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My email from Boris suggests the Tory database is not as sophisticated as you might expect – politic

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  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    Dura_Ace said:

    HYUFD said:



    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years

    That analysis will not survive a Sinn Fein government. They are already the largest party in the Dail and FG/FF had to form a coalition of the unwilling to keep them out.
    And that was only possible because Sinn Fein hadn't expected to get anywhere like the seats they actually won so gave seats away by not having candidates.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,724

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.
    But it's patently not true. Whilst Garage might come across as a little Englander in caricature, he has a German wife, and is an atlanticist. Boris is bumbling but is very much a social liberal. More a randy professor than a retired major. On the left you had people like Gisela Stuart (not a little Englander) and in normal times Corbyn and his ilk against the EU business club. You can't get to 17 million with the group's you describe - you get to a million or so - historic UKIP general election levels
    On Referendum Day I was part of a team doing some last minute Remain-supporting in out local market. Middle class area, generally fairly positive, or at least polite.

    A driver, delivering to one of the local shops though told me 'Definitely WON'T be voting your way!' 'Why?" 'Them" Couldn't ask more, he was obviously on a tight schedule, but I've often regretted him not being able to talk for a minute longer.
  • eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,719
    edited April 2021
    Dura_Ace said:

    HYUFD said:



    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years

    That analysis will not survive a Sinn Fein government. They are already the largest party in the Dail and FG/FF had to form a coalition of the unwilling to keep them out.
    There will not be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland, latest poll in Ireland has FG on 30%, SF on 29% and FF on 11%, so FG and FF still have comfortably more combined than SF.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Irish_general_election

    The irony of course is that while the DUP work with Sinn Fein in government in Northern Ireland, FG and FF refuse to work with Sinn Fein in the Republic
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,226
    FF43 said:

    moonshine said:

    FF43 said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    But equally why do you push back on Scott's "Little Englander" comment, when that seems to be what you want?
    I am like Don Corleone. I’m not interested in things that don’t concern me. If a majority of Scots want self rule then what business is that of mine? Equally very happy to have them in the Union of that’s what they want.

    My overriding belief is power is best exercised by the individual. Where thats not possible or is inappropriate, it should be as localised, accountable and transparent as possible.

    Where does the current arrangement sit against that metric? That’s for the Scots to decide, whatever my private view.
    I assume you are English? What do you want for England?
    Goodness now there’s a question. I’d like England to win the football World Cup in my lifetime certainly. I have some big holes to dig right now so can’t give you a deeper answer I’m afraid.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    Its not about laziness remotely. That's an insane suggestion and is like suggesting that Amazon's business is about attracting customs too lazy to pick up the phone. Or anyone else that has an online website.

    The ability to browse dozens of restaurants, pick one, browse their menu and then place an order all on one site makes great sense.
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    Do you wanna buy a bridge?

    I’ve 70 million of them out the back.

    Everyone has a price. We now know what Dave’s is. Your mate is radioactive I’m afraid.
  • AlanbrookeAlanbrooke Posts: 23,559
    eek said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    HYUFD said:



    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years

    That analysis will not survive a Sinn Fein government. They are already the largest party in the Dail and FG/FF had to form a coalition of the unwilling to keep them out.
    And that was only possible because Sinn Fein hadn't expected to get anywhere like the seats they actually won so gave seats away by not having candidates.
    No as I forecast some time back FG\FF will have to merge, whats the point of two RoC parties split by a rfight a century old which none of them can remember . SF is clearly left wing and will fight on that basis. However it is essentially the political arm of the Irish Mafia, how that will play in future years God knows.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 47,789
    edited April 2021
    UK exports to France and Germany in February 2021 bounced back to the level in December 2020.
    https://twitter.com/julianHjessop/status/1380433922702647297
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    HYUFD said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    HYUFD said:



    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years

    That analysis will not survive a Sinn Fein government. They are already the largest party in the Dail and FG/FF had to form a coalition of the unwilling to keep them out.
    There will not be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland, latest poll in Ireland has FG on 30%, SF on 29% and FF on 11%, so FG and FF still have comfortably more combined than SF.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Irish_general_election

    The irony of course is that while the DUP work with Sinn Fein in government in Northern Ireland, FG and FF refuse to work with Sinn Fein in the Republic
    There absolutely may be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland one day.

    The DUP only work with Sinn Fein because they have no choice in the matter, they need to do so. If it reaches a point where Sinn Fein can force their way into government (and stranger things have happened) then they could end up in office.

    The problem with "grand coalitions" being in government is that government's tend to lose support to the opposition. So even the grand coalition eventually becomes not enough.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739

    Spotify all the way. With the Good Stuff recorded onto MiniDisc so that I have a hard copy.

    MiniDisc is great, if you don't actually care about sound quality...
  • AlanbrookeAlanbrooke Posts: 23,559

    HYUFD said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    HYUFD said:



    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years

    That analysis will not survive a Sinn Fein government. They are already the largest party in the Dail and FG/FF had to form a coalition of the unwilling to keep them out.
    There will not be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland, latest poll in Ireland has FG on 30%, SF on 29% and FF on 11%, so FG and FF still have comfortably more combined than SF.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Irish_general_election

    The irony of course is that while the DUP work with Sinn Fein in government in Northern Ireland, FG and FF refuse to work with Sinn Fein in the Republic
    There absolutely may be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland one day.

    The DUP only work with Sinn Fein because they have no choice in the matter, they need to do so. If it reaches a point where Sinn Fein can force their way into government (and stranger things have happened) then they could end up in office.

    The problem with "grand coalitions" being in government is that government's tend to lose support to the opposition. So even the grand coalition eventually becomes not enough.
    In a UI SF would be the biggest party in Ireland and by right would have the first crack at forming a govt.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    UK exports to France and Germany in February 2021 bounced back to the level in December 2020.
    https://twitter.com/julianHjessop/status/1380433922702647297

    LOL. Surprise, surprise.

    That's actually better than I expected.
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    moonshine said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    It’s a perfect anecdote to represent the chumocracy he presided over. Cant see the bad in people because they went to Oxford so must be a good sort.
    I hate to shit on your theory, but Lex Greensill went to the Universities of Queensland and Manchester.

    He saw sense and avoided Oxford.
    🤢 he sounds like a right pleb
    Queensland is a great university
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,719
    edited April 2021

    HYUFD said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    HYUFD said:



    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years

    That analysis will not survive a Sinn Fein government. They are already the largest party in the Dail and FG/FF had to form a coalition of the unwilling to keep them out.
    There will not be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland, latest poll in Ireland has FG on 30%, SF on 29% and FF on 11%, so FG and FF still have comfortably more combined than SF.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Irish_general_election

    The irony of course is that while the DUP work with Sinn Fein in government in Northern Ireland, FG and FF refuse to work with Sinn Fein in the Republic
    There absolutely may be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland one day.

    The DUP only work with Sinn Fein because they have no choice in the matter, they need to do so. If it reaches a point where Sinn Fein can force their way into government (and stranger things have happened) then they could end up in office.

    The problem with "grand coalitions" being in government is that government's tend to lose support to the opposition. So even the grand coalition eventually becomes not enough.
    There will not be, less than a third of Irish votes in Ireland vote Sinn Fein and FG and FF will always likely have more combined than Sinn Fein and work together to keep Sinn Fein out.

    However it would not matter if Sinn Fein got 100% of the vote in Ireland of course provided Unionist parties combined still win more votes than Nationalist parties combined in NI there would be no mandate in NI for a United Ireland.

    Plus as I have said loyalist paramilitaries would resort to violence in Antrim, Down and Derry and loyalists would also likely declare UDI than ever submit to Sinn Fein rule from Dublin, so it would be a recipe for Irish civil war 2
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
  • NemtynakhtNemtynakht Posts: 2,311
    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Another cartoon the fanbois will not like


    I doubt that such imagery will distress that portion of the electorate that both voted Leave and doesn't particularly care about Northern Ireland - i.e. most of them.

    I'm afraid that a lot of Unionists still haven't appreciated that Brexit isn't their real problem, it's that the British state itself has been fatally undermined by the total mess created by devolution. De jure the UK is still a unitary state; de facto it's neither that nor a fully-functional federation, but a wobbly, uneven, lop-sided confederacy, in which - unlike the vast majority of the world's nations - a right of secession is assumed. The result is that, with every passing year, the percentage of people within its borders who think of themselves as actually being British declines and the forces pulling it apart become that bit stronger.

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise. The cause is that the UK is now a horrible chimera of an institution, still with some of the attributes of a conventional sovereign state but in many respects rather like a small, crap European Union - with a central authority that nobody likes, where all the members increasingly dislike each other, and where there's a one-way ratchet not of "more powers" but "less powers" as the clock ticks balefully towards its inevitable collapse.

    As to whether the reality of their doomed situation has yet to dawn on the Loyalist rioters in Belfast, and they therefore think that their nonsense might still get them somewhere, or it has and they're acting out of nihilistic despair, who can say? The important point to absorb is that most voters in England, especially those likely to support the Conservatives, don't care very much about Northern Ireland - and why should they? In Scotland, Northern Ireland, and increasingly in Wales as well (where Labour is a nationalistic force that now offers pro-independence candidates to the electorate,) the political scene is full of angry nationalists who like nothing about England except its money. For them, the devolved parliaments represent the sole legitimate expression of the political will of their respective peoples; the British state is an imperial master to be defied and pulled down. The English, meanwhile, who don't get to have a parliament, are meant to sit there, disregard their own interests and hand over fat bribes every year in order to prevent the whole thing collapsing. It's small wonder that this doesn't work very well.
    Leave voters should care about Northern Ireland and the DUP in particular. After all if the DUP had not been in the Commons in 2017 to prop up the Tories there would have been a majority in the Commons for EUref2, EEA or the Customs Union at least combining Labour, the SNP, some LDs, the Greens, Plaid and anti Brexit Tories like Grieve and Soubry and Ken Clarke.

    Remember 276 MPs voted against staying in the Customs Union in early 2019 (including the 10 DUP) and 273 voted to stay in.

    Plus of course Wales voted Leave, London voted Remain
    Surely the leave bus has now gone. People voted 5 years ago - that's almost a generation in Scotland, and the DUP - in a true Ulster says no fashion - said no to every deal put in front of them.
  • BournvilleBournville Posts: 303
    The way it works is that the Conservatives (both CCHQ and your local association) use a database called Votesource. Typically, local associations will upload voting intentions and contact information, when given, to Votesource. CCHQ then uses this for mass emails and more sophisticated data analysis.

    In 2019, CCHQ decided to go with a new targeting system that was meant to target likely Conservative voters without a recent known voting intention, using specific demographics (age, gender, house price, etc). Although not everyone in the selected demographics will be Conservative, the calculation is that more will than won't, so there is a net benefit to contacting all of them if you can, even if some of them end up motivated to vote against.

    What has probably happened here is that Mike has previously given contact information but no recent voting intention to his local Conservative association, falls into a target group based on his demographics, and so is being caught up in CCHQ's regular trawling operations.
  • kjhkjh Posts: 10,468
    edited April 2021
    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
  • ridaligoridaligo Posts: 174
    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    I disagree. Blair's stupid devolution bill let the genie out of the bottle. Scottish Independence has been inevitable since then, Brexit or no Brexit. Brexit may well accelerate it, I'll grant you that.

    As a Scottish Brit, I can't tell you how desperately sad I am that my country is heading toward this disaster, driven by resentment of the English - for that's what lies behind all the Nat policies despite their protestations to the contrary. I know - I was born, raised and educated in Scotland. This is not about independence - how could it be when the number one priority post-Indy will be the join the EU? It's about anti-English sentiment and I despise them for it.

    Once they've got their way, and the Nats only have to be lucky once, I really fear for the future of my homeland give the lack of quality evident in the Scottish political class. The petty, manufactured differences in approach to the COVID measures tells you all you need to know about their priorities - they can't possibly do the same as the English, oh no. These people really are not qualified to govern as the decline in Education standards bears witness. And when it comes to any substantive policy on independence, they haven't got a clue. Exhibit A - the currency issue.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    While consistently losing money, hoping to struggle along to the IPO so the initial investors can cash out.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739

    Surely the leave bus has now gone.

    Not exactly


  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    On the local election front, I am yet to receive any literature other than a crappy Labour leaflet.

    Who am I supposed to vote for?

    I just got the neutral mayors brioche. Utterly useless. All the candidates are pledging to stand up for the police, cut the cost of transport and make the streets cleaner and greener 🙄
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,719

    The way it works is that the Conservatives (both CCHQ and your local association) use a database called Votesource. Typically, local associations will upload voting intentions and contact information, when given, to Votesource. CCHQ then uses this for mass emails and more sophisticated data analysis.

    In 2019, CCHQ decided to go with a new targeting system that was meant to target likely Conservative voters without a recent known voting intention, using specific demographics (age, gender, house price, etc). Although not everyone in the selected demographics will be Conservative, the calculation is that more will than won't, so there is a net benefit to contacting all of them if you can, even if some of them end up motivated to vote against.

    What has probably happened here is that Mike has previously given contact information but no recent voting intention to his local Conservative association, falls into a target group based on his demographics, and so is being caught up in CCHQ's regular trawling operations.

    Indeed, Mike is a male home owner aged over 65, classic Tory demographic
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,724
    HYUFD said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    HYUFD said:



    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years

    That analysis will not survive a Sinn Fein government. They are already the largest party in the Dail and FG/FF had to form a coalition of the unwilling to keep them out.
    There will not be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland, latest poll in Ireland has FG on 30%, SF on 29% and FF on 11%, so FG and FF still have comfortably more combined than SF.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Irish_general_election

    The irony of course is that while the DUP work with Sinn Fein in government in Northern Ireland, FG and FF refuse to work with Sinn Fein in the Republic
    But according to the terms of the Agreement the parties in N.Ireland MUST work together. That's why Naomi Long's in Government. However if, at the next election SF gets the largest number of seats it will provide the First Minister.
  • ridaligoridaligo Posts: 174

    Scott_xP said:

    Another cartoon the fanbois will not like


    I doubt that such imagery will distress that portion of the electorate that both voted Leave and doesn't particularly care about Northern Ireland - i.e. most of them.

    I'm afraid that a lot of Unionists still haven't appreciated that Brexit isn't their real problem, it's that the British state itself has been fatally undermined by the total mess created by devolution. De jure the UK is still a unitary state; de facto it's neither that nor a fully-functional federation, but a wobbly, uneven, lop-sided confederacy, in which - unlike the vast majority of the world's nations - a right of secession is assumed. The result is that, with every passing year, the percentage of people within its borders who think of themselves as actually being British declines and the forces pulling it apart become that bit stronger.

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise. The cause is that the UK is now a horrible chimera of an institution, still with some of the attributes of a conventional sovereign state but in many respects rather like a small, crap European Union - with a central authority that nobody likes, where all the members increasingly dislike each other, and where there's a one-way ratchet not of "more powers" but "less powers" as the clock ticks balefully towards its inevitable collapse.

    As to whether the reality of their doomed situation has yet to dawn on the Loyalist rioters in Belfast, and they therefore think that their nonsense might still get them somewhere, or it has and they're acting out of nihilistic despair, who can say? The important point to absorb is that most voters in England, especially those likely to support the Conservatives, don't care very much about Northern Ireland - and why should they? In Scotland, Northern Ireland, and increasingly in Wales as well (where Labour is a nationalistic force that now offers pro-independence candidates to the electorate,) the political scene is full of angry nationalists who like nothing about England except its money. For them, the devolved parliaments represent the sole legitimate expression of the political will of their respective peoples; the British state is an imperial master to be defied and pulled down. The English, meanwhile, who don't get to have a parliament, are meant to sit there, disregard their own interests and hand over fat bribes every year in order to prevent the whole thing collapsing. It's small wonder that this doesn't work very well.
    Poor little England, abused, exploited and without the balls to do anything about it. When will the agony end?!
    QED.
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,288

    UK exports to France and Germany in February 2021 bounced back to the level in December 2020.
    https://twitter.com/julianHjessop/status/1380433922702647297

    Selling them Astra Zeneca?
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 12,884

    HYUFD said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    HYUFD said:



    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years

    That analysis will not survive a Sinn Fein government. They are already the largest party in the Dail and FG/FF had to form a coalition of the unwilling to keep them out.
    There will not be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland, latest poll in Ireland has FG on 30%, SF on 29% and FF on 11%, so FG and FF still have comfortably more combined than SF.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Irish_general_election

    The irony of course is that while the DUP work with Sinn Fein in government in Northern Ireland, FG and FF refuse to work with Sinn Fein in the Republic
    There absolutely may be a Sinn Fein government in Ireland one day.

    The DUP only work with Sinn Fein because they have no choice in the matter, they need to do so. If it reaches a point where Sinn Fein can force their way into government (and stranger things have happened) then they could end up in office.

    The problem with "grand coalitions" being in government is that government's tend to lose support to the opposition. So even the grand coalition eventually becomes not enough.
    It's Merkel's 'Goldene Regel' in action. Eventually the smaller party gets crushed. See also LibDems.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,719
    edited April 2021
    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    As each nation would be smaller economically and smaller in population and with a smaller military.

    France for instance is about level with the UK economically and population wise but would be significantly bigger economically and population wise than England alone as well as every other home nation, so one of the biggest winners of the UK breaking up in global and European politics terms would be France. Russia would also benefit from a weaker, divided British Isles with the UK broken up
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    Its worth remembering the 21 June pledge isn't for social distancing to end either.

    The 21 June step, as written on Sky's ad-break is: "All legal limits on social contact removed. Social distancing, facemasks and working from home reviewed".

    What's the difference between a legal limit on social contact and social distancing?

    I assume that’s related to rule of 6 / mixing indoors etc
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    ridaligo said:

    As a Scottish Brit, I can't tell you how desperately sad I am that my country is heading toward this disaster, driven by resentment of the English - for that's what lies behind all the Nat policies despite their protestations to the contrary. I know - I was born, raised and educated in Scotland. This is not about independence - how could it be when the number one priority post-Indy will be the join the EU? It's about anti-English sentiment and I despise them for it.

    Once they've got their way, and the Nats only have to be lucky once, I really fear for the future of my homeland give the lack of quality evident in the Scottish political class. The petty, manufactured differences in approach to the COVID measures tells you all you need to know about their priorities - they can't possibly do the same as the English, oh no. These people really are not qualified to govern as the decline in Education standards bears witness. And when it comes to any substantive policy on independence, they haven't got a clue. Exhibit A - the currency issue.

    Indeed.

    Nationalism is always driven by hatred of others.

    Scot Nats by hatred of the English

    English Nats (Brexiteers) by hatred of foreigners.

    I have nothing but contempt for all of them
  • kjhkjh Posts: 10,468

    The way it works is that the Conservatives (both CCHQ and your local association) use a database called Votesource. Typically, local associations will upload voting intentions and contact information, when given, to Votesource. CCHQ then uses this for mass emails and more sophisticated data analysis.

    In 2019, CCHQ decided to go with a new targeting system that was meant to target likely Conservative voters without a recent known voting intention, using specific demographics (age, gender, house price, etc). Although not everyone in the selected demographics will be Conservative, the calculation is that more will than won't, so there is a net benefit to contacting all of them if you can, even if some of them end up motivated to vote against.

    What has probably happened here is that Mike has previously given contact information but no recent voting intention to his local Conservative association, falls into a target group based on his demographics, and so is being caught up in CCHQ's regular trawling operations.

    That would make sense for my contact and the LDs do a similar thing. It doesn't explain why my letter (for the 2019 election) said I received it because I was or had been a member or a donor; none of which was true. I am assuming cock up for which all party databases must have quite a few.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    While consistently losing money, hoping to struggle along to the IPO so the initial investors can cash out.
    Another thing worth noting - and Cazoo is a prime example of this is that US valuations of internet firms are utterly insane compared to UK ones.

    I know Deliveroo needed to IPO quickly (remember last year they needed money from Amazon to get through May) but they really could have raised a whole lot more money by IPOing in the US (who 20 years after the .com bust still have people who think if you build it on the internet it will make money).
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    The way it works is that the Conservatives (both CCHQ and your local association) use a database called Votesource. Typically, local associations will upload voting intentions and contact information, when given, to Votesource. CCHQ then uses this for mass emails and more sophisticated data analysis.

    In 2019, CCHQ decided to go with a new targeting system that was meant to target likely Conservative voters without a recent known voting intention, using specific demographics (age, gender, house price, etc). Although not everyone in the selected demographics will be Conservative, the calculation is that more will than won't, so there is a net benefit to contacting all of them if you can, even if some of them end up motivated to vote against.

    What has probably happened here is that Mike has previously given contact information but no recent voting intention to his local Conservative association, falls into a target group based on his demographics, and so is being caught up in CCHQ's regular trawling operations.

    That is actually way worse on a GDPR prospective than Mike's actual theory for him getting emails.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    That's pretty simple to understand - a database of millions of people and (some of) their spending habits. They are trying to monetise it one way or another and will at some point hit upon the right channel (cf Ocado). And mainly by crowding out other taxis thus depleting the competition at which point prices will rise.

    But as for all these business models I think it was someone here who posted that great article that explained that the current business model for many start-up and other firms is to sell you a dollar for 90cents up until the time that you need them or they are the only alternative at which point the charge for the dollar goes up to $1.10.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    edited April 2021

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Get to self-driving cars, so they don’t need drivers.

    They’ve belatedly realised that self driving cars are not an 80/20 problem, but a 95/5 problem at best.

    Edit: @eek beat me to it.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    Scott_xP said:

    ridaligo said:

    As a Scottish Brit, I can't tell you how desperately sad I am that my country is heading toward this disaster, driven by resentment of the English - for that's what lies behind all the Nat policies despite their protestations to the contrary. I know - I was born, raised and educated in Scotland. This is not about independence - how could it be when the number one priority post-Indy will be the join the EU? It's about anti-English sentiment and I despise them for it.

    Once they've got their way, and the Nats only have to be lucky once, I really fear for the future of my homeland give the lack of quality evident in the Scottish political class. The petty, manufactured differences in approach to the COVID measures tells you all you need to know about their priorities - they can't possibly do the same as the English, oh no. These people really are not qualified to govern as the decline in Education standards bears witness. And when it comes to any substantive policy on independence, they haven't got a clue. Exhibit A - the currency issue.

    Indeed.

    Nationalism is always driven by hatred of others.

    Scot Nats by hatred of the English

    English Nats (Brexiteers) by hatred of foreigners.

    I have nothing but contempt for all of them
    Your Euronationalism leads you to hate.

    Ironic, hey?
  • kjhkjh Posts: 10,468
    HYUFD said:

    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    As each nation would be smaller economically and smaller in population and with a smaller military.

    France for instance is about level with the UK economically and population wise but would be significantly bigger economically and population wise than England alone as well as every other home nation, so one of the biggest winners of the UK breaking up in global and European politics terms would be France. Russia would also benefit from a weaker, divided British Isles with the UK broken up
    Thank you.
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    On topic, the email from the Tories doesn't surprise me. The Labour membership database was also woefully out of date - don't forget that for a long time the only real way to quit the party was to stop paying your subs. That meant a database with a whole load of lapsed "members".

    I stopped being CLP secretary in something like 2018, quit the party in 2019 and yet was still receiving post addressed to me as CLP Secretary in 2020. Post containing cheques with affiliation fees from trade unions!

    Well, these new houses in Aberdeenshire have got to be paid for somehow! (You do realise that at least until independence it is not difficult to be extradited back to England?)_
    Which reminds me, I'm spending three days in Aberdeen in the summer, any decent places to visit, also any decent restaurants.

    My previous trips were limited to the Malmaison.
    Can't really help I'm afraid. Even before Covid there had been absolute carnage in the Aberdeen restaurant industry as the oil money dried up and many of the best places had closed. God knows what it will be like now. The Rustico used to be a nice Italian but whether it will have survived lockdown who can say?

    Aberdeen is a pale shadow of the place it used to be when hotel rooms were very hard to find because the oil companies would have block bookings just in case people came onshore unexpectedly.
    Cheers, that's a shame about Aberdeen.
    Aberdeen Art Gallery reopens at the end of April (it went through a lengthy and expensive renovation and only opened for a few months before Covid struck so I haven’t seen the new look). It’s got a good collection, even a couple of my pals in there.

    Kafka used to be the place for expensive designer tat, just 200m from the art gallery (everything’s pretty close in Aberdeen city centre).
    I’ve just picked a complete set of Fred Hohler’s magnus opus on oil paintings in public ownership in 84 volumes. Looking forward to the Scottish books as I understand their collections are almost as good as Hartlepool’s.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    ridaligo said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    I disagree. Blair's stupid devolution bill let the genie out of the bottle. Scottish Independence has been inevitable since then, Brexit or no Brexit. Brexit may well accelerate it, I'll grant you that.

    As a Scottish Brit, I can't tell you how desperately sad I am that my country is heading toward this disaster, driven by resentment of the English - for that's what lies behind all the Nat policies despite their protestations to the contrary. I know - I was born, raised and educated in Scotland. This is not about independence - how could it be when the number one priority post-Indy will be the join the EU? It's about anti-English sentiment and I despise them for it.

    Once they've got their way, and the Nats only have to be lucky once, I really fear for the future of my homeland give the lack of quality evident in the Scottish political class. The petty, manufactured differences in approach to the COVID measures tells you all you need to know about their priorities - they can't possibly do the same as the English, oh no. These people really are not qualified to govern as the decline in Education standards bears witness. And when it comes to any substantive policy on independence, they haven't got a clue. Exhibit A - the currency issue.
    The entire point of Independence for this SNP Government is to distract people from any other issue - raise a problem and the answer is always it's only an issue because we aren't independent.

    Actually answering any issues regarding independency especially ones such as currency which are impossibly complex for most people to understand doesn't help their battle.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    TOPPING said:

    But as for all these business models I think it was someone here who posted that great article that explained that the current business model for many start-up and other firms is to sell you a dollar for 90cents up until the time that you need them or they are the only alternative at which point the charge for the dollar goes up to $1.10.

    As explained in the movie 'Confidence', the business model of many startups is to get bought by someone before the cash runs out
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    HYUFD said:

    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    As each nation would be smaller economically and smaller in population and with a smaller military.

    France for instance is about level with the UK economically and population wise but would be significantly bigger economically and population wise than England alone as well as every other home nation, so one of the biggest winners of the UK breaking up in global and European politics terms would be France. Russia would also benefit from a weaker, divided British Isles with the UK broken up
    Which no doubt is why you voted to Remain in the European Union. Same failed logic.

    Yet you abandoned that PDQ. You'll abandon your unionism just as quick if it becomes Tory policy to break up the union.
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 35,776

    Scott_xP said:

    ridaligo said:

    As a Scottish Brit, I can't tell you how desperately sad I am that my country is heading toward this disaster, driven by resentment of the English - for that's what lies behind all the Nat policies despite their protestations to the contrary. I know - I was born, raised and educated in Scotland. This is not about independence - how could it be when the number one priority post-Indy will be the join the EU? It's about anti-English sentiment and I despise them for it.

    Once they've got their way, and the Nats only have to be lucky once, I really fear for the future of my homeland give the lack of quality evident in the Scottish political class. The petty, manufactured differences in approach to the COVID measures tells you all you need to know about their priorities - they can't possibly do the same as the English, oh no. These people really are not qualified to govern as the decline in Education standards bears witness. And when it comes to any substantive policy on independence, they haven't got a clue. Exhibit A - the currency issue.

    Indeed.

    Nationalism is always driven by hatred of others.

    Scot Nats by hatred of the English

    English Nats (Brexiteers) by hatred of foreigners.

    I have nothing but contempt for all of them
    Your Euronationalism leads you to hate.

    Ironic, hey?
    WRT matters EU, I note that Yougov now has a plurality believing that Leave was the right decision.

    Giles Fraser made the good point that Brexit supporters should not rely upon consequentialism, but the success of the Covid vaccination, combined with the absence of predicted horrors, has made our case easier.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,724
    Charles said:

    Its worth remembering the 21 June pledge isn't for social distancing to end either.

    The 21 June step, as written on Sky's ad-break is: "All legal limits on social contact removed. Social distancing, facemasks and working from home reviewed".

    What's the difference between a legal limit on social contact and social distancing?

    I assume that’s related to rule of 6 / mixing indoors etc
    I know the u3a, the WI and the like are working on the assumption that meetings in public halls will have to be socially distanced in the Autumn. What, I wonder, will that do, if correct, for the economics of such halls?
    If, as I say, that's correct.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072

    HYUFD said:

    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    As each nation would be smaller economically and smaller in population and with a smaller military.

    France for instance is about level with the UK economically and population wise but would be significantly bigger economically and population wise than England alone as well as every other home nation, so one of the biggest winners of the UK breaking up in global and European politics terms would be France. Russia would also benefit from a weaker, divided British Isles with the UK broken up
    Which no doubt is why you voted to Remain in the European Union. Same failed logic.

    Yet you abandoned that PDQ. You'll abandon your unionism just as quick if it becomes Tory policy to break up the union.
    He's already admitted that.

    His policy after Indy is to punish his Scottish brethren as much as possible for having the gaul to leave.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    Charles said:

    Its worth remembering the 21 June pledge isn't for social distancing to end either.

    The 21 June step, as written on Sky's ad-break is: "All legal limits on social contact removed. Social distancing, facemasks and working from home reviewed".

    What's the difference between a legal limit on social contact and social distancing?

    I assume that’s related to rule of 6 / mixing indoors etc
    I know the u3a, the WI and the like are working on the assumption that meetings in public halls will have to be socially distanced in the Autumn. What, I wonder, will that do, if correct, for the economics of such halls?
    If, as I say, that's correct.
    Does anyone know, is there any social distancing in Israeli halls, theatres, stadia etc?
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950
    Scott_xP said:

    TOPPING said:

    But as for all these business models I think it was someone here who posted that great article that explained that the current business model for many start-up and other firms is to sell you a dollar for 90cents up until the time that you need them or they are the only alternative at which point the charge for the dollar goes up to $1.10.

    As explained in the movie 'Confidence', the business model of many startups is to get bought by someone before the cash runs out
    Is also true.

    I remember still the "Des"(cription) page on Bloomberg for one dotcom recently listed company at the height of the boom:

    "This company has no assets or businesses and is actively looking for investment opportunities."

    A listed company!
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072

    Charles said:

    Its worth remembering the 21 June pledge isn't for social distancing to end either.

    The 21 June step, as written on Sky's ad-break is: "All legal limits on social contact removed. Social distancing, facemasks and working from home reviewed".

    What's the difference between a legal limit on social contact and social distancing?

    I assume that’s related to rule of 6 / mixing indoors etc
    I know the u3a, the WI and the like are working on the assumption that meetings in public halls will have to be socially distanced in the Autumn. What, I wonder, will that do, if correct, for the economics of such halls?
    If, as I say, that's correct.
    Makes no sense.

    You can cram into a nightclub in the summer but not a WI meeting?
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    HYUFD said:

    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    As each nation would be smaller economically and smaller in population and with a smaller military.

    France for instance is about level with the UK economically and population wise but would be significantly bigger economically and population wise than England alone as well as every other home nation, so one of the biggest winners of the UK breaking up in global and European politics terms would be France. Russia would also benefit from a weaker, divided British Isles with the UK broken up
    Which no doubt is why you voted to Remain in the European Union. Same failed logic.

    Yet you abandoned that PDQ. You'll abandon your unionism just as quick if it becomes Tory policy to break up the union.
    He's already admitted that.

    His policy after Indy is to punish his Scottish brethren as much as possible for having the gaul to leave.
    His loyalty to party comes before any principles or belief in democracy.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    edited April 2021

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    Its not about laziness remotely. That's an insane suggestion and is like suggesting that Amazon's business is about attracting customs too lazy to pick up the phone. Or anyone else that has an online website.

    The ability to browse dozens of restaurants, pick one, browse their menu and then place an order all on one site makes great sense.
    It's convenience but I suspect you are paying at least 50% more than I do for the same meal.

    Also round here the best takeaways don't go near any of them...
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    Its not about laziness remotely. That's an insane suggestion and is like suggesting that Amazon's business is about attracting customs too lazy to pick up the phone. Or anyone else that has an online website.

    The ability to browse dozens of restaurants, pick one, browse their menu and then place an order all on one site makes great sense.
    It's convenience but I suspect you are paying at least 50% more than I do for the same meal.

    Also round here the best takeaways don't go near any of them...
    That may be true, but I have tried many restaurants that I'd have never tried without it.

    When you find one you like you can always get a menu and a phone number from them to use subsequently if its cheaper.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,719
    edited April 2021

    HYUFD said:

    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    As each nation would be smaller economically and smaller in population and with a smaller military.

    France for instance is about level with the UK economically and population wise but would be significantly bigger economically and population wise than England alone as well as every other home nation, so one of the biggest winners of the UK breaking up in global and European politics terms would be France. Russia would also benefit from a weaker, divided British Isles with the UK broken up
    Which no doubt is why you voted to Remain in the European Union. Same failed logic.

    Yet you abandoned that PDQ. You'll abandon your unionism just as quick if it becomes Tory policy to break up the union.
    No, the same logic, we were stronger on the world stage as part of the EU. Only as part of the EU could we be an equal of China, the US and India who will dominate the 21st century. If Brexit was followed by Scexit we would end up not even the equal of France, let alone the equal of the US and China!

    I just opposed joining the Euro, however I respected the vote which took place 41 years after the first EEC vote ie a genuine generation.

    If Scots in a genuine generation after the 2014 vote vote to leave the UK so be it, I would be disappointed but respect the vote but on the basis that not a penny more of English taxpayers money goes to Scotland too of course.

    However indyref2 must not be for at least another generation
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,724

    Charles said:

    Its worth remembering the 21 June pledge isn't for social distancing to end either.

    The 21 June step, as written on Sky's ad-break is: "All legal limits on social contact removed. Social distancing, facemasks and working from home reviewed".

    What's the difference between a legal limit on social contact and social distancing?

    I assume that’s related to rule of 6 / mixing indoors etc
    I know the u3a, the WI and the like are working on the assumption that meetings in public halls will have to be socially distanced in the Autumn. What, I wonder, will that do, if correct, for the economics of such halls?
    If, as I say, that's correct.
    Makes no sense.

    You can cram into a nightclub in the summer but not a WI meeting?
    You clearly have never stood outside a WI meeting and listened.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    TOPPING said:

    Scott_xP said:

    TOPPING said:

    But as for all these business models I think it was someone here who posted that great article that explained that the current business model for many start-up and other firms is to sell you a dollar for 90cents up until the time that you need them or they are the only alternative at which point the charge for the dollar goes up to $1.10.

    As explained in the movie 'Confidence', the business model of many startups is to get bought by someone before the cash runs out
    Is also true.

    I remember still the "Des"(cription) page on Bloomberg for one dotcom recently listed company at the height of the boom:

    "This company has no assets or businesses and is actively looking for investment opportunities."

    A listed company!
    Have you watched “The China Hustle” on Netflix?

    https://www.barrons.com/articles/when-chinese-stock-fraud-was-rampant-1521659454

    Tells the story of how a bunch of dormant listed companies on Wall St were used for reverse-takeovers of Chinese businesses - which were then pumped to US investors, somewhat overstating their performance to the American markets.
  • ridaligoridaligo Posts: 174
    Scott_xP said:

    ridaligo said:

    As a Scottish Brit, I can't tell you how desperately sad I am that my country is heading toward this disaster, driven by resentment of the English - for that's what lies behind all the Nat policies despite their protestations to the contrary. I know - I was born, raised and educated in Scotland. This is not about independence - how could it be when the number one priority post-Indy will be the join the EU? It's about anti-English sentiment and I despise them for it.

    Once they've got their way, and the Nats only have to be lucky once, I really fear for the future of my homeland give the lack of quality evident in the Scottish political class. The petty, manufactured differences in approach to the COVID measures tells you all you need to know about their priorities - they can't possibly do the same as the English, oh no. These people really are not qualified to govern as the decline in Education standards bears witness. And when it comes to any substantive policy on independence, they haven't got a clue. Exhibit A - the currency issue.

    Indeed.

    Nationalism is always driven by hatred of others.

    Scot Nats by hatred of the English

    English Nats (Brexiteers) by hatred of foreigners.

    I have nothing but contempt for all of them
    I disagree again. I don't think you can compare the UK with the EU in that respect; 300 years of shared history in the former versus 50 years of a creeping political project the other. The two are not comparable. Scottish Nats really do loath the English in my experience - leavers don't feel the same way about Europeans (quite the contrary) but they do resent the political institutions of the EU and the EC.

  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,780
    eek said:

    HYUFD said:

    algarkirk said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    About right. It is of course possible to be a unionist about Britain (looking at a map indicates why) while thinking that being a unionist about the island of Ireland (again, look at a map) involves a union of the whole island self determining its future, either as one island state or in union with Britain. As the second is even less plausible than the first, a state called Ireland embracing the whole is the only option

    The rioters + the DUP having only negative policies and no affirmative ones, and, crucially having no better plan for Brexit than all the ones they voted against, all suggest that they know this.

    However the end of the union with Scotland isn't in sight; there isn't the support and I don't think there will be. Of the two islands, critical to the future is the whole island either being in or out of the EU.

    Of course the loyalist violence in Northern Ireland against the Irish Sea border would increase tenfold if a United Ireland was imposed on loyalists in Antrim and Down and Derry without their consent.

    The IRA violence pre GFA against direct rule from London would be replaced with loyalist paramilitary violence against direct rule from Dublin.

    Loyalists would also likely declare UDI for Antrim and much of Down and Derry rather than submit to the whole of Northern Ireland coming under direct Dublin rule.

    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years
    The problem for the Irish is that the trigger for a border poll isn't in their control.

    But equally no-one wants Northern Ireland as it's a money pit and makes Scotland's look fiscally sane.
    *Looks again at those Guarantees given to Gupta for £500m*

    Scotland: "hold my beer!"
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    HYUFD said:

    No, the same logic, we were stronger on the world stage as part of the EU.

    I just opposed joining the Euro

    Ironic that those who voted for "Global Britain" will end up with neither
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    Its not about laziness remotely. That's an insane suggestion and is like suggesting that Amazon's business is about attracting customs too lazy to pick up the phone. Or anyone else that has an online website.

    The ability to browse dozens of restaurants, pick one, browse their menu and then place an order all on one site makes great sense.
    It's convenience but I suspect you are paying at least 50% more than I do for the same meal.

    Also round here the best takeaways don't go near any of them...
    That may be true, but I have tried many restaurants that I'd have never tried without it.

    When you find one you like you can always get a menu and a phone number from them to use subsequently if its cheaper.
    Ringing a restaurant or takeaway is always an awful experience. Tons of background noise, half the time the person answering the phone can barely speak English, and they will ultimately get your order wrong.

    Ordering on an app and getting a receipt is a 1000% better user experience.

    I tend to order on JustEat and then collect rather than faff around with delivery, although I will use a restaurant or takeaway's own user interface online if it's good.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    ridaligo said:

    leavers don't feel the same way about Europeans (quite the contrary) but they do resent the political institutions of the EU and the EC.

    I didn't say Europeans, I said foreigners.

    Areas with low levels of immigration voted heavily for Brexit.

    Xenophobia, not politics.
  • kjhkjh Posts: 10,468

    Charles said:

    Its worth remembering the 21 June pledge isn't for social distancing to end either.

    The 21 June step, as written on Sky's ad-break is: "All legal limits on social contact removed. Social distancing, facemasks and working from home reviewed".

    What's the difference between a legal limit on social contact and social distancing?

    I assume that’s related to rule of 6 / mixing indoors etc
    I know the u3a, the WI and the like are working on the assumption that meetings in public halls will have to be socially distanced in the Autumn. What, I wonder, will that do, if correct, for the economics of such halls?
    If, as I say, that's correct.
    Makes no sense.

    You can cram into a nightclub in the summer but not a WI meeting?
    You clearly have never stood outside a WI meeting and listened.
    Is this something I need to add to my bucket list?
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    Charles said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    On topic, the email from the Tories doesn't surprise me. The Labour membership database was also woefully out of date - don't forget that for a long time the only real way to quit the party was to stop paying your subs. That meant a database with a whole load of lapsed "members".

    I stopped being CLP secretary in something like 2018, quit the party in 2019 and yet was still receiving post addressed to me as CLP Secretary in 2020. Post containing cheques with affiliation fees from trade unions!

    Well, these new houses in Aberdeenshire have got to be paid for somehow! (You do realise that at least until independence it is not difficult to be extradited back to England?)_
    Which reminds me, I'm spending three days in Aberdeen in the summer, any decent places to visit, also any decent restaurants.

    My previous trips were limited to the Malmaison.
    Can't really help I'm afraid. Even before Covid there had been absolute carnage in the Aberdeen restaurant industry as the oil money dried up and many of the best places had closed. God knows what it will be like now. The Rustico used to be a nice Italian but whether it will have survived lockdown who can say?

    Aberdeen is a pale shadow of the place it used to be when hotel rooms were very hard to find because the oil companies would have block bookings just in case people came onshore unexpectedly.
    Cheers, that's a shame about Aberdeen.
    Aberdeen Art Gallery reopens at the end of April (it went through a lengthy and expensive renovation and only opened for a few months before Covid struck so I haven’t seen the new look). It’s got a good collection, even a couple of my pals in there.

    Kafka used to be the place for expensive designer tat, just 200m from the art gallery (everything’s pretty close in Aberdeen city centre).
    I’ve just picked a complete set of Fred Hohler’s magnus opus on oil paintings in public ownership in 84 volumes. Looking forward to the Scottish books as I understand their collections are almost as good as Hartlepool’s.
    Most of them (78) appear to be available from https://artuk.org/shop/art-books/art-books-by-location.html?showall=1

    At £10 each I'm surprised at how cheap they are given how much I usually spend on Taschen art books
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 39,756
    Sean_F said:



    Scott_xP said:

    ridaligo said:

    As a Scottish Brit, I can't tell you how desperately sad I am that my country is heading toward this disaster, driven by resentment of the English - for that's what lies behind all the Nat policies despite their protestations to the contrary. I know - I was born, raised and educated in Scotland. This is not about independence - how could it be when the number one priority post-Indy will be the join the EU? It's about anti-English sentiment and I despise them for it.

    Once they've got their way, and the Nats only have to be lucky once, I really fear for the future of my homeland give the lack of quality evident in the Scottish political class. The petty, manufactured differences in approach to the COVID measures tells you all you need to know about their priorities - they can't possibly do the same as the English, oh no. These people really are not qualified to govern as the decline in Education standards bears witness. And when it comes to any substantive policy on independence, they haven't got a clue. Exhibit A - the currency issue.

    Indeed.

    Nationalism is always driven by hatred of others.

    Scot Nats by hatred of the English

    English Nats (Brexiteers) by hatred of foreigners.

    I have nothing but contempt for all of them
    Your Euronationalism leads you to hate.

    Ironic, hey?
    WRT matters EU, I note that Yougov now has a plurality believing that Leave was the right decision.

    Giles Fraser made the good point that Brexit supporters should not rely upon consequentialism, but the success of the Covid vaccination, combined with the absence of predicted horrors, has made our case easier.
    And yet Scotland still thinks it was wrong by a ratio of 2:1 so your case is the same as it ever was north of Gretna. How long do you think that dislocation can endure or is it a case of suck it up?
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950
    Sandpit said:

    TOPPING said:

    Scott_xP said:

    TOPPING said:

    But as for all these business models I think it was someone here who posted that great article that explained that the current business model for many start-up and other firms is to sell you a dollar for 90cents up until the time that you need them or they are the only alternative at which point the charge for the dollar goes up to $1.10.

    As explained in the movie 'Confidence', the business model of many startups is to get bought by someone before the cash runs out
    Is also true.

    I remember still the "Des"(cription) page on Bloomberg for one dotcom recently listed company at the height of the boom:

    "This company has no assets or businesses and is actively looking for investment opportunities."

    A listed company!
    Have you watched “The China Hustle” on Netflix?

    https://www.barrons.com/articles/when-chinese-stock-fraud-was-rampant-1521659454

    Tells the story of how a bunch of dormant listed companies on Wall St were used for reverse-takeovers of Chinese businesses - which were then pumped to US investors, somewhat overstating their performance to the American markets.
    No but sounds good - Netflix I'll look it out. Thanks.

  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 25,047
    The database will be managed automatically - you have not unsubscribed, and you also open and read (if this one is anything to go by) the emails, making you moderately engaged. There will be a lot of people on there who never open them, and they'll be culled before you get culled. As for it being sophisticated enough to sniff you out as a secret sandal wearer, I don't think many email database systems have that capability.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    HYUFD said:

    algarkirk said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    About right. It is of course possible to be a unionist about Britain (looking at a map indicates why) while thinking that being a unionist about the island of Ireland (again, look at a map) involves a union of the whole island self determining its future, either as one island state or in union with Britain. As the second is even less plausible than the first, a state called Ireland embracing the whole is the only option

    The rioters + the DUP having only negative policies and no affirmative ones, and, crucially having no better plan for Brexit than all the ones they voted against, all suggest that they know this.

    However the end of the union with Scotland isn't in sight; there isn't the support and I don't think there will be. Of the two islands, critical to the future is the whole island either being in or out of the EU.

    Of course the loyalist violence in Northern Ireland against the Irish Sea border would increase tenfold if a United Ireland was imposed on loyalists in Antrim and Down and Derry without their consent.

    The IRA violence pre GFA against direct rule from London would be replaced with loyalist paramilitary violence against direct rule from Dublin.

    Loyalists would also likely declare UDI for Antrim and much of Down and Derry rather than submit to the whole of Northern Ireland coming under direct Dublin rule.

    Even the Irish PM knows that which is why, coupled with the subsidy Dublin would have to provide for NI for years, he has no desire for a United Ireland any time soon
    https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/the-interview/20210219-irish-pm-micheál-martin-rules-out-border-poll-over-the-next-number-of-years
    The problem for the Irish is that the trigger for a border poll isn't in their control.

    But equally no-one wants Northern Ireland as it's a money pit and makes Scotland's look fiscally sane.
    *Looks again at those Guarantees given to Gupta for £500m*

    Scotland: "hold my beer!"
    You are aware of the Renewable Heat Incentive scandal - which reportedly also cost £500m and resulted in people generating heat for no reason.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    Its not about laziness remotely. That's an insane suggestion and is like suggesting that Amazon's business is about attracting customs too lazy to pick up the phone. Or anyone else that has an online website.

    The ability to browse dozens of restaurants, pick one, browse their menu and then place an order all on one site makes great sense.
    It's convenience but I suspect you are paying at least 50% more than I do for the same meal.

    Also round here the best takeaways don't go near any of them...
    That may be true, but I have tried many restaurants that I'd have never tried without it.

    When you find one you like you can always get a menu and a phone number from them to use subsequently if its cheaper.
    Ringing a restaurant or takeaway is always an awful experience. Tons of background noise, half the time the person answering the phone can barely speak English, and they will ultimately get your order wrong.

    Ordering on an app and getting a receipt is a 1000% better user experience.

    I tend to order on JustEat and then collect rather than faff around with delivery, although I will use a restaurant or takeaway's own user interface online if it's good.
    The best pizza maker in the world, Dominos, has a good app.

    That said atm which you can well understand they are offering all kinds of discounts if you pick up rather than have delivered. Something like one large pizza delivered: £20. Two large pizzas, two drinks, two sides: £20 if collected.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    As each nation would be smaller economically and smaller in population and with a smaller military.

    France for instance is about level with the UK economically and population wise but would be significantly bigger economically and population wise than England alone as well as every other home nation, so one of the biggest winners of the UK breaking up in global and European politics terms would be France. Russia would also benefit from a weaker, divided British Isles with the UK broken up
    Which no doubt is why you voted to Remain in the European Union. Same failed logic.

    Yet you abandoned that PDQ. You'll abandon your unionism just as quick if it becomes Tory policy to break up the union.
    No, the same logic, we were stronger on the world stage as part of the EU. Only as part of the EU could we be an equal of China, the US and India who will dominate the 21st century. If Brexit was followed by Scexit we would end up not even the equal of France, let alone the equal of the US and China!

    I just opposed joining the Euro, however I respected the vote which took place 41 years after the first EEC vote ie a genuine generation.

    If Scots in a genuine generation after the 2014 vote vote to leave the UK so be it, I would be disappointed but respect the vote but on the basis that not a penny more of English taxpayers money goes to Scotland too of course.

    However indyref2 must not be for at least another generation
    Why don't you go and join the Lib Dems. 🤔
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,780
    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072
    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,780

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
    There is a very big difference from having contingencies on a balance sheet (if they did) and writing cheques. The former is a book entry, the latter concerns the bank and those from whom credit is going to be sought.

    The challenge for most of the drivers is going to be vouching their claims and showing how many hours they worked for their pittance. Most will not have adequate records but the risk from the company's perspective is that they get bogged down with mountains of crap trying to sort out what is valid and what is not.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,719

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    As each nation would be smaller economically and smaller in population and with a smaller military.

    France for instance is about level with the UK economically and population wise but would be significantly bigger economically and population wise than England alone as well as every other home nation, so one of the biggest winners of the UK breaking up in global and European politics terms would be France. Russia would also benefit from a weaker, divided British Isles with the UK broken up
    Which no doubt is why you voted to Remain in the European Union. Same failed logic.

    Yet you abandoned that PDQ. You'll abandon your unionism just as quick if it becomes Tory policy to break up the union.
    No, the same logic, we were stronger on the world stage as part of the EU. Only as part of the EU could we be an equal of China, the US and India who will dominate the 21st century. If Brexit was followed by Scexit we would end up not even the equal of France, let alone the equal of the US and China!

    I just opposed joining the Euro, however I respected the vote which took place 41 years after the first EEC vote ie a genuine generation.

    If Scots in a genuine generation after the 2014 vote vote to leave the UK so be it, I would be disappointed but respect the vote but on the basis that not a penny more of English taxpayers money goes to Scotland too of course.

    However indyref2 must not be for at least another generation
    Why don't you go and join the Lib Dems. 🤔
    As I am a Conservative not a Liberal, I opposed the Euro when the Lib Dems were campaigning for it and I respect the Brexit vote.

    However leaving the EU as I said will mean we will not be as strong on the world stage as we would have been as part of that block, particularly in relation to China and the US.

    That makes it even more important to keep the UK together, otherwise we will end up weaker than France, let alone the US and China!
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    @SkyNews: Jet2 suspends flights and holidays until late June due to uncertainty over government travel plans http://news.sky.com/story/jet2-suspends-flights-and-holidays-until-late-june-due-to-uncertainty-over-government-travel-plans-12270156
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    The killer for Uber isn't employment costs it's VAT.

    You usually pay taxi drivers directly and as they don't earn £85,000 a year they don't charge VAT.

    Uber passengers don't however pay the driver directly, they pay Uber. And because these people are now workers and not drivers Uber should be charging VAT at 20% on all the rides.

    Which is an ongoing court case at the moment over I think £2bn+/
  • Fysics_TeacherFysics_Teacher Posts: 6,060
    edited April 2021

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    moonshine said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    Why do you EU extremists always forget the Welsh? England and Wales Cricket team. England and Wales Law. And Wales voted for Brexit too.
    Should soon be able to change their name to the United Kingdom Cricket Board.
    Or the Cricketing Union of National Teams.

    The initials would describe them very well...
    Are you sure you don’t have any Australian blood?
    Quite sure. I want England to win, and therefore I hate the ECB.
    Any organisation which could some up with the idea for The Hundred deserves contempt!
    I'm anti The Hundred but my friends who work at LCCC say normal cricket fans aren't the target market.

    The Hundred is designed to bring in people who aren't cricket fans, to get them hooked.
    Read and laugh:
    https://www.thecricketer.com/Topics/opinion/who_on_earth_is_the_hundred_for_we_try_to_identify_the_ecb's_mysterious_'new_audience'.html
    Seen it before and it is good.

    Franchise cricket in England (and Wales) is such a bad idea it must have been designed by someone who puts pineapple on their pizza.

    I think one of the stats that really scares the ECB is that cricket has stopped being played in state schools and is pretty much the preserve of the private sector.
    Not all state schools have stopped (although there was not much played last year). I spent about fifteen years as the U13b team coach/minibus driver/umpire, spending a lot of summer term Saturdays standing on a cricket pitch trying to count to six and to remember what the limit was on fielders behind square leg. I stopped due to age about ten years ago, but occasionally get asked to fill in, last time for our U12C team. At that level the ability to actually catch a cricket ball means you are probably in the wrong team...

  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    There’s an even bigger case brewing for Uber against HMRC. The government are arguing that the cab fare -paid to Uber directly and not the driver - should be VATable.

    The case is something like four years old at this point, so a final ruling against them leaves a VAT bill of more than a billion pounds.

    https://www.londonreconnections.com/2019/schrodingers-cab-firm-ubers-existential-crisis/
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
    Uber's business model was to ignore all regulations and rules until they had reached such a critical mass such things didn't matter.

    That worked in the US, it really hasn't gone down well in Europe.
  • ridaligoridaligo Posts: 174
    Scott_xP said:

    ridaligo said:

    leavers don't feel the same way about Europeans (quite the contrary) but they do resent the political institutions of the EU and the EC.

    I didn't say Europeans, I said foreigners.

    Areas with low levels of immigration voted heavily for Brexit.

    Xenophobia, not politics.
    Well you are conflating different issues then.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 44,082

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    Its not about laziness remotely. That's an insane suggestion and is like suggesting that Amazon's business is about attracting customs too lazy to pick up the phone. Or anyone else that has an online website.

    The ability to browse dozens of restaurants, pick one, browse their menu and then place an order all on one site makes great sense.
    It's convenience but I suspect you are paying at least 50% more than I do for the same meal.

    Also round here the best takeaways don't go near any of them...
    That may be true, but I have tried many restaurants that I'd have never tried without it.

    When you find one you like you can always get a menu and a phone number from them to use subsequently if its cheaper.
    Ringing a restaurant or takeaway is always an awful experience. Tons of background noise, half the time the person answering the phone can barely speak English, and they will ultimately get your order wrong.

    Ordering on an app and getting a receipt is a 1000% better user experience.

    I tend to order on JustEat and then collect rather than faff around with delivery, although I will use a restaurant or takeaway's own user interface online if it's good.
    Yes, I see the sense of the app.

    I just get a bleak vision of the economy of the future. People sitting on sofas, browsing mobiles, ordering junk food, delivered by gig workers with no rights.

    I want a future with hoverboards and silver clothes with no pockets. A future with ambition.

  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    edited April 2021
    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
    There is a very big difference from having contingencies on a balance sheet (if they did) and writing cheques. The former is a book entry, the latter concerns the bank and those from whom credit is going to be sought.

    The challenge for most of the drivers is going to be vouching their claims and showing how many hours they worked for their pittance. Most will not have adequate records but the risk from the company's perspective is that they get bogged down with mountains of crap trying to sort out what is valid and what is not.
    Not really - that data should be stored in Uber's systems which means it's just the matter of requesting the data to be provided.

    but as I said the issue here actually isn't the worker's benefits its whether VAT should have been charged on the ride or not.
  • ridaligo said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    I disagree. Blair's stupid devolution bill let the genie out of the bottle. Scottish Independence has been inevitable since then, Brexit or no Brexit. Brexit may well accelerate it, I'll grant you that.

    As a Scottish Brit, I can't tell you how desperately sad I am that my country is heading toward this disaster, driven by resentment of the English - for that's what lies behind all the Nat policies despite their protestations to the contrary. I know - I was born, raised and educated in Scotland. This is not about independence - how could it be when the number one priority post-Indy will be the join the EU? It's about anti-English sentiment and I despise them for it.

    Once they've got their way, and the Nats only have to be lucky once, I really fear for the future of my homeland give the lack of quality evident in the Scottish political class. The petty, manufactured differences in approach to the COVID measures tells you all you need to know about their priorities - they can't possibly do the same as the English, oh no. These people really are not qualified to govern as the decline in Education standards bears witness. And when it comes to any substantive policy on independence, they haven't got a clue. Exhibit A - the currency issue.
    My wife could have written your piece to be fair

    And I can vouch that anti English attitudes from some, even within our north east Scots family 50 years ago prevailed and, though I have claim to being Welsh, I am English on my Fathers side and I well remember my wife telling me that one of her relatives at the time we were to be married in 1964 had been heard to say about me that 'He is English, but he is very nice'

  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072
    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
    There is a very big difference from having contingencies on a balance sheet (if they did) and writing cheques. The former is a book entry, the latter concerns the bank and those from whom credit is going to be sought.

    The challenge for most of the drivers is going to be vouching their claims and showing how many hours they worked for their pittance. Most will not have adequate records but the risk from the company's perspective is that they get bogged down with mountains of crap trying to sort out what is valid and what is not.
    The contingency should have been in the business model. In my opinion (which I know doesn't count for anything) they should have seen this coming as a possibility and had a viable and sustainable business model for the worst case scenario. I don't understand why anyone would want to invest in Uber WITHOUT such a business model contingency.

    If their business is sustainable going forwards with drivers as "employees", then surely obtaining credit and/or resource to process this backpay shouldn't be too difficult as the business overall is still popular and presumably profit making.

    If not, well...
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Predatory pricing

    And if that doesn’t work you’ve got the Bigger Fool theory to fall back on
  • NemtynakhtNemtynakht Posts: 2,311
    TOPPING said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    Its not about laziness remotely. That's an insane suggestion and is like suggesting that Amazon's business is about attracting customs too lazy to pick up the phone. Or anyone else that has an online website.

    The ability to browse dozens of restaurants, pick one, browse their menu and then place an order all on one site makes great sense.
    It's convenience but I suspect you are paying at least 50% more than I do for the same meal.

    Also round here the best takeaways don't go near any of them...
    That may be true, but I have tried many restaurants that I'd have never tried without it.

    When you find one you like you can always get a menu and a phone number from them to use subsequently if its cheaper.
    Ringing a restaurant or takeaway is always an awful experience. Tons of background noise, half the time the person answering the phone can barely speak English, and they will ultimately get your order wrong.

    Ordering on an app and getting a receipt is a 1000% better user experience.

    I tend to order on JustEat and then collect rather than faff around with delivery, although I will use a restaurant or takeaway's own user interface online if it's good.
    The best pizza maker in the world, Dominos, has a good app.

    That said atm which you can well understand they are offering all kinds of discounts if you pick up rather than have delivered. Something like one large pizza delivered: £20. Two large pizzas, two drinks, two sides: £20 if collected.
    Do they do Hawaiian?
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    Its not about laziness remotely. That's an insane suggestion and is like suggesting that Amazon's business is about attracting customs too lazy to pick up the phone. Or anyone else that has an online website.

    The ability to browse dozens of restaurants, pick one, browse their menu and then place an order all on one site makes great sense.
    I’d bet interested to know what % of people do that though

    My guess is that most people decide the type of food (Indian or Thai or whatever) and then use their normal place.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,780

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
    There is a very big difference from having contingencies on a balance sheet (if they did) and writing cheques. The former is a book entry, the latter concerns the bank and those from whom credit is going to be sought.

    The challenge for most of the drivers is going to be vouching their claims and showing how many hours they worked for their pittance. Most will not have adequate records but the risk from the company's perspective is that they get bogged down with mountains of crap trying to sort out what is valid and what is not.
    The contingency should have been in the business model. In my opinion (which I know doesn't count for anything) they should have seen this coming as a possibility and had a viable and sustainable business model for the worst case scenario. I don't understand why anyone would want to invest in Uber WITHOUT such a business model contingency.

    If their business is sustainable going forwards with drivers as "employees", then surely obtaining credit and/or resource to process this backpay shouldn't be too difficult as the business overall is still popular and presumably profit making.

    If not, well...
    Gallowgate, they didn't have a viable business model without this liability. See @Charles's posts. This just adds another world of pain and shortens the end game considerably.
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    UK exports to France and Germany in February 2021 bounced back to the level in December 2020.
    https://twitter.com/julianHjessop/status/1380433922702647297

    LOL. Surprise, surprise.

    That's actually better than I expected.
    Where are the headlines?

    (I must admit my reaction to @RochdalePioneers doomladen agonising yesterday was to wonder when the data was coming out!)
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072
    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
    There is a very big difference from having contingencies on a balance sheet (if they did) and writing cheques. The former is a book entry, the latter concerns the bank and those from whom credit is going to be sought.

    The challenge for most of the drivers is going to be vouching their claims and showing how many hours they worked for their pittance. Most will not have adequate records but the risk from the company's perspective is that they get bogged down with mountains of crap trying to sort out what is valid and what is not.
    The contingency should have been in the business model. In my opinion (which I know doesn't count for anything) they should have seen this coming as a possibility and had a viable and sustainable business model for the worst case scenario. I don't understand why anyone would want to invest in Uber WITHOUT such a business model contingency.

    If their business is sustainable going forwards with drivers as "employees", then surely obtaining credit and/or resource to process this backpay shouldn't be too difficult as the business overall is still popular and presumably profit making.

    If not, well...
    Gallowgate, they didn't have a viable business model without this liability. See @Charles's posts. This just adds another world of pain and shortens the end game considerably.
    I see. Well I have no sympathy.

    It's a shame because their app is really good.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,780
    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
    There is a very big difference from having contingencies on a balance sheet (if they did) and writing cheques. The former is a book entry, the latter concerns the bank and those from whom credit is going to be sought.

    The challenge for most of the drivers is going to be vouching their claims and showing how many hours they worked for their pittance. Most will not have adequate records but the risk from the company's perspective is that they get bogged down with mountains of crap trying to sort out what is valid and what is not.
    Not really - that data should be stored in Uber's systems which means it's just the matter of requesting the data to be provided.

    but as I said the issue here actually isn't the worker's benefits its whether VAT should have been charged on the ride or not.
    The data will show when the ride started and when it ended. It won't show the unspecified time that the "worker" hung around waiting for the call. I agree the VAT issue is chunky.
  • ClippPClippP Posts: 1,667
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.
    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.
    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    As each nation would be smaller economically and smaller in population and with a smaller military.

    France for instance is about level with the UK economically and population wise but would be significantly bigger economically and population wise than England alone as well as every other home nation, so one of the biggest winners of the UK breaking up in global and European politics terms would be France. Russia would also benefit from a weaker, divided British Isles with the UK broken up
    Which no doubt is why you voted to Remain in the European Union. Same failed logic.

    Yet you abandoned that PDQ. You'll abandon your unionism just as quick if it becomes Tory policy to break up the union.
    No, the same logic, we were stronger on the world stage as part of the EU. Only as part of the EU could we be an equal of China, the US and India who will dominate the 21st century. If Brexit was followed by Scexit we would end up not even the equal of France, let alone the equal of the US and China!

    I just opposed joining the Euro, however I respected the vote which took place 41 years after the first EEC vote ie a genuine generation.

    If Scots in a genuine generation after the 2014 vote vote to leave the UK so be it, I would be disappointed but respect the vote but on the basis that not a penny more of English taxpayers money goes to Scotland too of course.

    However indyref2 must not be for at least another generation
    Why don't you go and join the Lib Dems. 🤔
    As I am a Conservative not a Liberal, I opposed the Euro when the Lib Dems were campaigning for it and I respect the Brexit vote.

    However leaving the EU as I said will mean we will not be as strong on the world stage as we would have been as part of that block, particularly in relation to China and the US.

    That makes it even more important to keep the UK together, otherwise we will end up weaker than France, let alone the US and China!
    I have the sense that you are closer to the Lib Dems than you are to the current Tory leadership, friend HY. Most people are, actually!!!!
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072
    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
    There is a very big difference from having contingencies on a balance sheet (if they did) and writing cheques. The former is a book entry, the latter concerns the bank and those from whom credit is going to be sought.

    The challenge for most of the drivers is going to be vouching their claims and showing how many hours they worked for their pittance. Most will not have adequate records but the risk from the company's perspective is that they get bogged down with mountains of crap trying to sort out what is valid and what is not.
    Not really - that data should be stored in Uber's systems which means it's just the matter of requesting the data to be provided.

    but as I said the issue here actually isn't the worker's benefits its whether VAT should have been charged on the ride or not.
    The data will show when the ride started and when it ended. It won't show the unspecified time that the "worker" hung around waiting for the call. I agree the VAT issue is chunky.
    I'd be surprised if they weren't location tracking all their drivers whenever they had the app open, so they probably do have the data somewhere.
  • OllyTOllyT Posts: 4,911
    edited April 2021

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.
    Ever stop to ask why people were discontent ?
    If the EU really was the cause of their discontent we should shortly be seeing polls showing leave voters now very contented with their lot. Are you expecting this to be the case.
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    eek said:



    Uber's business model was to ignore all regulations and rules until they had reached such a critical mass such things didn't matter.

    That worked in the US, it really hasn't gone down well in Europe.

    It hasn't even worked in America. Uber sell mini cab rides at below cost. Pluss they run a massive IT department plus (until recently) they have their ludicrous self-driving car research that no-one could explain how it would help them reach profitability.

    Their business model is to trick investors into thinking that they were a tech company and thus immune to standard considerations of cost of capital and the like.
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758
    kjh said:

    HYUFD said:

    moonshine said:

    HYUFD said:

    Scott_xP said:

    All the bad tempered arguments over Brexit, who did and did not vote for it, and its effects are primarily a symptom rather than a cause of the malaise.

    Brexit was and is a Little Englander project that will lead to the break up of the Union.

    This was known before the vote.

    And still the fanbois cheer.
    How can 17 million people be little Englanders? This is the level of analysis of a 12 year old. Why don't you stick to posting other people's tweets.

    If you think me questioning your intelligence and insulting you is unlikely to change your mind, then perhaps your approach might not work on Brexit supporters.
    The project was driven by Little Englanders - they recruited a large number of the gullible and discontented.

    I note you haven't adressed @Scott_xP's point. Brexit is going to destroy the union.
    No its not. Black_Rook hit the nail on the head before, the union was destroyed by devolution.

    Its only a matter of time now. Brexit is coincidental to it. There's no solution to the West Lothian Question still, half a century after it was asked and the forces against the union now are ratchetting one way.

    The union will end. Brexit isn't why.
    Utter rubbish, the Union will not end.

    We Tories will refuse a legal indyref2 under all circumstances for starters.

    However I do agree in my local party at least a majority of Tories support an English Parliament within the UK now
    I don’t mean this in an inflammatory way. But why do you care so much? If there’s a popular majority for independence in what was a historically sovereign nation, who are you to stand on the way? It’s also a somewhat counterproductive position to take if I may say so.

    As I am a diehard Unionist and we will each be weaker if the Union breaks up.

    As our conservative cousins in the PP in Spain showed separatist nationalist governments trying to undermine the unity of the state can be ignored
    We know you are a diehard unionist HYUFD, but why?. Why will each be weaker?

    I am not saying I disagree with you. I don't have a view as I don't have enough information, so I am ambivalent and I am happy for those with more at stake to decide.

    But being a Unionist is an opinion not a fact. Being English or Scottish is a fact; you can't change it. Being a Unionist or Separatist is an opinion. Why do you have this opinion? Why will the two parts be weaker?
    The argument is exactly the same for the EU

    There are economic benefits from being together. There is some pooling of sovereign. The question is do the benefits of the former outweigh the second / or is there a Scottish or a UK demos.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,780
    Sandpit said:

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    There’s an even bigger case brewing for Uber against HMRC. The government are arguing that the cab fare -paid to Uber directly and not the driver - should be VATable.

    The case is something like four years old at this point, so a final ruling against them leaves a VAT bill of more than a billion pounds.

    https://www.londonreconnections.com/2019/schrodingers-cab-firm-ubers-existential-crisis/
    How the hell has that taken 4 years? Given that the money is paid to Uber and not the driver I really don't see the start of a defence. In the meantime how many local taxi companies have been destroyed by this unfair competition not meeting its obligations? Bah.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,861
    Yep. The roadmap lives. It's still a map. It's still a road. The end is nigh.

    Holidays are coming, holidays are coming ...
  • AnneJGPAnneJGP Posts: 2,869

    I am a previous member but haven't been a member for some years. Perhaps he knows I wouldn't give the Tory party a bean, because I have not received anything from him.

    Not long after I arrived in the Newton Abbot constituency, I expressed an interest in supporting the Labour party.

    No one ever replied.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072
    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    There’s an even bigger case brewing for Uber against HMRC. The government are arguing that the cab fare -paid to Uber directly and not the driver - should be VATable.

    The case is something like four years old at this point, so a final ruling against them leaves a VAT bill of more than a billion pounds.

    https://www.londonreconnections.com/2019/schrodingers-cab-firm-ubers-existential-crisis/
    How the hell has that taken 4 years? Given that the money is paid to Uber and not the driver I really don't see the start of a defence. In the meantime how many local taxi companies have been destroyed by this unfair competition not meeting its obligations? Bah.
    To be fair, the local taxi companies who have survived are the ones who upped their game in response to Uber.

    I remember ordering taxis before Uber and they were crap. The card machine was always "broken", you had to hold on the line to speak to an unhelpful receptionist, and they'd take the long way round and you'd have no way of proving it.

    Uber was better in every single way.
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    edited April 2021

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    Its not about laziness remotely. That's an insane suggestion and is like suggesting that Amazon's business is about attracting customs too lazy to pick up the phone. Or anyone else that has an online website.

    The ability to browse dozens of restaurants, pick one, browse their menu and then place an order all on one site makes great sense.
    But the traditional takeaway model runs their delivery service at a loss (or break even at best) to attract business. Deliveroo is attempting to dominate and own a loss making business.

    It is utterly nuts. It shows how abysmally capital is being allocated at the moment.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    eek said:

    eek said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Sandpit said:

    eek said:

    I missed the previous Sunak thread but on its topic I'm not seeing anything that makes me question my bet. I'm letting my bet ride to the end (in one part because I don't know how to lay it off without putting £5000 in cash into Betfair considering it wasn't a Betfair bet to begin with), but I don't see anything in those texts that would cause Sunak to be fired from being Chancellor. I don't see anything there that will be significant for the next leadership election with MPs nominating or the membership vote either. So I don't see how its a factor.

    I suspect Sunak's fate will be far more tied to whether and how the UK economy bounces back from Covid than anything to do with texts with Dave.

    Greensill didn't get the loans they were after - so I'm at a loss as to why it's even vaguely a story. Sunak's emails are the exact thing you do to move an issue elsewhere
    Indeed. Former minister lobbies current minister isn’t exactly a story.

    Company employing former minister gets preferential treatment would have been; but the preferential treatment they hoped to get by employing the former minister never arrived.
    It’s not really a huge story in itself.

    However, it isn’t just a “former minister”, it’s a former prime minister, who I naively assumed would be above such things.

    Can’t he swan off to the middle east to advocate for peace or something?
    Like you I feel that this is more than a little grubby for an ex PM and it does not reflect well on him, whether it worked or not.
    Dave (pbuh) doesn't have a sleazy bone in his body, I know he's turned down several jobs/directorships with firms because he didn't think it would be proper.

    This story is an example of Dave being nice and helpful to people he knows.
    He turned down several directorships and took Greensill Capital? Did he not ask George?
    George has had a hectic private life in recent years, getting divorced, getting a new fiancée, knocking her up.

    Just to make it even more exciting, Thea Rogers is Chief Customer Experience Offer at Deliveroo, which had a bit of a disaster recently with their IPO.

    People are asking whose bright idea it was to spam the users of the App and their email and encourage the customers to invest in Deliveroo.
    There is not a single part of the Deliveroo / Just Eat or Uber Eats business model that makes any actual sense. It's a combination of doing everything and anything to pretend their delivery workers aren't employees attached to charging takeaways 30% to attract customers too lazy to pick up the phone.
    I don't understand the wider business model of Uber.
    Uber's business model was based on price low, drive out the competition and then raise prices to something closer to the actual cost of providing the journey. Attached to that was the hope that automated driving was an 80/20 problem that would be rapidly resolved and the expensive running cost of drivers would disappear - at which point Uber would be the leader in a capital intensive business with high barriers to entry.

    Sadly Automated Driving is a 99.9999/0.00001 especially in the places where taxis operate so they are now a taxi company that have set price levels that will never allow them to make a profit.

    However the initial dream has allowed a lot of venture capitalists to make money provided they've extracted some money by now.
    The liabilities clocked up on the back of the Supreme Court decision that their drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage, holidays and sick pay must be truly horrendous and the cost implications going forward are significant. All in all it is going to make a serious dent in their cash pile.

    That was arguably one of the more important decisions by the Court in recent years, albeit they confirmed much of what they had said 10 years earlier in the Autoclenz case. It is the best answer to the gig economy problems to date and will hopefully shake down a lot of abusive "self employment" into actual employment. If you are going to bear the costs of having employees you may as well have the disciplinary rights and control that comes with it.
    They should/would have known such a court case was coming, for years. If they failed to put any contingency in place then I wouldn't hesitate to call them incompetent.
    There is a very big difference from having contingencies on a balance sheet (if they did) and writing cheques. The former is a book entry, the latter concerns the bank and those from whom credit is going to be sought.

    The challenge for most of the drivers is going to be vouching their claims and showing how many hours they worked for their pittance. Most will not have adequate records but the risk from the company's perspective is that they get bogged down with mountains of crap trying to sort out what is valid and what is not.
    Not really - that data should be stored in Uber's systems which means it's just the matter of requesting the data to be provided.

    but as I said the issue here actually isn't the worker's benefits its whether VAT should have been charged on the ride or not.
    The data will show when the ride started and when it ended. It won't show the unspecified time that the "worker" hung around waiting for the call. I agree the VAT issue is chunky.
    That data actually gives you a reasonable start and end point for the time worked. Granted you don't know how long you spent waiting for the first journey and you don't know how long you spent after the final journey for another one to be booked but it would be a valid assumption that all the time in between was time spent "working for uber".

    For reference deliveroo argue that they only pay minimum wage for the period a worker is delivering the food - the rest of the time should be unpaid. I suspect that will be heading to court at some point.

This discussion has been closed.