Woop, got my vaccine booked for a week on Sunday. The website still says 34 and up (I'm 33), but after the tips on here repeated attempts at booking anyway have paid off.
I see the people who were having a hernia at Merkel mentioning the British virus are also prolapsing at Sturgeon not using the term Indian variant. A permanent truss (surgical not tory) to keep everything tucked in might be a wise move.
I have no problem with her not using the term Indian variant.
It does beg the term why she does use the term Kent variant though.
Is there a Kentish community in Scotland?
Is their an Indian community? Aren't they all Scots?
There is an Indian community but not a Kentian one. That's the rationale - people didn’t seem to get it so I helped.
Although tbh I don't think it matters too much what you call the variants. So long as you don't go around chanting "China virus China virus China virus" in a smarmily menacing way like the Donald.
Sorry - this doesn't address the issue of Brazilian communities or indeed SA, both of decent size in the UK. Its pathetic.
I wasn't seeking to address that. So it wasn't pathetic.
I see the BBC reporting uses the noun, not the adjective - so 'India variant', 'Brazil variant', 'Kent variant' etc.
Makes more sense really, as it's simply named after the place it was discovered (not necessarily where it arose), there's nothing actually Indian or Kentish about the variant. I can see the logic in that. Hard for anyone to have a problem about Merkel if she'd said Britain or England variant, too, surely? The apparent attempted renaming of the India variant on a date basis is doomed, a complete waste of time.
What I don't get is why everyone doesn't just use the catchy name provided by scientists. What is wrong with simply saying 'B.1.617.2 variant?'
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I think he said "back in 1999".
I lived there back in 1999. There was plenty of supermarkets.
There IS a slight lack of big shops (and, particularly, pubs) in the university-ish part of Bloomsbury, but this is for two highly specific reasons: the university and its ancillary buildings - ULU, Senate House, Halls of Residence, takes up so much of the land there simply isn't room. AND the Russell Family/Bedford Estates, that owns the land, used to be fierce teetotallers so they tried to limit or prohibit pubs. True story
Central London has long been very well stocked with good supermarkets. It's one thing British cities do quite well
I lived in Bloomsbury too for a while. It's an odd pocket of London. Buildings quite uniform and ostensibly very little happening. Certainly not for me anyway. Wasn't sorry to move somewhere else.
It's a lovely place to live. All those gorgeous Georgian squares. Quaint and pretty pubs - tho you have to seek them out. Lots of smart students keeping it youthful and lively, yet somehow it is also quiet and leafy, because of those same squares
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
I see the people who were having a hernia at Merkel mentioning the British virus are also prolapsing at Sturgeon not using the term Indian variant. A permanent truss (surgical not tory) to keep everything tucked in might be a wise move.
I have no problem with her not using the term Indian variant.
It does beg the term why she does use the term Kent variant though.
Is there a Kentish community in Scotland?
Is their an Indian community? Aren't they all Scots?
There is an Indian community but not a Kentian one. That's the rationale - people didn’t seem to get it so I helped.
Although tbh I don't think it matters too much what you call the variants. So long as you don't go around chanting "China virus China virus China virus" in a smarmily menacing way like the Donald.
Sorry - this doesn't address the issue of Brazilian communities or indeed SA, both of decent size in the UK. Its pathetic.
I wasn't seeking to address that. So it wasn't pathetic.
Not you - the Scottish government. Pathetic weasel behaviour. They just need to call it B1.167.2, then no community is stigmatised. Its like they are just trying to wind people up. Oh wait...
Ah right, sorry. Too sensitive. Too used to being gaslighted and bullied and abused by all and sundry merely for wanting a better fairer world.
Meanwhile, the 70,000 shortage of drivers is creating a stand-off between suppliers and supermarkets. Wage inflation (like £5k instant payrise) for the remaining drivers means there's still a shortage of delivery slots AND upward pressure on prices that can't be contained.
Someone will foot the bill. Unless the supermarkets have a radical change of heart it will be punters.
So the market is solving the issue and the drivers are getting a pay rise.
Funny that's again exactly what I said would happen weeks ago.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
I completely agree with you that meat that lived outside, eating grass, wandering around and not being stuffed with hormomes and antibiotics is highly likely to taste better than the alternative.
But fat content - are you kidding me? The best meat is that with decent fat content, like the rib eye.
Update on my son - the CEO himself has just rung him!
Personally apologised (some things he needs to investigate still, but he has seen enough to know they have not acted well)and said he would be investigating this himself this afternoon and tomorrow.
Said he was basically ashamed this could happen in an organisation he runs - he said if the team could not see that there was something very wrong in a 2 bed flat running up that sort of bill then they all need retraining.
He told my son it would be sorted, not to worry about it and they will make sure it does not impact his credit rating.
He told my son to concentrate on getting well - now I seem to have something in my eye......
That is the way a company should act when things go wrong - own it and act on it.
All we wanted was a recognition that this was stupid and a stop to them threatening him with debt collectors
Meanwhile, the 70,000 shortage of drivers is creating a stand-off between suppliers and supermarkets. Wage inflation (like £5k instant payrise) for the remaining drivers means there's still a shortage of delivery slots AND upward pressure on prices that can't be contained.
Someone will foot the bill. Unless the supermarkets have a radical change of heart it will be punters.
So the market is solving the issue and the drivers are getting a pay rise.
Funny that's again exactly what I said would happen weeks ago.
Update on my son - the CEO himself has just rung him!
Personally apologised (some things he needs to investigate still, but he has seen enough to know they have not acted well)and said he would be investigating this himself this afternoon and tomorrow.
Said he was basically ashamed this could happen in an organisation he runs - he said if the team could not see that there was something very wrong in a 2 bed flat running up that sort of bill then they all need retraining.
He told my son it would be sorted, not to worry about it and they will make sure it does not impact his credit rating.
He told my son to concentrate on getting well - now I seem to have something in my eye......
That is the way a company should act when things go wrong - own it and act on it.
All we wanted was a recognition that this was stupid and a stop to them threatening him with debt collectors
Thanks all for your advice on this
Very pleased for you and him. And decent of the CEO, too. Really ought not to have happened, but at least a positive outcome is in sight.
England 234,818 1st doses / 367,142 2nd doses Scotland 18,603 / 26,968 Wales 11,583 / 17,214 NI 3,247 / 8,988
Is that the first time over 1% of population?
That must be very close to a record. We certainly haven't done 700k before – and that is only a whisker off that...
Was it a French Minister who made the comment that it was how you finished and that the UK would be crawling over the finish line while the EU marched ahead?
Given the urgent need to immunise your most vulnerable it was tosh even at the time but we don't seem to be in that position.
Yebbut...they still seem to be opening up at the same time as us if not before so net-net it's even stevens.
As is Spain - I do however think this is a huge risk to open up while the majority of those under 50 have not had a 1st dose - and this is the group who will ten dto take the most risks....
Yes absolutely we will see in the weeks and months to come the relative merits of each approach.
At the moment where I live the case numbers are very low indeed but the arrival of thousands of tourists is imminent and of concern - my second jab is still around 10 weeks away - I'm 67 so you can imagine how many millions are at risk still for some time.
Yes I can understand the concern. Still, it's an interesting decision by the Spanish govt. What motivated it, do you think?
They are desperate to have a big summer tourist season. The polls have turned against the socialist government and I guess they are hoping for a payoff. Time will tell.
Why does agriculture take up so much land? Perhaps you need land to grow soy to feed to cows to turn into burgers? Think about how much more efficient things would be if we concrete over the farms and turn them into nice office parks full of people mining Britcoin which we then use to buy food grown by foreign wasters happy to be inefficient.
Yes, a sure way to a secure and prosperous future.
Yep, the UK dedicates 71.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 0.61% of UK GDP.
In contrast Sweden uses 6.5% of its land for agriculture to generate 1.44% of GDP.
Norway uses 2.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 1.93% of GDP.
Large parts of Sweden and Norway are effectively uninhabited
The number is also slightly misleading: it's not "agriculture" alone, but "agriculture, forestry and fishing".
And forestry is going to absolutely dominate the number for Norway and Sweden.
That's a fair point but in which case fishing would be included in the UKs figure too presumably?
In which case do you think using 71% of our available land, to provide 0.61% of GDP minus whatever the fishing figure is, is good value for money land?
Philip, nice to see you know jackshit about farming, the countryside, economics, and the importance of food security, just like you know jackshit about everything else you pronounce on.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Why does agriculture take up so much land? Perhaps you need land to grow soy to feed to cows to turn into burgers? Think about how much more efficient things would be if we concrete over the farms and turn them into nice office parks full of people mining Britcoin which we then use to buy food grown by foreign wasters happy to be inefficient.
Yes, a sure way to a secure and prosperous future.
Yep, the UK dedicates 71.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 0.61% of UK GDP.
In contrast Sweden uses 6.5% of its land for agriculture to generate 1.44% of GDP.
Norway uses 2.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 1.93% of GDP.
Large parts of Sweden and Norway are effectively uninhabited
The number is also slightly misleading: it's not "agriculture" alone, but "agriculture, forestry and fishing".
And forestry is going to absolutely dominate the number for Norway and Sweden.
That's a fair point but in which case fishing would be included in the UKs figure too presumably?
In which case do you think using 71% of our available land, to provide 0.61% of GDP minus whatever the fishing figure is, is good value for money land?
My point is that your agricultural land number doesn't include managed forests while your GDP number includes their output. So, it skews the numbers. If you excluded forestry from the GDP number, you might get 0.1% or less for Norway and Sweden.
That's a fair point so skip the Scandinavian countries. I quoted the Japanese and Italian figures too which are much more comparable as densely populated nations.
Either way though, I can't think of a single densely populated developed nation anywhere in the world reserving over 70% of the countries land for agricultural purposes. Considering that land is not exactly something we have a major competitive advantage in it is really shooting ourselves in the foot economically.
If we were to have our agricultural land in G7 or G20 averages that would free up a lot of land for other purposes without whacking our GDP.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
Fair point.
Kraft "cheese" and stuff like that probably doesn't do America's reputation much good. 😂
Like culture, the US exports the lowest common denominator, and keeps the good stuff for itself. Anyone who has been to New York City (or and of the large cities) and said "the food is shit here" probably spent whole trip in a hospital.
American food is rather like British food. Has a mediocre reputation worldwide, but in many big coastal cities you can get fantastic, innovative restaurant food, there's a great array of foreign cuisines, and in the first order cities - New York, LA (London in the UK) - the food can be some of the best in the world. America also has stand-out smaller food cities like New Orleans, which are as good as the best in Europe
Where America does fall down is in the flyover country, where you can drive for 100 miles and the only choice is fast food, literally. DAIRY QUEENS
And don't get me on to the cheese or charcuterie selection in, say, a Walmart in Mississippi. UGH
Yes, America is somewhat of a paradox. It is easy to eat well and healthily on the coasts, but baffingly expensive. I always remember a friend visiting from the Bay Area and telling me that the almonds in Sainsbury's were half price what they are in his local Safeway BUT THEY WERE GROWN IN CALIFORNIA.
And on Manhattan, where there are no supermarkets except about one Trader Joe's, it's even worse. I met another friend in New York once who was studying at NYU and he told me he'd get together with a few other students and get a cab to the nearest Costco and back ($70-$80) and do his food shopping there rather than pay bodega prices.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It has the same problem as New York, for different reasons. Italy, like Japan, protects its small shopkeepers just, well, because.
Whereas on Manhattan it's the sky high price of real estate that means that supermarkets, or any halfway decent foodstores, aren't viable.
Actually, there are lots of non- Trader Joe's or Whole Foods and non-bodega "regular" supermarkets in Manhattan. There are plenty of Gristedes and Key Foods and the like in the residential areas. They are uniformly grimy and have dreadful produce though, and have a feel of 1980s Albania about them. Quite an eye-opener when we lived temporarily on the UES when we first moved to NY.
Even here in the 'burbs the most local markets, like our local C-Town, have a bit of a down-at-heel feel to them. That said, we have recently had a Wegman's open near us, and it's really good. Even carries some British lines like Jaffa Cakes!
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
The big Sainsburys at the top of Tottenham Court Road used to be a Budgens. It only changed in about 2004/5.
An Asda, I think? It certainly changed, yes
No, it was definitely a Budgens.
I moved to just by Great Portland Street station in 2002, and it was the nearest large supermarket. At that time we also had a Europa foods, and that was the overpriced local place where one got eggs and bread.
So, I'd do my "big" shops at the Budgens every couple of weeks, and fill in with smaller stuff from Europa.
In the middle of 2004, Europa Foods sold out to Tesco, and the little Tesco Metro appeared by GPS station. And around the same time Budgens became Sainsburys. And there was much rejoicing in the Smithson household.
There was, of course, also the M&S on Tottenham Court Road, just South of Goodge Street station.
Definitely a budgens, I remember going there when I did a summer internship during my sixth form nearby.
Fair enough, I yield: It was a Budgens. I remember it changing to Sainsbury's
The Tesco on Goodge Street was always there
But yes I also forgot the M&S on TTC. To say there was a "dearth of supermarkets" even back in 1999 is pretty daft, unless you mean "I must have ten large supermarkets with two minutes walk"
Now there is almost too many, an embarrassment of supermarket riches
But I fear we have likely exhausted the exciting debate on "supermarkets in Bloomsbury at the turn of the millennium" and I should do some work. Later
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I think he said "back in 1999".
I lived there back in 1999. There was plenty of supermarkets.
There IS a slight lack of big shops (and, particularly, pubs) in the university-ish part of Bloomsbury, but this is for two highly specific reasons: the university and its ancillary buildings - ULU, Senate House, Halls of Residence, takes up so much of the land there simply isn't room. AND the Russell Family/Bedford Estates, that owns the land, used to be fierce teetotallers so they tried to limit or prohibit pubs. True story
Central London has long been very well stocked with good supermarkets. It's one thing British cities do quite well
I lived in Bloomsbury too for a while. It's an odd pocket of London. Buildings quite uniform and ostensibly very little happening. Certainly not for me anyway. Wasn't sorry to move somewhere else.
It's a lovely place to live. All those gorgeous Georgian squares. Quaint and pretty pubs - tho you have to seek them out. Lots of smart students keeping it youthful and lively, yet somehow it is also quiet and leafy, because of those same squares
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
I remember looking around a five bedroom house (admittedly in shitty condition) on Great Ormand Street in 2000 for about £600,000. It was too expensive for me. But it was obviously incredible value.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I think he said "back in 1999".
I lived there back in 1999. There was plenty of supermarkets.
There IS a slight lack of big shops (and, particularly, pubs) in the university-ish part of Bloomsbury, but this is for two highly specific reasons: the university and its ancillary buildings - ULU, Senate House, Halls of Residence, takes up so much of the land there simply isn't room. AND the Russell Family/Bedford Estates, that owns the land, used to be fierce teetotallers so they tried to limit or prohibit pubs. True story
Central London has long been very well stocked with good supermarkets. It's one thing British cities do quite well
I lived in Bloomsbury too for a while. It's an odd pocket of London. Buildings quite uniform and ostensibly very little happening. Certainly not for me anyway. Wasn't sorry to move somewhere else.
It's a lovely place to live. All those gorgeous Georgian squares. Quaint and pretty pubs - tho you have to seek them out. Lots of smart students keeping it youthful and lively, yet somehow it is also quiet and leafy, because of those same squares
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
There was a wonderful remainder bookshop somewhere in the Bloomsbury St/ Gt Russell St area - I forget its name, a double barrelled one. Does that ring a bell? Can't find it on the map now though.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
Fair point.
Kraft "cheese" and stuff like that probably doesn't do America's reputation much good. 😂
Like culture, the US exports the lowest common denominator, and keeps the good stuff for itself. Anyone who has been to New York City (or and of the large cities) and said "the food is shit here" probably spent whole trip in a hospital.
American food is rather like British food. Has a mediocre reputation worldwide, but in many big coastal cities you can get fantastic, innovative restaurant food, there's a great array of foreign cuisines, and in the first order cities - New York, LA (London in the UK) - the food can be some of the best in the world. America also has stand-out smaller food cities like New Orleans, which are as good as the best in Europe
Where America does fall down is in the flyover country, where you can drive for 100 miles and the only choice is fast food, literally. DAIRY QUEENS
And don't get me on to the cheese or charcuterie selection in, say, a Walmart in Mississippi. UGH
America its the processed stuff, it just so so so bad...fructose corn syrup in everything, crazy numbers of calories, fat, sugar etc. Its been creeping in here though over the past few years, increasingly products have the fructose corn syrup.
I usually spend a month a year there and have to be so careful with food, otherwise so easy to put on serious weight in no time.
Yes, the portions are obscene, I hate it. NO I DON'T WANT A KILO OF FRENCH FRIES WITH PROCESSED ORANGE "JACK" CHEESE ON TOP
I've read various theories about this inability to serve sane portions, my favourite is this: it derives from the backstory of early immigrants, who were often fleeing Famine - Ireland, Germany - and therefore Americans are hardwired to want LOTS of food, whatever it is
The best food thing in America - where it beats the world - is barbecues. They REALLY know how to do a barbie.
Helps that they actually have sunshine
Leon – I agree 100% with your analyses of food in the US: the great, the bad, and the ugly.
Have you seen Chef's Table BBQ on Netflix yet? UHD and an absolutely beautiful series. You will love it.
One of my closest friends and another Ops Geologist like myself is Marcus Bawdon who is considered one of the foremost BBQ experts in the UK and who runs BBQ schools down in Devon. Well worth catching up with his books and TV programmes as he has some stunningly good inventive ideas.
Update on my son - the CEO himself has just rung him!
Personally apologised (some things he needs to investigate still, but he has seen enough to know they have not acted well)and said he would be investigating this himself this afternoon and tomorrow.
Said he was basically ashamed this could happen in an organisation he runs - he said if the team could not see that there was something very wrong in a 2 bed flat running up that sort of bill then they all need retraining.
He told my son it would be sorted, not to worry about it and they will make sure it does not impact his credit rating.
He told my son to concentrate on getting well - now I seem to have something in my eye......
That is the way a company should act when things go wrong - own it and act on it.
All we wanted was a recognition that this was stupid and a stop to them threatening him with debt collectors
Thanks all for your advice on this
Amazing story. I missed your OP – what was the trigger for the CEOs response?
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I think he said "back in 1999".
I lived there back in 1999. There was plenty of supermarkets.
There IS a slight lack of big shops (and, particularly, pubs) in the university-ish part of Bloomsbury, but this is for two highly specific reasons: the university and its ancillary buildings - ULU, Senate House, Halls of Residence, takes up so much of the land there simply isn't room. AND the Russell Family/Bedford Estates, that owns the land, used to be fierce teetotallers so they tried to limit or prohibit pubs. True story
Central London has long been very well stocked with good supermarkets. It's one thing British cities do quite well
I lived in Bloomsbury too for a while. It's an odd pocket of London. Buildings quite uniform and ostensibly very little happening. Certainly not for me anyway. Wasn't sorry to move somewhere else.
It's a lovely place to live. All those gorgeous Georgian squares. Quaint and pretty pubs - tho you have to seek them out. Lots of smart students keeping it youthful and lively, yet somehow it is also quiet and leafy, because of those same squares
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
Yeah it's great often you saw film crews setting up in any of the squares because they were so untouched.
But also reminds me in a way of Pimlico - can walk to the West End or Chelsea, there are some v nice pubs nearby, an SW1 postcode so very spenny and you can get mugged before breakfast on Lupus Street.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
In any case, getting rid of sheep, fish, etc. from Scotland is like getting rid of Scots lawyers. Neither may take up a huge part of GDP, but we are on the whole a lot better for having them available locally ...
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I suspect a better explanation is just that you are a shit cook.
I thought the same. The odd thing is that Philip seems to believe in English exceptionalism on everything except areas where there is the possibility of defending some action of Boris Johnson's government. OK, I am biased, because I come from a farming family, but I can honestly say, as a foody, that British meat is something we should be proud of as it is amongst the best, if not the best, in the world.
England 234,818 1st doses / 367,142 2nd doses Scotland 18,603 / 26,968 Wales 11,583 / 17,214 NI 3,247 / 8,988
Is that the first time over 1% of population?
That must be very close to a record. We certainly haven't done 700k before – and that is only a whisker off that...
Was it a French Minister who made the comment that it was how you finished and that the UK would be crawling over the finish line while the EU marched ahead?
Given the urgent need to immunise your most vulnerable it was tosh even at the time but we don't seem to be in that position.
Yebbut...they still seem to be opening up at the same time as us if not before so net-net it's even stevens.
As is Spain - I do however think this is a huge risk to open up while the majority of those under 50 have not had a 1st dose - and this is the group who will ten dto take the most risks....
Yes absolutely we will see in the weeks and months to come the relative merits of each approach.
At the moment where I live the case numbers are very low indeed but the arrival of thousands of tourists is imminent and of concern - my second jab is still around 10 weeks away - I'm 67 so you can imagine how many millions are at risk still for some time.
Yes I can understand the concern. Still, it's an interesting decision by the Spanish govt. What motivated it, do you think?
They are desperate to have a big summer tourist season. The polls have turned against the socialist government and I guess they are hoping for a payoff. Time will tell.
Ah yes of course the tourist season. Difficult not to accept the draw on such an important sector.
Why does agriculture take up so much land? Perhaps you need land to grow soy to feed to cows to turn into burgers? Think about how much more efficient things would be if we concrete over the farms and turn them into nice office parks full of people mining Britcoin which we then use to buy food grown by foreign wasters happy to be inefficient.
Yes, a sure way to a secure and prosperous future.
Yep, the UK dedicates 71.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 0.61% of UK GDP.
In contrast Sweden uses 6.5% of its land for agriculture to generate 1.44% of GDP.
Norway uses 2.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 1.93% of GDP.
I think their definition of agricultural land may be different. In theory all of northern Scandinavia could be designated as 'farmland' because it is used for reindeer grazing.
In any case, all that tells us is that Scandinavia is not heavily populated.
Can you name any heavily populated nation on the planet that so inefficiently wastes 71% of its land to generate below 1% of GDP?
Japan would probably be more comparable to the UK. They dedicated 12% of land to agriculture and they get 1.14% of GDP from agriculture.
Why is ours so inefficient compared to everyone else?
You've got your hand on some nice stats there Philip.
Perhaps it's do with our brand. Brit food doesn't have the best rep.
Why does agriculture take up so much land? Perhaps you need land to grow soy to feed to cows to turn into burgers? Think about how much more efficient things would be if we concrete over the farms and turn them into nice office parks full of people mining Britcoin which we then use to buy food grown by foreign wasters happy to be inefficient.
Yes, a sure way to a secure and prosperous future.
Yep, the UK dedicates 71.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 0.61% of UK GDP.
In contrast Sweden uses 6.5% of its land for agriculture to generate 1.44% of GDP.
Norway uses 2.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 1.93% of GDP.
So we should waste less land growing food and import it? Perhaps some kind of open border free trade area with the places we'd then buy food from would be a good idea...
That's one suggestion.
Another suggestion would be that we use our land better and get more return from it and be more efficient.
Why is it that Sweden can use 1/10th of its land as we do for agriculture, but get a better GDP return than we do? ...
Probably as our GDP is five and a half times theirs, and our land area about half ?
That still leaves the UK as being inefficient, by more than half (without considering the fact our extra population should see more GDP anyway.
Let alone comparing with the likes of Italy and Japan with much more comparable population densities were the same thing is very much the case.
There's something with these stats, and I can't put a finger on it.
Sweden is a low productivity agricultural sector, due to climate and short season.
And UK has traditonally been a driver for productivity within the EU. What has changed to justify the numbers, oe what is variable in the numbers?
I can see that some things would throw it off - eg glasshouses in NL, or 15% of Italian agriculture being wine.
UK productivity may have been reduced by set-aside or organics, but I can't account for the apparent gaps of 50% or double.
I see the people who were having a hernia at Merkel mentioning the British virus are also prolapsing at Sturgeon not using the term Indian variant. A permanent truss (surgical not tory) to keep everything tucked in might be a wise move.
I have no problem with her not using the term Indian variant.
It does beg the term why she does use the term Kent variant though.
Is there a Kentish community in Scotland?
Is their an Indian community? Aren't they all Scots?
There is an Indian community but not a Kentian one. That's the rationale - people didn’t seem to get it so I helped.
Although tbh I don't think it matters too much what you call the variants. So long as you don't go around chanting "China virus China virus China virus" in a smarmily menacing way like the Donald.
Sorry - this doesn't address the issue of Brazilian communities or indeed SA, both of decent size in the UK. Its pathetic.
I wasn't seeking to address that. So it wasn't pathetic.
I see the BBC reporting uses the noun, not the adjective - so 'India variant', 'Brazil variant', 'Kent variant' etc.
Makes more sense really, as it's simply named after the place it was discovered (not necessarily where it arose), there's nothing actually Indian or Kentish about the variant. I can see the logic in that. Hard for anyone to have a problem about Merkel if she'd said Britain or England variant, too, surely? The apparent attempted renaming of the India variant on a date basis is doomed, a complete waste of time.
What I don't get is why everyone doesn't just use the catchy name provided by scientists. What is wrong with simply saying 'B.1.617.2 variant?'
Just wondering, having idly glanced at this after a U3a Group meeting. Is the variant from South of the River (don't go there after dark) a Kentish variant or a Variant of Kent?
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I think he said "back in 1999".
I lived there back in 1999. There was plenty of supermarkets.
There IS a slight lack of big shops (and, particularly, pubs) in the university-ish part of Bloomsbury, but this is for two highly specific reasons: the university and its ancillary buildings - ULU, Senate House, Halls of Residence, takes up so much of the land there simply isn't room. AND the Russell Family/Bedford Estates, that owns the land, used to be fierce teetotallers so they tried to limit or prohibit pubs. True story
Central London has long been very well stocked with good supermarkets. It's one thing British cities do quite well
I lived in Bloomsbury too for a while. It's an odd pocket of London. Buildings quite uniform and ostensibly very little happening. Certainly not for me anyway. Wasn't sorry to move somewhere else.
It's a lovely place to live. All those gorgeous Georgian squares. Quaint and pretty pubs - tho you have to seek them out. Lots of smart students keeping it youthful and lively, yet somehow it is also quiet and leafy, because of those same squares
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
Why does agriculture take up so much land? Perhaps you need land to grow soy to feed to cows to turn into burgers? Think about how much more efficient things would be if we concrete over the farms and turn them into nice office parks full of people mining Britcoin which we then use to buy food grown by foreign wasters happy to be inefficient.
Yes, a sure way to a secure and prosperous future.
Yep, the UK dedicates 71.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 0.61% of UK GDP.
In contrast Sweden uses 6.5% of its land for agriculture to generate 1.44% of GDP.
Norway uses 2.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 1.93% of GDP.
Large parts of Sweden and Norway are effectively uninhabited
The number is also slightly misleading: it's not "agriculture" alone, but "agriculture, forestry and fishing".
And forestry is going to absolutely dominate the number for Norway and Sweden.
That's a fair point but in which case fishing would be included in the UKs figure too presumably?
In which case do you think using 71% of our available land, to provide 0.61% of GDP minus whatever the fishing figure is, is good value for money land?
Philip, nice to see you know jackshit about farming, the countryside, economics, and the importance of food security, just like you know jackshit about everything else you pronounce on.
Amusing that you made this response to the same post RCS said it was a fair point too. I know whose opinion I respect more.
Making more efficient use of our land would help not hurt our security.
If you think that dedicating over 70% of our land to less that 0.7% of GDP is a great return on investment perhaps you can explain why you think no other G7 or G20 nation does anything comparable?
I've not called for eliminating agriculture from the UK. But land is something we are short of in this nation, so we should use it efficiently. Or do you disagree? Always easier for you to throw stones at others than come up with any productive solutions yourself.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I think he said "back in 1999".
I lived there back in 1999. There was plenty of supermarkets.
There IS a slight lack of big shops (and, particularly, pubs) in the university-ish part of Bloomsbury, but this is for two highly specific reasons: the university and its ancillary buildings - ULU, Senate House, Halls of Residence, takes up so much of the land there simply isn't room. AND the Russell Family/Bedford Estates, that owns the land, used to be fierce teetotallers so they tried to limit or prohibit pubs. True story
Central London has long been very well stocked with good supermarkets. It's one thing British cities do quite well
I lived in Bloomsbury too for a while. It's an odd pocket of London. Buildings quite uniform and ostensibly very little happening. Certainly not for me anyway. Wasn't sorry to move somewhere else.
It's a lovely place to live. All those gorgeous Georgian squares. Quaint and pretty pubs - tho you have to seek them out. Lots of smart students keeping it youthful and lively, yet somehow it is also quiet and leafy, because of those same squares
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
Yeah it's great often you saw film crews setting up in any of the squares because they were so untouched.
But also reminds me in a way of Pimlico - can walk to the West End or Chelsea, there are some v nice pubs nearby, an SW1 postcode so very spenny and you can get mugged before breakfast on Lupus Street.
Bloomsbury is far nicer than Pimlico. It's pretty hard to get mugged in Bloomsbury unless you hang out in the eastern bit and try to score heroin, but even that has largely gone upmarket
Pimlico is weird. I've never particularly liked it despite its often beautiful Georgian streets.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
In any case, getting rid of sheep, fish, etc. from Scotland is like getting rid of Scots lawyers. Neither may take up a huge part of GDP, but we are on the whole a lot better for having them available locally ...
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
Indeed. The repeal of the Corn Laws, and the rise of the Canadian Prairies, had huge impacts on corn farming especially and the countryside. I remember reading, I think, Adrian Bell's memoirs of the 1920s and how his family went into dairying and milk delivery to local towns rather than stay in corn.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
The big Sainsburys at the top of Tottenham Court Road used to be a Budgens. It only changed in about 2004/5.
An Asda, I think? It certainly changed, yes
No, it was definitely a Budgens.
I moved to just by Great Portland Street station in 2002, and it was the nearest large supermarket. At that time we also had a Europa foods, and that was the overpriced local place where one got eggs and bread.
So, I'd do my "big" shops at the Budgens every couple of weeks, and fill in with smaller stuff from Europa.
In the middle of 2004, Europa Foods sold out to Tesco, and the little Tesco Metro appeared by GPS station. And around the same time Budgens became Sainsburys. And there was much rejoicing in the Smithson household.
There was, of course, also the M&S on Tottenham Court Road, just South of Goodge Street station.
Definitely a budgens, I remember going there when I did a summer internship during my sixth form nearby.
Fair enough, I yield: It was a Budgens. I remember it changing to Sainsbury's
The Tesco on Goodge Street was always there
But yes I also forgot the M&S on TTC. To say there was a "dearth of supermarkets" even back in 1999 is pretty daft, unless you mean "I must have ten large supermarkets with two minutes walk"
Now there is almost too many, an embarrassment of supermarket riches
But I fear we have likely exhausted the exciting debate on "supermarkets in Bloomsbury at the turn of the millennium" and I should do some work. Later
My London apartment is on Shaftesbury Avenue on the Eastern side of Cambridge Circus.
It's probably the furthest place in Central London from a decent supermarket, with Sainsbury Holborn and Sainsburys TCR (bottom end) both being 10 minute walks.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
Fair point.
Kraft "cheese" and stuff like that probably doesn't do America's reputation much good. 😂
Like culture, the US exports the lowest common denominator, and keeps the good stuff for itself. Anyone who has been to New York City (or and of the large cities) and said "the food is shit here" probably spent whole trip in a hospital.
American food is rather like British food. Has a mediocre reputation worldwide, but in many big coastal cities you can get fantastic, innovative restaurant food, there's a great array of foreign cuisines, and in the first order cities - New York, LA (London in the UK) - the food can be some of the best in the world. America also has stand-out smaller food cities like New Orleans, which are as good as the best in Europe
Where America does fall down is in the flyover country, where you can drive for 100 miles and the only choice is fast food, literally. DAIRY QUEENS
And don't get me on to the cheese or charcuterie selection in, say, a Walmart in Mississippi. UGH
America its the processed stuff, it just so so so bad...fructose corn syrup in everything, crazy numbers of calories, fat, sugar etc. Its been creeping in here though over the past few years, increasingly products have the fructose corn syrup.
I usually spend a month a year there and have to be so careful with food, otherwise so easy to put on serious weight in no time.
Yes, the portions are obscene, I hate it. NO I DON'T WANT A KILO OF FRENCH FRIES WITH PROCESSED ORANGE "JACK" CHEESE ON TOP
I've read various theories about this inability to serve sane portions, my favourite is this: it derives from the backstory of early immigrants, who were often fleeing Famine - Ireland, Germany - and therefore Americans are hardwired to want LOTS of food, whatever it is
The best food thing in America - where it beats the world - is barbecues. They REALLY know how to do a barbie.
Helps that they actually have sunshine
Leon – I agree 100% with your analyses of food in the US: the great, the bad, and the ugly.
Have you seen Chef's Table BBQ on Netflix yet? UHD and an absolutely beautiful series. You will love it.
One of my closest friends and another Ops Geologist like myself is Marcus Bawdon who is considered one of the foremost BBQ experts in the UK and who runs BBQ schools down in Devon. Well worth catching up with his books and TV programmes as he has some stunningly good inventive ideas.
Thanks, I will check out his books – I'm in the market for a new one this summer. My go-to guide is Steve Raichlen's How to Grill – a key text for BBQ. But will take a look at Bawdon's offerings!
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I think he said "back in 1999".
I lived there back in 1999. There was plenty of supermarkets.
There IS a slight lack of big shops (and, particularly, pubs) in the university-ish part of Bloomsbury, but this is for two highly specific reasons: the university and its ancillary buildings - ULU, Senate House, Halls of Residence, takes up so much of the land there simply isn't room. AND the Russell Family/Bedford Estates, that owns the land, used to be fierce teetotallers so they tried to limit or prohibit pubs. True story
Central London has long been very well stocked with good supermarkets. It's one thing British cities do quite well
I lived in Bloomsbury too for a while. It's an odd pocket of London. Buildings quite uniform and ostensibly very little happening. Certainly not for me anyway. Wasn't sorry to move somewhere else.
It's a lovely place to live. All those gorgeous Georgian squares. Quaint and pretty pubs - tho you have to seek them out. Lots of smart students keeping it youthful and lively, yet somehow it is also quiet and leafy, because of those same squares
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Yeah lol at tourists in Bloomsbury. I guess some people mistake foreign students for tourists sometimes.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
In any case, getting rid of sheep, fish, etc. from Scotland is like getting rid of Scots lawyers. Neither may take up a huge part of GDP, but we are on the whole a lot better for having them available locally ...
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
Indeed. The repeal of the Corn Laws, and the rise of the Canadian Prairies, had huge impacts on corn farming especially and the countryside. I remember reading, I think, Adrian Bell's memoirs of the 1920s and how his family went into dairying and milk delivery to local towns rather than stay in corn.
Some things would be fine. Soft fruit production would almost certainly be ok. Probably seed potatoes. Maybe Aberdeen Angus beef. But very few agrarian crops would be viable and the likes of lamb would probably disappear apart from the odd "special" variety.
Update on my son - the CEO himself has just rung him!
Personally apologised (some things he needs to investigate still, but he has seen enough to know they have not acted well)and said he would be investigating this himself this afternoon and tomorrow.
Said he was basically ashamed this could happen in an organisation he runs - he said if the team could not see that there was something very wrong in a 2 bed flat running up that sort of bill then they all need retraining.
He told my son it would be sorted, not to worry about it and they will make sure it does not impact his credit rating.
He told my son to concentrate on getting well - now I seem to have something in my eye......
That is the way a company should act when things go wrong - own it and act on it.
All we wanted was a recognition that this was stupid and a stop to them threatening him with debt collectors
Thanks all for your advice on this
Amazing story. I missed your OP – what was the trigger for the CEOs response?
Long story - basically energy provider never dealt with his complaints and said he was running up in excess of 800 a month in electric bills. Final straw was after an engineer came out and said there was a problem with supply that needed investigating and they then accepted just shy of 600 of outstanding bill (nearly 2K) as final settlement they then had their debt collection on to him for the rest as the person who made him the settlement offer "wasnt authorised" and if the meter said he was using that amount then he must be.......
Then they hung up on him and then me 3 times when I tried to find out who to escalate complaint too - and a 50 min web chat where they swore blind there were no details they could give me to allow an escalation.
Followed by this forum passing me details of the CEO and his e mail and to threaten to take to press if not actioned.
E mail sent at 10pm last night - followed by a very prompt response from them it has to be said.
Italy's population density is probably closest to the UK's within large nations in Europe.
They dedicate 41.7% of land to agriculture and it generates 1.93% of GDP. We dedicated 71.7% of land to agriculture and it generated 0.61% of GDP.
What would be so wrong about going down the Italian route, freeing up countless hectares across the country, while tripling our domestic agricultural output? What is the downside?
Italian farming relies of quality of produce on highly productive land due to sunshine hours, rain and desirable end product with a huge and captive domestic audience.
We won't ever make the same agricultural and food products as Italy and it won't ever be worth the same GDP as what we produce. Additionally, the UK economy is significantly more diverse than Italy. We have huge tech, financial and pharma sectors that Italy could only hope to imitate. Italy has got GDP of $2tn and falling, the UK has got GDP of $3tn and rising. 0.79% of GDP for agriculture isn't necessarily a bad thing when you take into account the sheer size of the UK economy vs others that are being compared to.
I'm not fussed about Australian food imports, in fact I think that they will be a net benefit to the country and having been to Australia a few times the quality of their red meat is excellent, it's comparable to our own. I'm not sure you can make cross country comparisons on the agricultural economic contribution as those numbers are, IMO, fairly useless in isolation.
The UK, - England in particular has a large amount of land that is suitable for agriculture - Japan is mountainous in the middle, Sweden doesn't have the sunshine hours we do. But we don't have the sunshine of the Med so the land likely isn't as productive as areas further south. In addition we don't really have the intense farming of the USA and higher welfare standards than the EU with respect to pig farming. So it's massive land areas of middling agriculture. The farmers do tend to sell up if they can turn their fields of rape into fields of chimney pots too; that's a whole another argument though.
'Sunshine' - only in the climatic sense maybe - Scotland gets a huge amount with the short nights and that's why the Laich of Moray, the Merse and the Howe of Fife inter aliis are superb farmland.
Scotland does not get a "huge amount of sunshine". It is one of the least sunny places on earth, along with North West England
Edinburgh gets about 1300 hours of sunshine per year. London gets about 1640. The sunniest place in the UK, Eastbourne, gets 1800
Paris gets close to 2000 hours, Nice gets 2800 hours, Marbella gets over 3000
The east coast of Scotland might be a slightly better than Edinburgh, but its not much. Fife gets 1430 hours
A striking thing about sunshine hours is how much sunnier it is in America, compared to Europe. The least sunny place in the USA is akin to a sunnier place in Europe. eg Seattle gets 2200 hours
Not that I'm obsessed with sun at the moment, or anything
Of course - I was thinking of daylight hours and growing season, not 'taps aff'. Sorry. That comes of having allotments, and the kind of fair freckly skin that has Dracula-like responses to UV, so I'm quite content if the sun is above the horizon at all and not too bright. But it is sure interesting to see that much difference even with the daylight hours.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I think he said "back in 1999".
I lived there back in 1999. There was plenty of supermarkets.
There IS a slight lack of big shops (and, particularly, pubs) in the university-ish part of Bloomsbury, but this is for two highly specific reasons: the university and its ancillary buildings - ULU, Senate House, Halls of Residence, takes up so much of the land there simply isn't room. AND the Russell Family/Bedford Estates, that owns the land, used to be fierce teetotallers so they tried to limit or prohibit pubs. True story
Central London has long been very well stocked with good supermarkets. It's one thing British cities do quite well
I lived in Bloomsbury too for a while. It's an odd pocket of London. Buildings quite uniform and ostensibly very little happening. Certainly not for me anyway. Wasn't sorry to move somewhere else.
It's a lovely place to live. All those gorgeous Georgian squares. Quaint and pretty pubs - tho you have to seek them out. Lots of smart students keeping it youthful and lively, yet somehow it is also quiet and leafy, because of those same squares
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
Yeah it's great often you saw film crews setting up in any of the squares because they were so untouched.
But also reminds me in a way of Pimlico - can walk to the West End or Chelsea, there are some v nice pubs nearby, an SW1 postcode so very spenny and you can get mugged before breakfast on Lupus Street.
Bloomsbury is far nicer than Pimlico. It's pretty hard to get mugged in Bloomsbury unless you hang out in the eastern bit and try to score heroin, but even that has largely gone upmarket
Pimlico is weird. I've never particularly liked it despite its often beautiful Georgian streets.
Perhaps it is the lack of decent supermarkets
Yes but you have Linleys and a whole street full of customerless antique shops with 20ft stone statuary in the windows. So there is that.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I think he said "back in 1999".
I lived there back in 1999. There was plenty of supermarkets.
There IS a slight lack of big shops (and, particularly, pubs) in the university-ish part of Bloomsbury, but this is for two highly specific reasons: the university and its ancillary buildings - ULU, Senate House, Halls of Residence, takes up so much of the land there simply isn't room. AND the Russell Family/Bedford Estates, that owns the land, used to be fierce teetotallers so they tried to limit or prohibit pubs. True story
Central London has long been very well stocked with good supermarkets. It's one thing British cities do quite well
I lived in Bloomsbury too for a while. It's an odd pocket of London. Buildings quite uniform and ostensibly very little happening. Certainly not for me anyway. Wasn't sorry to move somewhere else.
It's a lovely place to live. All those gorgeous Georgian squares. Quaint and pretty pubs - tho you have to seek them out. Lots of smart students keeping it youthful and lively, yet somehow it is also quiet and leafy, because of those same squares
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
I remember looking around a five bedroom house (admittedly in shitty condition) on Great Ormand Street in 2000 for about £600,000. It was too expensive for me. But it was obviously incredible value.
I very nearly bought a huge 2 bed flat in WC1 with my brother around 2005. Vast, high windows, gorgeous Georgian Street, it was about £300,000 maybe. It could be five times that now. Bloomsbury has exploded in value
A five bed house on Great Ormond street now, if properly done up, might be £6m
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
In any case, getting rid of sheep, fish, etc. from Scotland is like getting rid of Scots lawyers. Neither may take up a huge part of GDP, but we are on the whole a lot better for having them available locally ...
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
Indeed. The repeal of the Corn Laws, and the rise of the Canadian Prairies, had huge impacts on corn farming especially and the countryside. I remember reading, I think, Adrian Bell's memoirs of the 1920s and how his family went into dairying and milk delivery to local towns rather than stay in corn.
Some things would be fine. Soft fruit production would almost certainly be ok. Probably seed potatoes. Maybe Aberdeen Angus beef. But very few agrarian crops would be viable and the likes of lamb would probably disappear apart from the odd "special" variety.
Not much demand for seed potatoes if there are no potato farmers, and the Irish can't get them because HMG forgot to sort out the technicalities. I have a horrible feeling about all this.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
In any case, getting rid of sheep, fish, etc. from Scotland is like getting rid of Scots lawyers. Neither may take up a huge part of GDP, but we are on the whole a lot better for having them available locally ...
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
Indeed. The repeal of the Corn Laws, and the rise of the Canadian Prairies, had huge impacts on corn farming especially and the countryside. I remember reading, I think, Adrian Bell's memoirs of the 1920s and how his family went into dairying and milk delivery to local towns rather than stay in corn.
There was a time, not too long ago, when I was preparing a short presentation on English grape wine, and discovered that it had been quite popular up until the repeal of the Corn Laws and liberalisation of agricultural trade. French wine was better quality and so drove English production down ...... I suspect that there was more to the story ....... but it was starting to recover before WWI. However land was then needed for food. Then it was recovering again towards the end of the thirties, but of course food shortages in WWII killed it again, until the recovery from the 70's onwards.
Update on my son - the CEO himself has just rung him!
Personally apologised (some things he needs to investigate still, but he has seen enough to know they have not acted well)and said he would be investigating this himself this afternoon and tomorrow.
Said he was basically ashamed this could happen in an organisation he runs - he said if the team could not see that there was something very wrong in a 2 bed flat running up that sort of bill then they all need retraining.
He told my son it would be sorted, not to worry about it and they will make sure it does not impact his credit rating.
He told my son to concentrate on getting well - now I seem to have something in my eye......
That is the way a company should act when things go wrong - own it and act on it.
All we wanted was a recognition that this was stupid and a stop to them threatening him with debt collectors
Thanks all for your advice on this
Amazing story. I missed your OP – what was the trigger for the CEOs response?
Long story - basically energy provider never dealt with his complaints and said he was running up in excess of 800 a month in electric bills. Final straw was after an engineer came out and said there was a problem with supply that needed investigating and they then accepted just shy of 600 of outstanding bill (nearly 2K) as final settlement they then had their debt collection on to him for the rest as the person who made him the settlement offer "wasnt authorised" and if the meter said he was using that amount then he must be.......
Then they hung up on him and then me 3 times when I tried to find out who to escalate complaint too - and a 50 min web chat where they swore blind there were no details they could give me to allow an escalation.
Followed by this forum passing me details of the CEO and his e mail and to threaten to take to press if not actioned.
E mail sent at 10pm last night - followed by a very prompt response from them it has to be said.
One great thing about PB is that there are a huge number of very well connected people who are willing to lend a hand when another is having problems.
Why does agriculture take up so much land? Perhaps you need land to grow soy to feed to cows to turn into burgers? Think about how much more efficient things would be if we concrete over the farms and turn them into nice office parks full of people mining Britcoin which we then use to buy food grown by foreign wasters happy to be inefficient.
Yes, a sure way to a secure and prosperous future.
Yep, the UK dedicates 71.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 0.61% of UK GDP.
In contrast Sweden uses 6.5% of its land for agriculture to generate 1.44% of GDP.
Norway uses 2.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 1.93% of GDP.
Large parts of Sweden and Norway are effectively uninhabited
The number is also slightly misleading: it's not "agriculture" alone, but "agriculture, forestry and fishing".
And forestry is going to absolutely dominate the number for Norway and Sweden.
That's a fair point but in which case fishing would be included in the UKs figure too presumably?
In which case do you think using 71% of our available land, to provide 0.61% of GDP minus whatever the fishing figure is, is good value for money land?
Philip, nice to see you know jackshit about farming, the countryside, economics, and the importance of food security, just like you know jackshit about everything else you pronounce on.
Amusing that you made this response to the same post RCS said it was a fair point too. I know whose opinion I respect more.
Making more efficient use of our land would help not hurt our security.
If you think that dedicating over 70% of our land to less that 0.7% of GDP is a great return on investment perhaps you can explain why you think no other G7 or G20 nation does anything comparable?
I've not called for eliminating agriculture from the UK. But land is something we are short of in this nation, so we should use it efficiently. Or do you disagree? Always easier for you to throw stones at others than come up with any productive solutions yourself.
Oh, I am sure the whole farming community is sooo relieved the "great all knowing one" hasn't called for it. Land has been used efficiently, you numpty, since the 1960s.It was called intensive farming and evolved in response to the nation almost starving during WW1 and WW2. The general feeling today is that land is not used "efficient" so that it can be "greener". The trend and government policy is for inefficient use of land, not efficient.
Here is what I find irritating and objectionable about your posts Philip. You make pronouncements on matters as though you are expert on them when in fact it is as plain as a pikestaff you are not. Perhaps you could make your opinions as questions or statements prefaced occasionally by IMO, or "based on this that I have read", rather than make it obvious to us all that your post is simply you shooting from the hip on yet another subject that you have zero knowledge or experience of.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Yeah lol at tourists in Bloomsbury. I guess some people mistake foreign students for tourists sometimes.
Well I lived in Russell Sq and there were quite a few tourists round there. Lots of students too of course with UCL etc.
I think we often make the mistake of comparing our humdrum day to day lives in the UK with the luxury, splash out experiences we get when visiting overseas.
For example we might dine on supermarket beef or visit pubs for Sunday Roast in our small suburb most of the year, then visit New York for a blow out long weekend and be amazed that the prime USDA striploin we're served in some eye wateringly pricey Manhatten palace is better than what we got from Sainsburys last week.
Same as we tend to visit the prettiest rural or coastal parts of our neighbouring European countries on holiday and wonder at how much nicer the lifestyle and landscape is than Bexleyheath or Harlow.
The top end meat in most rich countries these days is pretty good. The worst is pretty bad in the UK, downright toxic in the US and not that bad in Italy, Spain or Southern France.
Why does agriculture take up so much land? Perhaps you need land to grow soy to feed to cows to turn into burgers? Think about how much more efficient things would be if we concrete over the farms and turn them into nice office parks full of people mining Britcoin which we then use to buy food grown by foreign wasters happy to be inefficient.
Yes, a sure way to a secure and prosperous future.
Yep, the UK dedicates 71.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 0.61% of UK GDP.
In contrast Sweden uses 6.5% of its land for agriculture to generate 1.44% of GDP.
Norway uses 2.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 1.93% of GDP.
Large parts of Sweden and Norway are effectively uninhabited
The number is also slightly misleading: it's not "agriculture" alone, but "agriculture, forestry and fishing".
And forestry is going to absolutely dominate the number for Norway and Sweden.
That's a fair point but in which case fishing would be included in the UKs figure too presumably?
In which case do you think using 71% of our available land, to provide 0.61% of GDP minus whatever the fishing figure is, is good value for money land?
Philip, nice to see you know jackshit about farming, the countryside, economics, and the importance of food security, just like you know jackshit about everything else you pronounce on.
Amusing that you made this response to the same post RCS said it was a fair point too. I know whose opinion I respect more.
Making more efficient use of our land would help not hurt our security.
If you think that dedicating over 70% of our land to less that 0.7% of GDP is a great return on investment perhaps you can explain why you think no other G7 or G20 nation does anything comparable?
I've not called for eliminating agriculture from the UK. But land is something we are short of in this nation, so we should use it efficiently. Or do you disagree? Always easier for you to throw stones at others than come up with any productive solutions yourself.
Given that the point of agriculture is to feed people and we still import around 50% of our food I would suggest Nigel is absolutely right. Your 0.7% of GDP figure is meaningless as it is based on the stupid idea that the bottom line is all that matters. It isn't, never has been and hopefully never will be. Moreover we are slowly but surely rolling back the years of intensive farming and turning more back to organic farming and more environmentally friendly farming. This is an absolute necessity as people like Gove recognised because soil degradation, plunging insect populations and nitrate pollution are serious threats to our future wellbeing.
So yes that 70% is justified. Far more than building ever more houses just to suit a particular lifestyle choice.
Update on my son - the CEO himself has just rung him!
Personally apologised (some things he needs to investigate still, but he has seen enough to know they have not acted well)and said he would be investigating this himself this afternoon and tomorrow.
Said he was basically ashamed this could happen in an organisation he runs - he said if the team could not see that there was something very wrong in a 2 bed flat running up that sort of bill then they all need retraining.
He told my son it would be sorted, not to worry about it and they will make sure it does not impact his credit rating.
He told my son to concentrate on getting well - now I seem to have something in my eye......
That is the way a company should act when things go wrong - own it and act on it.
All we wanted was a recognition that this was stupid and a stop to them threatening him with debt collectors
Thanks all for your advice on this
Amazing story. I missed your OP – what was the trigger for the CEOs response?
Long story - basically energy provider never dealt with his complaints and said he was running up in excess of 800 a month in electric bills. Final straw was after an engineer came out and said there was a problem with supply that needed investigating and they then accepted just shy of 600 of outstanding bill (nearly 2K) as final settlement they then had their debt collection on to him for the rest as the person who made him the settlement offer "wasnt authorised" and if the meter said he was using that amount then he must be.......
Then they hung up on him and then me 3 times when I tried to find out who to escalate complaint too - and a 50 min web chat where they swore blind there were no details they could give me to allow an escalation.
Followed by this forum passing me details of the CEO and his e mail and to threaten to take to press if not actioned.
E mail sent at 10pm last night - followed by a very prompt response from them it has to be said.
Thanks for the context - I too had missed previous posts, I think.
Sounds familiar. I had a (much less troubling) issue with a courtesy car after insurance write-off. Small lease company linked to a law firm that the insurers passed the case on to (as I realised later, the lease company charged above market rate which the law firm then recovered from the other party's insurer). I forget what happened exactly, think they tried to bill me for something, while it was all supposed to be free (to me). Got nowhere with customer services, but the company was small and I was able to get MD's contact details via Companies House. I got the impression the MD was shocked to be contacted directly, but it was all sorted in about ten minutes.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
Fair point.
Kraft "cheese" and stuff like that probably doesn't do America's reputation much good. 😂
Like culture, the US exports the lowest common denominator, and keeps the good stuff for itself. Anyone who has been to New York City (or and of the large cities) and said "the food is shit here" probably spent whole trip in a hospital.
American food is rather like British food. Has a mediocre reputation worldwide, but in many big coastal cities you can get fantastic, innovative restaurant food, there's a great array of foreign cuisines, and in the first order cities - New York, LA (London in the UK) - the food can be some of the best in the world. America also has stand-out smaller food cities like New Orleans, which are as good as the best in Europe
Where America does fall down is in the flyover country, where you can drive for 100 miles and the only choice is fast food, literally. DAIRY QUEENS
And don't get me on to the cheese or charcuterie selection in, say, a Walmart in Mississippi. UGH
I lived and worked in Boulder, Colorado for a few months during 2011, and I was actually surprised to find decent vegetarian food to take-away or eat-in over there (and several options to boot).
Colorado is NOT flyover country. It's posh AF.
Especially past 10-15 years, hoards of people with money moved there. Arizona, Texas and Colorado is where all the pissed off people of California are moving.
The question is will we see this post pandemic of people from London and which areas? I imagine Wiltshire and Somerset, as still easy to get to London.
Ah, not ALL of the "pissed off" ex-Californicators are moving to just those three. And the ones who are going to CO & AZ & TX are helping make those states LESS Republican, not more.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
Fair point.
Kraft "cheese" and stuff like that probably doesn't do America's reputation much good. 😂
Like culture, the US exports the lowest common denominator, and keeps the good stuff for itself. Anyone who has been to New York City (or and of the large cities) and said "the food is shit here" probably spent whole trip in a hospital.
American food is rather like British food. Has a mediocre reputation worldwide, but in many big coastal cities you can get fantastic, innovative restaurant food, there's a great array of foreign cuisines, and in the first order cities - New York, LA (London in the UK) - the food can be some of the best in the world. America also has stand-out smaller food cities like New Orleans, which are as good as the best in Europe
Where America does fall down is in the flyover country, where you can drive for 100 miles and the only choice is fast food, literally. DAIRY QUEENS
And don't get me on to the cheese or charcuterie selection in, say, a Walmart in Mississippi. UGH
I lived and worked in Boulder, Colorado for a few months during 2011, and I was actually surprised to find decent vegetarian food to take-away or eat-in over there (and several options to boot).
Colorado is NOT flyover country. It's posh AF.
Are you kidding? Boulder is like on the edge of the Rocky Mountains! HUNDREDS of miles from the nearest ocean!
Boulder is like Austin, it is a fortress of LeftWoke in a wasteland of RightWoke.
That is, a place that folks flying over fly-over country put down for some trendy R&R before reboarding to brave the badlands yet again.
When I want burgers for my BBQ I go to Scott the Butchers and buy them. They come all ready made and everything. I am not sure whether I should keep posting here on this basis. 😢
When I want a burger (maybe once a year), I get a Big Mac.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
Fair point.
Kraft "cheese" and stuff like that probably doesn't do America's reputation much good. 😂
Like culture, the US exports the lowest common denominator, and keeps the good stuff for itself. Anyone who has been to New York City (or and of the large cities) and said "the food is shit here" probably spent whole trip in a hospital.
American food is rather like British food. Has a mediocre reputation worldwide, but in many big coastal cities you can get fantastic, innovative restaurant food, there's a great array of foreign cuisines, and in the first order cities - New York, LA (London in the UK) - the food can be some of the best in the world. America also has stand-out smaller food cities like New Orleans, which are as good as the best in Europe
Where America does fall down is in the flyover country, where you can drive for 100 miles and the only choice is fast food, literally. DAIRY QUEENS
And don't get me on to the cheese or charcuterie selection in, say, a Walmart in Mississippi. UGH
America its the processed stuff, it just so so so bad...fructose corn syrup in everything, crazy numbers of calories, fat, sugar etc. Its been creeping in here though over the past few years, increasingly products have the fructose corn syrup.
I usually spend a month a year there and have to be so careful with food, otherwise so easy to put on serious weight in no time.
Yes, the portions are obscene, I hate it. NO I DON'T WANT A KILO OF FRENCH FRIES WITH PROCESSED ORANGE "JACK" CHEESE ON TOP
I've read various theories about this inability to serve sane portions, my favourite is this: it derives from the backstory of early immigrants, who were often fleeing Famine - Ireland, Germany - and therefore Americans are hardwired to want LOTS of food, whatever it is
The best food thing in America - where it beats the world - is barbecues. They REALLY know how to do a barbie.
Helps that they actually have sunshine
Leon – I agree 100% with your analyses of food in the US: the great, the bad, and the ugly.
Have you seen Chef's Table BBQ on Netflix yet? UHD and an absolutely beautiful series. You will love it.
One of my closest friends and another Ops Geologist like myself is Marcus Bawdon who is considered one of the foremost BBQ experts in the UK and who runs BBQ schools down in Devon. Well worth catching up with his books and TV programmes as he has some stunningly good inventive ideas.
Thanks, I will check out his books – I'm in the market for a new one this summer. My go-to guide is Steve Raichlen's How to Grill – a key text for BBQ. But will take a look at Bawdon's offerings!
@Richard_TyndallFood and Fire looks superb. I'll be buying that.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
The big Sainsburys at the top of Tottenham Court Road used to be a Budgens. It only changed in about 2004/5.
An Asda, I think? It certainly changed, yes
No, it was definitely a Budgens.
I moved to just by Great Portland Street station in 2002, and it was the nearest large supermarket. At that time we also had a Europa foods, and that was the overpriced local place where one got eggs and bread.
So, I'd do my "big" shops at the Budgens every couple of weeks, and fill in with smaller stuff from Europa.
In the middle of 2004, Europa Foods sold out to Tesco, and the little Tesco Metro appeared by GPS station. And around the same time Budgens became Sainsburys. And there was much rejoicing in the Smithson household.
There was, of course, also the M&S on Tottenham Court Road, just South of Goodge Street station.
Definitely a budgens, I remember going there when I did a summer internship during my sixth form nearby.
Fair enough, I yield: It was a Budgens. I remember it changing to Sainsbury's
The Tesco on Goodge Street was always there
But yes I also forgot the M&S on TTC. To say there was a "dearth of supermarkets" even back in 1999 is pretty daft, unless you mean "I must have ten large supermarkets with two minutes walk"
Now there is almost too many, an embarrassment of supermarket riches
But I fear we have likely exhausted the exciting debate on "supermarkets in Bloomsbury at the turn of the millennium" and I should do some work. Later
My London apartment is on Shaftesbury Avenue on the Eastern side of Cambridge Circus.
It's probably the furthest place in Central London from a decent supermarket, with Sainsbury Holborn and Sainsburys TCR (bottom end) both being 10 minute walks.
I had a friend who lived in a truly magnificent apartment on Whitehall, staring out at the Ministry of Defence
But not a great shopping street, it has to be said
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Clearly you are not a chef as any decent cook will tell you that you need a good fat content in meat to bring out the flavour when cooking it. This is why a good chef will always go for the marbled meat not the lean stuff.
The other key element in red meat is how well hung it is (if you excuse the expression!), or so a beef farming friend of mine tells me. This adds to the cost, so cheap producers who care less for flavour and more for price will hang it for the minimum time
I don’t even use eggs in mine. Just a 20-30% chuck mince, make a garlic herb butter to add inside the patty, then BBQ - serve with salad, frenchies and Reggae Reggae sauce in a brioche bun.
I've been mastering the honey mustard glaze for my burgers, it's an incredible addition. Try it.
Crush a bit of garlic to a paste. Add to your mince with a splash of top-quality soy (Kikkoman). Season with star anise salt (toast star anise, and grind with salt), and away you go. Soy and star anise are fab meat flavour boosters.
As for steak, nothing compares with the meat from knackered old Galician dairy cows. Beautiful deep-yellow fat.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Yeah lol at tourists in Bloomsbury. I guess some people mistake foreign students for tourists sometimes.
Well I lived in Russell Sq and there were quite a few tourists round there. Lots of students too of course with UCL etc.
As soon as you step behind TCR on the Fitzrovia side it's one of the few places in central London that is mostly tourist free.
I think it's entirely possible for tourists to want to see grand and formal Georgian architecture and "olde London/England" and if they do I can think of few better places than Bloomsbury.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Yeah lol at tourists in Bloomsbury. I guess some people mistake foreign students for tourists sometimes.
I was a foreign tourist who spent a LOT of time during various trips to London in Bloomsbury. And was certainly NOT alone in that, not by a long short.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
Fair point.
Kraft "cheese" and stuff like that probably doesn't do America's reputation much good. 😂
Like culture, the US exports the lowest common denominator, and keeps the good stuff for itself. Anyone who has been to New York City (or and of the large cities) and said "the food is shit here" probably spent whole trip in a hospital.
American food is rather like British food. Has a mediocre reputation worldwide, but in many big coastal cities you can get fantastic, innovative restaurant food, there's a great array of foreign cuisines, and in the first order cities - New York, LA (London in the UK) - the food can be some of the best in the world. America also has stand-out smaller food cities like New Orleans, which are as good as the best in Europe
Where America does fall down is in the flyover country, where you can drive for 100 miles and the only choice is fast food, literally. DAIRY QUEENS
And don't get me on to the cheese or charcuterie selection in, say, a Walmart in Mississippi. UGH
America its the processed stuff, it just so so so bad...fructose corn syrup in everything, crazy numbers of calories, fat, sugar etc. Its been creeping in here though over the past few years, increasingly products have the fructose corn syrup.
I usually spend a month a year there and have to be so careful with food, otherwise so easy to put on serious weight in no time.
Yes, the portions are obscene, I hate it. NO I DON'T WANT A KILO OF FRENCH FRIES WITH PROCESSED ORANGE "JACK" CHEESE ON TOP
I've read various theories about this inability to serve sane portions, my favourite is this: it derives from the backstory of early immigrants, who were often fleeing Famine - Ireland, Germany - and therefore Americans are hardwired to want LOTS of food, whatever it is
The best food thing in America - where it beats the world - is barbecues. They REALLY know how to do a barbie.
Helps that they actually have sunshine
Leon – I agree 100% with your analyses of food in the US: the great, the bad, and the ugly.
Have you seen Chef's Table BBQ on Netflix yet? UHD and an absolutely beautiful series. You will love it.
One of my closest friends and another Ops Geologist like myself is Marcus Bawdon who is considered one of the foremost BBQ experts in the UK and who runs BBQ schools down in Devon. Well worth catching up with his books and TV programmes as he has some stunningly good inventive ideas.
Thanks, I will check out his books – I'm in the market for a new one this summer. My go-to guide is Steve Raichlen's How to Grill – a key text for BBQ. But will take a look at Bawdon's offerings!
@Richard_TyndallFood and Fire looks superb. I'll be buying that.
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
Fair point.
Kraft "cheese" and stuff like that probably doesn't do America's reputation much good. 😂
Like culture, the US exports the lowest common denominator, and keeps the good stuff for itself. Anyone who has been to New York City (or and of the large cities) and said "the food is shit here" probably spent whole trip in a hospital.
American food is rather like British food. Has a mediocre reputation worldwide, but in many big coastal cities you can get fantastic, innovative restaurant food, there's a great array of foreign cuisines, and in the first order cities - New York, LA (London in the UK) - the food can be some of the best in the world. America also has stand-out smaller food cities like New Orleans, which are as good as the best in Europe
Where America does fall down is in the flyover country, where you can drive for 100 miles and the only choice is fast food, literally. DAIRY QUEENS
And don't get me on to the cheese or charcuterie selection in, say, a Walmart in Mississippi. UGH
Yes, America is somewhat of a paradox. It is easy to eat well and healthily on the coasts, but baffingly expensive. I always remember a friend visiting from the Bay Area and telling me that the almonds in Sainsbury's were half price what they are in his local Safeway BUT THEY WERE GROWN IN CALIFORNIA.
And on Manhattan, where there are no supermarkets except about one Trader Joe's, it's even worse. I met another friend in New York once who was studying at NYU and he told me he'd get together with a few other students and get a cab to the nearest Costco and back ($70-$80) and do his food shopping there rather than pay bodega prices.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I found the morning market was great for basically everything, but you have to get stuff every couple of days, you can't do big shops as you would in the UK.
Never land in Italy on a Sunday. Absolutely impossible to buy anything anywhere. Your only option is restaurants in much of the country.
Liberalising Sunday trading was by far thing the Major government did.
It was one of the very worst. It has helped to destroy the way of life for many many people in this country. I think John Major equals Tony Blair as a blight on the history of our nation. An utter shitehawk whose every instinct is wrong.
I think it's entirely possible for tourists to want to see grand and formal Georgian architecture and "olde London/England" and if they do I can think of few better places than Bloomsbury.
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
There was a TV show where they sent the guy from Masterchef to Argentina who then stated he had been doing BBQ wrong all his life
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Yeah lol at tourists in Bloomsbury. I guess some people mistake foreign students for tourists sometimes.
I was a foreign tourist who spent a LOT of time during various trips to London in Bloomsbury. And was certainly NOT alone in that, not by a long short.
I spent 4 years working in Soho and drinking in Bloomsbury because Soho was full of tourists. I guess it's all relative.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Clearly you are not a chef as any decent cook will tell you that you need a good fat content in meat to bring out the flavour when cooking it. This is why a good chef will always go for the marbled meat not the lean stuff.
The other key element in red meat is how well hung it is (if you excuse the expression!), or so a beef farming friend of mine tells me. This adds to the cost, so cheap producers who care less for flavour and more for price will hang it for the minimum time
I must admit that whilst I am sure this is right, I do know some who take this too far - not so much with beef but particularly with game. I eat a lot of game but sometimes it is just too... gamey.
Update on my son - the CEO himself has just rung him!
Personally apologised (some things he needs to investigate still, but he has seen enough to know they have not acted well)and said he would be investigating this himself this afternoon and tomorrow.
Said he was basically ashamed this could happen in an organisation he runs - he said if the team could not see that there was something very wrong in a 2 bed flat running up that sort of bill then they all need retraining.
He told my son it would be sorted, not to worry about it and they will make sure it does not impact his credit rating.
He told my son to concentrate on getting well - now I seem to have something in my eye......
That is the way a company should act when things go wrong - own it and act on it.
All we wanted was a recognition that this was stupid and a stop to them threatening him with debt collectors
Thanks all for your advice on this
Amazing story. I missed your OP – what was the trigger for the CEOs response?
Long story - basically energy provider never dealt with his complaints and said he was running up in excess of 800 a month in electric bills. Final straw was after an engineer came out and said there was a problem with supply that needed investigating and they then accepted just shy of 600 of outstanding bill (nearly 2K) as final settlement they then had their debt collection on to him for the rest as the person who made him the settlement offer "wasnt authorised" and if the meter said he was using that amount then he must be.......
Then they hung up on him and then me 3 times when I tried to find out who to escalate complaint too - and a 50 min web chat where they swore blind there were no details they could give me to allow an escalation.
Followed by this forum passing me details of the CEO and his e mail and to threaten to take to press if not actioned.
E mail sent at 10pm last night - followed by a very prompt response from them it has to be said.
One great thing about PB is that there are a huge number of very well connected people who are willing to lend a hand when another is having problems.
Yes, I'm always heartened that PBers can argue hammer and tongs about politics all day long but will step up for a fellow poster whether PB Tory or PB Leftie.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Yeah lol at tourists in Bloomsbury. I guess some people mistake foreign students for tourists sometimes.
Well I lived in Russell Sq and there were quite a few tourists round there. Lots of students too of course with UCL etc.
As soon as you step behind TCR on the Fitzrovia side it's one of the few places in central London that is mostly tourist free.
You must be judging based on your notions of what a typical tourist looks & sounds like. And the ones who seek out Bloomsbury are just NOT on your personal radar.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
Fair point.
Kraft "cheese" and stuff like that probably doesn't do America's reputation much good. 😂
Like culture, the US exports the lowest common denominator, and keeps the good stuff for itself. Anyone who has been to New York City (or and of the large cities) and said "the food is shit here" probably spent whole trip in a hospital.
American food is rather like British food. Has a mediocre reputation worldwide, but in many big coastal cities you can get fantastic, innovative restaurant food, there's a great array of foreign cuisines, and in the first order cities - New York, LA (London in the UK) - the food can be some of the best in the world. America also has stand-out smaller food cities like New Orleans, which are as good as the best in Europe
Where America does fall down is in the flyover country, where you can drive for 100 miles and the only choice is fast food, literally. DAIRY QUEENS
And don't get me on to the cheese or charcuterie selection in, say, a Walmart in Mississippi. UGH
America its the processed stuff, it just so so so bad...fructose corn syrup in everything, crazy numbers of calories, fat, sugar etc. Its been creeping in here though over the past few years, increasingly products have the fructose corn syrup.
I usually spend a month a year there and have to be so careful with food, otherwise so easy to put on serious weight in no time.
Yes, the portions are obscene, I hate it. NO I DON'T WANT A KILO OF FRENCH FRIES WITH PROCESSED ORANGE "JACK" CHEESE ON TOP
I've read various theories about this inability to serve sane portions, my favourite is this: it derives from the backstory of early immigrants, who were often fleeing Famine - Ireland, Germany - and therefore Americans are hardwired to want LOTS of food, whatever it is
The best food thing in America - where it beats the world - is barbecues. They REALLY know how to do a barbie.
Helps that they actually have sunshine
Leon – I agree 100% with your analyses of food in the US: the great, the bad, and the ugly.
Have you seen Chef's Table BBQ on Netflix yet? UHD and an absolutely beautiful series. You will love it.
One of my closest friends and another Ops Geologist like myself is Marcus Bawdon who is considered one of the foremost BBQ experts in the UK and who runs BBQ schools down in Devon. Well worth catching up with his books and TV programmes as he has some stunningly good inventive ideas.
Thanks, I will check out his books – I'm in the market for a new one this summer. My go-to guide is Steve Raichlen's How to Grill – a key text for BBQ. But will take a look at Bawdon's offerings!
@Richard_TyndallFood and Fire looks superb. I'll be buying that.
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
His Dirty Tomahawk Steak recipe is featured as a 'look inside' on Amazon. It sells the book!
When I want burgers for my BBQ I go to Scott the Butchers and buy them. They come all ready made and everything. I am not sure whether I should keep posting here on this basis. 😢
When I want a burger (maybe once a year), I get a Big Mac.
I've not had a Big Mac for about 30 years. 20 years ago I developed a brief weakness for Burger King, which was much meatier but I recovered.
BBQs are pretty much the only time I will have a burger now and I feel so inadequate that I have not massaged my own cow from its birth, slaughtered it in a humane fashion, hung it for the appropriate period, minced it, added special salts and herbs and butters and whatever. I am ashamed of my inadequacy. Hell, I don't even live in Bloomsbury. There really is no hope.
Why does agriculture take up so much land? Perhaps you need land to grow soy to feed to cows to turn into burgers? Think about how much more efficient things would be if we concrete over the farms and turn them into nice office parks full of people mining Britcoin which we then use to buy food grown by foreign wasters happy to be inefficient.
Yes, a sure way to a secure and prosperous future.
Yep, the UK dedicates 71.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 0.61% of UK GDP.
In contrast Sweden uses 6.5% of its land for agriculture to generate 1.44% of GDP.
Norway uses 2.7% of land to agricultural use in order to generate 1.93% of GDP.
Large parts of Sweden and Norway are effectively uninhabited
The number is also slightly misleading: it's not "agriculture" alone, but "agriculture, forestry and fishing".
And forestry is going to absolutely dominate the number for Norway and Sweden.
That's a fair point but in which case fishing would be included in the UKs figure too presumably?
In which case do you think using 71% of our available land, to provide 0.61% of GDP minus whatever the fishing figure is, is good value for money land?
Philip, nice to see you know jackshit about farming, the countryside, economics, and the importance of food security, just like you know jackshit about everything else you pronounce on.
Amusing that you made this response to the same post RCS said it was a fair point too. I know whose opinion I respect more.
Making more efficient use of our land would help not hurt our security.
If you think that dedicating over 70% of our land to less that 0.7% of GDP is a great return on investment perhaps you can explain why you think no other G7 or G20 nation does anything comparable?
I've not called for eliminating agriculture from the UK. But land is something we are short of in this nation, so we should use it efficiently. Or do you disagree? Always easier for you to throw stones at others than come up with any productive solutions yourself.
According to the good folk at Wikipedia, most of the agricultural land (which includes racecourses iirc) in Scotland and Wales is not very good.
In Wales, 80% of the farmland is designated as a "Less Favoured Area", and in Scotland the figure is 84%. "Less Favoured Area" means land that produces a lower agricultural yield, typically upland moors and hill farms, which explains the tendency to focus on sheep and sometimes dairy farming. In England, the eastern and southern areas where the fields are flatter, larger and more open tend to concentrate on cereal crops, while the hillier northern and western areas with smaller, more enclosed fields tend to concentrate on livestock farming. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_the_United_Kingdom
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
In any case, getting rid of sheep, fish, etc. from Scotland is like getting rid of Scots lawyers. Neither may take up a huge part of GDP, but we are on the whole a lot better for having them available locally ...
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
Indeed. The repeal of the Corn Laws, and the rise of the Canadian Prairies, had huge impacts on corn farming especially and the countryside. I remember reading, I think, Adrian Bell's memoirs of the 1920s and how his family went into dairying and milk delivery to local towns rather than stay in corn.
Some things would be fine. Soft fruit production would almost certainly be ok. Probably seed potatoes. Maybe Aberdeen Angus beef. But very few agrarian crops would be viable and the likes of lamb would probably disappear apart from the odd "special" variety.
Not much demand for seed potatoes if there are no potato farmers, and the Irish can't get them because HMG forgot to sort out the technicalities. I have a horrible feeling about all this.
"because HMG forgot to sort out the technicalities"
This implies current HMG at one time knew (or cared) about such "technicalities"? A dubious assertion!
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
There was a TV show where they sent the guy from Masterchef to Argentina who then stated he had been doing BBQ wrong all his life
I must admit I was one of those who thought the whole point of the lid on the BBQ was to keep the rain off Boy was I wrong. The first trick I learnt was you have to have coals over only maybe 1/3 to 1/2 of your BBQ so that you have a place for indirect heat. Makes a huge difference.
I am still pretty rubbish at it but miles better than I was 5 years ago.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
The big Sainsburys at the top of Tottenham Court Road used to be a Budgens. It only changed in about 2004/5.
An Asda, I think? It certainly changed, yes
No, it was definitely a Budgens.
I moved to just by Great Portland Street station in 2002, and it was the nearest large supermarket. At that time we also had a Europa foods, and that was the overpriced local place where one got eggs and bread.
So, I'd do my "big" shops at the Budgens every couple of weeks, and fill in with smaller stuff from Europa.
In the middle of 2004, Europa Foods sold out to Tesco, and the little Tesco Metro appeared by GPS station. And around the same time Budgens became Sainsburys. And there was much rejoicing in the Smithson household.
There was, of course, also the M&S on Tottenham Court Road, just South of Goodge Street station.
Definitely a budgens, I remember going there when I did a summer internship during my sixth form nearby.
Fair enough, I yield: It was a Budgens. I remember it changing to Sainsbury's
The Tesco on Goodge Street was always there
But yes I also forgot the M&S on TTC. To say there was a "dearth of supermarkets" even back in 1999 is pretty daft, unless you mean "I must have ten large supermarkets with two minutes walk"
Now there is almost too many, an embarrassment of supermarket riches
But I fear we have likely exhausted the exciting debate on "supermarkets in Bloomsbury at the turn of the millennium" and I should do some work. Later
My London apartment is on Shaftesbury Avenue on the Eastern side of Cambridge Circus.
It's probably the furthest place in Central London from a decent supermarket, with Sainsbury Holborn and Sainsburys TCR (bottom end) both being 10 minute walks.
I had a friend who lived in a truly magnificent apartment on Whitehall, staring out at the Ministry of Defence
But not a great shopping street, it has to be said
So long as you can buy tea, bread, eggs, milk, loo roll. Mixed together they make a lovely dish.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Yeah lol at tourists in Bloomsbury. I guess some people mistake foreign students for tourists sometimes.
I was a foreign tourist who spent a LOT of time during various trips to London in Bloomsbury. And was certainly NOT alone in that, not by a long short.
I spent 4 years working in Soho and drinking in Bloomsbury because Soho was full of tourists. I guess it's all relative.
Will take it as a personal (albeit undeserved) compliment, that yours truly and my fellow Bloombury tourists did NOT fit the Ugly American (or whatever) profile, and instead managed to blend into your woodwork!
I think we often make the mistake of comparing our humdrum day to day lives in the UK with the luxury, splash out experiences we get when visiting overseas.
For example we might dine on supermarket beef or visit pubs for Sunday Roast in our small suburb most of the year, then visit New York for a blow out long weekend and be amazed that the prime USDA striploin we're served in some eye wateringly pricey Manhatten palace is better than what we got from Sainsburys last week.
Same as we tend to visit the prettiest rural or coastal parts of our neighbouring European countries on holiday and wonder at how much nicer the lifestyle and landscape is than Bexleyheath or Harlow.
The top end meat in most rich countries these days is pretty good. The worst is pretty bad in the UK, downright toxic in the US and not that bad in Italy, Spain or Southern France.
Yes it's the New Zealand Fallacy in miniature.
People visit NZ, hire a sports car, tour the country in high summer, visited every majestic beauty spot going, sample both of the North Island's good restaurants, and decide to move there. Within a year they are desperate to move back because when you are living and working there, it's mundane and limited.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Clearly you are not a chef as any decent cook will tell you that you need a good fat content in meat to bring out the flavour when cooking it. This is why a good chef will always go for the marbled meat not the lean stuff.
The other key element in red meat is how well hung it is (if you excuse the expression!), or so a beef farming friend of mine tells me. This adds to the cost, so cheap producers who care less for flavour and more for price will hang it for the minimum time
I must admit that whilst I am sure this is right, I do know some who take this too far - not so much with beef but particularly with game. I eat a lot of game but sometimes it is just too... gamey.
Indeed Richard. I also eat a lot of game, and hang and prep it myself. A lot of people have been put off by the suggestion it should be hung until it stinks, which, is, in my view revolting. I now hang pheasant or partridge in an old fridge in the garage for no longer than a 4 or 5 days.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Yeah lol at tourists in Bloomsbury. I guess some people mistake foreign students for tourists sometimes.
Well I lived in Russell Sq and there were quite a few tourists round there. Lots of students too of course with UCL etc.
As soon as you step behind TCR on the Fitzrovia side it's one of the few places in central London that is mostly tourist free.
You must be judging based on your notions of what a typical tourist looks & sounds like. And the ones who seek out Bloomsbury are just NOT on your personal radar.
You get a more subtle, learned class of international guest in WC1.
IF you like USA BBQ, then next time you are willing & able to hope across the pond with some time on your hands, and in season, check out the tailgating in the parking lots at American pro & college football games.
Especially down South. Most especially in the parking lot of Tiger Stadium for LSU home games!
Update on my son - the CEO himself has just rung him!
Personally apologised (some things he needs to investigate still, but he has seen enough to know they have not acted well)and said he would be investigating this himself this afternoon and tomorrow.
Said he was basically ashamed this could happen in an organisation he runs - he said if the team could not see that there was something very wrong in a 2 bed flat running up that sort of bill then they all need retraining.
He told my son it would be sorted, not to worry about it and they will make sure it does not impact his credit rating.
He told my son to concentrate on getting well - now I seem to have something in my eye......
That is the way a company should act when things go wrong - own it and act on it.
All we wanted was a recognition that this was stupid and a stop to them threatening him with debt collectors
Thanks all for your advice on this
Amazing story. I missed your OP – what was the trigger for the CEOs response?
Long story - basically energy provider never dealt with his complaints and said he was running up in excess of 800 a month in electric bills. Final straw was after an engineer came out and said there was a problem with supply that needed investigating and they then accepted just shy of 600 of outstanding bill (nearly 2K) as final settlement they then had their debt collection on to him for the rest as the person who made him the settlement offer "wasnt authorised" and if the meter said he was using that amount then he must be.......
Then they hung up on him and then me 3 times when I tried to find out who to escalate complaint too - and a 50 min web chat where they swore blind there were no details they could give me to allow an escalation.
Followed by this forum passing me details of the CEO and his e mail and to threaten to take to press if not actioned.
E mail sent at 10pm last night - followed by a very prompt response from them it has to be said.
One great thing about PB is that there are a huge number of very well connected people who are willing to lend a hand when another is having problems.
Hope Mr F's son doesn't get a call from someone saying 'You b@£$@^d, you got me sacked!" Just a thought. His contact details must be pretty easily available.
Italy has the same supermarket problem. Try looking for a decent big supermarket in the centre of Milan or Naples. Impossible. It's just tiny stores selling massively overpriced tins of tomatoes, and three kinds of Chianti with a 200% mark up
It's bizarre in a country with such brilliant cuisine, generally
If you want to shop well you have to go the bakers, the butchers, the market, the wine store, which is all very picturesque and Italian but is also a bloody pain, and they are often shut for most of the day
I lived in zone 1 back in 1999. The only supermarket in walking distance was Safeway (now a Waitrose I think) at the Brunswick Centre and it was tiny. So for almost anything you ended up heading out of town. So I moved to zone 4.
This is complete crap, sorry
I know the area you're talking about very well. I lived there for decades.
There's the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick Centre, a Sainsbury in the Brunswick Centre, two Sainsbury's on Tottenham Court Road (one big) a Tesco on Goodge Street, a Tesco Express on Russell Square, another big Sainsbury's in Holborn....
I am 99% sure that the Goodge Street and at least one of the two Sainsburys on TCR were not open when I was at law school on Store Street in 97-98. The Brunswick Centre Safeways/whatever certainly was but I distinctly remember the dearth of supermarket shopping options round Bloomsbury/Fitzrovia in the late 90s.
I literally lived on Store Street for ten years, I lived in Fitzrovia for ten years before that, and Bloomsbury (again) before that
Goodge Street was always open, as was one of the TCR Sainsburys, the other was back then a big Asda. Ditto the others, mostly they existed
The supermarket choice has somewhat expanded and elevated (eg the huge Waitrose in the Brunswick, once a Safeways) but your memory is largely faulty
If you say so. I don't call a Tesco Express or Sainsburys local a "supermarket" - they are convenience stores. You sure it isn't your memory that was fuzzy? Plenty of small independent c-stores stores to buy food in, but not a full size supermarket.
I think the main thing I hated about Z1 living was the tourists. Having to try and squeeze / dodge past people everywhere when doing normal stuff. Sod off down the Mall or something.
Calling bullshit on this, sorry.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Yeah lol at tourists in Bloomsbury. I guess some people mistake foreign students for tourists sometimes.
Well I lived in Russell Sq and there were quite a few tourists round there. Lots of students too of course with UCL etc.
As soon as you step behind TCR on the Fitzrovia side it's one of the few places in central London that is mostly tourist free.
You must be judging based on your notions of what a typical tourist looks & sounds like. And the ones who seek out Bloomsbury are just NOT on your personal radar.
You get a more subtle, learned class of international guest in WC1.
Which is why I was amazed they let ME wander around the place!
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
There was a TV show where they sent the guy from Masterchef to Argentina who then stated he had been doing BBQ wrong all his life
I must admit I was one of those who thought the whole point of the lid on the BBQ was to keep the rain off Boy was I wrong. The first trick I learnt was you have to have coals over only maybe 1/3 to 1/2 of your BBQ so that you have a place for indirect heat. Makes a huge difference.
I am still pretty rubbish at it but miles better than I was 5 years ago.
Doing a beer-can chicken using the 1/3 coals indirect heat technique is an education. Throw a bit of beer-soaked hickory on the coals to up the smoke.
England 234,818 1st doses / 367,142 2nd doses Scotland 18,603 / 26,968 Wales 11,583 / 17,214 NI 3,247 / 8,988
Is that the first time over 1% of population?
That must be very close to a record. We certainly haven't done 700k before – and that is only a whisker off that...
Was it a French Minister who made the comment that it was how you finished and that the UK would be crawling over the finish line while the EU marched ahead?
Given the urgent need to immunise your most vulnerable it was tosh even at the time but we don't seem to be in that position.
Yebbut...they still seem to be opening up at the same time as us if not before so net-net it's even stevens.
As is Spain - I do however think this is a huge risk to open up while the majority of those under 50 have not had a 1st dose - and this is the group who will ten dto take the most risks....
Yes absolutely we will see in the weeks and months to come the relative merits of each approach.
At the moment where I live the case numbers are very low indeed but the arrival of thousands of tourists is imminent and of concern - my second jab is still around 10 weeks away - I'm 67 so you can imagine how many millions are at risk still for some time.
Yes I can understand the concern. Still, it's an interesting decision by the Spanish govt. What motivated it, do you think?
They are desperate to have a big summer tourist season. The polls have turned against the socialist government and I guess they are hoping for a payoff. Time will tell.
I think we may be about to find out how well the third country -> Shengen zone regulations are going to work.
Spain will fudge it.
France will be interesting - officially to stay with a friend you will need a docket from the Mairie to show at the border which they have a month to provide after your friend has applied
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
There was a TV show where they sent the guy from Masterchef to Argentina who then stated he had been doing BBQ wrong all his life
I must admit I was one of those who thought the whole point of the lid on the BBQ was to keep the rain off Boy was I wrong. The first trick I learnt was you have to have coals over only maybe 1/3 to 1/2 of your BBQ so that you have a place for indirect heat. Makes a huge difference.
I am still pretty rubbish at it but miles better than I was 5 years ago.
I have used kettledrum BBQs for the last 20 years. Not only useful for the rain (although there is that) but it effectively roasts the food bringing the flavours of my grossly inadequate burgers, corn, steak etc through all the food and helping it to cook through thoroughly. I usually give chicken a starter in the oven though, just to be sure.
My biggest challenge these days is that half the stuff on the BBQ is vegetarian. Keeping them all apart and using the right utensils is an administrative challenge.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
In any case, getting rid of sheep, fish, etc. from Scotland is like getting rid of Scots lawyers. Neither may take up a huge part of GDP, but we are on the whole a lot better for having them available locally ...
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
Indeed. The repeal of the Corn Laws, and the rise of the Canadian Prairies, had huge impacts on corn farming especially and the countryside. I remember reading, I think, Adrian Bell's memoirs of the 1920s and how his family went into dairying and milk delivery to local towns rather than stay in corn.
Some things would be fine. Soft fruit production would almost certainly be ok. Probably seed potatoes. Maybe Aberdeen Angus beef. But very few agrarian crops would be viable and the likes of lamb would probably disappear apart from the odd "special" variety.
Not much demand for seed potatoes if there are no potato farmers, and the Irish can't get them because HMG forgot to sort out the technicalities. I have a horrible feeling about all this.
"because HMG forgot to sort out the technicalities"
This implies current HMG at one time knew (or cared) about such "technicalities"? A dubious assertion!
What's so odd is it kicks a key segment of a key Scottish industry in the teeth - and one heavily populated by the local Tories. And one with knock on effects, too. The seed potato issue seems to be unresolved.
Update on my son - the CEO himself has just rung him!
Personally apologised (some things he needs to investigate still, but he has seen enough to know they have not acted well)and said he would be investigating this himself this afternoon and tomorrow.
Said he was basically ashamed this could happen in an organisation he runs - he said if the team could not see that there was something very wrong in a 2 bed flat running up that sort of bill then they all need retraining.
He told my son it would be sorted, not to worry about it and they will make sure it does not impact his credit rating.
He told my son to concentrate on getting well - now I seem to have something in my eye......
That is the way a company should act when things go wrong - own it and act on it.
All we wanted was a recognition that this was stupid and a stop to them threatening him with debt collectors
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
There was a TV show where they sent the guy from Masterchef to Argentina who then stated he had been doing BBQ wrong all his life
I must admit I was one of those who thought the whole point of the lid on the BBQ was to keep the rain off Boy was I wrong. The first trick I learnt was you have to have coals over only maybe 1/3 to 1/2 of your BBQ so that you have a place for indirect heat. Makes a huge difference.
I am still pretty rubbish at it but miles better than I was 5 years ago.
Yeah BBQing is an art form. Happily I'm better than I used to be but still a lot of room for improvement. Now that we have a bigger garden I'm really looking forwards to this summer.
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
There was a TV show where they sent the guy from Masterchef to Argentina who then stated he had been doing BBQ wrong all his life
I must admit I was one of those who thought the whole point of the lid on the BBQ was to keep the rain off Boy was I wrong. The first trick I learnt was you have to have coals over only maybe 1/3 to 1/2 of your BBQ so that you have a place for indirect heat. Makes a huge difference.
I am still pretty rubbish at it but miles better than I was 5 years ago.
I have lived in the Deep South of the USA, Australia and New Zealand. All do better BBQ than Britain, but none are as good as a South African Braai. It is such a cultural centrepiece there.
The problem with British BBQ is that we do it rarely, often by men who rarely cook otherwise and usually while drunk. It is surprising that the food is edible at all...
Going to be an interesting one this. As I live in countryside we burn oil for heating. I'd like to look at alternatives, but solar isn't really an option as my house is listed, and there must be many other reasons why it will be challenging to go carbon neutral for many folk. I will be genuinely interested to see how the government approach it, particularly in rural areas.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
In any case, getting rid of sheep, fish, etc. from Scotland is like getting rid of Scots lawyers. Neither may take up a huge part of GDP, but we are on the whole a lot better for having them available locally ...
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
Indeed. The repeal of the Corn Laws, and the rise of the Canadian Prairies, had huge impacts on corn farming especially and the countryside. I remember reading, I think, Adrian Bell's memoirs of the 1920s and how his family went into dairying and milk delivery to local towns rather than stay in corn.
Some things would be fine. Soft fruit production would almost certainly be ok. Probably seed potatoes. Maybe Aberdeen Angus beef. But very few agrarian crops would be viable and the likes of lamb would probably disappear apart from the odd "special" variety.
Not much demand for seed potatoes if there are no potato farmers, and the Irish can't get them because HMG forgot to sort out the technicalities. I have a horrible feeling about all this.
"because HMG forgot to sort out the technicalities"
This implies current HMG at one time knew (or cared) about such "technicalities"? A dubious assertion!
What's so odd is it kicks a key segment of a key Scottish industry in the teeth - and one heavily populated by the local Tories. And one with knock on effects, too. The seed potato issue seems to be unresolved.
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
There was a TV show where they sent the guy from Masterchef to Argentina who then stated he had been doing BBQ wrong all his life
I must admit I was one of those who thought the whole point of the lid on the BBQ was to keep the rain off Boy was I wrong. The first trick I learnt was you have to have coals over only maybe 1/3 to 1/2 of your BBQ so that you have a place for indirect heat. Makes a huge difference.
I am still pretty rubbish at it but miles better than I was 5 years ago.
I have lived in the Deep South of the USA, Australia and New Zealand. All do better BBQ than Britain, but none are as good as a South African Braai. It is such a cultural centrepiece there.
The problem with British BBQ is that we do it rarely, often by men who rarely cook otherwise and usually while drunk. It is surprising that the food is edible at all...
Yes I tend to agree that British BBQs are a bit lame, though that is changing now. YouTube and generally people favouring quality over quantity has meant BBQs are better focused with fewer types of meat done better than when I was growing up.
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
There was a TV show where they sent the guy from Masterchef to Argentina who then stated he had been doing BBQ wrong all his life
I must admit I was one of those who thought the whole point of the lid on the BBQ was to keep the rain off Boy was I wrong. The first trick I learnt was you have to have coals over only maybe 1/3 to 1/2 of your BBQ so that you have a place for indirect heat. Makes a huge difference.
I am still pretty rubbish at it but miles better than I was 5 years ago.
I have lived in the Deep South of the USA, Australia and New Zealand. All do better BBQ than Britain, but none are as good as a South African Braai. It is such a cultural centrepiece there.
The problem with British BBQ is that we do it rarely, often by men who rarely cook otherwise and usually while drunk. It is surprising that the food is edible at all...
Anyone can learn – with the right book. How to Grill by Steve Raichlen is the essential text. Best £20 I spend on any recipe book in my life.
When we were working together in Aberdeen Marcus had a couple of restaurants that he used to guest chef at. It really is another world entirely to taste a real expert in BBQ compared to what I do on my little grill.
There was a TV show where they sent the guy from Masterchef to Argentina who then stated he had been doing BBQ wrong all his life
I must admit I was one of those who thought the whole point of the lid on the BBQ was to keep the rain off Boy was I wrong. The first trick I learnt was you have to have coals over only maybe 1/3 to 1/2 of your BBQ so that you have a place for indirect heat. Makes a huge difference.
I am still pretty rubbish at it but miles better than I was 5 years ago.
Yeah BBQing is an art form. Happily I'm better than I used to be but still a lot of room for improvement. Now that we have a bigger garden I'm really looking forwards to this summer.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Clearly you are not a chef as any decent cook will tell you that you need a good fat content in meat to bring out the flavour when cooking it. This is why a good chef will always go for the marbled meat not the lean stuff.
The other key element in red meat is how well hung it is (if you excuse the expression!), or so a beef farming friend of mine tells me. This adds to the cost, so cheap producers who care less for flavour and more for price will hang it for the minimum time
Going to be an interesting one this. As I live in countryside we burn oil for heating. I'd like to look at alternatives, but solar isn't really an option as my house is listed, and there must be many other reasons why it will be challenging to go carbon neutral for many folk. I will be genuinely interested to see how the government approach it, particularly in rural areas.
Yep I am in the same boat as you. I am currently going through the long process of getting listed building consent to build an extension for a wood fired boiler. We have an old bullet proof oil fired boiler in the cellar but I can see the way thigs are going and want to get an alternative of my choice in place before they ban them. Again being a listed property I have had all applications for solar panels and windpower turned down both on the building and within the curtilage.
The Truss's leadership prospects are surely in tatters. The Tories would never risk her - an absolutely vilified character within Britain's rural communities. Truss the Farmer's Cuss she'll be known as.
Dunno about that. The Tory members in the SE couldn’t give a damn about the farmers.
Everyone knows that the "countryside" is to stop plebs building houses, not for things like "farming". Don't be ridiculous.
I'm beginning to think some people don't know what "food security" means.
How does banning perfectly safe, perfectly scientific, well tested hormone supplements aid our food security?
Especially considering that the hormone supplement ban was protectionist unscientific bullshit that the EU imposed on us, as UK farmers were using hormone supplements until the EU instituted its ban that the UK opposed at the time in the Council of Ministers?
Maybe the UK farmer should just go back to doing what they were before the EU started meddling, and thus improve our food security?
Not hormones, but actually having farming and fishing industries at all in the Isles of Great Britain and Ireland.
Yes we have an industry, it represents all of 0.61% of UK GDP while taking up 70% of UK land.
Being made to compete with the rest of the world would force the industry to improve and become more efficient and more productive, just as happened with New Zealand when they eliminated their trade barriers and subsidies.
An improved and more efficient agriculture industry would improve our security, wouldn't it?
You won’t be happy until we’re eating dog food
Why would we eat dog food?
Have you ever eaten Australian meat? Its excellent top quality.
Your xenophobia at imports is weird, especially while seeing 27 other nations getting free access to export their meat to us zero tariffs, zero quotas.
They have lower standards then we do. 'OLB' post on PT has examples. Or if you want an even better authority - the best let's be honest - there's Mark Drakeford. But it won't bother you and that's perfectly understandable. This whole thing is bespoke tailored to push all your buttons.
Free trade. Free free free. No quotas or tariffs. Deregulated mangy beef. Don't like it? So don't eat it then. Problem solved. Choice. The market pure and simple. And omg Australia. Red on the map. Trad Commonwealth. Five eyes. FAMILY.
7th Heaven in other words.
I rarely succeed in changing your view on anything but I sometimes like to try. Not here though. It'd be too close to the bone.
"Mangy beef"?
I used to live there you forget, I grew up downunder.
American food is shit, when you talk about shit food and you're talking about American deals you have a point. Australian meat is top nosh. Great quality.
Has anyone on this site ever gone to Australia, eaten beef there and thought "urgh this is mangy dog food shit"? Don't be ridiculous.
As someone who has lived in the US and eats American cooking (as provided by the Wife) every day I beg to differ.
I have a friend who - and you can know someone for 20 years and still be finding things out about them - it turns out is a massive fan of really top quality beef. He insists on American beef - reckons it far superior to British in almost all circumstances.
British meat is relatively shit.
I don't know why. But it is. Maybe its the lack of sunshine, maybe its in your head, but go to Australia, or America and the meat there just tastes better. My wife is from South Africa and she says the same thing, when she moved to the UK she stopped eating meat for a while, not because of any 'vegetarian' reason but because it was so disappointing compared to what she was used to in South Africa.
If British and Aussie meat was available at the same price next to each other in a supermarket, I'd be very tempted to go for the latter.
I haven't done a scientific study of this but I tend to agree. I think the UK meat tends to a higher fat content, possibly because our lousy climate encourages that in the animals and our smaller fields means they don't move around as much. Leaner, firmer beef is better in the same way that free range chicken tastes much better than factory farmed.
Absolutely, hence why beef with low far content such as Wagyu is so cheap.
Oh wait.
Ok, ok, I give up. But I still think it is important how the animal has lived.
In any case, getting rid of sheep, fish, etc. from Scotland is like getting rid of Scots lawyers. Neither may take up a huge part of GDP, but we are on the whole a lot better for having them available locally ...
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
Absolutely, but its worth bearing in mind the words of Ricardo and JS Mill and so on - if the farms can't compete on a level playing field then its not a competitive advantage and maybe something else should be considered?
If people want to go for locally produce organic etc etc and stick a flag on it then some will pay a premium for that. But you've got to find something you're competitive in and if you can't, then as a nation we should move on and not save every Luddite job under threat.
Comments
Makes more sense really, as it's simply named after the place it was discovered (not necessarily where it arose), there's nothing actually Indian or Kentish about the variant. I can see the logic in that. Hard for anyone to have a problem about Merkel if she'd said Britain or England variant, too, surely? The apparent attempted renaming of the India variant on a date basis is doomed, a complete waste of time.
What I don't get is why everyone doesn't just use the catchy name provided by scientists. What is wrong with simply saying 'B.1.617.2 variant?'
Gigs fish and chip shop! The Lamb Tavern with its snob screens. Coram's Fields. Cross TTC for all the restaurants on Charlotte St
And if you want a world class park stroll to Regent's Park, or if you want world city fun walk fifteen minutes to Soho and Covent Garden, Oxford Circus and Mayfair....
It's pretty hard to beat, in Europe. Which is presumably why it is so expensive.
3 bedroom house in Great Ormond Street: £5m
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/104160044#/
Funny that's again exactly what I said would happen weeks ago.
But fat content - are you kidding me? The best meat is that with decent fat content, like the rib eye.
Do you know where Bloomsbury is? My office is about ten minutes away. There aren't many tourists there unless you are circumnavigating the grounds of the British Museum. I get that you don't like London and want to tell everyone that, but making stuff up is a bizarre way of doing it, given how many of us actually live here.
Even here in the 'burbs the most local markets, like our local C-Town, have a bit of a down-at-heel feel to them. That said, we have recently had a Wegman's open near us, and it's really good. Even carries some British lines like Jaffa Cakes!
The Tesco on Goodge Street was always there
But yes I also forgot the M&S on TTC. To say there was a "dearth of supermarkets" even back in 1999 is pretty daft, unless you mean "I must have ten large supermarkets with two minutes walk"
Now there is almost too many, an embarrassment of supermarket riches
But I fear we have likely exhausted the exciting debate on "supermarkets in Bloomsbury at the turn of the millennium" and I should do some work. Later
Amazing story. I missed your OP – what was the trigger for the CEOs response?
But also reminds me in a way of Pimlico - can walk to the West End or Chelsea, there are some v nice pubs nearby, an SW1 postcode so very spenny and you can get mugged before breakfast on Lupus Street.
The problem, as I said yesterday, is that asking UK and in particular Scottish farms to compete on a no tariff level playing field with Australia and NZ is the problem of Morgan Motor Co taking on Ford and GM. The scale of production in the Antipodes means that competition is simply impossible and what we are looking at is surviving in niche segments of the market. That creates real problems with what we are going to do with all the marginal land that is going to go out of production.
It's not an insuperable problem but it would be a nasty jolt to our rural communities (our urban communities would of course gain by cheaper food) and it would change what a lot of our country actually looks like. There are reasons why agriculture is usually one of the hardest areas to agree in FTAs.
Sweden is a low productivity agricultural sector, due to climate and short season.
And UK has traditonally been a driver for productivity within the EU. What has changed to justify the numbers, oe what is variable in the numbers?
I can see that some things would throw it off - eg glasshouses in NL, or 15% of Italian agriculture being wine.
UK productivity may have been reduced by set-aside or organics, but I can't account for the apparent gaps of 50% or double.
I don't think even CAP subsidies are that big.
Is the variant from South of the River (don't go there after dark) a Kentish variant or a Variant of Kent?
Making more efficient use of our land would help not hurt our security.
If you think that dedicating over 70% of our land to less that 0.7% of GDP is a great return on investment perhaps you can explain why you think no other G7 or G20 nation does anything comparable?
I've not called for eliminating agriculture from the UK. But land is something we are short of in this nation, so we should use it efficiently. Or do you disagree? Always easier for you to throw stones at others than come up with any productive solutions yourself.
Pimlico is weird. I've never particularly liked it despite its often beautiful Georgian streets.
Perhaps it is the lack of decent supermarkets
It's probably the furthest place in Central London from a decent supermarket, with Sainsbury Holborn and Sainsburys TCR (bottom end) both being 10 minute walks.
Ha! II have never lived there. I work near there though
True of much of London, of course
Then they hung up on him and then me 3 times when I tried to find out who to escalate complaint too - and a 50 min web chat where they swore blind there were no details they could give me to allow an escalation.
Followed by this forum passing me details of the CEO and his e mail and to threaten to take to press if not actioned.
E mail sent at 10pm last night - followed by a very prompt response from them it has to be said.
A five bed house on Great Ormond street now, if properly done up, might be £6m
Here is what I find irritating and objectionable about your posts Philip. You make pronouncements on matters as though you are expert on them when in fact it is as plain as a pikestaff you are not. Perhaps you could make your opinions as questions or statements prefaced occasionally by IMO, or "based on this that I have read", rather than make it obvious to us all that your post is simply you shooting from the hip on yet another subject that you have zero knowledge or experience of.
For example we might dine on supermarket beef or visit pubs for Sunday Roast in our small suburb most of the year, then visit New York for a blow out long weekend and be amazed that the prime USDA striploin we're served in some eye wateringly pricey Manhatten palace is better than what we got from Sainsburys last week.
Same as we tend to visit the prettiest rural or coastal parts of our neighbouring European countries on holiday and wonder at how much nicer the lifestyle and landscape is than Bexleyheath or Harlow.
The top end meat in most rich countries these days is pretty good. The worst is pretty bad in the UK, downright toxic in the US and not that bad in Italy, Spain or Southern France.
So yes that 70% is justified. Far more than building ever more houses just to suit a particular lifestyle choice.
Sounds familiar. I had a (much less troubling) issue with a courtesy car after insurance write-off. Small lease company linked to a law firm that the insurers passed the case on to (as I realised later, the lease company charged above market rate which the law firm then recovered from the other party's insurer). I forget what happened exactly, think they tried to bill me for something, while it was all supposed to be free (to me). Got nowhere with customer services, but the company was small and I was able to get MD's contact details via Companies House. I got the impression the MD was shocked to be contacted directly, but it was all sorted in about ten minutes.
That is, a place that folks flying over fly-over country put down for some trendy R&R before reboarding to brave the badlands yet again.
But not a great shopping street, it has to be said
As for steak, nothing compares with the meat from knackered old Galician dairy cows. Beautiful deep-yellow fat.
Except horse of course, which is the tastiest.
BBQs are pretty much the only time I will have a burger now and I feel so inadequate that I have not massaged my own cow from its birth, slaughtered it in a humane fashion, hung it for the appropriate period, minced it, added special salts and herbs and butters and whatever. I am ashamed of my inadequacy. Hell, I don't even live in Bloomsbury. There really is no hope.
In Wales, 80% of the farmland is designated as a "Less Favoured Area", and in Scotland the figure is 84%. "Less Favoured Area" means land that produces a lower agricultural yield, typically upland moors and hill farms, which explains the tendency to focus on sheep and sometimes dairy farming. In England, the eastern and southern areas where the fields are flatter, larger and more open tend to concentrate on cereal crops, while the hillier northern and western areas with smaller, more enclosed fields tend to concentrate on livestock farming.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_the_United_Kingdom
This implies current HMG at one time knew (or cared) about such "technicalities"? A dubious assertion!
I am still pretty rubbish at it but miles better than I was 5 years ago.
Yes it's the New Zealand Fallacy in miniature.
People visit NZ, hire a sports car, tour the country in high summer, visited every majestic beauty spot going, sample both of the North Island's good restaurants, and decide to move there. Within a year they are desperate to move back because when you are living and working there, it's mundane and limited.
Especially down South. Most especially in the parking lot of Tiger Stadium for LSU home games!
Just a thought. His contact details must be pretty easily available.
EXCLUSIVE: U.K. Set to Tell Homeowners to Ditch Gas Boilers, in Green Plan
The heat & buildings strategy is another political minefield for Boris Johnson on the road to net zero
By @AlexJFMorales and me https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-21/u-k-homeowners-could-be-forced-to-ditch-gas-boilers-in-new-plan
Doing a beer-can chicken using the 1/3 coals indirect heat technique is an education. Throw a bit of beer-soaked hickory on the coals to up the smoke.
Spain will fudge it.
France will be interesting - officially to stay with a friend you will need a docket from the Mairie to show at the border which they have a month to provide after your friend has applied
My biggest challenge these days is that half the stuff on the BBQ is vegetarian. Keeping them all apart and using the right utensils is an administrative challenge.
https://www.potatopro.com/news/2021/deadlock-much-concern-eu-about-seed-potato-trade-uk
The problem with British BBQ is that we do it rarely, often by men who rarely cook otherwise and usually while drunk. It is surprising that the food is edible at all...
If people want to go for locally produce organic etc etc and stick a flag on it then some will pay a premium for that. But you've got to find something you're competitive in and if you can't, then as a nation we should move on and not save every Luddite job under threat.