now, or it will allow a " we're so great, we don't need to do this after all" moment in three months' time.
The UK has already done enough jabs to stop pretty much all the foreseeable Covid deaths; say 90%. The EU isn't there yet, but will be there in a few weeks' time.
The UK will hit herd immunity in June and everyone who can be done will be done in July.
The time window where vaxports are needed internally is really short. So the benefits don't outweigh the costs in cash and national cohesion.
Under the FTPA the latest an election can be held is the 2nd of July 2024.
Repealing the FTPA isn't as easy as assumed, it's going to be tricky trying to restore a royal prerogative power especially as the government is going to argue the prerogative powers are not judicially reviewable, that's why the government has got the Lords involved at this early stage.
Perhaps you'd care to clarify? - seems out of line with the 'five year term'.
Following the early election, in December 2019, the next election is scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024. Parliament will be dissolved on 26 March 2024.
and
There is provision for the Prime Minister to make an order to extend this date for a maximum of two months to deal with unexpected developments. He/she must set out the reasons for the delay, and such an order must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before it can be made. One precedent is the foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001 which delayed local elections by one month. (In 2001, the general election was held on the same day as the delayed local elections.)
Thanks. I hadn't appreciated that May was explicitly favoued.
Ok, so May 2024 is an even more likely date than I'd thought.
I think May 2024 will be the date for GE simply for no other reason that boundary changes recommendations will not be received until July 2023.
The primary legislation has been passed but I suspect there may be issues from the Welsh and the Tories (if the Tories look like they will win Wales) about reducing the Welsh number of MPs by 20%.
The Tories are more likely to favour the reduction in seats because it makes it plausible for them to win Wales. It’s the Valleys where the heaviest cuts will fall and although the Tories have made progress there they’re still not in serious contention to win any seats on current boundaries except possibly Gower and a very long shot at Blaenau Gwent.
Plus the changes if along the lines proposed would exterminate Labour outside the south, cut Plaid Cymru in half by costing them the current Carmarthen East and Ceredigion seats and leave Newport and Llanelli both looking vulnerable to a fairly modest Tory swing.
So I do not see that as a problem. There might be a couple of cases of two Tory MPs fighting for the same seat in the north east but actually there are enough tempting targets to go round to buy off any losers.
I was talking more about the optics, it isn't inconceivable that the Tories win* the Senedd elections next month that creates momentum for them for them in the GE, it'll be easy attack line for Labour to use about the Tories reducing Welsh influence in Parliament when they need it the most.
I do not think that will resonate outside the Cardiff/Swansea/Merthyr triangle, if I’m honest. The immediate riposte is ‘you’ve had influence for years and things keep getting worse. Let’s try influencing the other lot.’
Bear in mind, there is only one seat Labour have never held at any level in Wales. They’ve held all the others at one time or another and done fuck all with it. A trade Union exec once told me with a straight face that Nicholas Edwards had done far more for Wales than ever Peter Hain did (On the one occasion I met him, Edwards himself agreed, incidentally, and wasn’t amused when I tripped him up over one or two of his claims).
So I think there isn’t a problem for the Tories in cutting seats outside the Valleys, and there aren’t many likely to go there anyway, while inside the valleys it will make no difference anyway.
Aren't a number of seats in North Wales to go too? Labour only holds one of them.
The way the boundaries were being drawn, with Anglesey protected, that Labour seat is in effect the only one that goes.
There might be a bit of a scuffle between the MP for Montgomeryshire and one of the Clwyd seats, but elsewhere it’s as you were.
In the south west, helpfully, the redrawn seats pitch incumbent Tories against incumbent PC.
It doesn't appear to me as if there are sufficient seats in the North to go round for the available Tory MPs, even if we assume that the successor to the current Alyn & Deeside flips Lab to Con and that one extra seat is added, relative to the 2019 proposals, since Wales is now to receive 32 rather than 29 MPs. I guess that whoever is left without a chair when the music stops will be sent to try to lift Ceredigion plus whatever gets tacked onto it from Plaid, although then again I'm not sure I'd much fancy their chances. They might actually have more luck trying to prise Llanelli away from Labour, if it ends up having some more rural hinterland tacked onto it.
Stephen Crabbe will be the candidate in Ceredigion and North Pembs unless he retires.
Edit - and I would very much fancy their chances there, on current boundaries it would be a fairly comfortable Tory hold.
Llanelli is another one the Tories might begin to challenge in.
Cardigan has never elected a Tory as far as I know - it was Labour-held by Elystan Morgan 1966 - Feb 1974. Rural North Pembrokeshire tends to be less favourable for the Tories than South Pembrokeshire - with significant pockets of support for Plaid and - periodically - the LDs. Tactical anti - Tory voting there might be more effective than many assume. Crabb is not a natural fit there and most of his current seat would be likely to fall into the residual Pembroke seat. He is a Scot by birth - and not obviously culturally Welsh really.
Under the FTPA the latest an election can be held is the 2nd of July 2024.
Repealing the FTPA isn't as easy as assumed, it's going to be tricky trying to restore a royal prerogative power especially as the government is going to argue the prerogative powers are not judicially reviewable, that's why the government has got the Lords involved at this early stage.
Perhaps you'd care to clarify? - seems out of line with the 'five year term'.
Following the early election, in December 2019, the next election is scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024. Parliament will be dissolved on 26 March 2024.
and
There is provision for the Prime Minister to make an order to extend this date for a maximum of two months to deal with unexpected developments. He/she must set out the reasons for the delay, and such an order must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before it can be made. One precedent is the foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001 which delayed local elections by one month. (In 2001, the general election was held on the same day as the delayed local elections.)
Thanks. I hadn't appreciated that May was explicitly favoued.
Ok, so May 2024 is an even more likely date than I'd thought.
I think May 2024 will be the date for GE simply for no other reason that boundary changes recommendations will not be received until July 2023.
The primary legislation has been passed but I suspect there may be issues from the Welsh and the Tories (if the Tories look like they will win Wales) about reducing the Welsh number of MPs by 20%.
The Tories are more likely to favour the reduction in seats because it makes it plausible for them to win Wales. It’s the Valleys where the heaviest cuts will fall and although the Tories have made progress there they’re still not in serious contention to win any seats on current boundaries except possibly Gower and a very long shot at Blaenau Gwent.
Plus the changes if along the lines proposed would exterminate Labour outside the south, cut Plaid Cymru in half by costing them the current Carmarthen East and Ceredigion seats and leave Newport and Llanelli both looking vulnerable to a fairly modest Tory swing.
So I do not see that as a problem. There might be a couple of cases of two Tory MPs fighting for the same seat in the north east but actually there are enough tempting targets to go round to buy off any losers.
I was talking more about the optics, it isn't inconceivable that the Tories win* the Senedd elections next month that creates momentum for them for them in the GE, it'll be easy attack line for Labour to use about the Tories reducing Welsh influence in Parliament when they need it the most.
I do not think that will resonate outside the Cardiff/Swansea/Merthyr triangle, if I’m honest. The immediate riposte is ‘you’ve had influence for years and things keep getting worse. Let’s try influencing the other lot.’
Bear in mind, there is only one seat Labour have never held at any level in Wales. They’ve held all the others at one time or another and done fuck all with it. A trade Union exec once told me with a straight face that Nicholas Edwards had done far more for Wales than ever Peter Hain did (On the one occasion I met him, Edwards himself agreed, incidentally, and wasn’t amused when I tripped him up over one or two of his claims).
So I think there isn’t a problem for the Tories in cutting seats outside the Valleys, and there aren’t many likely to go there anyway, while inside the valleys it will make no difference anyway.
Aren't a number of seats in North Wales to go too? Labour only holds one of them.
The way the boundaries were being drawn, with Anglesey protected, that Labour seat is in effect the only one that goes.
There might be a bit of a scuffle between the MP for Montgomeryshire and one of the Clwyd seats, but elsewhere it’s as you were.
In the south west, helpfully, the redrawn seats pitch incumbent Tories against incumbent PC.
On the basis of current national polls Labour would be likely to reverse its 2019 losses in NE Wales. The idea that this area has been shifting to the Tories over time is not really supported by electoral data. To take Delyn as an example, the Tory majority there in 1987 - never mind 1983 - was bigger than achieved in 2019. Keith Raffan was then still a Tory - and the incumbent.
It depends whether these kinds of seats have been subject to an easily reversible shift, or have flipped over. The five northern English seats that Theresa May's Tories managed to narrowly capture from Labour in 2017 all returned their incumbents again in 2019, that time with five-figure majorities.
Thus, it is possible that moderate nationwide swings to Labour might cause them to revert, but it's also possible that - previous allegiances and voting habits having been broken - they'll become more typical Tory territory. Time will tell.
We do have the recent example of the Vale of Clwyd which was one of the Tory gains from Labour in 2015. Labour took it back in 2017 - only to see it fall again in 2019. No clear pattern there! Gower also fell to the Tories in 2015 only to see Labour regain it in 2017 - and retain in 2019.
That is also a reminder that - while we will have gotten out of this before the EU - we can't pat ourselves on the back and say that we've handled the crisis perfectly.
What this shows is that we were doing averagely, by European standards, until we got hammered by the Kentish Variant (which is now hammering others)
This does not excuse our government and our scientists their many tragic, grievous errors (eg treating it like flu, mask advice, travel quarantine, etc) but it is vital context.
What that chart tells me is that a few travel restrictions last Summer and Autumn could have saved an awful lot of lives and prevented a severe Spring lockdown.
No, the Kentish Variant was a total googly
You can tell that yourself if you like, but I remember being ridiculed on here when I forecast in September that the case rises that we were seeing in Europe were going to come to the UK too.
My recollection is that it was the other way around; I was in Italy and Germany during September watching case numbers start to rise in the Uk while both of those countries had low incidence. The warmer weather left Southern Europe later.
It was Spain first, where they opened the nightclubs and tried to get a summer holiday season.
Just been to my first social engagement since.... God knows. A barbecue in bouji NW London. Freezing but great fun. Quite emotional
In truth probably my first relaxed social thing for a year: the first time with a sense of real freedom, at least on the horizon
It could be a one-off, or it could be indicative, but it was notably hedonistic. Think middle aged housewives doing lines of coke off the kitchen table (from John Lewis). If it is indicative, then we are in for a rip roaring 2020s
Ditto, sort of. Only from a much lower base. Two-family back garden social. My first alcoholic drinks for six and a half months. You know that taste you get when beer is unexpectedly strong? When you haven't drunk for a while, that's how all beer tastes. Our host had basically built a small pub in a back garden. It was built to be the exact size needed for a pool table, plus a bar. It is a thing of joy and will become our venue of choice if you end up having to wear facemasks to go to real pubs. Oh, and not freezing at all in South Manchester - shorts and t-shirts weather. But I agree with your conclusion - the 20s will be a cascade of hedonism, if we can get through them without another pandemic, world war three or a descent into a surveillance state.
Not freezing in Manc?!? London is about minus 10
The booze and the drugs masked it well, however. In the end
Just been to my first social engagement since.... God knows. A barbecue in bouji NW London. Freezing but great fun. Quite emotional
In truth probably my first relaxed social thing for a year: the first time with a sense of real freedom, at least on the horizon
It could be a one-off, or it could be indicative, but it was notably hedonistic. Think middle aged housewives doing lines of coke off the kitchen table (from John Lewis). If it is indicative, then we are in for a rip roaring 2020s
Ditto, sort of. Only from a much lower base. Two-family back garden social. My first alcoholic drinks for six and a half months. You know that taste you get when beer is unexpectedly strong? When you haven't drunk for a while, that's how all beer tastes. Our host had basically built a small pub in a back garden. It was built to be the exact size needed for a pool table, plus a bar. It is a thing of joy and will become our venue of choice if you end up having to wear facemasks to go to real pubs. Oh, and not freezing at all in South Manchester - shorts and t-shirts weather. But I agree with your conclusion - the 20s will be a cascade of hedonism, if we can get through them without another pandemic, world war three or a descent into a surveillance state.
Not freezing in Manc?!? London is about minus 10
The booze and the drugs masked it well, however. In the end
At the risk of derailing a promising and possibly salacious conversation about drugs and debauchery by wittering on about the weather, yes, it was absolutely glorious. Not a cloud in the sky. Go-home-and-change-into-shorts weather. Sunburn weather. Cold after the sun passed behind the roofs though. In my defence hot, cloudless Easter Saturdays in Greater Manchester are considerably more unusual than drugs in North London.
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
Yes, generally one tower looks better than many, or the one biggest tower has to loom over the others. This aesthetic ideal has now been lost in Canary Wharf, entirely
Imagine the Eiffel Tower surrounded by many similar towers almost as high. It would be meaningless. Despite its impressive height, all impact would be lost. It would be forgotten (as we are now forgetting the Gherkin)
However we do have one singular Eiffel Tower-like Tower: the Shard, which is a masterpiece. if Sadiq Khan can do one good thing in his mayoralty, it is this: forbid the construction of any other towers in the vicinity of The Shard.
The Shard is good because it's on the wrong side of the river and gives a great view of the right side of river and especially the square mile. Otherwise it's far from being a masterpiece. The cheese grater is probably my favourite building in London from an architectural perspective. Our new building is pretty nice too (100 Liverpool Street) the terraces will be absolutely amazing in the summer for a post work beer, it's not a particularly tall building though.
Under the FTPA the latest an election can be held is the 2nd of July 2024.
Repealing the FTPA isn't as easy as assumed, it's going to be tricky trying to restore a royal prerogative power especially as the government is going to argue the prerogative powers are not judicially reviewable, that's why the government has got the Lords involved at this early stage.
Perhaps you'd care to clarify? - seems out of line with the 'five year term'.
Following the early election, in December 2019, the next election is scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024. Parliament will be dissolved on 26 March 2024.
and
There is provision for the Prime Minister to make an order to extend this date for a maximum of two months to deal with unexpected developments. He/she must set out the reasons for the delay, and such an order must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before it can be made. One precedent is the foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001 which delayed local elections by one month. (In 2001, the general election was held on the same day as the delayed local elections.)
Thanks. I hadn't appreciated that May was explicitly favoued.
Ok, so May 2024 is an even more likely date than I'd thought.
I think May 2024 will be the date for GE simply for no other reason that boundary changes recommendations will not be received until July 2023.
The primary legislation has been passed but I suspect there may be issues from the Welsh and the Tories (if the Tories look like they will win Wales) about reducing the Welsh number of MPs by 20%.
The Tories are more likely to favour the reduction in seats because it makes it plausible for them to win Wales. It’s the Valleys where the heaviest cuts will fall and although the Tories have made progress there they’re still not in serious contention to win any seats on current boundaries except possibly Gower and a very long shot at Blaenau Gwent.
Plus the changes if along the lines proposed would exterminate Labour outside the south, cut Plaid Cymru in half by costing them the current Carmarthen East and Ceredigion seats and leave Newport and Llanelli both looking vulnerable to a fairly modest Tory swing.
So I do not see that as a problem. There might be a couple of cases of two Tory MPs fighting for the same seat in the north east but actually there are enough tempting targets to go round to buy off any losers.
I was talking more about the optics, it isn't inconceivable that the Tories win* the Senedd elections next month that creates momentum for them for them in the GE, it'll be easy attack line for Labour to use about the Tories reducing Welsh influence in Parliament when they need it the most.
I do not think that will resonate outside the Cardiff/Swansea/Merthyr triangle, if I’m honest. The immediate riposte is ‘you’ve had influence for years and things keep getting worse. Let’s try influencing the other lot.’
Bear in mind, there is only one seat Labour have never held at any level in Wales. They’ve held all the others at one time or another and done fuck all with it. A trade Union exec once told me with a straight face that Nicholas Edwards had done far more for Wales than ever Peter Hain did (On the one occasion I met him, Edwards himself agreed, incidentally, and wasn’t amused when I tripped him up over one or two of his claims).
So I think there isn’t a problem for the Tories in cutting seats outside the Valleys, and there aren’t many likely to go there anyway, while inside the valleys it will make no difference anyway.
Aren't a number of seats in North Wales to go too? Labour only holds one of them.
The way the boundaries were being drawn, with Anglesey protected, that Labour seat is in effect the only one that goes.
There might be a bit of a scuffle between the MP for Montgomeryshire and one of the Clwyd seats, but elsewhere it’s as you were.
In the south west, helpfully, the redrawn seats pitch incumbent Tories against incumbent PC.
It doesn't appear to me as if there are sufficient seats in the North to go round for the available Tory MPs, even if we assume that the successor to the current Alyn & Deeside flips Lab to Con and that one extra seat is added, relative to the 2019 proposals, since Wales is now to receive 32 rather than 29 MPs. I guess that whoever is left without a chair when the music stops will be sent to try to lift Ceredigion plus whatever gets tacked onto it from Plaid, although then again I'm not sure I'd much fancy their chances. They might actually have more luck trying to prise Llanelli away from Labour, if it ends up having some more rural hinterland tacked onto it.
Stephen Crabbe will be the candidate in Ceredigion and North Pembs unless he retires.
Edit - and I would very much fancy their chances there, on current boundaries it would be a fairly comfortable Tory hold.
Llanelli is another one the Tories might begin to challenge in.
Cardigan has never elected a Tory as far as I know - it was Labour-held by Elystan Morgan 1966 - Feb 1974. Rural North Pembrokeshire tends to be less favourable for the Tories than South Pembrokeshire - with significant pockets of support for Plaid and - periodically - the LDs. Tactical anti - Tory voting there might be more effective than many assume. Crabb is not a natural fit there and most of his current seat would be likely to fall into the residual Pembroke seat. He is a Scot by birth - and not obviously culturally Welsh really.
On the proposed boundaries, in 2019, the figures were Con 30,260 Lab 22,636 and Plaid 17,984.
Plaid simply didn’t register in Preseli while in Ceredigion the Tories managed a solid second place.
That’s a pretty safe Tory seat. I can’t help it if you don’t like the figures, those remain the figures. Even if Stephen Crabbe lost every single vote the Tories won in Ceredigion, he would still win the seat ahead of Labour. He’s that far ahead.
Under the FTPA the latest an election can be held is the 2nd of July 2024.
Repealing the FTPA isn't as easy as assumed, it's going to be tricky trying to restore a royal prerogative power especially as the government is going to argue the prerogative powers are not judicially reviewable, that's why the government has got the Lords involved at this early stage.
Perhaps you'd care to clarify? - seems out of line with the 'five year term'.
Following the early election, in December 2019, the next election is scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024. Parliament will be dissolved on 26 March 2024.
and
There is provision for the Prime Minister to make an order to extend this date for a maximum of two months to deal with unexpected developments. He/she must set out the reasons for the delay, and such an order must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before it can be made. One precedent is the foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001 which delayed local elections by one month. (In 2001, the general election was held on the same day as the delayed local elections.)
Thanks. I hadn't appreciated that May was explicitly favoued.
Ok, so May 2024 is an even more likely date than I'd thought.
I think May 2024 will be the date for GE simply for no other reason that boundary changes recommendations will not be received until July 2023.
The primary legislation has been passed but I suspect there may be issues from the Welsh and the Tories (if the Tories look like they will win Wales) about reducing the Welsh number of MPs by 20%.
The Tories are more likely to favour the reduction in seats because it makes it plausible for them to win Wales. It’s the Valleys where the heaviest cuts will fall and although the Tories have made progress there they’re still not in serious contention to win any seats on current boundaries except possibly Gower and a very long shot at Blaenau Gwent.
Plus the changes if along the lines proposed would exterminate Labour outside the south, cut Plaid Cymru in half by costing them the current Carmarthen East and Ceredigion seats and leave Newport and Llanelli both looking vulnerable to a fairly modest Tory swing.
So I do not see that as a problem. There might be a couple of cases of two Tory MPs fighting for the same seat in the north east but actually there are enough tempting targets to go round to buy off any losers.
I was talking more about the optics, it isn't inconceivable that the Tories win* the Senedd elections next month that creates momentum for them for them in the GE, it'll be easy attack line for Labour to use about the Tories reducing Welsh influence in Parliament when they need it the most.
I do not think that will resonate outside the Cardiff/Swansea/Merthyr triangle, if I’m honest. The immediate riposte is ‘you’ve had influence for years and things keep getting worse. Let’s try influencing the other lot.’
Bear in mind, there is only one seat Labour have never held at any level in Wales. They’ve held all the others at one time or another and done fuck all with it. A trade Union exec once told me with a straight face that Nicholas Edwards had done far more for Wales than ever Peter Hain did (On the one occasion I met him, Edwards himself agreed, incidentally, and wasn’t amused when I tripped him up over one or two of his claims).
So I think there isn’t a problem for the Tories in cutting seats outside the Valleys, and there aren’t many likely to go there anyway, while inside the valleys it will make no difference anyway.
Aren't a number of seats in North Wales to go too? Labour only holds one of them.
The way the boundaries were being drawn, with Anglesey protected, that Labour seat is in effect the only one that goes.
There might be a bit of a scuffle between the MP for Montgomeryshire and one of the Clwyd seats, but elsewhere it’s as you were.
In the south west, helpfully, the redrawn seats pitch incumbent Tories against incumbent PC.
It doesn't appear to me as if there are sufficient seats in the North to go round for the available Tory MPs, even if we assume that the successor to the current Alyn & Deeside flips Lab to Con and that one extra seat is added, relative to the 2019 proposals, since Wales is now to receive 32 rather than 29 MPs. I guess that whoever is left without a chair when the music stops will be sent to try to lift Ceredigion plus whatever gets tacked onto it from Plaid, although then again I'm not sure I'd much fancy their chances. They might actually have more luck trying to prise Llanelli away from Labour, if it ends up having some more rural hinterland tacked onto it.
Stephen Crabbe will be the candidate in Ceredigion and North Pembs unless he retires.
Edit - and I would very much fancy their chances there, on current boundaries it would be a fairly comfortable Tory hold.
Llanelli is another one the Tories might begin to challenge in.
Cardigan has never elected a Tory as far as I know - it was Labour-held by Elystan Morgan 1966 - Feb 1974. Rural North Pembrokeshire tends to be less favourable for the Tories than South Pembrokeshire - with significant pockets of support for Plaid and - periodically - the LDs. Tactical anti - Tory voting there might be more effective than many assume. Crabb is not a natural fit there and most of his current seat would be likely to fall into the residual Pembroke seat. He is a Scot by birth - and not obviously culturally Welsh really.
Quite. If the net effect of the boundary changes is not dissimilar to those previously proposed in 2018, then one would've thought that the two sitting Tories in the South West would go for the Carmarthen and Pembroke seats and leave the Ceredigion one well alone.
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
Yes, generally one tower looks better than many, or the one biggest tower has to loom over the others. This aesthetic ideal has now been lost in Canary Wharf, entirely
Imagine the Eiffel Tower surrounded by many similar towers almost as high. It would be meaningless. Despite its impressive height, all impact would be lost. It would be forgotten (as we are now forgetting the Gherkin)
However we do have one singular Eiffel Tower-like Tower: the Shard, which is a masterpiece. if Sadiq Khan can do one good thing in his mayoralty, it is this: forbid the construction of any other towers in the vicinity of The Shard.
The Shard is good because it's on the wrong side of the river and gives a great view of the right side of river and especially the square mile. Otherwise it's far from being a masterpiece. The cheese grater is probably my favourite building in London from an architectural perspective. Our new building is pretty nice too (100 Liverpool Street) the terraces will be absolutely amazing in the summer for a post work beer, it's not a particularly tall building though.
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
Yes, generally one tower looks better than many, or the one biggest tower has to loom over the others. This aesthetic ideal has now been lost in Canary Wharf, entirely
Imagine the Eiffel Tower surrounded by many similar towers almost as high. It would be meaningless. Despite its impressive height, all impact would be lost. It would be forgotten (as we are now forgetting the Gherkin)
However we do have one singular Eiffel Tower-like Tower: the Shard, which is a masterpiece. if Sadiq Khan can do one good thing in his mayoralty, it is this: forbid the construction of any other towers in the vicinity of The Shard.
The Shard is good because it's on the wrong side of the river and gives a great view of the right side of river and especially the square mile. Otherwise it's far from being a masterpiece. The cheese grater is probably my favourite building in London from an architectural perspective. Our new building is pretty nice too (100 Liverpool Street) the terraces will be absolutely amazing in the summer for a post work beer, it's not a particularly tall building though.
The Shard is a slam-dunk masterpiece. It is the only skyscraper in Europe when, as you walk out of the nearest Tube (or Metro, or Subway) you look up every time and go Wow!
Its isolation helps, but also crucial is the way it fades into nothing, making it appear much taller than it is. Jean Nouvel's Tower Without End (Tour Sans Fins) was meant to do the same, but never got built
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
British architects will not seem to countenance buildings which reflect the historical buildings around them. 'Pastiche!', they cry. Yet the buildings around them are often very nice. Why can't we, in Manchester, have gothic skyscrapers to match the gothic style of the best of our Victoriana? Because that would be a pastiche, apparently. But I don't see why that would be bad. If anyone wants to discuss this further the subject geta an airing roughly twice a day over on the skyscraper city blog.
So it seems after one cold afternoon in a garden, it's the 1920s redux. Great - hyperinflation and the charleston and no doubt we'll all be talking flappers (or something similar).
Back in the real world, I'm sure this year will see an outpouring of normality before we get back to normal. Perceived hedonism, rather like imagining one has become enormously attractive to the opposite or same sex (delete as appropriate), is probably a latent effect of lockdown stress brought on by having too much time and not doing anything constructive with it.
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
Yes, generally one tower looks better than many, or the one biggest tower has to loom over the others. This aesthetic ideal has now been lost in Canary Wharf, entirely
Imagine the Eiffel Tower surrounded by many similar towers almost as high. It would be meaningless. Despite its impressive height, all impact would be lost. It would be forgotten (as we are now forgetting the Gherkin)
However we do have one singular Eiffel Tower-like Tower: the Shard, which is a masterpiece. if Sadiq Khan can do one good thing in his mayoralty, it is this: forbid the construction of any other towers in the vicinity of The Shard.
The Shard is good because it's on the wrong side of the river and gives a great view of the right side of river and especially the square mile. Otherwise it's far from being a masterpiece. The cheese grater is probably my favourite building in London from an architectural perspective. Our new building is pretty nice too (100 Liverpool Street) the terraces will be absolutely amazing in the summer for a post work beer, it's not a particularly tall building though.
The great Heaney was born in Northern Ireland - part of today's commonwealth wrote in English was culturally Hiberno-British died in the most British part of Ireland, an area speaking English is buried in Northern Ireland is loved, read and admired throughout the Irish, British and English speaking world
and
is as good a reason as any I can think of why the people of these islands can get on together.
Could we respect him and read him, and not appropriate him?
Kudos for not involving yourself in any of that vulgar appropriating business.
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
Change the law. These are exceptional times.
I doubt very much they will change the law. The whole point of this exercise is to force people into having the ID cards without it actually being a legal requirement. They want it all to be the fault of businesses rather than the Government. That way when it goes horribly wrong they can say it wasn't their intention for it to be enforced in that way. It is classic Johnson tactics.
I still don't understand what vaxport advocates think these things are going to accomplish in the first place. If I am vaccinated and have a vax port and catch covid I will still be mixing with them just like I would be if there was no passport.
If R shoots up despite everyone being vaccinated then we just have to live with it or accept a lockdown for evermore.
This is the fundamental point.
The vaxport brings exactly zero benefits, will cost billions (remind me how much track and trace wasted?), and impinges on civil liberties.
I'm struggling to think of a single good thing about it.
Yes it's completely ridiculous how the whole government seems to have been captured by this idiotic thinking. The vaccines are the way out of this and we will have 90%+ adults vaccinated by the end of June and 95%+ by the end of July once the J&J "jab and go" scheme is introduced for under 25s.
Janet Daley asks in tomorrow's Telegraph: "How did a free people become so relaxed about losing their liberty?"
She might well ask.
I am being told repeatedly that covid tracking mega app is what The People want.
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
Yes, generally one tower looks better than many, or the one biggest tower has to loom over the others. This aesthetic ideal has now been lost in Canary Wharf, entirely
Imagine the Eiffel Tower surrounded by many similar towers almost as high. It would be meaningless. Despite its impressive height, all impact would be lost. It would be forgotten (as we are now forgetting the Gherkin)
However we do have one singular Eiffel Tower-like Tower: the Shard, which is a masterpiece. if Sadiq Khan can do one good thing in his mayoralty, it is this: forbid the construction of any other towers in the vicinity of The Shard.
The Shard is good because it's on the wrong side of the river and gives a great view of the right side of river and especially the square mile. Otherwise it's far from being a masterpiece. The cheese grater is probably my favourite building in London from an architectural perspective. Our new building is pretty nice too (100 Liverpool Street) the terraces will be absolutely amazing in the summer for a post work beer, it's not a particularly tall building though.
Just been to my first social engagement since.... God knows. A barbecue in bouji NW London. Freezing but great fun. Quite emotional
In truth probably my first relaxed social thing for a year: the first time with a sense of real freedom, at least on the horizon
It could be a one-off, or it could be indicative, but it was notably hedonistic. Think middle aged housewives doing lines of coke off the kitchen table (from John Lewis). If it is indicative, then we are in for a rip roaring 2020s
Wonder if there is more coke about in London compared to the rest of the UK
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
British architects will not seem to countenance buildings which reflect the historical buildings around them. 'Pastiche!', they cry. Yet the buildings around them are often very nice. Why can't we, in Manchester, have gothic skyscrapers to match the gothic style of the best of our Victoriana? Because that would be a pastiche, apparently. But I don't see why that would be bad. If anyone wants to discuss this further the subject geta an airing roughly twice a day over on the skyscraper city blog.
I love skyscraper city
Yes the argument over "pastiche" is nuts
The Houses of Parliament are pastiche Gothic. St Paul's is pastiche classical. Almost any building is, in some sense, "pastiche".
The curlicues on top of Corinthian columns, in classical times, are "pastiche" nature - meant to resemble foliage. The little blocks you get on fundamental classical pediments - the "dentils" - are a pastiche of the ends of rafters in earlier wooden buildings
He worked closely with BoZo when twit was at the FCO, so he is a pretty close witness.
That doesn't make him an unbiased observer.
Duncan is a zealous and idiotic Remoaner, who loathes Johnson and Brexit, and has striven to hide this, and has failed completely, time and again. Ignore
"Sir Alan Duncan's long campaign to destroy the career of Boris Johnson "
Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime Starmer....large chunks of his own party will scream racist if he advocates things like more stop and search, tougher sentencing for knife crime and drug dealing...as they do when the Tories wibble about doing such things.
Just look at their reaction when Boris said about not releasing dangerous terrorists early from jail or letting them back into the country.
Under the FTPA the latest an election can be held is the 2nd of July 2024.
Repealing the FTPA isn't as easy as assumed, it's going to be tricky trying to restore a royal prerogative power especially as the government is going to argue the prerogative powers are not judicially reviewable, that's why the government has got the Lords involved at this early stage.
Perhaps you'd care to clarify? - seems out of line with the 'five year term'.
Following the early election, in December 2019, the next election is scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024. Parliament will be dissolved on 26 March 2024.
and
There is provision for the Prime Minister to make an order to extend this date for a maximum of two months to deal with unexpected developments. He/she must set out the reasons for the delay, and such an order must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before it can be made. One precedent is the foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001 which delayed local elections by one month. (In 2001, the general election was held on the same day as the delayed local elections.)
Thanks. I hadn't appreciated that May was explicitly favoued.
Ok, so May 2024 is an even more likely date than I'd thought.
I think May 2024 will be the date for GE simply for no other reason that boundary changes recommendations will not be received until July 2023.
The primary legislation has been passed but I suspect there may be issues from the Welsh and the Tories (if the Tories look like they will win Wales) about reducing the Welsh number of MPs by 20%.
The Tories are more likely to favour the reduction in seats because it makes it plausible for them to win Wales. It’s the Valleys where the heaviest cuts will fall and although the Tories have made progress there they’re still not in serious contention to win any seats on current boundaries except possibly Gower and a very long shot at Blaenau Gwent.
Plus the changes if along the lines proposed would exterminate Labour outside the south, cut Plaid Cymru in half by costing them the current Carmarthen East and Ceredigion seats and leave Newport and Llanelli both looking vulnerable to a fairly modest Tory swing.
So I do not see that as a problem. There might be a couple of cases of two Tory MPs fighting for the same seat in the north east but actually there are enough tempting targets to go round to buy off any losers.
I was talking more about the optics, it isn't inconceivable that the Tories win* the Senedd elections next month that creates momentum for them for them in the GE, it'll be easy attack line for Labour to use about the Tories reducing Welsh influence in Parliament when they need it the most.
I do not think that will resonate outside the Cardiff/Swansea/Merthyr triangle, if I’m honest. The immediate riposte is ‘you’ve had influence for years and things keep getting worse. Let’s try influencing the other lot.’
Bear in mind, there is only one seat Labour have never held at any level in Wales. They’ve held all the others at one time or another and done fuck all with it. A trade Union exec once told me with a straight face that Nicholas Edwards had done far more for Wales than ever Peter Hain did (On the one occasion I met him, Edwards himself agreed, incidentally, and wasn’t amused when I tripped him up over one or two of his claims).
So I think there isn’t a problem for the Tories in cutting seats outside the Valleys, and there aren’t many likely to go there anyway, while inside the valleys it will make no difference anyway.
Aren't a number of seats in North Wales to go too? Labour only holds one of them.
The way the boundaries were being drawn, with Anglesey protected, that Labour seat is in effect the only one that goes.
There might be a bit of a scuffle between the MP for Montgomeryshire and one of the Clwyd seats, but elsewhere it’s as you were.
In the south west, helpfully, the redrawn seats pitch incumbent Tories against incumbent PC.
It doesn't appear to me as if there are sufficient seats in the North to go round for the available Tory MPs, even if we assume that the successor to the current Alyn & Deeside flips Lab to Con and that one extra seat is added, relative to the 2019 proposals, since Wales is now to receive 32 rather than 29 MPs. I guess that whoever is left without a chair when the music stops will be sent to try to lift Ceredigion plus whatever gets tacked onto it from Plaid, although then again I'm not sure I'd much fancy their chances. They might actually have more luck trying to prise Llanelli away from Labour, if it ends up having some more rural hinterland tacked onto it.
Stephen Crabbe will be the candidate in Ceredigion and North Pembs unless he retires.
Edit - and I would very much fancy their chances there, on current boundaries it would be a fairly comfortable Tory hold.
Llanelli is another one the Tories might begin to challenge in.
Cardigan has never elected a Tory as far as I know - it was Labour-held by Elystan Morgan 1966 - Feb 1974. Rural North Pembrokeshire tends to be less favourable for the Tories than South Pembrokeshire - with significant pockets of support for Plaid and - periodically - the LDs. Tactical anti - Tory voting there might be more effective than many assume. Crabb is not a natural fit there and most of his current seat would be likely to fall into the residual Pembroke seat. He is a Scot by birth - and not obviously culturally Welsh really.
Quite. If the net effect of the boundary changes is not dissimilar to those previously proposed in 2018, then one would've thought that the two sitting Tories in the South West would go for the Carmarthen and Pembroke seats and leave the Ceredigion one well alone.
The Carmarthen seat would be a likely Plaid hold - and Pembroke would be vulnerable to Labour in a reasonable year as evidenced by the 1992 result there.
Really enjoying it. I'm watching Drop the Dead Donkey and Men Behaving Badly now, which I remember both being very modern and contemporary at the time but seem rather dated now. I get the jokes about running out of 20ps in phone boxes and British Rail but I'm not sure everyone else will.
Still very funny though. No eggshells, culture war or special interests. Just jokes for laughs.
Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime Starmer....large chunks of his own party will scream racist if he advocates things like more stop and search, tougher sentencing for knife crime and drug dealing...as they do when the Tories wibble about doing such things.
The great Heaney was born in Northern Ireland - part of today's commonwealth wrote in English was culturally Hiberno-British died in the most British part of Ireland, an area speaking English is buried in Northern Ireland is loved, read and admired throughout the Irish, British and English speaking world
and
is as good a reason as any I can think of why the people of these islands can get on together.
Could we respect him and read him, and not appropriate him?
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
That really is going to cause a fabulous number of law suits if they push ahead with it.
No legal requirement to have the app but you are not allowed back into the office without it. Companies try to force people to have the app - which is a change in their terms and conditions. People refuse. Company left with choice. Sack people and face unfair dismissal legal action or back down and people allowed to work from home indefinitely.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
What about people without smartphones? If it's 25% of the population as a whole, it must be over a third of the 40+ population.
So the possibilities. 1 The Johnson government has already reached the "in the bunker detached from reality" phase that Thatcher reached in about 1989 and none of her successors really attained.
2 They know it's a scam, it's never going to happen, but the calculation is that it's in their partisan interest to propose it. Either because it polls well now, or it will allow a " we're so great, we don't need to do this after all" moment in three months' time.
The UK has already done enough jabs to stop pretty much all the foreseeable Covid deaths; say 90%. The EU isn't there yet, but will be there in a few weeks' time.
The UK will hit herd immunity in June and everyone who can be done will be done in July.
The time window where vaxports are needed internally is really short. So the benefits don't outweigh the costs in cash and national cohesion.
Option 3 is there is a small group of anti vaxxers who can be turned by convincing them that life with jabs will be brutish, nasty and short.
Can we agree if nothing else that "vaxport" is a horrible word?
Could be worse. How about the Coronavisa or Cov-ID?
Vaxport is an excellent word. Does exactly what is says on the tin, and reduces two concepts into one word, highly comprehensibly. An absolute model for any new word
You only have to hear it once, or see it, and you get what it probably means
The problem is that it has been taken by several companies (it seems), and I wonder if they can enforce some intellectual property-rights? Can you copyright a new word?!
Can we agree if nothing else that "vaxport" is a horrible word?
Could be worse. How about the Coronavisa or Cov-ID?
Vaxport is an excellent word. Does exactly what is says on the tin, and reduces two concepts into one word, highly comprehensibly. An absolute model for any new word
You only have to hear it once, or see it, and you get what it probably means
You might almost call it an example of a passportmanteau...
Under the FTPA the latest an election can be held is the 2nd of July 2024.
Repealing the FTPA isn't as easy as assumed, it's going to be tricky trying to restore a royal prerogative power especially as the government is going to argue the prerogative powers are not judicially reviewable, that's why the government has got the Lords involved at this early stage.
Perhaps you'd care to clarify? - seems out of line with the 'five year term'.
Following the early election, in December 2019, the next election is scheduled to take place on 2 May 2024. Parliament will be dissolved on 26 March 2024.
and
There is provision for the Prime Minister to make an order to extend this date for a maximum of two months to deal with unexpected developments. He/she must set out the reasons for the delay, and such an order must be approved by both Houses of Parliament before it can be made. One precedent is the foot and mouth disease outbreak in 2001 which delayed local elections by one month. (In 2001, the general election was held on the same day as the delayed local elections.)
Thanks. I hadn't appreciated that May was explicitly favoued.
Ok, so May 2024 is an even more likely date than I'd thought.
I think May 2024 will be the date for GE simply for no other reason that boundary changes recommendations will not be received until July 2023.
The primary legislation has been passed but I suspect there may be issues from the Welsh and the Tories (if the Tories look like they will win Wales) about reducing the Welsh number of MPs by 20%.
The Tories are more likely to favour the reduction in seats because it makes it plausible for them to win Wales. It’s the Valleys where the heaviest cuts will fall and although the Tories have made progress there they’re still not in serious contention to win any seats on current boundaries except possibly Gower and a very long shot at Blaenau Gwent.
Plus the changes if along the lines proposed would exterminate Labour outside the south, cut Plaid Cymru in half by costing them the current Carmarthen East and Ceredigion seats and leave Newport and Llanelli both looking vulnerable to a fairly modest Tory swing.
So I do not see that as a problem. There might be a couple of cases of two Tory MPs fighting for the same seat in the north east but actually there are enough tempting targets to go round to buy off any losers.
I was talking more about the optics, it isn't inconceivable that the Tories win* the Senedd elections next month that creates momentum for them for them in the GE, it'll be easy attack line for Labour to use about the Tories reducing Welsh influence in Parliament when they need it the most.
I do not think that will resonate outside the Cardiff/Swansea/Merthyr triangle, if I’m honest. The immediate riposte is ‘you’ve had influence for years and things keep getting worse. Let’s try influencing the other lot.’
Bear in mind, there is only one seat Labour have never held at any level in Wales. They’ve held all the others at one time or another and done fuck all with it. A trade Union exec once told me with a straight face that Nicholas Edwards had done far more for Wales than ever Peter Hain did (On the one occasion I met him, Edwards himself agreed, incidentally, and wasn’t amused when I tripped him up over one or two of his claims).
So I think there isn’t a problem for the Tories in cutting seats outside the Valleys, and there aren’t many likely to go there anyway, while inside the valleys it will make no difference anyway.
Aren't a number of seats in North Wales to go too? Labour only holds one of them.
The way the boundaries were being drawn, with Anglesey protected, that Labour seat is in effect the only one that goes.
There might be a bit of a scuffle between the MP for Montgomeryshire and one of the Clwyd seats, but elsewhere it’s as you were.
In the south west, helpfully, the redrawn seats pitch incumbent Tories against incumbent PC.
It doesn't appear to me as if there are sufficient seats in the North to go round for the available Tory MPs, even if we assume that the successor to the current Alyn & Deeside flips Lab to Con and that one extra seat is added, relative to the 2019 proposals, since Wales is now to receive 32 rather than 29 MPs. I guess that whoever is left without a chair when the music stops will be sent to try to lift Ceredigion plus whatever gets tacked onto it from Plaid, although then again I'm not sure I'd much fancy their chances. They might actually have more luck trying to prise Llanelli away from Labour, if it ends up having some more rural hinterland tacked onto it.
Stephen Crabbe will be the candidate in Ceredigion and North Pembs unless he retires.
Edit - and I would very much fancy their chances there, on current boundaries it would be a fairly comfortable Tory hold.
Llanelli is another one the Tories might begin to challenge in.
Cardigan has never elected a Tory as far as I know - it was Labour-held by Elystan Morgan 1966 - Feb 1974. Rural North Pembrokeshire tends to be less favourable for the Tories than South Pembrokeshire - with significant pockets of support for Plaid and - periodically - the LDs. Tactical anti - Tory voting there might be more effective than many assume. Crabb is not a natural fit there and most of his current seat would be likely to fall into the residual Pembroke seat. He is a Scot by birth - and not obviously culturally Welsh really.
Quite. If the net effect of the boundary changes is not dissimilar to those previously proposed in 2018, then one would've thought that the two sitting Tories in the South West would go for the Carmarthen and Pembroke seats and leave the Ceredigion one well alone.
The Carmarthen seat would be a likely Plaid hold - and Pembroke would be vulnerable to Labour in a reasonable year as evidenced by the 1992 result there.
You think? Carmarthen East is a marginal and Plaid are nowhere in Carmarthen West & S Pembs.
The Pembroke seat's not going to Labour unless there's a fairly hefty swing (7% at a rough guess.)
Hopefully that's true, it's amazing what the opposition actually fucking opposing the government can achieve. Hopefully Starmer realises the power of opposition, especially given that there are at least 50 Tory MPs who will vote against any of the government virus measures at any time.
Not just Italy - they're all at it. In Spain if you are in the 65-75 range you're too young for Pfizer or Moderna by 6-8 weeks and too old to be offered AZT. The level of madness is extraordinary to behold.
It is a deliberate strategy in a lot of countries, like the Philippines, because they believe it's more important to give it to the people who are most likely to spread the virus.
Not in Spain - the only 'strategy' is to mpanic about blood clots and save doses for the second shot:
"The UK has now fully vaccinated almost double the number of people in Spain (5.2 million against 2.8 million). Spain continues to sit on about 1.1 million unused doses of vaccine, according to https://www.mscbs.gob.es/.../alert.../nCov/vacunaCovid19.htm The daily number of deaths across the UK on Friday was 10; in Almería province alone, it was 7."
So it seems after one cold afternoon in a garden, it's the 1920s redux. Great - hyperinflation and the charleston and no doubt we'll all be talking flappers (or something similar).
Back in the real world, I'm sure this year will see an outpouring of normality before we get back to normal. Perceived hedonism, rather like imagining one has become enormously attractive to the opposite or same sex (delete as appropriate), is probably a latent effect of lockdown stress brought on by having too much time and not doing anything constructive with it.
The clock tower is Victorian, and generally agreed to be the centre of the city. In the background is the Haymarket Centre, which is a bit of an eyesore. Leicester City centre is a mixture of mostly Victorian gothic, and a fair bit of post war concrete. Most British cities are architecturally a mess.
Alas, all of our cities and most of our towns suffer from carbuncles. The centres of many of the post-War New Towns consist of little else (the centre of Stevenage, for example, could do with being demolished and rebuilt almost entirely from scratch.) It'll be the work of centuries to put right all of the damage.
Too often we're adding to the damage, rather than seeking to put it right.
The hideous new development at Nine Elms is an obvious example.
Why are architects so obsessed with building ugly boxes?
Hard to say. At least the new London towers have the vigour of height. The problem is the proximity of London City Airport and Heathrow means there is a ceiling on scale - the Shard is as high as you can go, because of CAA safety limits.
This is the reason Canary Wharf is gaining an unpleasant table top appearance, when a pyramidal effect is generally considered more aesthetically pleasing: ie one massive tower with others being supportive but smaller
On the other hand I thought 22 Bishopsgate was an unmediated disaster (compared to the Pinnacle which was meant to be there) but from some angles (eg the South Bank) is works really well
Yes, generally one tower looks better than many, or the one biggest tower has to loom over the others. This aesthetic ideal has now been lost in Canary Wharf, entirely
Imagine the Eiffel Tower surrounded by many similar towers almost as high. It would be meaningless. Despite its impressive height, all impact would be lost. It would be forgotten (as we are now forgetting the Gherkin)
However we do have one singular Eiffel Tower-like Tower: the Shard, which is a masterpiece. if Sadiq Khan can do one good thing in his mayoralty, it is this: forbid the construction of any other towers in the vicinity of The Shard.
The Shard is good because it's on the wrong side of the river and gives a great view of the right side of river and especially the square mile. Otherwise it's far from being a masterpiece. The cheese grater is probably my favourite building in London from an architectural perspective. Our new building is pretty nice too (100 Liverpool Street) the terraces will be absolutely amazing in the summer for a post work beer, it's not a particularly tall building though.
Nice, mine was of the Thames but I wasn't lucky enough to be next to a window so it was just other desks/people really.
I used to be based in an office just at the south end of Tower Bridge. From my desk I had views of the river, the bridge, Tower of London, City Hall and that hotel across the river that looks more like it should be the HQ of the Stasi.
We could also see guns being fired outside the Tower on royal birthdays and the like.
The great Heaney was born in Northern Ireland - part of today's commonwealth wrote in English was culturally Hiberno-British died in the most British part of Ireland, an area speaking English is buried in Northern Ireland is loved, read and admired throughout the Irish, British and English speaking world
and
is as good a reason as any I can think of why the people of these islands can get on together.
Could we respect him and read him, and not appropriate him?
Kudos for not involving yourself in any of that vulgar appropriating business.
How kind but he isn't mine to give away. And he was better than all of us. But I shall go away and read about Doctor Kerlin's bag, and think Easter thoughts about how good he was at translating old saxon into modern saxon.
I would wonder if the government had lost their minds, were it not for the minor detail I never thought they found them in the first place.
The Government are genuinely mad if they try to force this through.
What about people without smartphones? If it's 25% of the population as a whole, it must be over a third of the 40+ population.
So the possibilities. 1 The Johnson government has already reached the "in the bunker detached from reality" phase that Thatcher reached in about 1989 and none of her successors really attained.
2 They know it's a scam, it's never going to happen, but the calculation is that it's in their partisan interest to propose it. Either because it polls well now, or it will allow a " we're so great, we don't need to do this after all" moment in three months' time.
The UK has already done enough jabs to stop pretty much all the foreseeable Covid deaths; say 90%. The EU isn't there yet, but will be there in a few weeks' time.
Agree with you on Vaccine Passport.
I don't believe the EU will be at "stop 90% of deaths" point in a few weeks. There are a lot of assumptions in that statement.
If we take the point as 50% of adult population (ie equivalent to our groups 1..9), then for EU that is 180m people jabbed twice, dependant on policy. Or 360m jabs.
Minus 76m done. Leaves 285m to do.
To reach that in 70 days (10 weeks) will be a rate of 0.9% of the population jabbed per day on average.
The best rate so far is 0.25% or so on occasional days,
It is going to take until the end of April to ramp that up at all significantly, and that means it needs to get a lot higher to generate the 10 week date.
So I would say it will be at least the end of May or into June before it gets to that point.
J&J single jab will help. Chaos in the order of jabbing to not follow medical priorities will undermine. More chaotic health info nearly everywhere than UK will hinder.
Plus it needs a month extra for vaccines to get through the system and immunity to build.
I presume the Prime Minister is picking up from the Conservative grassroots the proposed vaccine passport scheme may not be as popular as when first promulgated.
One might argue it's the sign of an effective Prime Minister that he or she isn't wholly inflexible and is prepared to be persuaded to change a view based on argument.
One might also argue it's the sign of an ineffective Prime Minister who is prepared to dump whatever he or she believed in if it no longer commands a majority.
Hopefully that's true, it's amazing what the opposition actually fucking opposing the government can achieve. Hopefully Starmer realises the power of opposition, especially given that there are at least 50 Tory MPs who will vote against any of the government virus measures at any time.
Starmer is on the fence on this issue saying it may be unbritish whilst his shadow cabinet brief that they support it, whereas the LibDems came out and said 'no way' to this bonkers, illiberal idea.
Comments
born in Northern Ireland - part of today's commonwealth
wrote in English
was culturally Hiberno-British
died in the most British part of Ireland, an area speaking English
is buried in Northern Ireland
is loved, read and admired throughout the Irish, British and English speaking world
and
is as good a reason as any I can think of why the people of these islands can get on together.
Could we respect him and read him, and not appropriate him?
And they shouldn't be congregating in the kitchen either.
In this instance Duncan appears to be pretty much in line with everyone else whose dealt with Johnson.
https://www.shutterstock.com/editorial/image-editorial/london-docklands-skyline-canary-wharf-1996-picture-1079783a
I feel for Starmer. He is like a doctor who entirely understands the problem, diagnoses it correctly, sees it is a bacterial infection - but is legally unable to administer anti-biotics, or he will lose his job.
So he is only allowed to make positive noises, and do non medical therapeutic interventions (drink lots of water! get lots of rest!) in the hope that Labour recovers
Meanwhile the Tories are playing drill music next door 24/7, and denying the supply of water
Basically he was rude about everyone who was promoted when his undoubtedly magnificent talents (at least in his own mind) were overlooked.
"Sir Alan Duncan's long campaign to destroy the career of Boris Johnson "
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/07/22/sir-alan-duncans-long-campaign-destroy-career-boris-johnson/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnyVInblipE
Edit - and I would very much fancy their chances there, on current boundaries it would be a fairly comfortable Tory hold.
Llanelli is another one the Tories might begin to challenge in.
Imagine the Eiffel Tower surrounded by many similar towers almost as high. It would be meaningless. Despite its impressive height, all impact would be lost. It would be forgotten (as we are now forgetting the Gherkin)
However we do have one singular Eiffel Tower-like Tower: the Shard, which is a masterpiece. if Sadiq Khan can do one good thing in his mayoralty, it is this: forbid the construction of any other towers in the vicinity of The Shard.
Our host had basically built a small pub in a back garden. It was built to be the exact size needed for a pool table, plus a bar. It is a thing of joy and will become our venue of choice if you end up having to wear facemasks to go to real pubs.
Oh, and not freezing at all in South Manchester - shorts and t-shirts weather.
But I agree with your conclusion - the 20s will be a cascade of hedonism, if we can get through them without another pandemic, world war three or a descent into a surveillance state.
The vaxport brings exactly zero benefits, will cost billions (remind me how much track and trace wasted?), and impinges on civil liberties.
I'm struggling to think of a single good thing about it.
Good night.
The booze and the drugs masked it well, however. In the end
Thus, it is possible that moderate nationwide swings to Labour might cause them to revert, but it's also possible that - previous allegiances and voting habits having been broken - they'll become more typical Tory territory. Time will tell.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9432715/Thousands-Kill-Bill-activists-march-central-London.html
If they are genuinely going to do this...
https://twitter.com/Zaatart/status/1153335536838500352
What he discovered, dear reader, is that the answer was 'Yes!'
1 The Johnson government has already reached the "in the bunker detached from reality" phase that Thatcher reached in about 1989 and none of her successors really attained.
2 They know it's a scam, it's never going to happen, but the calculation is that it's in their partisan interest to propose it. Either because it polls well now, or it will allow a " we're so great, we don't need to do this after all" moment in three months' time.
I must have missed something else for 3.
To restate the b#++@#y obvious;
The UK has already done enough jabs to stop pretty much all the foreseeable Covid deaths; say 90%. The EU isn't there yet, but will be there in a few weeks' time.
The UK will hit herd immunity in June and everyone who can be done will be done in July.
The time window where vaxports are needed internally is really short. So the benefits don't outweigh the costs in cash and national cohesion.
He lived in NI until 1976 (?).
UK is in the Commonwealth.
Crabb is not a natural fit there and most of his current seat would be likely to fall into the residual Pembroke seat. He is a Scot by birth - and not obviously culturally Welsh really.
Gower also fell to the Tories in 2015 only to see Labour regain it in 2017 - and retain in 2019.
Plaid simply didn’t register in Preseli while in Ceredigion the Tories managed a solid second place.
That’s a pretty safe Tory seat. I can’t help it if you don’t like the figures, those remain the figures. Even if Stephen Crabbe lost every single vote the Tories won in Ceredigion, he would still win the seat ahead of Labour. He’s that far ahead.
And this time, it really is good night.
https://1drv.ms/u/s!Av4jQcUMVtBpjgJaryMZ90mDP0Sn
Its isolation helps, but also crucial is the way it fades into nothing, making it appear much taller than it is. Jean Nouvel's Tower Without End (Tour Sans Fins) was meant to do the same, but never got built
https://en.phorio.com/tour_sans_fins,_paris,_france
http://www.jeannouvel.com/en/projects/tour-sans-fins/
Londoners should cherish it as much as St Paul's Cathedral, it is that good. I fear they won't
If anyone wants to discuss this further the subject geta an airing roughly twice a day over on the skyscraper city blog.
So it seems after one cold afternoon in a garden, it's the 1920s redux. Great - hyperinflation and the charleston and no doubt we'll all be talking flappers (or something similar).
Back in the real world, I'm sure this year will see an outpouring of normality before we get back to normal. Perceived hedonism, rather like imagining one has become enormously attractive to the opposite or same sex (delete as appropriate), is probably a latent effect of lockdown stress brought on by having too much time and not doing anything constructive with it.
If only we could knock down Guy's Hospital, which is one of the ugliest buildings in the entire world, it would look even better
She might well ask.
I am being told repeatedly that covid tracking mega app is what The People want.
Yes the argument over "pastiche" is nuts
The Houses of Parliament are pastiche Gothic. St Paul's is pastiche classical. Almost any building is, in some sense, "pastiche".
The curlicues on top of Corinthian columns, in classical times, are "pastiche" nature - meant to resemble foliage. The little blocks you get on fundamental classical pediments - the "dentils" - are a pastiche of the ends of rafters in earlier wooden buildings
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dentil
I think with Alan Duncan there's nothing more political than a personal grudge.
It's a horrible word for a horrible idea.
We entered Covidtide together. We suffered together; some more than others. If there is such a thing as society, we should leave it together.
(Especially if we're talking about a few weeks, which we are.)
https://twitter.com/Femi_Sorry/status/1378338963312803841
Just look at their reaction when Boris said about not releasing dangerous terrorists early from jail or letting them back into the country.
Labour planning for an early election
Really enjoying it. I'm watching Drop the Dead Donkey and Men Behaving Badly now, which I remember both being very modern and contemporary at the time but seem rather dated now. I get the jokes about running out of 20ps in phone boxes and British Rail but I'm not sure everyone else will.
Still very funny though. No eggshells, culture war or special interests. Just jokes for laughs.
Good.
You only have to hear it once, or see it, and you get what it probably means
The problem is that it has been taken by several companies (it seems), and I wonder if they can enforce some intellectual property-rights? Can you copyright a new word?!
The Pembroke seat's not going to Labour unless there's a fairly hefty swing (7% at a rough guess.)
https://twitter.com/BNODesk/status/1378428836669456388?s=19
We'll see if we get any kind of announcement on Monday, but it doesn't necessarily follow that he won't change his mind after that.
"The UK has now fully vaccinated almost double the number of people in Spain (5.2 million against 2.8 million).
Spain continues to sit on about 1.1 million unused doses of vaccine, according to https://www.mscbs.gob.es/.../alert.../nCov/vacunaCovid19.htm
The daily number of deaths across the UK on Friday was 10; in Almería province alone, it was 7."
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FB0zofK6tDM
We could also see guns being fired outside the Tower on royal birthdays and the like.
Either the Government's not briefed all this to the rag and they're printing rumours, or ministers haven't a clue what they're doing.
There's a lot of amateur bookmaking in it.
I don't believe the EU will be at "stop 90% of deaths" point in a few weeks. There are a lot of assumptions in that statement.
If we take the point as 50% of adult population (ie equivalent to our groups 1..9), then for EU that is 180m people jabbed twice, dependant on policy. Or 360m jabs.
Minus 76m done. Leaves 285m to do.
To reach that in 70 days (10 weeks) will be a rate of 0.9% of the population jabbed per day on average.
The best rate so far is 0.25% or so on occasional days,
It is going to take until the end of April to ramp that up at all significantly, and that means it needs to get a lot higher to generate the 10 week date.
So I would say it will be at least the end of May or into June before it gets to that point.
J&J single jab will help. Chaos in the order of jabbing to not follow medical priorities will undermine. More chaotic health info nearly everywhere than UK will hinder.
Plus it needs a month extra for vaccines to get through the system and immunity to build.
So I am not very optimistic.
One might argue it's the sign of an effective Prime Minister that he or she isn't wholly inflexible and is prepared to be persuaded to change a view based on argument.
One might also argue it's the sign of an ineffective Prime Minister who is prepared to dump whatever he or she believed in if it no longer commands a majority.
So
1) Website/newspaper announces x will do y
2) Tons of clicks
3) Website/newspaper announces x will not do y
4) Tons of clicks