Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Unsurprising. The Liverpool to Manchester train can be slow too, but never leaves urban areas on its entire journey.
The idea the two runs are the same is patently absurd.
To be pedantic - and I apologies because I am broadly on your side on this, but this is a bigger point: accuracy of information about trains - the main Mcr-Lpl train is now the Chat Moss route, which for a remarkable 10 miles or so passes through countryside (the aforementioned Chat Moss). Chat Moss is a bit of an anomaly though. Essentially there is a string of small and medium sized towns from the outer edges of Salford to the outer edges of Liverpool (Worsley-Tyldesley-Leigh-Golborne-Ashton in Makerfield/Newton-le-Willows-Haydock-St. Helens-Prescott-Huyton without a real gap between them.
It's the commuting, mixing and service / office heavy bias in the UK. So, I work in Manchester, live in Huddersfield. In early March last year, I worked in an open plan office, hot desking, in the neighborhood of folks from the Fylde, Liverpool, Burnley, Leeds, Sheffield, don't know any Stoke-rs but there probably are some. And some week away contractors from, for e.g., Oxfordshire and Surrey. I commuted on an, often packed, long distance train from somewhere in NE England/even Scotland to Liverpool or, worse, full of airport bound/returned people. At the weekend, I chatted with a bloke who does office work in Sheffield - when I worked there Nottingham, Leicester (from where my sister then commutes to Birmingham), South Derbyshire, North Lincs were all co-worker locations. That's pretty typical.
I don't think anywhere else in Europe comes close in terms of workplace interconnectivity as we do, and that was relevant last March.
The commission economic predictions for the UK definitely have a touch of jilted ex syndrome. The city consensus is noticeably higher and factors in little to no brexit related reduction in GDP. I think it would be fairly embarrassing for them to come in at ~7.5% where the city consensus is for the UK, though. Additionally it looks like their projections are done on a nominal GDP calculation basis but the GDP itself is the output model as preferred by the ONS. Most of the city has caught up with this and it's why there is expected to be a big bounceback as schools return to normal and health output picks up as the NHS works through a huge backlog.
It's interesting reading the economics editor of Berlingske today explaining how the UK economy fared worst of all economies last year "Unlike Denmark" - the whole piece is tinged with a "bastard british have left us at the mercy of the Germans" vibe - apparently there may be some short term bounce back over the summer but by Autumn the warning klaxons will be going off and the full error of Brexit will become visible - I don't know if that will happen but reading the piece it's clear he really wants it too because the UK 'abandoned' Denmark.
Another bit of jilted ex syndrome. Goldman Sachs have got UK growth this year penciled in at 7.8% which recovers all of our GDP by the end of 2021 based on the measure they use.
Also, there is a solution to being left at the mercy of Germany. 🤷♂️
I can't tell you the grief I get over the UK leaving the EU, mostly because I don't participate in gleefully hoping it all goes horribly wrong and saying Boris Johnson is an idiot and the electorate were tricked - Danes are mostly now looking on and suffering major jilted ex syndrome. They HATE the idea Brexit might not be that big a deal economically to the UK.
Too much guardian reading and CNN watching I think. If there is a brexit effect, even in the short term, it is mostly going to be carried by the food/fishing industry because of EU border pedantry. Most of everything else will just get on with life. Speaking from my position in financial services, the death of the City that everyone in the EU keeps hyping up doesn't seem likely, hiring is stronger than I've ever seen it and we're winning clients from outside the EU much faster than we were when we were in it and for us it's made up for the difficulty in servicing EU based clients and more. I think 2021 will be a record year for us in terms of asset gains and 2022 will be a record for profitability.
Thanks for the "I'm alright Jack" anecdote. There are plenty of very real businesses that have suffered so that those that jerk off about "sovrinty init" can have their moment of ecstasy.
The reality is that Brexit is and was a massive upheaval. Whether it was economically worth it I am happy to concede will now need to be decided by impartial historical economists probably long after I have ceased to care, and though I am not dead, I am already not far off not caring now.
As far as I was concerned, the worst thing about Brexit was that it was so massively divisive. Some people and some politicians get off on that, just like the SNP in Scotland. It might be helpful if people who were in favour of Brexit owned a bit of humility instead of constantly trying to justify Brexit when there is no need to do so. We are not going back in. You don't need to keep picking at the wound.
That's not really what I was going for and I do accept that there will be some tough times for specific industries, mostly in food and fishing.
I think what you fail to see is that EU membership was also massively divisive, as someone who benefits from it's not easy to understand why it would be but communities across the whole country have been destroyed by wage deflation and stagnation in lower-middle income jobs and the resulting increase in population has also resulted in a crash in owner occupation of houses.
As much as I'm a realist about what brexit is and isn't (and there are many items in each column) I think you should be realistic about what EU membership had turned into for large swathes of the country. That resentment and divisiveness was already there with or without a referendum. In 2015 4m people voted for UKIP, by a quirk of our voting system they didn't get any seats. In the road not taken where Dave refused a referendum how many cycles do you think it would have taken for PM Nige to become a reality? Pretending that EU membership was all sunlit uplands isn't realistic.
I am trying not to be drawn into EU arguments as I think we need to move on, but I think your argument about "EU membership" has some validity EXCEPT that a lot of the associated problems with free movement were as a result of British government immigration policies, and the reality that 50% of UK immigration had nothing to do with the EU and yet successive Home Secretaries (including Mrs May) did nothing about it and tacitly encouraged it. The EU was blamed for immigration because it was convenient. It is all history now though!
To some degree, but Indian doctors and engineers taking up £50k+ jobs were never really the issue wrt immigration. I also agree that the UK could have done a lot more to deter immigration from the EU and built a benefits system that didn't encourage people to work part time minimum wage jobs. There's a lot of "blame" to go around but ultimately free movement of people and almost immediate eligibility for national benefits systems was a huge issue that the EU refused to admit.
Anyway, I have a lot of work to do and only an hour to do it before I'm off for a week!
The commission economic predictions for the UK definitely have a touch of jilted ex syndrome. The city consensus is noticeably higher and factors in little to no brexit related reduction in GDP. I think it would be fairly embarrassing for them to come in at ~7.5% where the city consensus is for the UK, though. Additionally it looks like their projections are done on a nominal GDP calculation basis but the GDP itself is the output model as preferred by the ONS. Most of the city has caught up with this and it's why there is expected to be a big bounceback as schools return to normal and health output picks up as the NHS works through a huge backlog.
It's interesting reading the economics editor of Berlingske today explaining how the UK economy fared worst of all economies last year "Unlike Denmark" - the whole piece is tinged with a "bastard british have left us at the mercy of the Germans" vibe - apparently there may be some short term bounce back over the summer but by Autumn the warning klaxons will be going off and the full error of Brexit will become visible - I don't know if that will happen but reading the piece it's clear he really wants it too because the UK 'abandoned' Denmark.
Another bit of jilted ex syndrome. Goldman Sachs have got UK growth this year penciled in at 7.8% which recovers all of our GDP by the end of 2021 based on the measure they use.
Also, there is a solution to being left at the mercy of Germany. 🤷♂️
I can't tell you the grief I get over the UK leaving the EU, mostly because I don't participate in gleefully hoping it all goes horribly wrong and saying Boris Johnson is an idiot and the electorate were tricked - Danes are mostly now looking on and suffering major jilted ex syndrome. They HATE the idea Brexit might not be that big a deal economically to the UK.
Too much guardian reading and CNN watching I think. If there is a brexit effect, even in the short term, it is mostly going to be carried by the food/fishing industry because of EU border pedantry. Most of everything else will just get on with life. Speaking from my position in financial services, the death of the City that everyone in the EU keeps hyping up doesn't seem likely, hiring is stronger than I've ever seen it and we're winning clients from outside the EU much faster than we were when we were in it and for us it's made up for the difficulty in servicing EU based clients and more. I think 2021 will be a record year for us in terms of asset gains and 2022 will be a record for profitability.
Thanks for the "I'm alright Jack" anecdote. There are plenty of very real businesses that have suffered so that those that jerk off about "sovrinty init" can have their moment of ecstasy.
The reality is that Brexit is and was a massive upheaval. Whether it was economically worth it I am happy to concede will now need to be decided by impartial historical economists probably long after I have ceased to care, and though I am not dead, I am already not far off not caring now.
As far as I was concerned, the worst thing about Brexit was that it was so massively divisive. Some people and some politicians get off on that, just like the SNP in Scotland. It might be helpful if people who were in favour of Brexit owned a bit of humility instead of constantly trying to justify Brexit when there is no need to do so. We are not going back in. You don't need to keep picking at the wound.
That's not really what I was going for and I do accept that there will be some tough times for specific industries, mostly in food and fishing.
I think what you fail to see is that EU membership was also massively divisive, as someone who benefits from it's not easy to understand why it would be but communities across the whole country have been destroyed by wage deflation and stagnation in lower-middle income jobs and the resulting increase in population has also resulted in a crash in owner occupation of houses.
As much as I'm a realist about what brexit is and isn't (and there are many items in each column) I think you should be realistic about what EU membership had turned into for large swathes of the country. That resentment and divisiveness was already there with or without a referendum. In 2015 4m people voted for UKIP, by a quirk of our voting system they didn't get any seats. In the road not taken where Dave refused a referendum how many cycles do you think it would have taken for PM Nige to become a reality? Pretending that EU membership was all sunlit uplands isn't realistic.
I am trying not to be drawn into EU arguments as I think we need to move on, but I think your argument about "EU membership" has some validity EXCEPT that a lot of the associated problems with free movement were as a result of British government immigration policies, and the reality that 50% of UK immigration had nothing to do with the EU and yet successive Home Secretaries (including Mrs May) did nothing about it and tacitly encouraged it. The EU was blamed for immigration because it was convenient. It is all history now though!
Did nothing? May was far, far too authoritarian with immigration from the rest of the world! Unless you want zero migration, to say that 'nothing was being done' is just untrue - one irony is that many voted to Leave the EU to make it easier for the rest of the world to get a visa to come to the UK not harder.
I'm glad the authoritarian May Home Secretary has gone as well as her ludicrous and xenophobic "hundreds of thousands" pledge. I'm glad that we have liberalised getting a visa for many skilled migrants from the rest of the world post-Brexit.
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
45-60 mins, and the countryside bit is irrelevant as the doors are shut ...
Yuppie skiers coming back from Italy come a lot further and longer, and the doors are also shut ...
"Yuppie skiers"? WTF! You must be very old, I didn't know people still used that term.
A word to your prejudice: not all people who go skiing are "young and upwardly mobile": some of us are quite old, some are relatively monetarily successful, some less so, but the only really upwardly mobile aspect to us is when we are sitting on a lift!
They have some interesting tech (some of which is British), and it wouldn't be ridiculous to target a sector like this.
Hmm, it depends on the value chain. One of the reasons that import substitution tends to fail is because countries that attempt it have a much higher cost structure and more valuable jobs are lost higher up the value chain than are created at the bottom in low end manufacturing due to feed in prices rising.
For example, are we substituting German made BMWs for British made Jaguars? That's not a big deal as we've kept most of the value chain almost identical and it's a net gain in jobs as more Jags are built here to make up for fewer BMWs being bought. Are we replacing machine made semi-manufactured goods imported from Germany with more expensive British manually made goods that have a 50% higher cost with the imports made uncompetitive with tariffs? That is a big deal because Jag are saddled with a higher cost structure and unable to compete with BMW in export markets.
There are areas where import substitution makes sense but I'm not convinced that solar panels is one given just how big the cost differential is vs Chinese made solar panels. If we lumber domestic solar companies higher up the value chain with very high cost panels it may end up collapsing the industry and we won't sell those panels anywhere else as Chinese manufacturers will be offering a slightly lesser product for 10% of the cost.
The cost differential would be nothing like that. And bear in mind that module cost is well under 40% of any total project cost, whereas increased module efficiencies bear on 100% of the cost.
In any event, solar will provide over half of global electricity within a couple of decades. Allowing China to completely control the manufacturing chain is a strategic as well as economic error.
IIRC China doesn't dominate the production of metalurgical grade silicon, which is the preserve of the Norwegians (REC) and the Japanese (Tokayama?)
Edit to add: also Wacker in Germany. Basically, the Chinese are very good at doing the low value add part of the solar chain (i.e. making wafers out of silicon), but actually purifying the silicon is the difficult bit, and they have very little presence there.
Misconception, btw. - metallurgical silicon is insufficiently pure for solar panels. It's further refined though CVD into ultrapure polycrystalline silicon, also used (the highest purity) for chipmaking.
China has seven of the world's top 10 polysilicon manufacturers (versus none in 2005) and now accounts for most of the world's production.
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
45-60 mins, and the countryside bit is irrelevant as the doors are shut ...
Yuppie skiers coming back from Italy come a lot further and longer, and the doors are also shut ...
"Yuppie skiers"? WTF! You must be very old, I didn't know people still used that term.
A word to your prejudice: not all people who go skiing are "young and upwardly mobile": some of us are quite old, some are relatively monetarily successful, some less so, but the only really upwardly mobile aspect to us is when we are sitting on a lift!
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
Imagine inflation at 4% in September, with the Bank of England pondering on the one hand higher interest rates, and SAGE on the other calling for another lockdown.
And furlough ending.
And Gilt yields soaring.
And the national debt still ballooning.
And the economy still smaller than its pre-covid level.
At that point, how popular will the tories be in the south?
They have some interesting tech (some of which is British), and it wouldn't be ridiculous to target a sector like this.
Hmm, it depends on the value chain. One of the reasons that import substitution tends to fail is because countries that attempt it have a much higher cost structure and more valuable jobs are lost higher up the value chain than are created at the bottom in low end manufacturing due to feed in prices rising.
For example, are we substituting German made BMWs for British made Jaguars? That's not a big deal as we've kept most of the value chain almost identical and it's a net gain in jobs as more Jags are built here to make up for fewer BMWs being bought. Are we replacing machine made semi-manufactured goods imported from Germany with more expensive British manually made goods that have a 50% higher cost with the imports made uncompetitive with tariffs? That is a big deal because Jag are saddled with a higher cost structure and unable to compete with BMW in export markets.
There are areas where import substitution makes sense but I'm not convinced that solar panels is one given just how big the cost differential is vs Chinese made solar panels. If we lumber domestic solar companies higher up the value chain with very high cost panels it may end up collapsing the industry and we won't sell those panels anywhere else as Chinese manufacturers will be offering a slightly lesser product for 10% of the cost.
The cost differential would be nothing like that. And bear in mind that module cost is well under 40% of any total project cost, whereas increased module efficiencies bear on 100% of the cost.
In any event, solar will provide over half of global electricity within a couple of decades. Allowing China to completely control the manufacturing chain is a strategic as well as economic error.
IIRC China doesn't dominate the production of metalurgical grade silicon, which is the preserve of the Norwegians (REC) and the Japanese (Tokayama?)
Sure, but it makes around 90 of the world's solar modules. (And as perovskites improve, it's quite feasible that the whole business will go thin film and silicon won't be needed at all.)
Solar module manufacturing is incredibly easy and low tech: you buy solar cells and you connect them together in a frame. I could start a solar module manufacturing factory in less than a week, and without buying any expensive equipment.
Solar cell making is harder. You need to slice the silicon up and then perform various treatments on it. It requires specialist plants and specialist knowledge. But it's not that high tech. You could get a plant up and running in the UK in three or four months.
Silicon purification, on the other hand, is really quite hard work.
The Chinese are utterly dependent on the West for silicon. We're a little bit, but not really, dependent on the Chinese for modules and cells.
If we wanted to, we could shut down all Chinese solar manufacturing in about a week. And they wouldn't be able to rapidly recover. The reverse simply isn't true.
Incorrect - see my above post. China dominate most steps of the manufacturing process: a very recent development.
Which comes back to the original point that this is a market which will grow significantly over the next couple of decades, and there is a limited opportunity for Europe to get back on board. Biden's US looks as though it will have a go, too.
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
45-60 mins, and the countryside bit is irrelevant as the doors are shut ...
Yuppie skiers coming back from Italy come a lot further and longer, and the doors are also shut ...
"Yuppie skiers"? WTF! You must be very old, I didn't know people still used that term.
A word to your prejudice: not all people who go skiing are "young and upwardly mobile": some of us are quite old, some are relatively monetarily successful, some less so, but the only really upwardly mobile aspect to us is when we are sitting on a lift!
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Unsurprising. The Liverpool to Manchester train can be slow too, but never leaves urban areas on its entire journey.
The idea the two runs are the same is patently absurd.
To be pedantic - and I apologies because I am broadly on your side on this, but this is a bigger point: accuracy of information about trains - the main Mcr-Lpl train is now the Chat Moss route, which for a remarkable 10 miles or so passes through countryside (the aforementioned Chat Moss). Chat Moss is a bit of an anomaly though. Essentially there is a string of small and medium sized towns from the outer edges of Salford to the outer edges of Liverpool (Worsley-Tyldesley-Leigh-Golborne-Ashton in Makerfield/Newton-le-Willows-Haydock-St. Helens-Prescott-Huyton without a real gap between them.
It's the commuting, mixing and service / office heavy bias in the UK. So, I work in Manchester, live in Huddersfield. In early March last year, I worked in an open plan office, hot desking, in the neighborhood of folks from the Fylde, Liverpool, Burnley, Leeds, Sheffield, don't know any Stoke-rs but there probably are some. And some week away contractors from, for e.g., Oxfordshire and Surrey. I commuted on an, often packed, long distance train from somewhere in NE England/even Scotland to Liverpool or, worse, full of airport bound/returned people. At the weekend, I chatted with a bloke who does office work in Sheffield - when I worked there Nottingham, Leicester (from where my sister then commutes to Birmingham), South Derbyshire, North Lincs were all co-worker locations. That's pretty typical.
I don't think anywhere else in Europe comes close in terms of workplace interconnectivity as we do, and that was relevant last March.
That's certainly typical. I also work in Manchester and have a similar geography of colleagues (I do have a Stokie!) I don't know how atypical the UK is in this regard. I wonder what the geography of an office in Munich or Marseille would be?
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Unsurprising. The Liverpool to Manchester train can be slow too, but never leaves urban areas on its entire journey.
The idea the two runs are the same is patently absurd.
To be pedantic - and I apologies because I am broadly on your side on this, but this is a bigger point: accuracy of information about trains - the main Mcr-Lpl train is now the Chat Moss route, which for a remarkable 10 miles or so passes through countryside (the aforementioned Chat Moss). Chat Moss is a bit of an anomaly though. Essentially there is a string of small and medium sized towns from the outer edges of Salford to the outer edges of Liverpool (Worsley-Tyldesley-Leigh-Golborne-Ashton in Makerfield/Newton-le-Willows-Haydock-St. Helens-Prescott-Huyton without a real gap between them.
It's the commuting, mixing and service / office heavy bias in the UK. So, I work in Manchester, live in Huddersfield. In early March last year, I worked in an open plan office, hot desking, in the neighborhood of folks from the Fylde, Liverpool, Burnley, Leeds, Sheffield, don't know any Stoke-rs but there probably are some. And some week away contractors from, for e.g., Oxfordshire and Surrey. I commuted on an, often packed, long distance train from somewhere in NE England/even Scotland to Liverpool or, worse, full of airport bound/returned people. At the weekend, I chatted with a bloke who does office work in Sheffield - when I worked there Nottingham, Leicester (from where my sister then commutes to Birmingham), South Derbyshire, North Lincs were all co-worker locations. That's pretty typical.
I don't think anywhere else in Europe comes close in terms of workplace interconnectivity as we do, and that was relevant last March.
That's certainly typical. I also work in Manchester and have a similar geography of colleagues (I do have a Stokie!) I don't know how atypical the UK is in this regard. I wonder what the geography of an office in Munich or Marseille would be?
Am I alone in thinking these kind of distances travelled twice a day must have an effect on productivity. And mental and physical health?
Stats today: deaths continue down (by date of death, allowing for a six day lag, seven day average of deaths is at 8.7. Hospitalisations look static: after declining steadily through April, they have been flat at just over 100 a day in early May. Numbers of positive tests rising very slowly but steadily - slight movement upward every day for a week now. 11-19 cohort still by far the most significant in terms of positives.
Reasonable to believe based on this that the spread is amongst the unvaccinated, which is gradually becoming a smaller proportion of the population. The proportion of the population jabbed at least once is crawling upwards slowly as resources continue to be focused on second jabs - that will start to rise more steeply again soon.
Hope (and my expectation) is that there has been a proper disconnection now between deaths and positives, rather than the uptick in positives being a leading indicator.
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Unsurprising. The Liverpool to Manchester train can be slow too, but never leaves urban areas on its entire journey.
The idea the two runs are the same is patently absurd.
To be pedantic - and I apologies because I am broadly on your side on this, but this is a bigger point: accuracy of information about trains - the main Mcr-Lpl train is now the Chat Moss route, which for a remarkable 10 miles or so passes through countryside (the aforementioned Chat Moss). Chat Moss is a bit of an anomaly though. Essentially there is a string of small and medium sized towns from the outer edges of Salford to the outer edges of Liverpool (Worsley-Tyldesley-Leigh-Golborne-Ashton in Makerfield/Newton-le-Willows-Haydock-St. Helens-Prescott-Huyton without a real gap between them.
It's the commuting, mixing and service / office heavy bias in the UK. So, I work in Manchester, live in Huddersfield. In early March last year, I worked in an open plan office, hot desking, in the neighborhood of folks from the Fylde, Liverpool, Burnley, Leeds, Sheffield, don't know any Stoke-rs but there probably are some. And some week away contractors from, for e.g., Oxfordshire and Surrey. I commuted on an, often packed, long distance train from somewhere in NE England/even Scotland to Liverpool or, worse, full of airport bound/returned people. At the weekend, I chatted with a bloke who does office work in Sheffield - when I worked there Nottingham, Leicester (from where my sister then commutes to Birmingham), South Derbyshire, North Lincs were all co-worker locations. That's pretty typical.
I don't think anywhere else in Europe comes close in terms of workplace interconnectivity as we do, and that was relevant last March.
That's certainly typical. I also work in Manchester and have a similar geography of colleagues (I do have a Stokie!) I don't know how atypical the UK is in this regard. I wonder what the geography of an office in Munich or Marseille would be?
When I worked with Edinburgh it was with people from Glasgow, East Lothian, West Lothian, Fife and the Borders on a comparable daily basis - many commuting by train. Hence my reluctance to see Glasgow and Edinburgh as very separate. It was one big workplace (and to some extent also one big shopping zone).
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Unsurprising. The Liverpool to Manchester train can be slow too, but never leaves urban areas on its entire journey.
The idea the two runs are the same is patently absurd.
To be pedantic - and I apologies because I am broadly on your side on this, but this is a bigger point: accuracy of information about trains - the main Mcr-Lpl train is now the Chat Moss route, which for a remarkable 10 miles or so passes through countryside (the aforementioned Chat Moss). Chat Moss is a bit of an anomaly though. Essentially there is a string of small and medium sized towns from the outer edges of Salford to the outer edges of Liverpool (Worsley-Tyldesley-Leigh-Golborne-Ashton in Makerfield/Newton-le-Willows-Haydock-St. Helens-Prescott-Huyton without a real gap between them.
It's the commuting, mixing and service / office heavy bias in the UK. So, I work in Manchester, live in Huddersfield. In early March last year, I worked in an open plan office, hot desking, in the neighborhood of folks from the Fylde, Liverpool, Burnley, Leeds, Sheffield, don't know any Stoke-rs but there probably are some. And some week away contractors from, for e.g., Oxfordshire and Surrey. I commuted on an, often packed, long distance train from somewhere in NE England/even Scotland to Liverpool or, worse, full of airport bound/returned people. At the weekend, I chatted with a bloke who does office work in Sheffield - when I worked there Nottingham, Leicester (from where my sister then commutes to Birmingham), South Derbyshire, North Lincs were all co-worker locations. That's pretty typical.
I don't think anywhere else in Europe comes close in terms of workplace interconnectivity as we do, and that was relevant last March.
That's certainly typical. I also work in Manchester and have a similar geography of colleagues (I do have a Stokie!) I don't know how atypical the UK is in this regard. I wonder what the geography of an office in Munich or Marseille would be?
Am I alone in thinking these kind of distances travelled twice a day must have an effect on productivity. And mental and physical health?
Fascinating bit in @RachelReevesMP debut as shadow chancellor as she dares to touch the 3rd rail of Brexit: govt has no vision to help manufacturers, cultural industry, farmers + fishermen - all "suffering because of huge gaps in this govt's deal with our European neighbours" https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1392504285708050438
The commission economic predictions for the UK definitely have a touch of jilted ex syndrome. The city consensus is noticeably higher and factors in little to no brexit related reduction in GDP. I think it would be fairly embarrassing for them to come in at ~7.5% where the city consensus is for the UK, though. Additionally it looks like their projections are done on a nominal GDP calculation basis but the GDP itself is the output model as preferred by the ONS. Most of the city has caught up with this and it's why there is expected to be a big bounceback as schools return to normal and health output picks up as the NHS works through a huge backlog.
It's interesting reading the economics editor of Berlingske today explaining how the UK economy fared worst of all economies last year "Unlike Denmark" - the whole piece is tinged with a "bastard british have left us at the mercy of the Germans" vibe - apparently there may be some short term bounce back over the summer but by Autumn the warning klaxons will be going off and the full error of Brexit will become visible - I don't know if that will happen but reading the piece it's clear he really wants it too because the UK 'abandoned' Denmark.
Another bit of jilted ex syndrome. Goldman Sachs have got UK growth this year penciled in at 7.8% which recovers all of our GDP by the end of 2021 based on the measure they use.
Also, there is a solution to being left at the mercy of Germany. 🤷♂️
I can't tell you the grief I get over the UK leaving the EU, mostly because I don't participate in gleefully hoping it all goes horribly wrong and saying Boris Johnson is an idiot and the electorate were tricked - Danes are mostly now looking on and suffering major jilted ex syndrome. They HATE the idea Brexit might not be that big a deal economically to the UK.
Too much guardian reading and CNN watching I think. If there is a brexit effect, even in the short term, it is mostly going to be carried by the food/fishing industry because of EU border pedantry. Most of everything else will just get on with life. Speaking from my position in financial services, the death of the City that everyone in the EU keeps hyping up doesn't seem likely, hiring is stronger than I've ever seen it and we're winning clients from outside the EU much faster than we were when we were in it and for us it's made up for the difficulty in servicing EU based clients and more. I think 2021 will be a record year for us in terms of asset gains and 2022 will be a record for profitability.
Thanks for the "I'm alright Jack" anecdote. There are plenty of very real businesses that have suffered so that those that jerk off about "sovrinty init" can have their moment of ecstasy.
The reality is that Brexit is and was a massive upheaval. Whether it was economically worth it I am happy to concede will now need to be decided by impartial historical economists probably long after I have ceased to care, and though I am not dead, I am already not far off not caring now.
As far as I was concerned, the worst thing about Brexit was that it was so massively divisive. Some people and some politicians get off on that, just like the SNP in Scotland. It might be helpful if people who were in favour of Brexit owned a bit of humility instead of constantly trying to justify Brexit when there is no need to do so. We are not going back in. You don't need to keep picking at the wound.
That's not really what I was going for and I do accept that there will be some tough times for specific industries, mostly in food and fishing.
I think what you fail to see is that EU membership was also massively divisive, as someone who benefits from it's not easy to understand why it would be but communities across the whole country have been destroyed by wage deflation and stagnation in lower-middle income jobs and the resulting increase in population has also resulted in a crash in owner occupation of houses.
As much as I'm a realist about what brexit is and isn't (and there are many items in each column) I think you should be realistic about what EU membership had turned into for large swathes of the country. That resentment and divisiveness was already there with or without a referendum. In 2015 4m people voted for UKIP, by a quirk of our voting system they didn't get any seats. In the road not taken where Dave refused a referendum how many cycles do you think it would have taken for PM Nige to become a reality? Pretending that EU membership was all sunlit uplands isn't realistic.
I am trying not to be drawn into EU arguments as I think we need to move on, but I think your argument about "EU membership" has some validity EXCEPT that a lot of the associated problems with free movement were as a result of British government immigration policies, and the reality that 50% of UK immigration had nothing to do with the EU and yet successive Home Secretaries (including Mrs May) did nothing about it and tacitly encouraged it. The EU was blamed for immigration because it was convenient. It is all history now though!
Did nothing? May was far, far too authoritarian with immigration from the rest of the world! Unless you want zero migration, to say that 'nothing was being done' is just untrue - one irony is that many voted to Leave the EU to make it easier for the rest of the world to get a visa to come to the UK not harder.
I'm glad the authoritarian May Home Secretary has gone as well as her ludicrous and xenophobic "hundreds of thousands" pledge. I'm glad that we have liberalised getting a visa for many skilled migrants from the rest of the world post-Brexit.
Not according to wiki. Breakdown as follows -
Voting Leave to get lower net migration: 17,410,741 Voting Leave to get higher net migration: Richard Tyndall
Stats today: deaths continue down (by date of death, allowing for a six day lag, seven day average of deaths is at 8.7. Hospitalisations look static: after declining steadily through April, they have been flat at just over 100 a day in early May. Numbers of positive tests rising very slowly but steadily - slight movement upward every day for a week now. 11-19 cohort still by far the most significant in terms of positives.
Reasonable to believe based on this that the spread is amongst the unvaccinated, which is gradually becoming a smaller proportion of the population. The proportion of the population jabbed at least once is crawling upwards slowly as resources continue to be focused on second jabs - that will start to rise more steeply again soon.
Hope (and my expectation) is that there has been a proper disconnection now between deaths and positives, rather than the uptick in positives being a leading indicator.
I am very unsure about the accuracy of the hospital admissions data, we have been at 2000 cases a day for weeks, yet hospital admissions are still at 100. That seems very unlikely.
All hospitals in Hampshire now have zero covid cases as does Bourmemouth hospital.
My father has been told it is unlikely his services will be required after the end of this month due to them pretty much vaccinating all the people they need to, not just the ethnic minorities he was signed up to persuade/reassure.
My father has been told it is unlikely his services will be required after the end of this month due to them pretty much vaccinating all the people they need to, not just the ethnic minorities he was signed up to persuade/reassure.
What about all the second doses we still need to do?
The commission economic predictions for the UK definitely have a touch of jilted ex syndrome. The city consensus is noticeably higher and factors in little to no brexit related reduction in GDP. I think it would be fairly embarrassing for them to come in at ~7.5% where the city consensus is for the UK, though. Additionally it looks like their projections are done on a nominal GDP calculation basis but the GDP itself is the output model as preferred by the ONS. Most of the city has caught up with this and it's why there is expected to be a big bounceback as schools return to normal and health output picks up as the NHS works through a huge backlog.
It's interesting reading the economics editor of Berlingske today explaining how the UK economy fared worst of all economies last year "Unlike Denmark" - the whole piece is tinged with a "bastard british have left us at the mercy of the Germans" vibe - apparently there may be some short term bounce back over the summer but by Autumn the warning klaxons will be going off and the full error of Brexit will become visible - I don't know if that will happen but reading the piece it's clear he really wants it too because the UK 'abandoned' Denmark.
Another bit of jilted ex syndrome. Goldman Sachs have got UK growth this year penciled in at 7.8% which recovers all of our GDP by the end of 2021 based on the measure they use.
Also, there is a solution to being left at the mercy of Germany. 🤷♂️
I can't tell you the grief I get over the UK leaving the EU, mostly because I don't participate in gleefully hoping it all goes horribly wrong and saying Boris Johnson is an idiot and the electorate were tricked - Danes are mostly now looking on and suffering major jilted ex syndrome. They HATE the idea Brexit might not be that big a deal economically to the UK.
I really don't understand this! Why do they care at all?
Because they secretly fear we might be right.
Emotionally, there is a human need to justify to yourself, and others, that you have made the right decision. There are still a lot of remainers here who, emotionally, would quite like Brexit to be an unmitigated disaster - they may end up poorer but they will at least be able to tell themselves that they backed the right horse. (Remainers aren't alone in this and had the referendum gone the other way I'm quite sure there would have been just as many leavers willing Bremain to fail for exactly the same reason.) Similarly, can all unionists, hand on heart, say they would be delighted to see Scexit be a happy success for the Scots? Rationally we might wish it, but it would very much be a battle between head and heart. I say this as a man with a Scottish mother and a very Scottish grandmother whose early childhood holidays were there and who thinks fondly of the country and its people, and who is anyway unconvinced of the future of the union. If my feelings are mixed, how must a committed English unionist feel?
This is all doubly true if before the event you made a living telling people publicly what a disaster it would be.
This isn't a particularly edifying human characteristic but I don't think we can deny that it is there.
Yes, but that doesn't explain why Danes care about the UK, that explains why British Remainers Remoan
I understand Ireland's resentment of Brexit, but not Denmark's
Danes love the UK, they quote huge screeds of Monty Python, they adore British TV shows, they like to practice their English (which is not great compared to Sweden or Norway) and they felt their was a bond - a bit like the UK obsession with the USA, the UK only knows about Denmark from Guardian articles that are invariably wrong about life here and dark police dramas....
There's also Borgen, and the vicious battles between parties called 'Moderates', 'New Democrats', 'Principled Centrists' etc...
I don't think it's so much jilted, as abandoned by the friendly big brother in a dysfunctional extended family.
I think that’s right. If you were Denmark, you could rely on us as a close ally (see how integrated we were in Afghanistan for instance) to stand up for you in the EU and always be working with you at the Cion. We’ve abandoned them. The whole northern group, really.
I always felt that the UK should lead Scandinavia (Sweden, Denmark, possibly Finland) into a semi-detached status WRT to the EU. One of Cameron's big failures was to miss the fact that we weren't the only unhappy country inside the EU, and that many of the other unhappy countries had interests in common with us.
I agree. We never did build that alliance. Many of those countries would at the very least have been keen to join a “this far and no further” block.
That boat sailed once the Euro and the ECB were in place. The EU does not allow reverse gear which would have been required for semi detached status and Finland are in the Euro already. Denmark and Sweden should have joined our Brexit project, of course, but may because of their opt out, be under the illusion that they are not part of an emerging state by being in the EU. Norway, Denmark, Sweden and UK would have made excellent EFTA partners.
Well yes, that was the grouping I was thinking of. None of them keen to be part of the European superstate, none of the Euro-members (although Denmark's currency is pegged).
If I had been Cameron, I would have spent a lot of time in Stockholm and Copenhagen and seen if there was something that could have been put together. And maybe there was, maybe there wasn't, but I do feel that if there was a group of countries moving together, it would have been better and made for a more durable settlement.
My father has been told it is unlikely his services will be required after the end of this month due to them pretty much vaccinating all the people they need to, not just the ethnic minorities he was signed up to persuade/reassure.
What about all the second doses we still need to do?
There's enough staffing in the system to cope with that.
Fascinating bit in @RachelReevesMP debut as shadow chancellor as she dares to touch the 3rd rail of Brexit: govt has no vision to help manufacturers, cultural industry, farmers + fishermen - all "suffering because of huge gaps in this govt's deal with our European neighbours" https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1392504285708050438
IF i was Sunak, I would be effing bricking it right now.
Inflationary pressures are rising sharply, and borrowing costs are creeping higher too. Meanwhile the economy is still 5% smaller than it was before COVID.
Spending? goodness only knows. Deficit? I cannot imagine
Some horrible, horrible choices face the government soon.
They have some interesting tech (some of which is British), and it wouldn't be ridiculous to target a sector like this.
Hmm, it depends on the value chain. One of the reasons that import substitution tends to fail is because countries that attempt it have a much higher cost structure and more valuable jobs are lost higher up the value chain than are created at the bottom in low end manufacturing due to feed in prices rising.
For example, are we substituting German made BMWs for British made Jaguars? That's not a big deal as we've kept most of the value chain almost identical and it's a net gain in jobs as more Jags are built here to make up for fewer BMWs being bought. Are we replacing machine made semi-manufactured goods imported from Germany with more expensive British manually made goods that have a 50% higher cost with the imports made uncompetitive with tariffs? That is a big deal because Jag are saddled with a higher cost structure and unable to compete with BMW in export markets.
There are areas where import substitution makes sense but I'm not convinced that solar panels is one given just how big the cost differential is vs Chinese made solar panels. If we lumber domestic solar companies higher up the value chain with very high cost panels it may end up collapsing the industry and we won't sell those panels anywhere else as Chinese manufacturers will be offering a slightly lesser product for 10% of the cost.
The cost differential would be nothing like that. And bear in mind that module cost is well under 40% of any total project cost, whereas increased module efficiencies bear on 100% of the cost.
In any event, solar will provide over half of global electricity within a couple of decades. Allowing China to completely control the manufacturing chain is a strategic as well as economic error.
IIRC China doesn't dominate the production of metalurgical grade silicon, which is the preserve of the Norwegians (REC) and the Japanese (Tokayama?)
Sure, but it makes around 90 of the world's solar modules. (And as perovskites improve, it's quite feasible that the whole business will go thin film and silicon won't be needed at all.)
Solar module manufacturing is incredibly easy and low tech: you buy solar cells and you connect them together in a frame. I could start a solar module manufacturing factory in less than a week, and without buying any expensive equipment.
Solar cell making is harder. You need to slice the silicon up and then perform various treatments on it. It requires specialist plants and specialist knowledge. But it's not that high tech. You could get a plant up and running in the UK in three or four months.
Silicon purification, on the other hand, is really quite hard work.
The Chinese are utterly dependent on the West for silicon. We're a little bit, but not really, dependent on the Chinese for modules and cells.
If we wanted to, we could shut down all Chinese solar manufacturing in about a week. And they wouldn't be able to rapidly recover. The reverse simply isn't true.
Incorrect - see my above post. China dominate most steps of the manufacturing process: a very recent development.
Which comes back to the original point that this is a market which will grow significantly over the next couple of decades, and there is a limited opportunity for Europe to get back on board. Biden's US looks as though it will have a go, too.
Fair enough, my information is clearly out of date.
My father has been told it is unlikely his services will be required after the end of this month due to them pretty much vaccinating all the people they need to, not just the ethnic minorities he was signed up to persuade/reassure.
Good evening everyone. I'd volunteered late too, although not an ethnic minority, and been told 'unlikely to be required, shall we keep your name on the books?" So I said no. The gym this morning was very much more relaxed. I wasn't, but the general atmosphere was. Masked people still about in the town and some of the very old (ie at least 10 years older than me) cautiously about.
If I had been Cameron, I would have spent a lot of time in Stockholm and Copenhagen and seen if there was something that could have been put together. And maybe there was, maybe there wasn't, but I do feel that if there was a group of countries moving together, it would have been better and made for a more durable settlement.
Cameron was campaigning to keep it together, not break it up.
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
Imagine inflation at 4% in September, with the Bank of England pondering on the one hand higher interest rates, and SAGE on the other calling for another lockdown.
And furlough ending.
And Gilt yields soaring.
And the national debt still ballooning.
And the economy still smaller than its pre-covid level.
At that point, how popular will the tories be in the south?
Boris will be in a right pickle. I don’t see what his party could do, though. Push him back to austerity?
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Unsurprising. The Liverpool to Manchester train can be slow too, but never leaves urban areas on its entire journey.
The idea the two runs are the same is patently absurd.
To be pedantic - and I apologies because I am broadly on your side on this, but this is a bigger point: accuracy of information about trains - the main Mcr-Lpl train is now the Chat Moss route, which for a remarkable 10 miles or so passes through countryside (the aforementioned Chat Moss). Chat Moss is a bit of an anomaly though. Essentially there is a string of small and medium sized towns from the outer edges of Salford to the outer edges of Liverpool (Worsley-Tyldesley-Leigh-Golborne-Ashton in Makerfield/Newton-le-Willows-Haydock-St. Helens-Prescott-Huyton without a real gap between them.
It's the commuting, mixing and service / office heavy bias in the UK. So, I work in Manchester, live in Huddersfield. In early March last year, I worked in an open plan office, hot desking, in the neighborhood of folks from the Fylde, Liverpool, Burnley, Leeds, Sheffield, don't know any Stoke-rs but there probably are some. And some week away contractors from, for e.g., Oxfordshire and Surrey. I commuted on an, often packed, long distance train from somewhere in NE England/even Scotland to Liverpool or, worse, full of airport bound/returned people. At the weekend, I chatted with a bloke who does office work in Sheffield - when I worked there Nottingham, Leicester (from where my sister then commutes to Birmingham), South Derbyshire, North Lincs were all co-worker locations. That's pretty typical.
I don't think anywhere else in Europe comes close in terms of workplace interconnectivity as we do, and that was relevant last March.
That's certainly typical. I also work in Manchester and have a similar geography of colleagues (I do have a Stokie!) I don't know how atypical the UK is in this regard. I wonder what the geography of an office in Munich or Marseille would be?
Am I alone in thinking these kind of distances travelled twice a day must have an effect on productivity. And mental and physical health?
The longest daily distances there ended up not being that long term, after a year or two people would move or find a job closer, but then the next lot would come in and take over. The hotel staying contractors and the overlap between all the, fairly evenly spaced, major cities I'd think is what is more prevalent in the UK. I don't see the same series of do-able hops anywhere beyond the Ruhr or Belgium/Holland and we do commute longer to work for a fact.
Actually don't mind my commute, an under 30 minute train journey frequent enough that I don't worry much about setting off on any given dot, and a brisk walk at each end. Mancunians tend to think you live on the moon though, even though it takes a good bit longer to get in from most Lancashire towns.
The commission economic predictions for the UK definitely have a touch of jilted ex syndrome. The city consensus is noticeably higher and factors in little to no brexit related reduction in GDP. I think it would be fairly embarrassing for them to come in at ~7.5% where the city consensus is for the UK, though. Additionally it looks like their projections are done on a nominal GDP calculation basis but the GDP itself is the output model as preferred by the ONS. Most of the city has caught up with this and it's why there is expected to be a big bounceback as schools return to normal and health output picks up as the NHS works through a huge backlog.
It's interesting reading the economics editor of Berlingske today explaining how the UK economy fared worst of all economies last year "Unlike Denmark" - the whole piece is tinged with a "bastard british have left us at the mercy of the Germans" vibe - apparently there may be some short term bounce back over the summer but by Autumn the warning klaxons will be going off and the full error of Brexit will become visible - I don't know if that will happen but reading the piece it's clear he really wants it too because the UK 'abandoned' Denmark.
Another bit of jilted ex syndrome. Goldman Sachs have got UK growth this year penciled in at 7.8% which recovers all of our GDP by the end of 2021 based on the measure they use.
Also, there is a solution to being left at the mercy of Germany. 🤷♂️
I can't tell you the grief I get over the UK leaving the EU, mostly because I don't participate in gleefully hoping it all goes horribly wrong and saying Boris Johnson is an idiot and the electorate were tricked - Danes are mostly now looking on and suffering major jilted ex syndrome. They HATE the idea Brexit might not be that big a deal economically to the UK.
I really don't understand this! Why do they care at all?
Because they secretly fear we might be right.
Emotionally, there is a human need to justify to yourself, and others, that you have made the right decision. There are still a lot of remainers here who, emotionally, would quite like Brexit to be an unmitigated disaster - they may end up poorer but they will at least be able to tell themselves that they backed the right horse. (Remainers aren't alone in this and had the referendum gone the other way I'm quite sure there would have been just as many leavers willing Bremain to fail for exactly the same reason.) Similarly, can all unionists, hand on heart, say they would be delighted to see Scexit be a happy success for the Scots? Rationally we might wish it, but it would very much be a battle between head and heart. I say this as a man with a Scottish mother and a very Scottish grandmother whose early childhood holidays were there and who thinks fondly of the country and its people, and who is anyway unconvinced of the future of the union. If my feelings are mixed, how must a committed English unionist feel?
This is all doubly true if before the event you made a living telling people publicly what a disaster it would be.
This isn't a particularly edifying human characteristic but I don't think we can deny that it is there.
Yes, but that doesn't explain why Danes care about the UK, that explains why British Remainers Remoan
I understand Ireland's resentment of Brexit, but not Denmark's
Danes love the UK, they quote huge screeds of Monty Python, they adore British TV shows, they like to practice their English (which is not great compared to Sweden or Norway) and they felt their was a bond - a bit like the UK obsession with the USA, the UK only knows about Denmark from Guardian articles that are invariably wrong about life here and dark police dramas....
There's also Borgen, and the vicious battles between parties called 'Moderates', 'New Democrats', 'Principled Centrists' etc...
I don't think it's so much jilted, as abandoned by the friendly big brother in a dysfunctional extended family.
I think that’s right. If you were Denmark, you could rely on us as a close ally (see how integrated we were in Afghanistan for instance) to stand up for you in the EU and always be working with you at the Cion. We’ve abandoned them. The whole northern group, really.
I always felt that the UK should lead Scandinavia (Sweden, Denmark, possibly Finland) into a semi-detached status WRT to the EU. One of Cameron's big failures was to miss the fact that we weren't the only unhappy country inside the EU, and that many of the other unhappy countries had interests in common with us.
I agree. We never did build that alliance. Many of those countries would at the very least have been keen to join a “this far and no further” block.
That boat sailed once the Euro and the ECB were in place. The EU does not allow reverse gear which would have been required for semi detached status and Finland are in the Euro already. Denmark and Sweden should have joined our Brexit project, of course, but may because of their opt out, be under the illusion that they are not part of an emerging state by being in the EU. Norway, Denmark, Sweden and UK would have made excellent EFTA partners.
Well yes, that was the grouping I was thinking of. None of them keen to be part of the European superstate, none of the Euro-members (although Denmark's currency is pegged).
If I had been Cameron, I would have spent a lot of time in Stockholm and Copenhagen and seen if there was something that could have been put together. And maybe there was, maybe there wasn't, but I do feel that if there was a group of countries moving together, it would have been better and made for a more durable settlement.
Couple of years ago I was at an apparently quite well-informed counter-factual history discussion on 'What if William the Bastard had lost at Hastings?" The consensus was that we'd have been much more involved with Scandinavia than France etc.
Fascinating bit in @RachelReevesMP debut as shadow chancellor as she dares to touch the 3rd rail of Brexit: govt has no vision to help manufacturers, cultural industry, farmers + fishermen - all "suffering because of huge gaps in this govt's deal with our European neighbours" https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1392504285708050438
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
Imagine inflation at 4% in September, with the Bank of England pondering on the one hand higher interest rates, and SAGE on the other calling for another lockdown.
And furlough ending.
And Gilt yields soaring.
And the national debt still ballooning.
And the economy still smaller than its pre-covid level.
At that point, how popular will the tories be in the south?
Boris will be in a right pickle. I don’t see what his party could do, though. Push him back to austerity?
I think he’d rather quit.
Pensions will be rising, if inflation's around 4%, too. Possibly good for the Tories, possibly not.
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
Imagine inflation at 4% in September, with the Bank of England pondering on the one hand higher interest rates, and SAGE on the other calling for another lockdown.
And furlough ending.
And Gilt yields soaring.
And the national debt still ballooning.
And the economy still smaller than its pre-covid level.
At that point, how popular will the tories be in the south?
Boris will be in a right pickle. I don’t see what his party could do, though. Push him back to austerity?
I think he’d rather quit.
Pensions will be rising, if inflation's around 4%, too. Possibly good for the Tories, possibly not.
The triple lock would come under huge pressure, though, if wages weren’t rising anywhere near as much.
The government would be better off spending some political capital on reforming/abolishing it now, rather than waiting until it is unpopular and its hand is forced, imo
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
Imagine inflation at 4% in September, with the Bank of England pondering on the one hand higher interest rates, and SAGE on the other calling for another lockdown.
And furlough ending.
And Gilt yields soaring.
And the national debt still ballooning.
And the economy still smaller than its pre-covid level.
At that point, how popular will the tories be in the south?
Boris will be in a right pickle. I don’t see what his party could do, though. Push him back to austerity?
I think he’d rather quit.
In a sense, it doesn't really matter. The thing about inflation is that it imposes its own austerity by making the money the government prints worth less. And that has huge implications for everything and everybody.
The only remedy is to start hiking interest rates, but how can the Bank of England do that to an economy that has been shattered by lockdowns and remains cowed by the threat of more?
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
45-60 mins, and the countryside bit is irrelevant as the doors are shut ...
Yuppie skiers coming back from Italy come a lot further and longer, and the doors are also shut ...
"Yuppie skiers"? WTF! You must be very old, I didn't know people still used that term.
A word to your prejudice: not all people who go skiing are "young and upwardly mobile": some of us are quite old, some are relatively monetarily successful, some less so, but the only really upwardly mobile aspect to us is when we are sitting on a lift!
Point taken. Apologies.
Don't apologize for taking abuse from savage yuppies!
Plus the fact that you've been victim of (quasi-) unprovoked age discrimination is an outrage!!
WHERE are the monitors when we (semi-) superannuated need them? No doubt chugging their Red Bull and diddling with their Tik-Tok!
Or is it the other way around - I get so confused?!?
IF the PB powers-that-be refuse to take action, then it becomes incumbent upon the likes of yours truly to administer a well-deserved thrashing to the young punk. Just as soon as I can find my horsewhip.
Stats today: deaths continue down (by date of death, allowing for a six day lag, seven day average of deaths is at 8.7. Hospitalisations look static: after declining steadily through April, they have been flat at just over 100 a day in early May. Numbers of positive tests rising very slowly but steadily - slight movement upward every day for a week now. 11-19 cohort still by far the most significant in terms of positives.
Reasonable to believe based on this that the spread is amongst the unvaccinated, which is gradually becoming a smaller proportion of the population. The proportion of the population jabbed at least once is crawling upwards slowly as resources continue to be focused on second jabs - that will start to rise more steeply again soon.
Hope (and my expectation) is that there has been a proper disconnection now between deaths and positives, rather than the uptick in positives being a leading indicator.
Looking at the detailed regional map there are clearly local outbreaks going on among the unvaccinated. See this story from yesterday about Long Eaton in Nottinghamshire:
Seems to have spread around the school quite quickly. I suspect many of these cases have been picked up due to LFD testing and probably a lot of asymptomatic cases. This is probably replicated across the country.
I am not so much looking at cases any more but the hospitalisations and deaths. Let's hope hospitalisations starts going down again and deaths continue the slow fall to zero. We are never going to get Covid Zero, the fact that some people will refuse the vaccine will make it impossible.
What the local outbreaks shows is that we do really need to vaccinate the secondary school children before they start the Autumn term.
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
Imagine inflation at 4% in September, with the Bank of England pondering on the one hand higher interest rates, and SAGE on the other calling for another lockdown.
And furlough ending.
And Gilt yields soaring.
And the national debt still ballooning.
And the economy still smaller than its pre-covid level.
At that point, how popular will the tories be in the south?
Boris will be in a right pickle. I don’t see what his party could do, though. Push him back to austerity?
I think he’d rather quit.
Pensions will be rising, if inflation's around 4%, too. Possibly good for the Tories, possibly not.
The triple lock would come under huge pressure, though, if wages weren’t rising anywhere near as much.
The government is better off spending some political capital on reforming/abolishing it now, rather than waiting until it is unpopular and its hand is forced, imo
It would, and it should, but it won't. Not this year. 'You locked us away from our grandchildren! Wasn't that enough?'
The commission economic predictions for the UK definitely have a touch of jilted ex syndrome. The city consensus is noticeably higher and factors in little to no brexit related reduction in GDP. I think it would be fairly embarrassing for them to come in at ~7.5% where the city consensus is for the UK, though. Additionally it looks like their projections are done on a nominal GDP calculation basis but the GDP itself is the output model as preferred by the ONS. Most of the city has caught up with this and it's why there is expected to be a big bounceback as schools return to normal and health output picks up as the NHS works through a huge backlog.
It's interesting reading the economics editor of Berlingske today explaining how the UK economy fared worst of all economies last year "Unlike Denmark" - the whole piece is tinged with a "bastard british have left us at the mercy of the Germans" vibe - apparently there may be some short term bounce back over the summer but by Autumn the warning klaxons will be going off and the full error of Brexit will become visible - I don't know if that will happen but reading the piece it's clear he really wants it too because the UK 'abandoned' Denmark.
Another bit of jilted ex syndrome. Goldman Sachs have got UK growth this year penciled in at 7.8% which recovers all of our GDP by the end of 2021 based on the measure they use.
Also, there is a solution to being left at the mercy of Germany. 🤷♂️
I can't tell you the grief I get over the UK leaving the EU, mostly because I don't participate in gleefully hoping it all goes horribly wrong and saying Boris Johnson is an idiot and the electorate were tricked - Danes are mostly now looking on and suffering major jilted ex syndrome. They HATE the idea Brexit might not be that big a deal economically to the UK.
I really don't understand this! Why do they care at all?
Because they secretly fear we might be right.
Emotionally, there is a human need to justify to yourself, and others, that you have made the right decision. There are still a lot of remainers here who, emotionally, would quite like Brexit to be an unmitigated disaster - they may end up poorer but they will at least be able to tell themselves that they backed the right horse. (Remainers aren't alone in this and had the referendum gone the other way I'm quite sure there would have been just as many leavers willing Bremain to fail for exactly the same reason.) Similarly, can all unionists, hand on heart, say they would be delighted to see Scexit be a happy success for the Scots? Rationally we might wish it, but it would very much be a battle between head and heart. I say this as a man with a Scottish mother and a very Scottish grandmother whose early childhood holidays were there and who thinks fondly of the country and its people, and who is anyway unconvinced of the future of the union. If my feelings are mixed, how must a committed English unionist feel?
This is all doubly true if before the event you made a living telling people publicly what a disaster it would be.
This isn't a particularly edifying human characteristic but I don't think we can deny that it is there.
Yes, but that doesn't explain why Danes care about the UK, that explains why British Remainers Remoan
I understand Ireland's resentment of Brexit, but not Denmark's
Danes love the UK, they quote huge screeds of Monty Python, they adore British TV shows, they like to practice their English (which is not great compared to Sweden or Norway) and they felt their was a bond - a bit like the UK obsession with the USA, the UK only knows about Denmark from Guardian articles that are invariably wrong about life here and dark police dramas....
There's also Borgen, and the vicious battles between parties called 'Moderates', 'New Democrats', 'Principled Centrists' etc...
I don't think it's so much jilted, as abandoned by the friendly big brother in a dysfunctional extended family.
I think that’s right. If you were Denmark, you could rely on us as a close ally (see how integrated we were in Afghanistan for instance) to stand up for you in the EU and always be working with you at the Cion. We’ve abandoned them. The whole northern group, really.
I always felt that the UK should lead Scandinavia (Sweden, Denmark, possibly Finland) into a semi-detached status WRT to the EU. One of Cameron's big failures was to miss the fact that we weren't the only unhappy country inside the EU, and that many of the other unhappy countries had interests in common with us.
I agree. We never did build that alliance. Many of those countries would at the very least have been keen to join a “this far and no further” block.
That boat sailed once the Euro and the ECB were in place. The EU does not allow reverse gear which would have been required for semi detached status and Finland are in the Euro already. Denmark and Sweden should have joined our Brexit project, of course, but may because of their opt out, be under the illusion that they are not part of an emerging state by being in the EU. Norway, Denmark, Sweden and UK would have made excellent EFTA partners.
Well yes, that was the grouping I was thinking of. None of them keen to be part of the European superstate, none of the Euro-members (although Denmark's currency is pegged).
If I had been Cameron, I would have spent a lot of time in Stockholm and Copenhagen and seen if there was something that could have been put together. And maybe there was, maybe there wasn't, but I do feel that if there was a group of countries moving together, it would have been better and made for a more durable settlement.
Very interesting, and to be filed under 'Ifs of history'. However at the time Cameron and the establishment were in complete denial about the nature of the project, the Euro and the ECB were showing what they were for and what they were made of, the EU was entirely fundamentalist about the pillars of the single market, and the ordinary public who could see the underlying reality of the EU, exemplified by our complete inability to control our borders, and where it was going, were being treated as if they were morons and racists.
It is now obvious to everyone that the EU should have been a different sort of project and much more modest and realistic. But the Euro and ECB has put paid to sorting that short of an unimaginable and terrible crisis. sad.
Has Denmark or Sweden made any moves since 2016 to show their desire for statehood or detachment from the EU?
My father has been told it is unlikely his services will be required after the end of this month due to them pretty much vaccinating all the people they need to, not just the ethnic minorities he was signed up to persuade/reassure.
You dad did sterling work during the greatest crisis facing the UK and the world in (most of) our lifetimes. Please thank him for all of us!
(And how's it going re: West West Virginia? Enquiring minds want to know!)
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
I could see inflation being a black swan that knocks the Tories out of office in 2024 if it gets out of control.
I think it's something that overrides concerns on cultural/social and values matters, at least temporarily, as a sort of political Maslow hierarchy of needs.
However, it would need the Opposition to look and feel more credible first, but it is possible.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
And Mr A G adds
"If a cockup, then it would mean 10 Downing Street/Johnson's office/Johnson missed following correspondence:
- letter before claim/final demand - Claim Form from Court - copy of CCJ itself
If the latter two slipped through, then serious questions about how post dealt with"
It really does screw up your credit score, as you take a hit for the late payment(s), then default, and then the CCJ.
Stays on his record for six years (unless he satisfies it within a month).
Does anyone know who obtained the CCJ?
Because whilst it disappears off your record after six years depending on the company they keep in their internal records, so if you default with a certain financial institution, they never let you back.
Then you find out the hard way that certain banks/financial institutions have more than one brand, and good luck getting an account with them.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
And Mr A G adds
"If a cockup, then it would mean 10 Downing Street/Johnson's office/Johnson missed following correspondence:
- letter before claim/final demand - Claim Form from Court - copy of CCJ itself
If the latter two slipped through, then serious questions about how post dealt with"
I am fully see Boris getting the letters, putting them to one side to deal with after (insert literally everything else).....and then forgetting.
Obviously he is massively disorganized at the best of times, but baby son and watching the vaccine documentary you got a glimpse into the hours been kept by government ministers e.g. Important meetings regarding vaccine funding starting (by design) at 8pm on a Friday night, because that is the only time they could fit it in.
No excuse, but I wouldn't be shocked to find Boris stuck them in a drawer (especially when they came round to do some decorating on the flat), wandered around occasionally mumbling sure there is something I need to do, some letter or something...and then being distracted by something else.
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
Imagine inflation at 4% in September, with the Bank of England pondering on the one hand higher interest rates, and SAGE on the other calling for another lockdown.
And furlough ending.
And Gilt yields soaring.
And the national debt still ballooning.
And the economy still smaller than its pre-covid level.
At that point, how popular will the tories be in the south?
Boris will be in a right pickle. I don’t see what his party could do, though. Push him back to austerity?
I think he’d rather quit.
Pensions will be rising, if inflation's around 4%, too. Possibly good for the Tories, possibly not.
Public spending in the noraml way with inflation at 4% would, essentially, be unsustainable, I think. There is no way, given the amounts that have been spent and the way the economy has been decimated, that the exchequer could keep pace.
Something would simply have to give. Big time.
So much for Johnson's popularity then. The Bill for corona is large. Lockdown has made it gargantuan. It is nearly here.
My father has been told it is unlikely his services will be required after the end of this month due to them pretty much vaccinating all the people they need to, not just the ethnic minorities he was signed up to persuade/reassure.
You dad did sterling work during the greatest crisis facing the UK and the world in (most of) our lifetimes. Please thank him for all of us!
(And how's it going re: West West Virginia? Enquiring minds want to know!)
Unfortunately my work these days is focussed on the impacts of Scottish secession.
Rob Brewer @rbrwr Replying to @davidallengreen "Thank you for your letter to the Prime Minister about your COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Regrettably he is unable to answer every letter personally, but he is deeply concerned about COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Yours faithfully, Correspondence Secretary, No. 10
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
Imagine inflation at 4% in September, with the Bank of England pondering on the one hand higher interest rates, and SAGE on the other calling for another lockdown.
And furlough ending.
And Gilt yields soaring.
And the national debt still ballooning.
And the economy still smaller than its pre-covid level.
At that point, how popular will the tories be in the south?
Boris will be in a right pickle. I don’t see what his party could do, though. Push him back to austerity?
I think he’d rather quit.
Like his idol Winston, Boris does NOT do austerity. OR if he does, he doesn't do it well.
Certainly not personally. Yet another Churchillian trait!
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
And Mr A G adds
"If a cockup, then it would mean 10 Downing Street/Johnson's office/Johnson missed following correspondence:
- letter before claim/final demand - Claim Form from Court - copy of CCJ itself
If the latter two slipped through, then serious questions about how post dealt with"
Letters from the court for the paperwork for the claim form comes in a brown envelope heavily labelled that this is an official court document.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
The photo in Private Eye refers to 'Boris Johnson'. That's not his name. A B de P or some such, would surely be on a court document.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
The photo in Private Eye refers to 'Boris Johnson'. That's not his name. A B de P or some such, would surely be on a court document.
Apparently not a problem according to Mr Allen Green in that thread, IIRC.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
And Mr A G adds
"If a cockup, then it would mean 10 Downing Street/Johnson's office/Johnson missed following correspondence:
- letter before claim/final demand - Claim Form from Court - copy of CCJ itself
If the latter two slipped through, then serious questions about how post dealt with"
I am fully see Boris getting the letters, putting them to one side to deal with after.....and then forgetting.
Obviously he is massively disorganized at the best of times, but watching the vaccine documentary you got a glimpse into the hours been kept by government ministers e.g. Important meetings regarding vaccine funding starting (by design) at 8pm on a Friday night, because that is the only time they could fit it in.
"Thank you for your letter to the Prime Minister about your COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Regrettably he is unable to answer every letter personally, but he is deeply concerned about COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Yours faithfully, Correspondence Secretary, No. 10"
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
The photo in Private Eye refers to 'Boris Johnson'. That's not his name. A B de P or some such, would surely be on a court document.
I'm suspecting is he applied for the credit/service as Boris Johnson then that's how the form was processed at the claimant's end.
So long as his DOB and address were accurate then it isn't an issue.
Radovan Karadzic, the former Bosnian Serb leader convicted of genocide during the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, is to serve the rest of his life sentence in a British jail.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
The photo in Private Eye refers to 'Boris Johnson'. That's not his name. A B de P or some such, would surely be on a court document.
Well somebody did stick the Downing Street flat on SpareRooms.com ....
They have some interesting tech (some of which is British), and it wouldn't be ridiculous to target a sector like this.
Hmm, it depends on the value chain. One of the reasons that import substitution tends to fail is because countries that attempt it have a much higher cost structure and more valuable jobs are lost higher up the value chain than are created at the bottom in low end manufacturing due to feed in prices rising.
For example, are we substituting German made BMWs for British made Jaguars? That's not a big deal as we've kept most of the value chain almost identical and it's a net gain in jobs as more Jags are built here to make up for fewer BMWs being bought. Are we replacing machine made semi-manufactured goods imported from Germany with more expensive British manually made goods that have a 50% higher cost with the imports made uncompetitive with tariffs? That is a big deal because Jag are saddled with a higher cost structure and unable to compete with BMW in export markets.
There are areas where import substitution makes sense but I'm not convinced that solar panels is one given just how big the cost differential is vs Chinese made solar panels. If we lumber domestic solar companies higher up the value chain with very high cost panels it may end up collapsing the industry and we won't sell those panels anywhere else as Chinese manufacturers will be offering a slightly lesser product for 10% of the cost.
The cost differential would be nothing like that. And bear in mind that module cost is well under 40% of any total project cost, whereas increased module efficiencies bear on 100% of the cost.
In any event, solar will provide over half of global electricity within a couple of decades. Allowing China to completely control the manufacturing chain is a strategic as well as economic error.
IIRC China doesn't dominate the production of metalurgical grade silicon, which is the preserve of the Norwegians (REC) and the Japanese (Tokayama?)
Sure, but it makes around 90 of the world's solar modules. (And as perovskites improve, it's quite feasible that the whole business will go thin film and silicon won't be needed at all.)
Solar module manufacturing is incredibly easy and low tech: you buy solar cells and you connect them together in a frame. I could start a solar module manufacturing factory in less than a week, and without buying any expensive equipment.
Solar cell making is harder. You need to slice the silicon up and then perform various treatments on it. It requires specialist plants and specialist knowledge. But it's not that high tech. You could get a plant up and running in the UK in three or four months.
Silicon purification, on the other hand, is really quite hard work.
The Chinese are utterly dependent on the West for silicon. We're a little bit, but not really, dependent on the Chinese for modules and cells.
If we wanted to, we could shut down all Chinese solar manufacturing in about a week. And they wouldn't be able to rapidly recover. The reverse simply isn't true.
Incorrect - see my above post. China dominate most steps of the manufacturing process: a very recent development.
Which comes back to the original point that this is a market which will grow significantly over the next couple of decades, and there is a limited opportunity for Europe to get back on board. Biden's US looks as though it will have a go, too.
Fair enough, my information is clearly out of date.
The world is changing fast, and our governments don't really react at the same speed. With the election of sleepy old Joe Biden, the US, paradoxically, might be an exception to that.
(Monocrystalline silicon wafer production for the high end solar cells and advanced chip manufacturing is not yet Chinese dominated, though they did buy the Finnish manufacturer Okmetic.)
Fascinating bit in @RachelReevesMP debut as shadow chancellor as she dares to touch the 3rd rail of Brexit: govt has no vision to help manufacturers, cultural industry, farmers + fishermen - all "suffering because of huge gaps in this govt's deal with our European neighbours" https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1392504285708050438
Labour will never learn
That it's unpatriotic to criticize the government?
OK - I am royally pissed off and if anyone has any ideas I am all ears
E.on are my sons energy provider - I have mentioned that he has been running up some impossible bills
In last month he has allegedly run up 700 - his arrears were getting on for 2 grand (a complaint has been open for a while on how this amount can possibly be used).
An engineer came out agreed he couldn't run that up living on his own in a 2 bed flat and said he suspected someone else was drawing his supply too. (This is the second person contracted by Eon to say this)
Eon manager subsequently rang my son and agreed to accept a certain payment and agreed my son could leave them for another supplier - he has I think 4 complaints open with Eon going back nearly a year for the first one - none resolved.
He hit a snag with paying them and a compromise was agreed (so, multiple calls on this) - this agreement was kept by us. (Delay was literally 48 hours tops)
He has had debt collection on the phone today asking for full payment - he referred them to his agreement with manager and she said she could not find record of the phone call and in any event the person who made the agreement was not entitled to do so.... (despite not knowing who it was )
This person said it was entirely possible to run up 700 a month on a 2 bed flat on his own (Like feck, I spend a fraction of that on a 5 bed place with a family in it)
When he pointed out that the engineer who came out said he could not and it needed further investigation and he was probably better placed to make that determination she claimed she knew better and then hung up on him.....
I tried 3 times to get details on how to escalate a complaint and they hung up on me 3 times. Then it took 50 minutes on one of those chat tools to finally just get an e mail address to make a written complaint to. They would not give me a way to escalate or a managers details - I had to threaten them with my mp and Ombudsman to get even that.
I said its almost like they don't want a proper record of what they are saying ..... (but I have screen shots of the chat)
He will hate me saying this - but he is dealing with some difficult health issues (cancer and severe kidney issues) plus he has mental health issues (bipolar) and this is making him ill with stress. I frankly am beyond furious, because he really does not need this (He and I have both told E.on this too)
As I say I'm mad and I will be helping son write to the general complaints line and I will contact our MP and Ombudsman with him but any other advice gratefully accepted -A friend mentioned Resover.co.uk - that looks like it might help - it even has a name within E.on to escalate to - which E.on just would not give me - which again just shows me they being deliberately uncooperative.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
And Mr A G adds
"If a cockup, then it would mean 10 Downing Street/Johnson's office/Johnson missed following correspondence:
- letter before claim/final demand - Claim Form from Court - copy of CCJ itself
If the latter two slipped through, then serious questions about how post dealt with"
I am fully see Boris getting the letters, putting them to one side to deal with after.....and then forgetting.
Obviously he is massively disorganized at the best of times, but watching the vaccine documentary you got a glimpse into the hours been kept by government ministers e.g. Important meetings regarding vaccine funding starting (by design) at 8pm on a Friday night, because that is the only time they could fit it in.
"Thank you for your letter to the Prime Minister about your COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Regrettably he is unable to answer every letter personally, but he is deeply concerned about COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Yours faithfully, Correspondence Secretary, No. 10"
Er..... er...... shouldn't said Correspondence Sec have seen at least some of the preceding letters? As pointed out elsewhere, the envelopes do make it clear that there's a Very Important Document inside.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
The photo in Private Eye refers to 'Boris Johnson'. That's not his name. A B de P or some such, would surely be on a court document.
Surely claim would be filed by the creditor? It's the name 99% of people would know him by.
Radovan Karadzic, the former Bosnian Serb leader convicted of genocide during the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, is to serve the rest of his life sentence in a British jail.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
The photo in Private Eye refers to 'Boris Johnson'. That's not his name. A B de P or some such, would surely be on a court document.
Surely claim would be filed by the creditor? It's the name 99% of people would know him by.
And good luck to him iof he tries to get out of it that way. "No, I'm not called Boris Johnson!"
Best thing to do is to get the official complaint at E.on 'deadlocked' then go to the ombudsman at OFGEM.
Depending on the situation, I might go for the nuclear option and make a complaint to the police about someone stealing your gas.
Once you have a police crime reference number then that really does put the ball in E.on's court, but so does deadlocking the complaint and taking it to OFGEM.
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
I could see inflation being a black swan that knocks the Tories out of office in 2024 if it gets out of control.
I think it's something that overrides concerns on cultural/social and values matters, at least temporarily, as a sort of political Maslow hierarchy of needs.
However, it would need the Opposition to look and feel more credible first, but it is possible.
Thatcher was heading for defeat until the Winter Of Discontent. Cameron was heading for being steamrollered by Brown. The IHT pledge bought him time, but the Credit Crunch got him into office.
A mediocre government beats a mediocre opposition, but if a government utterly fails then the mediocrity of the opposition matters a lot less. And the economy can't really cope with more than a small dollop of inflation, because it's so dependent on negligible nominal interest rates.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
The photo in Private Eye refers to 'Boris Johnson'. That's not his name. A B de P or some such, would surely be on a court document.
Surely claim would be filed by the creditor? It's the name 99% of people would know him by.
It is, but is more likely the name Boris Johnson used when he applied for credit/service.
"A default judgment/CCJ is rarely about being skint - as there are ways of heading off a CCJ even if skint, as long as you deal with the claim promptly. So unless this a prank or invalid service, a default CCJ here speaks to disorganisation at Johnson's end"
And Mr A G adds
"If a cockup, then it would mean 10 Downing Street/Johnson's office/Johnson missed following correspondence:
- letter before claim/final demand - Claim Form from Court - copy of CCJ itself
If the latter two slipped through, then serious questions about how post dealt with"
I am fully see Boris getting the letters, putting them to one side to deal with after (insert literally everything else).....and then forgetting.
Obviously he is massively disorganized at the best of times, but baby son and watching the vaccine documentary you got a glimpse into the hours been kept by government ministers e.g. Important meetings regarding vaccine funding starting (by design) at 8pm on a Friday night, because that is the only time they could fit it in.
No excuse, but I wouldn't be shocked to find Boris stuck them in a drawer (especially when they came round to do some decorating on the flat), wandered around occasionally mumbling sure there is something I need to do, some letter or something...and then being distracted by something else.
The false intimacy that comes with Brand "Boris" is super strong here. It's like you're talking about your uncle.
OK - I am royally pissed off and if anyone has any ideas I am all ears
E.on are my sons energy provider - I have mentioned that he has been running up some impossible bills
In last month he has allegedly run up 700 - his arrears were getting on for 2 grand (a complaint has been open for a while on how this amount can possibly be used).
An engineer came out agreed he couldn't run that up living on his own in a 2 bed flat and said he suspected someone else was drawing his supply too. (This is the second person contracted by Eon to say this)
Eon manager subsequently rang my son and agreed to accept a certain payment and agreed my son could leave them for another supplier - he has I think 4 complaints open with Eon going back nearly a year for the first one - none resolved.
He hit a snag with paying them and a compromise was agreed (so, multiple calls on this) - this agreement was kept by us. (Delay was literally 48 hours tops)
He has had debt collection on the phone today asking for full payment - he referred them to his agreement with manager and she said she could not find record of the phone call and in any event the person who made the agreement was not entitled to do so.... (despite not knowing who it was )
This person said it was entirely possible to run up 700 a month on a 2 bed flat on his own (Like feck, I spend a fraction of that on a 5 bed place with a family in it)
When he pointed out that the engineer who came out said he could not and it needed further investigation and he was probably better placed to make that determination she claimed she knew better and then hung up on him.....
I tried 3 times to get details on how to escalate a complaint and they hung up on me 3 times. Then it took 50 minutes on one of those chat tools to finally just get an e mail address to make a written complaint to. They would not give me a way to escalate or a managers details - I had to threaten them with my mp and Ombudsman to get even that.
I said its almost like they don't want a proper record of what they are saying ..... (but I have screen shots of the chat)
He will hate me saying this - but he is dealing with some difficult health issues (cancer and severe kidney issues) plus he has mental health issues (bipolar) and this is making him ill with stress. I frankly am beyond furious, because he really does not need this (He and I have both told E.on this too)
As I say I'm mad and I will be helping son write to the general complaints line and I will contact our MP and Ombudsman with him but any other advice gratefully accepted -A friend mentioned Resover.co.uk - that looks like it might help - it even has a name within E.on to escalate to - which E.on just would not give me - which again just shows me they being deliberately uncooperative.
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Unsurprising. The Liverpool to Manchester train can be slow too, but never leaves urban areas on its entire journey.
The idea the two runs are the same is patently absurd.
To be pedantic - and I apologies because I am broadly on your side on this, but this is a bigger point: accuracy of information about trains - the main Mcr-Lpl train is now the Chat Moss route, which for a remarkable 10 miles or so passes through countryside (the aforementioned Chat Moss). Chat Moss is a bit of an anomaly though. Essentially there is a string of small and medium sized towns from the outer edges of Salford to the outer edges of Liverpool (Worsley-Tyldesley-Leigh-Golborne-Ashton in Makerfield/Newton-le-Willows-Haydock-St. Helens-Prescott-Huyton without a real gap between them.
It's the commuting, mixing and service / office heavy bias in the UK. So, I work in Manchester, live in Huddersfield. In early March last year, I worked in an open plan office, hot desking, in the neighborhood of folks from the Fylde, Liverpool, Burnley, Leeds, Sheffield, don't know any Stoke-rs but there probably are some. And some week away contractors from, for e.g., Oxfordshire and Surrey. I commuted on an, often packed, long distance train from somewhere in NE England/even Scotland to Liverpool or, worse, full of airport bound/returned people. At the weekend, I chatted with a bloke who does office work in Sheffield - when I worked there Nottingham, Leicester (from where my sister then commutes to Birmingham), South Derbyshire, North Lincs were all co-worker locations. That's pretty typical.
I don't think anywhere else in Europe comes close in terms of workplace interconnectivity as we do, and that was relevant last March.
That's certainly typical. I also work in Manchester and have a similar geography of colleagues (I do have a Stokie!) I don't know how atypical the UK is in this regard. I wonder what the geography of an office in Munich or Marseille would be?
Am I alone in thinking these kind of distances travelled twice a day must have an effect on productivity. And mental and physical health?
I love being on public transport with my headphones on, listening to music, reading my Kindle. Much better than being at home or at work, where people are always bothering me for things.
Pendant note - assume there's a missing ' between "PM" and "s"?
IF yours truly recalls, this is you're 2nd offense, at least.
Lets not do it again, shall we. Its not nice, and your better than that!
Prime Ministers plural. As a class. Because I don't know that others haven't had one.
Good point. Wonder WHO else among First Lords of the Treasury would be most likely to have a CCJ (whatever the heck it is, but sounds bad or at least expensive)?
My nominations are (if such a thing existed during their tenures, and just since 1900)
> Lloyd George (well-documented procivities) > Winston Churchill (well-documented difficulties) > Anthony Eden (well-documented bad luck) > Gordon Brown (distracted by saving the world?) > David Cameron (slimmed-down wide boy on the cover of GQ?)
Would have included Tony Blair, but reckon that Cherie (for all her own wretched excesses) kept a pretty tight reign on finances.
But perhaps she slipped up, as even hot-shot lawyers have been known to do? (Cue TSE!)
OK - I am royally pissed off and if anyone has any ideas I am all ears
E.on are my sons energy provider - I have mentioned that he has been running up some impossible bills
In last month he has allegedly run up 700 - his arrears were getting on for 2 grand (a complaint has been open for a while on how this amount can possibly be used).
An engineer came out agreed he couldn't run that up living on his own in a 2 bed flat and said he suspected someone else was drawing his supply too. (This is the second person contracted by Eon to say this)
Eon manager subsequently rang my son and agreed to accept a certain payment and agreed my son could leave them for another supplier - he has I think 4 complaints open with Eon going back nearly a year for the first one - none resolved.
He hit a snag with paying them and a compromise was agreed (so, multiple calls on this) - this agreement was kept by us. (Delay was literally 48 hours tops)
He has had debt collection on the phone today asking for full payment - he referred them to his agreement with manager and she said she could not find record of the phone call and in any event the person who made the agreement was not entitled to do so.... (despite not knowing who it was )
This person said it was entirely possible to run up 700 a month on a 2 bed flat on his own (Like feck, I spend a fraction of that on a 5 bed place with a family in it)
When he pointed out that the engineer who came out said he could not and it needed further investigation and he was probably better placed to make that determination she claimed she knew better and then hung up on him.....
I tried 3 times to get details on how to escalate a complaint and they hung up on me 3 times. Then it took 50 minutes on one of those chat tools to finally just get an e mail address to make a written complaint to. They would not give me a way to escalate or a managers details - I had to threaten them with my mp and Ombudsman to get even that.
I said its almost like they don't want a proper record of what they are saying ..... (but I have screen shots of the chat)
He will hate me saying this - but he is dealing with some difficult health issues (cancer and severe kidney issues) plus he has mental health issues (bipolar) and this is making him ill with stress. I frankly am beyond furious, because he really does not need this (He and I have both told E.on this too)
As I say I'm mad and I will be helping son write to the general complaints line and I will contact our MP and Ombudsman with him but any other advice gratefully accepted -A friend mentioned Resover.co.uk - that looks like it might help - it even has a name within E.on to escalate to - which E.on just would not give me - which again just shows me they being deliberately uncooperative.
Dreadful. Have you tried Citizens Advice?
Not yet - but we we be contacting everyone we can think of
Best thing to do is to get the official complaint at E.on 'deadlocked' then go to the ombudsman at OFGEM.
Depending on the situation, I might go for the nuclear option and make a complaint to the police about someone stealing your gas.
Once you have a police crime reference number then that really does put the ball in E.on's court, but so does deadlocking the complaint and taking it to OFGEM.
OK - I am royally pissed off and if anyone has any ideas I am all ears
E.on are my sons energy provider - I have mentioned that he has been running up some impossible bills
In last month he has allegedly run up 700 - his arrears were getting on for 2 grand (a complaint has been open for a while on how this amount can possibly be used).
An engineer came out agreed he couldn't run that up living on his own in a 2 bed flat and said he suspected someone else was drawing his supply too. (This is the second person contracted by Eon to say this)
Eon manager subsequently rang my son and agreed to accept a certain payment and agreed my son could leave them for another supplier - he has I think 4 complaints open with Eon going back nearly a year for the first one - none resolved.
He hit a snag with paying them and a compromise was agreed (so, multiple calls on this) - this agreement was kept by us. (Delay was literally 48 hours tops)
He has had debt collection on the phone today asking for full payment - he referred them to his agreement with manager and she said she could not find record of the phone call and in any event the person who made the agreement was not entitled to do so.... (despite not knowing who it was )
This person said it was entirely possible to run up 700 a month on a 2 bed flat on his own (Like feck, I spend a fraction of that on a 5 bed place with a family in it)
When he pointed out that the engineer who came out said he could not and it needed further investigation and he was probably better placed to make that determination she claimed she knew better and then hung up on him.....
I tried 3 times to get details on how to escalate a complaint and they hung up on me 3 times. Then it took 50 minutes on one of those chat tools to finally just get an e mail address to make a written complaint to. They would not give me a way to escalate or a managers details - I had to threaten them with my mp and Ombudsman to get even that.
I said its almost like they don't want a proper record of what they are saying ..... (but I have screen shots of the chat)
He will hate me saying this - but he is dealing with some difficult health issues (cancer and severe kidney issues) plus he has mental health issues (bipolar) and this is making him ill with stress. I frankly am beyond furious, because he really does not need this (He and I have both told E.on this too)
As I say I'm mad and I will be helping son write to the general complaints line and I will contact our MP and Ombudsman with him but any other advice gratefully accepted -A friend mentioned Resover.co.uk - that looks like it might help - it even has a name within E.on to escalate to - which E.on just would not give me - which again just shows me they being deliberately uncooperative.
What a nightmare. Sympathy. You've probably got this, but here is a link to Ofgem.
Best thing to do is to get the official complaint at E.on 'deadlocked' then go to the ombudsman at OFGEM.
Depending on the situation, I might go for the nuclear option and make a complaint to the police about someone stealing your gas.
Once you have a police crime reference number then that really does put the ball in E.on's court, but so does deadlocking the complaint and taking it to OFGEM.
Cheers
Also, check your son's credit file every month, utility providers have a tendency to report late payments to the credit reference agencies, which screws up credit scores and can lead to CCJs.
Also make sure they don't try a but a CIFAS marker against's your son's name.
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Do you take the country train or the inter city though, quite a difference.
The commission economic predictions for the UK definitely have a touch of jilted ex syndrome. The city consensus is noticeably higher and factors in little to no brexit related reduction in GDP. I think it would be fairly embarrassing for them to come in at ~7.5% where the city consensus is for the UK, though. Additionally it looks like their projections are done on a nominal GDP calculation basis but the GDP itself is the output model as preferred by the ONS. Most of the city has caught up with this and it's why there is expected to be a big bounceback as schools return to normal and health output picks up as the NHS works through a huge backlog.
It's interesting reading the economics editor of Berlingske today explaining how the UK economy fared worst of all economies last year "Unlike Denmark" - the whole piece is tinged with a "bastard british have left us at the mercy of the Germans" vibe - apparently there may be some short term bounce back over the summer but by Autumn the warning klaxons will be going off and the full error of Brexit will become visible - I don't know if that will happen but reading the piece it's clear he really wants it too because the UK 'abandoned' Denmark.
Another bit of jilted ex syndrome. Goldman Sachs have got UK growth this year penciled in at 7.8% which recovers all of our GDP by the end of 2021 based on the measure they use.
Also, there is a solution to being left at the mercy of Germany. 🤷♂️
I can't tell you the grief I get over the UK leaving the EU, mostly because I don't participate in gleefully hoping it all goes horribly wrong and saying Boris Johnson is an idiot and the electorate were tricked - Danes are mostly now looking on and suffering major jilted ex syndrome. They HATE the idea Brexit might not be that big a deal economically to the UK.
Too much guardian reading and CNN watching I think. If there is a brexit effect, even in the short term, it is mostly going to be carried by the food/fishing industry because of EU border pedantry. Most of everything else will just get on with life. Speaking from my position in financial services, the death of the City that everyone in the EU keeps hyping up doesn't seem likely, hiring is stronger than I've ever seen it and we're winning clients from outside the EU much faster than we were when we were in it and for us it's made up for the difficulty in servicing EU based clients and more. I think 2021 will be a record year for us in terms of asset gains and 2022 will be a record for profitability.
Thanks for the "I'm alright Jack" anecdote. There are plenty of very real businesses that have suffered so that those that jerk off about "sovrinty init" can have their moment of ecstasy.
The reality is that Brexit is and was a massive upheaval. Whether it was economically worth it I am happy to concede will now need to be decided by impartial historical economists probably long after I have ceased to care, and though I am not dead, I am already not far off not caring now.
As far as I was concerned, the worst thing about Brexit was that it was so massively divisive. Some people and some politicians get off on that, just like the SNP in Scotland. It might be helpful if people who were in favour of Brexit owned a bit of humility instead of constantly trying to justify Brexit when there is no need to do so. We are not going back in. You don't need to keep picking at the wound.
Something about this comment tells me that, despite what you say, you still care *quite a lot* about Brexit
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
I could see inflation being a black swan that knocks the Tories out of office in 2024 if it gets out of control.
I think it's something that overrides concerns on cultural/social and values matters, at least temporarily, as a sort of political Maslow hierarchy of needs.
However, it would need the Opposition to look and feel more credible first, but it is possible.
Nah, inflation will be the dog that didn't bark, at least here, sterling will cover up a lot of the issues globally as it has been artificially depressed for a few years and going to back to $1.50 will eat up a lot of the import price inflation.
OK - I am royally pissed off and if anyone has any ideas I am all ears
E.on are my sons energy provider - I have mentioned that he has been running up some impossible bills
In last month he has allegedly run up 700 - his arrears were getting on for 2 grand (a complaint has been open for a while on how this amount can possibly be used).
An engineer came out agreed he couldn't run that up living on his own in a 2 bed flat and said he suspected someone else was drawing his supply too. (This is the second person contracted by Eon to say this)
Eon manager subsequently rang my son and agreed to accept a certain payment and agreed my son could leave them for another supplier - he has I think 4 complaints open with Eon going back nearly a year for the first one - none resolved.
He hit a snag with paying them and a compromise was agreed (so, multiple calls on this) - this agreement was kept by us. (Delay was literally 48 hours tops)
He has had debt collection on the phone today asking for full payment - he referred them to his agreement with manager and she said she could not find record of the phone call and in any event the person who made the agreement was not entitled to do so.... (despite not knowing who it was )
This person said it was entirely possible to run up 700 a month on a 2 bed flat on his own (Like feck, I spend a fraction of that on a 5 bed place with a family in it)
When he pointed out that the engineer who came out said he could not and it needed further investigation and he was probably better placed to make that determination she claimed she knew better and then hung up on him.....
I tried 3 times to get details on how to escalate a complaint and they hung up on me 3 times. Then it took 50 minutes on one of those chat tools to finally just get an e mail address to make a written complaint to. They would not give me a way to escalate or a managers details - I had to threaten them with my mp and Ombudsman to get even that.
I said its almost like they don't want a proper record of what they are saying ..... (but I have screen shots of the chat)
He will hate me saying this - but he is dealing with some difficult health issues (cancer and severe kidney issues) plus he has mental health issues (bipolar) and this is making him ill with stress. I frankly am beyond furious, because he really does not need this (He and I have both told E.on this too)
As I say I'm mad and I will be helping son write to the general complaints line and I will contact our MP and Ombudsman with him but any other advice gratefully accepted -A friend mentioned Resover.co.uk - that looks like it might help - it even has a name within E.on to escalate to - which E.on just would not give me - which again just shows me they being deliberately uncooperative.
Dreadful. Have you tried Citizens Advice?
Not yet - but we we be contacting everyone we can think of
Pendant note - assume there's a missing ' between "PM" and "s"?
IF yours truly recalls, this is you're 2nd offense, at least.
Lets not do it again, shall we. Its not nice, and your better than that!
Prime Ministers plural. As a class. Because I don't know that others haven't had one.
Good point. Wonder WHO else among First Lords of the Treasury would be most likely to have a CCJ (whatever the heck it is, but sounds bad or at least expensive)?
My nominations are (if such a thing existed during their tenures, and just since 1900)
> Lloyd George (well-documented procivities) > Winston Churchill (well-documented difficulties) > Anthony Eden (well-documented bad luck) > Gordon Brown (distracted by saving the world?) > David Cameron (slimmed-down wide boy on the cover of GQ?)
Would have included Tony Blair, but reckon that Cherie (for all her own wretched excesses) kept a pretty tight reign on finances.
But perhaps she slipped up, as even hot-shot lawyers have been known to do? (Cue TSE!)
A CCJ Is a county court judgement, in England and Wales only I think. Basically Mr Johnson is being taken to court to try and force him to pay his alleged debt. As he allegedly did damn all, the case went against him AIUI by 'default'I.
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Do you take the country train or the inter city though, quite a difference.
There's also the new route through Bathgate. But yes, the timings vary a lot.
Dreadful sounding affair. I once had something similar with British Gas and some of the interactions had me shaking with rage at times. Got there in the end but it took ages.
There's the media. People write in to newspapers and if their letter appeals and gets selected for the "troubleshooter" column it often unlocks a resolution PLUS a cash sum as apology (for PR).
Wouldn’t sit very well with the age of pay freezes?
Corbyn mania was basically May the public face of your pay freeze, Corbyn says no to pay freeze. And that the age of no inflation.
If inflation comes back and stays at over 4% and there is pay restraint in the client state, regardless who the LOTO is the Tories chances of winning the next election will be less than zero.
I could see inflation being a black swan that knocks the Tories out of office in 2024 if it gets out of control.
I think it's something that overrides concerns on cultural/social and values matters, at least temporarily, as a sort of political Maslow hierarchy of needs.
However, it would need the Opposition to look and feel more credible first, but it is possible.
Thatcher was heading for defeat until the Winter Of Discontent. Cameron was heading for being steamrollered by Brown. The IHT pledge bought him time, but the Credit Crunch got him into office.
A mediocre government beats a mediocre opposition, but if a government utterly fails then the mediocrity of the opposition matters a lot less. And the economy can't really cope with more than a small dollop of inflation, because it's so dependent on negligible nominal interest rates.
Much as I dislike the current government, I really do not want another economic crunch. If avoiding that means they get reelected, so be it.
OK - I am royally pissed off and if anyone has any ideas I am all ears
E.on are my sons energy provider - I have mentioned that he has been running up some impossible bills
In last month he has allegedly run up 700 - his arrears were getting on for 2 grand (a complaint has been open for a while on how this amount can possibly be used).
An engineer came out agreed he couldn't run that up living on his own in a 2 bed flat and said he suspected someone else was drawing his supply too. (This is the second person contracted by Eon to say this)
Eon manager subsequently rang my son and agreed to accept a certain payment and agreed my son could leave them for another supplier - he has I think 4 complaints open with Eon going back nearly a year for the first one - none resolved.
He hit a snag with paying them and a compromise was agreed (so, multiple calls on this) - this agreement was kept by us. (Delay was literally 48 hours tops)
He has had debt collection on the phone today asking for full payment - he referred them to his agreement with manager and she said she could not find record of the phone call and in any event the person who made the agreement was not entitled to do so.... (despite not knowing who it was )
This person said it was entirely possible to run up 700 a month on a 2 bed flat on his own (Like feck, I spend a fraction of that on a 5 bed place with a family in it)
When he pointed out that the engineer who came out said he could not and it needed further investigation and he was probably better placed to make that determination she claimed she knew better and then hung up on him.....
I tried 3 times to get details on how to escalate a complaint and they hung up on me 3 times. Then it took 50 minutes on one of those chat tools to finally just get an e mail address to make a written complaint to. They would not give me a way to escalate or a managers details - I had to threaten them with my mp and Ombudsman to get even that.
I said its almost like they don't want a proper record of what they are saying ..... (but I have screen shots of the chat)
He will hate me saying this - but he is dealing with some difficult health issues (cancer and severe kidney issues) plus he has mental health issues (bipolar) and this is making him ill with stress. I frankly am beyond furious, because he really does not need this (He and I have both told E.on this too)
As I say I'm mad and I will be helping son write to the general complaints line and I will contact our MP and Ombudsman with him but any other advice gratefully accepted -A friend mentioned Resover.co.uk - that looks like it might help - it even has a name within E.on to escalate to - which E.on just would not give me - which again just shows me they being deliberately uncooperative.
He might want to contact Macmillan too. From experience, companies are much less likely to ignore charities who have specialist teams and experience of negotiation on such issues. Here is a link to help with energy costs and difficulties with suppliers. At the very least they could take the stress of dealing with communication off him and you.
Best thing to do is to get the official complaint at E.on 'deadlocked' then go to the ombudsman at OFGEM.
Depending on the situation, I might go for the nuclear option and make a complaint to the police about someone stealing your gas.
Once you have a police crime reference number then that really does put the ball in E.on's court, but so does deadlocking the complaint and taking it to OFGEM.
Cheers
Are you by any chance a Which? member? even with the legal support option? (Or even your son?). Bit of potential bad publicity for Eon there.
OK - I am royally pissed off and if anyone has any ideas I am all ears
E.on are my sons energy provider - I have mentioned that he has been running up some impossible bills
In last month he has allegedly run up 700 - his arrears were getting on for 2 grand (a complaint has been open for a while on how this amount can possibly be used).
An engineer came out agreed he couldn't run that up living on his own in a 2 bed flat and said he suspected someone else was drawing his supply too. (This is the second person contracted by Eon to say this)
Eon manager subsequently rang my son and agreed to accept a certain payment and agreed my son could leave them for another supplier - he has I think 4 complaints open with Eon going back nearly a year for the first one - none resolved.
He hit a snag with paying them and a compromise was agreed (so, multiple calls on this) - this agreement was kept by us. (Delay was literally 48 hours tops)
He has had debt collection on the phone today asking for full payment - he referred them to his agreement with manager and she said she could not find record of the phone call and in any event the person who made the agreement was not entitled to do so.... (despite not knowing who it was )
This person said it was entirely possible to run up 700 a month on a 2 bed flat on his own (Like feck, I spend a fraction of that on a 5 bed place with a family in it)
When he pointed out that the engineer who came out said he could not and it needed further investigation and he was probably better placed to make that determination she claimed she knew better and then hung up on him.....
I tried 3 times to get details on how to escalate a complaint and they hung up on me 3 times. Then it took 50 minutes on one of those chat tools to finally just get an e mail address to make a written complaint to. They would not give me a way to escalate or a managers details - I had to threaten them with my mp and Ombudsman to get even that.
I said its almost like they don't want a proper record of what they are saying ..... (but I have screen shots of the chat)
He will hate me saying this - but he is dealing with some difficult health issues (cancer and severe kidney issues) plus he has mental health issues (bipolar) and this is making him ill with stress. I frankly am beyond furious, because he really does not need this (He and I have both told E.on this too)
As I say I'm mad and I will be helping son write to the general complaints line and I will contact our MP and Ombudsman with him but any other advice gratefully accepted -A friend mentioned Resover.co.uk - that looks like it might help - it even has a name within E.on to escalate to - which E.on just would not give me - which again just shows me they being deliberately uncooperative.
What a nightmare. Sympathy. You've probably got this, but here is a link to Ofgem.
They (Eon) have a statutory duty to investigate your suspicions.
It took them months but they investigated - the engineer has suspicions that it is being used by another party and has said it needs further investigation (I guess legal issues involved as they need access to another property) - the engineer agreed he could not be using that amount.
They then agreed a partial payment to clear the account- they threatened him with ruining his credit record if he didn't pay notwithstanding its under dispute - and now reneging on the agreement
I hope its a left hand / right hand thing but we need it in writing and escalated now to get on top of it.
But my wife has listened in to calls he made to them and confirms they really are so unhelpful - then my experience today was unreal - I have said to them dealing with them is the most frustrating experience I have ever had with any company over my lifetime - and that includes BT.........
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Unsurprising. The Liverpool to Manchester train can be slow too, but never leaves urban areas on its entire journey.
The idea the two runs are the same is patently absurd.
To be pedantic - and I apologies because I am broadly on your side on this, but this is a bigger point: accuracy of information about trains - the main Mcr-Lpl train is now the Chat Moss route, which for a remarkable 10 miles or so passes through countryside (the aforementioned Chat Moss). Chat Moss is a bit of an anomaly though. Essentially there is a string of small and medium sized towns from the outer edges of Salford to the outer edges of Liverpool (Worsley-Tyldesley-Leigh-Golborne-Ashton in Makerfield/Newton-le-Willows-Haydock-St. Helens-Prescott-Huyton without a real gap between them.
It's the commuting, mixing and service / office heavy bias in the UK. So, I work in Manchester, live in Huddersfield. In early March last year, I worked in an open plan office, hot desking, in the neighborhood of folks from the Fylde, Liverpool, Burnley, Leeds, Sheffield, don't know any Stoke-rs but there probably are some. And some week away contractors from, for e.g., Oxfordshire and Surrey. I commuted on an, often packed, long distance train from somewhere in NE England/even Scotland to Liverpool or, worse, full of airport bound/returned people. At the weekend, I chatted with a bloke who does office work in Sheffield - when I worked there Nottingham, Leicester (from where my sister then commutes to Birmingham), South Derbyshire, North Lincs were all co-worker locations. That's pretty typical.
I don't think anywhere else in Europe comes close in terms of workplace interconnectivity as we do, and that was relevant last March.
That's certainly typical. I also work in Manchester and have a similar geography of colleagues (I do have a Stokie!) I don't know how atypical the UK is in this regard. I wonder what the geography of an office in Munich or Marseille would be?
Am I alone in thinking these kind of distances travelled twice a day must have an effect on productivity. And mental and physical health?
I love being on public transport with my headphones on, listening to music, reading my Kindle. Much better than being at home or at work, where people are always bothering me for things.
You will miss it when the kids grow up. Make the most of it.
Pendant note - assume there's a missing ' between "PM" and "s"?
IF yours truly recalls, this is you're 2nd offense, at least.
Lets not do it again, shall we. Its not nice, and your better than that!
PS A pendant aka pennant is a type of Royal Navy flag (and derivatives thereof, e.g. pendant number = ship's number).
How's about a pundit? Plenty of THEM (me included) flying their flags aboard the Good Ship PB!
Which gives me an idea.
Next time the treacherous Froggies attempt to cut you off from the Queen's grace & favor, perhaps we could organize a flotilla of small-beer pundits (akin to the little ships that helped save the BEF in 1940 from the beaches at Dunkirk) to assist Admiral of the Blue H.Y.U.F.D Nelson in his naval operations?
Pendant note - assume there's a missing ' between "PM" and "s"?
IF yours truly recalls, this is you're 2nd offense, at least.
Lets not do it again, shall we. Its not nice, and your better than that!
PS A pendant aka pennant is a type of Royal Navy flag (and derivatives thereof, e.g. pendant number = ship's number).
How's about a pundit? Plenty of THEM (me included) flying their flags aboard the Good Ship PB!
Which gives me an idea.
Next time the treacherous Froggies attempt to cut you off from the Queen's grace & favor, perhaps we could organize a flotilla of small-beer pundits (akin to the little ships that helped save the BEF in 1940 from the beaches at Dunkirk) to assist Admiral of the Blue H.Y.U.F.D Nelson in his naval operations?
Dreadful sounding affair. I once had something similar with British Gas and some of the interactions had me shaking with rage at times. Got there in the end but it took ages.
There's the media. People write in to newspapers and if their letter appeals and gets selected for the "troubleshooter" column it often unlocks a resolution PLUS a cash sum as apology (for PR).
Yes I have that in mind too - thankyou
I once had to write to the banking ombudsman about a certain high street bank - after that a quick resolution and some compensation which was unexpected but nice.
OK - I am royally pissed off and if anyone has any ideas I am all ears
E.on are my sons energy provider - I have mentioned that he has been running up some impossible bills
In last month he has allegedly run up 700 - his arrears were getting on for 2 grand (a complaint has been open for a while on how this amount can possibly be used).
An engineer came out agreed he couldn't run that up living on his own in a 2 bed flat and said he suspected someone else was drawing his supply too. (This is the second person contracted by Eon to say this)
Eon manager subsequently rang my son and agreed to accept a certain payment and agreed my son could leave them for another supplier - he has I think 4 complaints open with Eon going back nearly a year for the first one - none resolved.
He hit a snag with paying them and a compromise was agreed (so, multiple calls on this) - this agreement was kept by us. (Delay was literally 48 hours tops)
He has had debt collection on the phone today asking for full payment - he referred them to his agreement with manager and she said she could not find record of the phone call and in any event the person who made the agreement was not entitled to do so.... (despite not knowing who it was )
This person said it was entirely possible to run up 700 a month on a 2 bed flat on his own (Like feck, I spend a fraction of that on a 5 bed place with a family in it)
When he pointed out that the engineer who came out said he could not and it needed further investigation and he was probably better placed to make that determination she claimed she knew better and then hung up on him.....
I tried 3 times to get details on how to escalate a complaint and they hung up on me 3 times. Then it took 50 minutes on one of those chat tools to finally just get an e mail address to make a written complaint to. They would not give me a way to escalate or a managers details - I had to threaten them with my mp and Ombudsman to get even that.
I said its almost like they don't want a proper record of what they are saying ..... (but I have screen shots of the chat)
He will hate me saying this - but he is dealing with some difficult health issues (cancer and severe kidney issues) plus he has mental health issues (bipolar) and this is making him ill with stress. I frankly am beyond furious, because he really does not need this (He and I have both told E.on this too)
As I say I'm mad and I will be helping son write to the general complaints line and I will contact our MP and Ombudsman with him but any other advice gratefully accepted -A friend mentioned Resover.co.uk - that looks like it might help - it even has a name within E.on to escalate to - which E.on just would not give me - which again just shows me they being deliberately uncooperative.
Dreadful. Have you tried Citizens Advice?
Not yet - but we we be contacting everyone we can think of
Your MP?
Yep -- might try my councillor too but might not really be in his area of things he can help with
Re; mental health effects of commuting via public transit.
When yours truly used to ride the bus on regular basis to downtown Seattle and back, used the time to read the paper and/or a book.
Most of my fellow rush-hour passengers were doing similar, generally with their phones and laptops (I'm a techno-peasant). Lot's got a lot done (answering emails & the like) before they got to the office.
Was also nice cruising along in the transit-only lane wizzing past the cars stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic. Nice for us in the bus that is!
Reports Boris is about to announce in the HOC a full public enquiry into Covid
Begins in Spring 2022
An eternity away. "There is bound to be a resurgence in the Autumn" so all the more reason not to understand all that has gone right and all that has gone wrong beforehand.
He is delaying for one simple reason. He currently has a boost from the vaccine and wants to ride that as long as possible before the enquiry tears him apart.
Sorry but that is utter nonsense and he explained all the reasons and as you mention a resurgence in the Autumn was one of those reasons as he did not want to interfer on front line services while this could be a critical period
Also, with respect, you have absolutely no creditability if you think a full public enquiry could be set up, terms of reference agreed, take evidence and produce a conclusion by the Autumn
And if it does attack Boris, then Sturgeon, Drakeford and Foster will all be in the same place as they more or less followed the same advice
Your hatred of Boris at times overwhelms what should be your common sense
Except.
England has done notably worse than the other home nations.
Going off the FT data, these are the current deaths per 100k: England 199 Wales 176 Scotland 140 (rather better than France) N Ireland 113 (almost as low as where Germany is likely to end up)
I think we can assume that the data are comparable in terms of what is and isn't counted as a Covid death. OK, that could be about geography, underlying health, whatever. But there were also critical differences in policy between the four nations. For an infection that doubles in less than a week when unchecked, you don't need big changes in policy to have big changes in outcome. For example, dithering about imposing a lockdown post-Christmas.
And whilst you can't convict PM Johnson on the basis of those figures alone, the idea that all the nation's leaders are in the same "awkward explaining to do" boat simply isn't borne out by the numbers.
What do you think of these numbers? Very relevant.
England 432 Wales 151 Northern Ireland 133 Scotland 65
Let me guess... population density. Am I right?
Except, if so, I don't think those numbers are as much of a slam dunk as you think. From a population point of view, Scotland is a densely populated central belt and a lot of mountains and lochs. From the point of view of a Covid virus, what matters is the density where people live.
According to the internet Glasgow is 3400 people per square kilometre London is 5683 people per square kilometre Paris is 21067 people per square kilometre
But to be fair, all of those numbers depend on what you do and don't include. A simple population / area calculation for Havering would be misleading, because half of it is inhabited and the other half is green belt. After all, we wouldn't want to bandy about numbers without meaningful context, would we?
Yes its population density and its extremely relevant. As I said before which TUD misquoted, there's vast firebreaks within Scotland between its cities that doesn't exist to the same extent in eg Northwest England. From Liverpool to Manchester the population density is higher than Glasgow, but also the area inbetween is much more populated. Going from Liverpool to Widnes, Warrington, Wigan, Leigh, Manchester, Bury etc is all one great urban and suburban sprawl with no firebreak between them. Unlike eg from Glasgow to Edinburgh that has natural firebreaks.
If you want to be stupid and ignore population density then you could try analysing deaths within England by local Council party control. I strongly suspect Labour controlled Councils have a higher death rate than Tory controlled Councils. Does that mean Tory Councils have done a better job?
Of course not, the virus targets dense population. Which England, especially in places like the Northwest, London etc has in abundance and Scotland does not to the same extent.
But people routinely commute between Glasgow and Edinburgh, for instance.
It's only the really remote communities (islands, in particular) that have more ort less escaped infection.
Also, the issue is not so much the spread of the virus between centres - it does - as how it develops within each centre. That.s where the stats come from and that's what the stats record.
During lockdown there would have been a fraction of the contiguous commuting between Glasgow and Edinburgh that there is between Liverpool and Manchester.
The stats record that more dense areas have more deaths and that's consistent across the UK and across the world.
Being idiotic and taking figures out of context is what Trump supporters tried to do last year to say that GOP Governors had done better than Democrat Governors - because deaths were higher in the densely populated Democrat states. Its bullshit, just as it would be bullshit to "blame" Labour Councils for the fact that the worst death rates in England are in Labour controlled Councils.
You mean contiguous commuting between Glasgow (pop. 600k plus) and Edinburgh (pop. 488k) via M8 belt (pop. c400k) compared to Liverpool (pop. 498k) and Manchester (pop. 550k) via M62 belt (pop. nofuckingidea)? Chalk and cheese, obviously.
Manchester Metropolitan area: 2,556,000 Liverpool Metropolitan area: 2,241,000 Total: 4,797,000
If you add in Leeds-Bradford (2,302,000) you're over 7 million.....
Some European definitions describe the Manchester-Liverpool conurbation as one continuous built-up area like the Ruhr. Manchester-Liverpool was considered the 10th largest conurbation in the EU, back when it was in the EU. I think this is reasonably convincing. It's easily possible to travel from Manchester city centre to Liverpool city centre and never be more than 200m from a building. (Some British definitions would have you believe that Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield is one continuous built up area but that is rather more dubious both topographically and economically).
Precisely!
@Theuniondivvie seems to think that Glasgow to Edinburgh is comparable to that, despite the fact the two cities combined have less population than either of the cities let alone the whole contiguous M62 corridor.
The train route between the two Scottish cities is also slow, and takes you through a lot of countryside.
Do you take the country train or the inter city though, quite a difference.
Comments
I don't think anywhere else in Europe comes close in terms of workplace interconnectivity as we do, and that was relevant last March.
Anyway, I have a lot of work to do and only an hour to do it before I'm off for a week!
I'm glad the authoritarian May Home Secretary has gone as well as her ludicrous and xenophobic "hundreds of thousands" pledge. I'm glad that we have liberalised getting a visa for many skilled migrants from the rest of the world post-Brexit.
A word to your prejudice: not all people who go skiing are "young and upwardly mobile": some of us are quite old, some are relatively monetarily successful, some less so, but the only really upwardly mobile aspect to us is when we are sitting on a lift!
China has seven of the world's top 10 polysilicon manufacturers (versus none in 2005) and now accounts for most of the world's production.
And furlough ending.
And Gilt yields soaring.
And the national debt still ballooning.
And the economy still smaller than its pre-covid level.
At that point, how popular will the tories be in the south?
China dominate most steps of the manufacturing process: a very recent development.
Which comes back to the original point that this is a market which will grow significantly over the next couple of decades, and there is a limited opportunity for Europe to get back on board. Biden's US looks as though it will have a go, too.
The T20 tournament that wasn’t: how fixers fabricated the UvaT20 League
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/may/12/the-t20-cricket-tournament-that-wasnt-how-fixers-fabricated-the-uvat20-league
I don't know how atypical the UK is in this regard. I wonder what the geography of an office in Munich or Marseille would be?
deaths continue down (by date of death, allowing for a six day lag, seven day average of deaths is at 8.7.
Hospitalisations look static: after declining steadily through April, they have been flat at just over 100 a day in early May.
Numbers of positive tests rising very slowly but steadily - slight movement upward every day for a week now.
11-19 cohort still by far the most significant in terms of positives.
Reasonable to believe based on this that the spread is amongst the unvaccinated, which is gradually becoming a smaller proportion of the population. The proportion of the population jabbed at least once is crawling upwards slowly as resources continue to be focused on second jabs - that will start to rise more steeply again soon.
Hope (and my expectation) is that there has been a proper disconnection now between deaths and positives, rather than the uptick in positives being a leading indicator.
https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1392504285708050438
Voting Leave to get lower net migration: 17,410,741
Voting Leave to get higher net migration: Richard Tyndall
All hospitals in Hampshire now have zero covid cases as does Bourmemouth hospital.
My father has been told it is unlikely his services will be required after the end of this month due to them pretty much vaccinating all the people they need to, not just the ethnic minorities he was signed up to persuade/reassure.
If I had been Cameron, I would have spent a lot of time in Stockholm and Copenhagen and seen if there was something that could have been put together. And maybe there was, maybe there wasn't, but I do feel that if there was a group of countries moving together, it would have been better and made for a more durable settlement.
Inflationary pressures are rising sharply, and borrowing costs are creeping higher too. Meanwhile the economy is still 5% smaller than it was before COVID.
Spending? goodness only knows. Deficit? I cannot imagine
Some horrible, horrible choices face the government soon.
So I said no.
The gym this morning was very much more relaxed. I wasn't, but the general atmosphere was.
Masked people still about in the town and some of the very old (ie at least 10 years older than me) cautiously about.
Fantastical whataboutery...
I think he’d rather quit.
Actually don't mind my commute, an under 30 minute train journey frequent enough that I don't worry much about setting off on any given dot, and a brisk walk at each end. Mancunians tend to think you live on the moon though, even though it takes a good bit longer to get in from most Lancashire towns.
Best get those Hitachis fixed though.
The consensus was that we'd have been much more involved with Scandinavia than France etc.
The government would be better off spending some political capital on reforming/abolishing it now, rather than waiting until it is unpopular and its hand is forced, imo
The only remedy is to start hiking interest rates, but how can the Bank of England do that to an economy that has been shattered by lockdowns and remains cowed by the threat of more?
Plus the fact that you've been victim of (quasi-) unprovoked age discrimination is an outrage!!
WHERE are the monitors when we (semi-) superannuated need them? No doubt chugging their Red Bull and diddling with their Tik-Tok!
Or is it the other way around - I get so confused?!?
IF the PB powers-that-be refuse to take action, then it becomes incumbent upon the likes of yours truly to administer a well-deserved thrashing to the young punk. Just as soon as I can find my horsewhip.
GET OFF MY LAWN!!!
https://twitter.com/davidallengreen/status/1392491856936775685
https://www.nottinghampost.com/news/local-news/long-eaton-now-worst-covid-5401525
Seems to have spread around the school quite quickly. I suspect many of these cases have been picked up due to LFD testing and probably a lot of asymptomatic cases. This is probably replicated across the country.
I am not so much looking at cases any more but the hospitalisations and deaths. Let's hope hospitalisations starts going down again and deaths continue the slow fall to zero. We are never going to get Covid Zero, the fact that some people will refuse the vaccine will make it impossible.
What the local outbreaks shows is that we do really need to vaccinate the secondary school children before they start the Autumn term.
'You locked us away from our grandchildren! Wasn't that enough?'
It is now obvious to everyone that the EU should have been a different sort of project and much more modest and realistic. But the Euro and ECB has put paid to sorting that short of an unimaginable and terrible crisis. sad.
Has Denmark or Sweden made any moves since 2016 to show their desire for statehood or detachment from the EU?
(And how's it going re: West West Virginia? Enquiring minds want to know!)
I think it's something that overrides concerns on cultural/social and values matters, at least temporarily, as a sort of political Maslow hierarchy of needs.
However, it would need the Opposition to look and feel more credible first, but it is possible.
"If a cockup, then it would mean 10 Downing Street/Johnson's office/Johnson missed following correspondence:
- letter before claim/final demand
- Claim Form from Court
- copy of CCJ itself
If the latter two slipped through, then serious questions about how post dealt with"
It really does screw up your credit score, as you take a hit for the late payment(s), then default, and then the CCJ.
Stays on his record for six years (unless he satisfies it within a month).
Does anyone know who obtained the CCJ?
Because whilst it disappears off your record after six years depending on the company they keep in their internal records, so if you default with a certain financial institution, they never let you back.
Then you find out the hard way that certain banks/financial institutions have more than one brand, and good luck getting an account with them.
IF yours truly recalls, this is you're 2nd offense, at least.
Lets not do it again, shall we. Its not nice, and your better than that!
Obviously he is massively disorganized at the best of times, but baby son and watching the vaccine documentary you got a glimpse into the hours been kept by government ministers e.g. Important meetings regarding vaccine funding starting (by design) at 8pm on a Friday night, because that is the only time they could fit it in.
No excuse, but I wouldn't be shocked to find Boris stuck them in a drawer (especially when they came round to do some decorating on the flat), wandered around occasionally mumbling sure there is something I need to do, some letter or something...and then being distracted by something else.
Something would simply have to give. Big time.
So much for Johnson's popularity then. The Bill for corona is large. Lockdown has made it gargantuan. It is nearly here.
Lol
Rob Brewer
@rbrwr
Replying to
@davidallengreen
"Thank you for your letter to the Prime Minister about your COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Regrettably he is unable to answer every letter personally, but he is deeply concerned about COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Yours faithfully, Correspondence Secretary, No. 10
Certainly not personally. Yet another Churchillian trait!
He does use that name rather a lot.
https://twitter.com/rbrwr/status/1392488158667984897?s=19
"Thank you for your letter to the Prime Minister about your COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Regrettably he is unable to answer every letter personally, but he is deeply concerned about COUNTY COURT JUDGMENT. Yours faithfully, Correspondence Secretary, No. 10"
So long as his DOB and address were accurate then it isn't an issue.
Radovan Karadzic, the former Bosnian Serb leader convicted of genocide during the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, is to serve the rest of his life sentence in a British jail.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57090123
(Monocrystalline silicon wafer production for the high end solar cells and advanced chip manufacturing is not yet Chinese dominated, though they did buy the Finnish manufacturer Okmetic.)
E.on are my sons energy provider - I have mentioned that he has been running up some impossible bills
In last month he has allegedly run up 700 - his arrears were getting on for 2 grand (a complaint has been open for a while on how this amount can possibly be used).
An engineer came out agreed he couldn't run that up living on his own in a 2 bed flat and said he suspected someone else was drawing his supply too. (This is the second person contracted by Eon to say this)
Eon manager subsequently rang my son and agreed to accept a certain payment and agreed my son could leave them for another supplier - he has I think 4 complaints open with Eon going back nearly a year for the first one - none resolved.
He hit a snag with paying them and a compromise was agreed (so, multiple calls on this) - this agreement was kept by us. (Delay was literally 48 hours tops)
He has had debt collection on the phone today asking for full payment - he referred them to his agreement with manager and she said she could not find record of the phone call and in any event the person who made the agreement was not entitled to do so.... (despite not knowing who it was )
This person said it was entirely possible to run up 700 a month on a 2 bed flat on his own (Like feck, I spend a fraction of that on a 5 bed place with a family in it)
When he pointed out that the engineer who came out said he could not and it needed further investigation and he was probably better placed to make that determination she claimed she knew better and then hung up on him.....
I tried 3 times to get details on how to escalate a complaint and they hung up on me 3 times. Then it took 50 minutes on one of those chat tools to finally just get an e mail address to make a written complaint to. They would not give me a way to escalate or a managers details - I had to threaten them with my mp and Ombudsman to get even that.
I said its almost like they don't want a proper record of what they are saying ..... (but I have screen shots of the chat)
He will hate me saying this - but he is dealing with some difficult health issues (cancer and severe kidney issues) plus he has mental health issues (bipolar) and this is making him ill with stress. I frankly am beyond furious, because he really does not need this (He and I have both told E.on this too)
As I say I'm mad and I will be helping son write to the general complaints line and I will contact our MP and Ombudsman with him but any other advice gratefully accepted -A friend mentioned Resover.co.uk - that looks like it might help - it even has a name within E.on to escalate to - which E.on just would not give me - which again just shows me they being deliberately uncooperative.
As pointed out elsewhere, the envelopes do make it clear that there's a Very Important Document inside.
Best thing to do is to get the official complaint at E.on 'deadlocked' then go to the ombudsman at OFGEM.
Depending on the situation, I might go for the nuclear option and make a complaint to the police about someone stealing your gas.
Once you have a police crime reference number then that really does put the ball in E.on's court, but so does deadlocking the complaint and taking it to OFGEM.
Cameron was heading for being steamrollered by Brown. The IHT pledge bought him time, but the Credit Crunch got him into office.
A mediocre government beats a mediocre opposition, but if a government utterly fails then the mediocrity of the opposition matters a lot less. And the economy can't really cope with more than a small dollop of inflation, because it's so dependent on negligible nominal interest rates.
My nominations are (if such a thing existed during their tenures, and just since 1900)
> Lloyd George (well-documented procivities)
> Winston Churchill (well-documented difficulties)
> Anthony Eden (well-documented bad luck)
> Gordon Brown (distracted by saving the world?)
> David Cameron (slimmed-down wide boy on the cover of GQ?)
Would have included Tony Blair, but reckon that Cherie (for all her own wretched excesses) kept a pretty tight reign on finances.
But perhaps she slipped up, as even hot-shot lawyers have been known to do? (Cue TSE!)
https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/electricity/retail-market/market-review-and-reform/electricity-theft
They (Eon) have a statutory duty to investigate your suspicions.
Also make sure they don't try a but a CIFAS marker against's your son's name.
https://www.gov.uk/county-court-judgments-ccj-for-debt
https://twitter.com/JayMitchinson/status/1392516317673107464/photo/1
Dreadful sounding affair. I once had something similar with British Gas and some of the interactions had me shaking with rage at times. Got there in the end but it took ages.
There's the media. People write in to newspapers and if their letter appeals and gets selected for the "troubleshooter" column it often unlocks a resolution PLUS a cash sum as apology (for PR).
Here is a link to help with energy costs and difficulties with suppliers.
At the very least they could take the stress of dealing with communication off him and you.
https://www.macmillan.org.uk/cancer-information-and-support/get-help/financial-help/everything-in-our-power
They then agreed a partial payment to clear the account- they threatened him with ruining his credit record if he didn't pay notwithstanding its under dispute - and now reneging on the agreement
I hope its a left hand / right hand thing but we need it in writing and escalated now to get on top of it.
But my wife has listened in to calls he made to them and confirms they really are so unhelpful - then my experience today was unreal - I have said to them dealing with them is the most frustrating experience I have ever had with any company over my lifetime - and that includes BT.........
Which gives me an idea.
Next time the treacherous Froggies attempt to cut you off from the Queen's grace & favor, perhaps we could organize a flotilla of small-beer pundits (akin to the little ships that helped save the BEF in 1940 from the beaches at Dunkirk) to assist Admiral of the Blue H.Y.U.F.D Nelson in his naval operations?
I once had to write to the banking ombudsman about a certain high street bank - after that a quick resolution and some compensation which was unexpected but nice.
When yours truly used to ride the bus on regular basis to downtown Seattle and back, used the time to read the paper and/or a book.
Most of my fellow rush-hour passengers were doing similar, generally with their phones and laptops (I'm a techno-peasant). Lot's got a lot done (answering emails & the like) before they got to the office.
Was also nice cruising along in the transit-only lane wizzing past the cars stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic. Nice for us in the bus that is!