All this is kind of spectacularly missing the point. “Trouble” will only arrive when a credible alternative presents itself. All this happened last year and has made barely a dent in the polls which, if anything, are getting better for the Tories
I regret, as someone who was a Labour supporter most of his adult life, that credible alternative is just not there at the moment. Labour is an untenable coalition of strong minded socialists and equally strong minded social liberals. The problem is that the former is an anathema in the South, the latter an anathema in the Midlands and North. Until someone can square that circle the Tories can spectacularly screw up as often as they like.
I don't entirely agree, there is no great enthusiasm for the dull Starmer but he also does not repel voters to vote against him as Corbyn did either.
If the economy goes downhill in the next few years then while a Labour majority remains unlikely a PM Starmer propped up by LD gains in the South, Labour gains in London and part of the Red Wall and the SNP remains possible
I accept that that is possible but vanishingly unlikely I think.
Like someone discovering dark matter anytime soon...
Like commercial nuclear fusion. Always in sight but as likely to happen as Sisyphus getting his ball to the top of the slope.
I thought with Sisyphus that he reached the top all the time, but then his stone rolled down the other side and he had to start over. Apparently I've misremembered the myth this whole time.
I hold true to the version of the tortoise and the hare where the tortoise cheated though.
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
{Scene - the near future}
AI Robot - "So, we have the equation s = ut + 0.5at2...."
{wasp enters stage left.... AI Robot fires nano scale flechette at mach 16... wasp evaporates with pretty sparkles}
{9Z gulp collectively, then write furiously}
I knew teachers who could do that with a bit of chalk...
When I was at primary school one of the teachers was a Polish guy who had been a commando in WW2. Rumour was he knew how to kill in thirteen different ways, none of which left a mark.
He wasn't someone who had any discipline problems.
I had a chemistry teacher who hit me smack dab in the middle of the forehead in the back (top) row with a blackboard duster.
British cheeses can be amazing, though unfortunatley for the makers the market (even in London) is utterly dominated by cheddar, the only cheese most Brits seem to eat.
I love French, Italian and Spanish cheeses too, and love finding good pairings with wine. Especially when the best cheese with an expensive claret is a northern English cheese!
I discovered an American "cheese" called Velveeta that features in this fine example of US cuisine:
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
I would suspect the use of online teaching during this time has hastened the day. The only real issue (apart from for the teachers) is the kids cannot be left at home unattended.
It is entirely possible that cubicle based online learning may not be too far away.
As I said (in an edit) upthread: I think lockdown showed that we could automate a lot of teaching IF we were prepared for about 50% of pupils to effectively drop out, unable to self-motivate enough to gain from online lessons. A smaller but significant number might actually do better...
Haven’t seen that. A very interesting perspective. Thank you.
Use of IT in teaching at the moment is very much a cottage industry with each teacher basically responsible for their own classes: if you are very lucky then an entire department in a school will have a coherent approach. If there was a truly national approach with outstanding teachers asked to prepare model lessons across the whole curriculum (and not just trying to get celebrities to condescend to show us how it is done), a sort of Open University for schools, then we might start to get somewhere. At the moment it feels like I'm having to reinvent the wheel anew each year, not helped by constant changes in the programs we use to get content to the pupils (we are on our fourth in a decade at my school).
All this is kind of spectacularly missing the point. “Trouble” will only arrive when a credible alternative presents itself. All this happened last year and has made barely a dent in the polls which, if anything, are getting better for the Tories
I regret, as someone who was a Labour supporter most of his adult life, that credible alternative is just not there at the moment. Labour is an untenable coalition of strong minded socialists and equally strong minded social liberals. The problem is that the former is an anathema in the South, the latter an anathema in the Midlands and North. Until someone can square that circle the Tories can spectacularly screw up as often as they like.
Remembering the age old quote about Oppositions not winning elections but Governments losing them, do you not think it entirely possible that Starmer might be able to win simply by being 'normal' and, most importantly, not being Johnson?
As I said to HYUFD it’s possible, a lot is possible, but not very likely. People need a credible alternative vision. Remain lost because they just said, essentially “yeah, this is a bit pants, but the alternative is worse” whereas leave said “This is going to be great!”. We can (and indeed have) argued as to the veracity of that prospectus but it is undeniable they were more enthusiastic about their vision. What do Labour actually believe in at the moment? Are they a social justice or an economic justice party? They should try and be both but squaring the circle is proving impossible.
Yes - a positive vision, not a negative one. "The EU will punish you for being naughty" seemed to be slogan of Remain.
There is a plenty of space for a social and economic justice program. The key is to sell it as social and economic justice for *everyone* rather than a matrix of special interests. If you look at the Labour manifesto in 45, for example, it was about *everyone* - not just a set of client groups.
Economic and social justice for everyone sounds great but is of course fatuous bollocks. It means absolutely nothing.
Why?
The entire concept of 19th Cent Socialism was that it was about re-engineering society to be better for everyone.
The original ideas was to create a set of universal laws and customs that would provide equalised opportunity and outcomes.
For example - the NHS wasn't a means tested benefit for poor people. Despite the fact that rich people had no health care access issues.
If we could enact big policies to make everyone significantly better off - all winners no losers - we'd just do it and that would be the End of Politics.
But we can't - and hence it isn't - because there are competing interests and agendas. So it's about choices and priorities. That's what politics is. That's the reality of it.
Course people and parties can PRETEND their politics is about benefiting everyone - and they do - but that's either delusion or spin. The latter being great if you can pull it off. It's a classic way to get elected.
Th point is that people (in general) will buy into policies that are universal. Applying policies through the Social Justice matrix is explicitly saying that some errr..... humans are more equal than others.
Yes - you have to lie. That's the actual point you're making. There's no magic 'everyone a winner' politics. But you can pretend there is and hope people swallow it.
No. Take the state pension. Everyone knows that everyone gets the same. So to ex-bankers, it is coffee money. To ex-barristas, it's worth more than that.
The point is the universality - the same rules apply to everyone.
Another example is income tax - even though it is progressive in rates. The same rules apply to everyone.
If you have a special income tax rate for one-legged Yezidi with green hair (or something) then you start to divide the community into tribes of special interests.
Favouring universal benefits does not in any way contradict my point that politics is about choices and priorities amongst competing interests - and that 'all winners no losers' is either delusion or spin.
Eg, if you brought in the ultimate in universal benefits - UBI - it would cost money that otherwise could be spent on something else.
Winners. Losers.
Will stop now because I've made the point a few times and I fear I'm sounding like Michael Barrymore.
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
I would suspect the use of online teaching during this time has hastened the day. The only real issue (apart from for the teachers) is the kids cannot be left at home unattended.
It is entirely possible that cubicle based online learning may not be too far away.
As I said (in an edit) upthread: I think lockdown showed that we could automate a lot of teaching IF we were prepared for about 50% of pupils to effectively drop out, unable to self-motivate enough to gain from online lessons. A smaller but significant number might actually do better...
That's the curious thing. Its not that difficult to automate a large part of the teaching process. The Open University have been doing it for decades. More recently, the UK has had seriously clever things like Oak National Academy (which came out of lockdown) and the Isaac Physics scheme (which I think was one of Domski's babies when he was with Gove at Education). But they're still machines without the necessary ghosts. And whilst you could replace the current model of schooling with online + human warders (because that is what it would be), I'm not sure that we'd want to, even if it was more efficient in learning per pound.
The bigger issue is- if we have sufficient intelligence in the AI to do teaching effectively, do we actually need educated humans any more? And that's where we need authors to do the thinking, not scientists...
Oh and thinking about the poll- C+6 will presumably steady some Labour nerves tonight. I'm not sure I believe it yet, but it's probably closer to reality than C+18 was. And steady nerves are always more productive than headless chickens.
It's going to depend on why. What could be correct is that the centre left vote has shifted slightly towards LD and Green for now; there is not much movement in the Tory vote. But, ignoring nationalists for a moment, this poll is Tories 43, centre left 45 and I should not be surprised if that's about right and very close to the 2019 election result. This poll may, within a point or two be OK.
I imagine Tory strategy will want to keep the three centre left parties both afloat and split. I think it would be wise to draw up a centre left deal soon, as if Tories win in 2024 you are looking at 5 in a row, and 18/19 years. At which point a centre left alliance is a forced choice I think.
But then we are back to all the familiar problems that prevent the "progressive alliance" from ever taking off:
1. Labour is the dominant party, and thinks it will win again if it just waits long enough for the pendulum to swing back in its direction. And that might even be possible. 2. Any meaningful pact will entail Labour standing aside for other parties to give them a free run in a large number of seats. This effectively involves Labour admitting to all of the following:
(a) We feel that we can never win a majority under FPTP again (in which case, the "I must vote Labour as the only party that can get rid of the Tories" crowd evaporates, and their support likely tanks a lot further) (b) We have decided to attempt to game the electoral system, with a view to changing it to something else that will suit us (and the smaller losers) better - which won't necessarily go down at all well with the public, and may also lose more voters who want to keep FPTP than the number of PR proponents that it attracts (c) We feel we need the support of the Lib Dems, Greens and the Celtic nationalists to govern. The Lib Dems they can probably get away with, but the Greens are very far left and the SNP is actively loathed by a huge chunk of the English electorate. It risks sending even more wet centrist and social conservative voters running screaming into the arms of the Tories, for fear that the alternative will be worse
3. All the parties have to agree on a wide ranging programme of constitutional reform. They're unlikely to get away with simply promising to ram through electoral reform and then call another election, as some have proposed. What method of PR should be chosen to replace FPTP? Should this be implemented based on the authority of Parliament, or should there be a referendum? And what about the structure of the country itself: will there be independence plebiscites agreed for Scotland (and possibly Wales) as part of the pact? If the UK isn't to be broken up, then what structural changes ought to be made: is there going to be a constitutional convention? Will there be federalism? Will there be one national or a number of regional parliaments for England, or none at all? Will the Barnett formula finally be replaced? What about the role of the upper house? Will any or all of this be put to a referendum? It's a minefield - and will enough of the population be willing to vote to walk into it?
Interesting. Put simply the problem is that, politics being what it is, to work it has to be complicated. If it's complicated it can't work. the voters won't have patience with it.
After 2024 when the centre left have lost again it may look different.
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
I would suspect the use of online teaching during this time has hastened the day. The only real issue (apart from for the teachers) is the kids cannot be left at home unattended.
It is entirely possible that cubicle based online learning may not be too far away.
As I said (in an edit) upthread: I think lockdown showed that we could automate a lot of teaching IF we were prepared for about 50% of pupils to effectively drop out, unable to self-motivate enough to gain from online lessons. A smaller but significant number might actually do better...
Haven’t seen that. A very interesting perspective. Thank you.
Use of IT in teaching at the moment is very much a cottage industry with each teacher basically responsible for their own classes: if you are very lucky then an entire department in a school will have a coherent approach. If there was a truly national approach with outstanding teachers asked to prepare model lessons across the whole curriculum (and not just trying to get celebrities to condescend to show us how it is done), a sort of Open University for schools, then we might start to get somewhere. At the moment it feels like I'm having to reinvent the wheel anew each year, not helped by constant changes in the programs we use to get content to the pupils (we are on our fourth in a decade at my school).
Not much stability then?
I remember when I was in primary school in the early 70s we had the odd lesson via tv. I suppose it was an experiment.
I did enjoy watching the OU on tv though. I believe a channel dedicated to it may get small but noticeable viewing figures.
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
I would suspect the use of online teaching during this time has hastened the day. The only real issue (apart from for the teachers) is the kids cannot be left at home unattended.
It is entirely possible that cubicle based online learning may not be too far away.
As I said (in an edit) upthread: I think lockdown showed that we could automate a lot of teaching IF we were prepared for about 50% of pupils to effectively drop out, unable to self-motivate enough to gain from online lessons. A smaller but significant number might actually do better...
That's the curious thing. Its not that difficult to automate a large part of the teaching process. The Open University have been doing it for decades. More recently, the UK has had seriously clever things like Oak National Academy (which came out of lockdown) and the Isaac Physics scheme (which I think was one of Domski's babies when he was with Gove at Education). But they're still machines without the necessary ghosts. And whilst you could replace the current model of schooling with online + human warders (because that is what it would be), I'm not sure that we'd want to, even if it was more efficient in learning per pound.
The bigger issue is- if we have sufficient intelligence in the AI to do teaching effectively, do we actually need educated humans any more? And that's where we need authors to do the thinking, not scientists...
Oh and thinking about the poll- C+6 will presumably steady some Labour nerves tonight. I'm not sure I believe it yet, but it's probably closer to reality than C+18 was. And steady nerves are always more productive than headless chickens.
I have for some time maintained the poll lead is between 8 and 10 points notwithstanding the 1% and 18%
Just had a text saying Boris married Carrie today... has it been confirmed?
Seems so but neither Sky or BBC are reporting it yet
If it had been bad news for HMG it would be up already
Telegraph and Mail websites leading with it now.
So who was the Catholic priest that married the divorcé and betrothed, who had a child together already? That must have been quite the discussion beforehand, both with the couple and with the Cardinal.
Seems Cummings has had some impact with Opinium then, a 6 point lead would still see a Tory majority but a majority halved from 2019
Might be a bit early for that- I reckon it's more the deflation of the War With France / Hartlepool Triumph / SKS Flapping Uselessly / Angie's Friends Stirring stuff from a few weeks ago.
Someone mentioned the Rob Hayward theory earlier, that it takes a couple of weeks for events to filter through to polls. It might be faster now, with insane media cycles, but there's still a lag.
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
I would suspect the use of online teaching during this time has hastened the day. The only real issue (apart from for the teachers) is the kids cannot be left at home unattended.
It is entirely possible that cubicle based online learning may not be too far away.
As I said (in an edit) upthread: I think lockdown showed that we could automate a lot of teaching IF we were prepared for about 50% of pupils to effectively drop out, unable to self-motivate enough to gain from online lessons. A smaller but significant number might actually do better...
That's the curious thing. Its not that difficult to automate a large part of the teaching process. The Open University have been doing it for decades. More recently, the UK has had seriously clever things like Oak National Academy (which came out of lockdown) and the Isaac Physics scheme (which I think was one of Domski's babies when he was with Gove at Education). But they're still machines without the necessary ghosts. And whilst you could replace the current model of schooling with online + human warders (because that is what it would be), I'm not sure that we'd want to, even if it was more efficient in learning per pound.
The bigger issue is- if we have sufficient intelligence in the AI to do teaching effectively, do we actually need educated humans any more? And that's where we need authors to do the thinking, not scientists...
Oh and thinking about the poll- C+6 will presumably steady some Labour nerves tonight. I'm not sure I believe it yet, but it's probably closer to reality than C+18 was. And steady nerves are always more productive than headless chickens.
I use Isaac Physics a lot: I know two of the people involved in setting it up. I can't recommend it too highly if you are a Physics teacher. But it is a model that only really works with Physics and possibly Chemistry (in maths it's not just about the answer but the working as well, and good luck trying to automatically mark an essay).
Maybe the Archbishop of Canterbury black-balled him. So it was either that or a Sikh temple....
Puzzled by this. As twice divorced, surely the Catholic Church can't marry him unless I've missed a very sudden change of doctrine. Given the circumstances of the end of his previous marriage, it is also against the (non-binding) advice given to CofE clergy too.
Maybe the Archbishop of Canterbury black-balled him. So it was either that or a Sikh temple....
Puzzled by this. As twice divorced, surely the Catholic Church can't marry him unless I've missed a very sudden change of doctrine. Given the circumstances of the end of his previous marriage, it is also against the (non-binding) advice given to CofE clergy too.
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
I would suspect the use of online teaching during this time has hastened the day. The only real issue (apart from for the teachers) is the kids cannot be left at home unattended.
It is entirely possible that cubicle based online learning may not be too far away.
As I said (in an edit) upthread: I think lockdown showed that we could automate a lot of teaching IF we were prepared for about 50% of pupils to effectively drop out, unable to self-motivate enough to gain from online lessons. A smaller but significant number might actually do better...
That's the curious thing. Its not that difficult to automate a large part of the teaching process. The Open University have been doing it for decades. More recently, the UK has had seriously clever things like Oak National Academy (which came out of lockdown) and the Isaac Physics scheme (which I think was one of Domski's babies when he was with Gove at Education). But they're still machines without the necessary ghosts. And whilst you could replace the current model of schooling with online + human warders (because that is what it would be), I'm not sure that we'd want to, even if it was more efficient in learning per pound.
The bigger issue is- if we have sufficient intelligence in the AI to do teaching effectively, do we actually need educated humans any more? And that's where we need authors to do the thinking, not scientists...
Oh and thinking about the poll- C+6 will presumably steady some Labour nerves tonight. I'm not sure I believe it yet, but it's probably closer to reality than C+18 was. And steady nerves are always more productive than headless chickens.
If I were in charge of this (which would be a really bad idea) then I would try to move to a sort of lecture/tutorial model: use the Oak Academy stuff to introduce the ideas, perhaps replacing homework, and then reserve school time for going though questions and making sure that the ideas have been understood. The problems are obvious though: it assumes that school children have time, IT resources, and motivation to watch and take in the lecture side without the supervision of a teacher trained in the highly skilled art of making sure everyone is awake. It would also give a government immense control over exactly what was being taught.
Seems Cummings has had some impact with Opinium then, a 6 point lead would still see a Tory majority but a majority halved from 2019
Might be a bit early for that- I reckon it's more the deflation of the War With France / Hartlepool Triumph / SKS Flapping Uselessly / Angie's Friends Stirring stuff from a few weeks ago.
Someone mentioned the Rob Hayward theory earlier, that it takes a couple of weeks for events to filter through to polls. It might be faster now, with insane media cycles, but there's still a lag.
Seems Cummings has had some impact with Opinium then, a 6 point lead would still see a Tory majority but a majority halved from 2019
Might be a bit early for that- I reckon it's more the deflation of the War With France / Hartlepool Triumph / SKS Flapping Uselessly / Angie's Friends Stirring stuff from a few weeks ago.
Someone mentioned the Rob Hayward theory earlier, that it takes a couple of weeks for events to filter through to polls. It might be faster now, with insane media cycles, but there's still a lag.
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
I would suspect the use of online teaching during this time has hastened the day. The only real issue (apart from for the teachers) is the kids cannot be left at home unattended.
It is entirely possible that cubicle based online learning may not be too far away.
As I said (in an edit) upthread: I think lockdown showed that we could automate a lot of teaching IF we were prepared for about 50% of pupils to effectively drop out, unable to self-motivate enough to gain from online lessons. A smaller but significant number might actually do better...
That's the curious thing. Its not that difficult to automate a large part of the teaching process. The Open University have been doing it for decades. More recently, the UK has had seriously clever things like Oak National Academy (which came out of lockdown) and the Isaac Physics scheme (which I think was one of Domski's babies when he was with Gove at Education). But they're still machines without the necessary ghosts. And whilst you could replace the current model of schooling with online + human warders (because that is what it would be), I'm not sure that we'd want to, even if it was more efficient in learning per pound.
The bigger issue is- if we have sufficient intelligence in the AI to do teaching effectively, do we actually need educated humans any more? And that's where we need authors to do the thinking, not scientists...
Oh and thinking about the poll- C+6 will presumably steady some Labour nerves tonight. I'm not sure I believe it yet, but it's probably closer to reality than C+18 was. And steady nerves are always more productive than headless chickens.
If I were in charge of this (which would be a really bad idea) then I would try to move to a sort of lecture/tutorial model: use the Oak Academy stuff to introduce the ideas, perhaps replacing homework, and then reserve school time for going though questions and making sure that the ideas have been understood. The problems are obvious though: it assumes that school children have time, IT resources, and motivation to watch and take in the lecture side without the supervision of a teacher trained in the highly skilled art of making sure everyone is awake. It would also give a government immense control over exactly what was being taught.
This "flip the classroom" model (learn at home, solve problems in class) was, aiui, tried a lot in America with the Khan Academy videos, but in the end was not the hoped-for panacea. At least, that is my vague recollection of reports I was not that interested in.
OT Brentford have been promoted. Brentford is owned by Matthew Benham, the algorithmic football punter, so if you are interested in Moneyball-type stories, there may be some.
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
I would suspect the use of online teaching during this time has hastened the day. The only real issue (apart from for the teachers) is the kids cannot be left at home unattended.
It is entirely possible that cubicle based online learning may not be too far away.
As I said (in an edit) upthread: I think lockdown showed that we could automate a lot of teaching IF we were prepared for about 50% of pupils to effectively drop out, unable to self-motivate enough to gain from online lessons. A smaller but significant number might actually do better...
That's the curious thing. Its not that difficult to automate a large part of the teaching process. The Open University have been doing it for decades. More recently, the UK has had seriously clever things like Oak National Academy (which came out of lockdown) and the Isaac Physics scheme (which I think was one of Domski's babies when he was with Gove at Education). But they're still machines without the necessary ghosts. And whilst you could replace the current model of schooling with online + human warders (because that is what it would be), I'm not sure that we'd want to, even if it was more efficient in learning per pound.
The bigger issue is- if we have sufficient intelligence in the AI to do teaching effectively, do we actually need educated humans any more? And that's where we need authors to do the thinking, not scientists...
Oh and thinking about the poll- C+6 will presumably steady some Labour nerves tonight. I'm not sure I believe it yet, but it's probably closer to reality than C+18 was. And steady nerves are always more productive than headless chickens.
If I were in charge of this (which would be a really bad idea) then I would try to move to a sort of lecture/tutorial model: use the Oak Academy stuff to introduce the ideas, perhaps replacing homework, and then reserve school time for going though questions and making sure that the ideas have been understood. The problems are obvious though: it assumes that school children have time, IT resources, and motivation to watch and take in the lecture side without the supervision of a teacher trained in the highly skilled art of making sure everyone is awake. It would also give a government immense control over exactly what was being taught.
This "flip the classroom" model (learn at home, solve problems in class) was, aiui, tried a lot in America with the Khan Academy videos, but in the end was not the hoped-for panacea. At least, that is my vague recollection of reports I was not that interested in.
"Flipped lessons"; yes, that's what they were referred to as at our school when we had a CPD session on them. If they were using Khan Academy videos then I'm not surprised it didn't work well.
Seems Cummings has had some impact with Opinium then, a 6 point lead would still see a Tory majority but a majority halved from 2019
Might be a bit early for that- I reckon it's more the deflation of the War With France / Hartlepool Triumph / SKS Flapping Uselessly / Angie's Friends Stirring stuff from a few weeks ago.
Someone mentioned the Rob Hayward theory earlier, that it takes a couple of weeks for events to filter through to polls. It might be faster now, with insane media cycles, but there's still a lag.
Or it’s just an outlier
I would suggest we need to wait and see how the polls move over the next few weeks but my 8-10 % lead seems to about right just now
Owen Jones Rose @OwenJones84 · 7h The Labour leadership shutting down the community organising unit - which was crucial to the party's future - sums it up: petty, vindictive, lacking in any ideas or vision, and incapable of offering anything other than collapsing polling numbers.
I suspect the actual reason is the party is skint.
Doesn't have the large donors that Blair used to attract. Doesn't have the small donors that Corbyn used to attract. Labour looks like a losing proposition and it inspires no enthusiasm. Why would people give it money?
Losing Hartlepool was a serious impediment to getting donations in.
Losing B&S could be very bad indeed. You're a centre-left multi-millionaire. What is going to possibly persuade you to get your cheque book out this side of the next election?
You have to wonder at what point the Trade Unions start asking "Remind me - exactly what do we get for our millions (apart from our peerages, which we could just buy from the Tories)?"
Besides which, the Union movement is not what it once was and is weighted heavily towards the public sector (i.e. largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains.) This is reflected in the existence of Corbyn-friendly leadership figures like McCluskey. They might simply decide that, if the electoral situation is hopeless, they've nothing left to lose by going for another Corbyn figure whom (i) will be far more to their liking and (ii) might just do a little better than 2017 (they fervently hope,) under the right conditions, and knock out the Tories.
Quite how what remains of the PLP will react to such circumstances may only be guessed at.
largely pampered, comfortable leftists in very secure employment like teaching, healthcare and driving trains
Quite right, pampered leftists in useless public sector jobs. I mean, what on earth is the point of having teachers, doctors and nurses, and train drivers? Sack them all, I say.
Train drivers will probably be the first of those to be made redundant by tech, with teachers and doctors fighting for second. Nurses will last the longest I expect.
Teachers will be fine until there is an AI that can keep 9Z attentive on a windy Friday afternoon. When there's a wasp in the room.
Fortunate teachers.
(Serious point: some jobs are automatable, others don't seem to be. One of the problems for the public sector is that it gets lumbered with the sort of jobs where there aren't huge, order of magnitude, efficiency gains to be had.)
I would suspect the use of online teaching during this time has hastened the day. The only real issue (apart from for the teachers) is the kids cannot be left at home unattended.
It is entirely possible that cubicle based online learning may not be too far away.
As I said (in an edit) upthread: I think lockdown showed that we could automate a lot of teaching IF we were prepared for about 50% of pupils to effectively drop out, unable to self-motivate enough to gain from online lessons. A smaller but significant number might actually do better...
That's the curious thing. Its not that difficult to automate a large part of the teaching process. The Open University have been doing it for decades. More recently, the UK has had seriously clever things like Oak National Academy (which came out of lockdown) and the Isaac Physics scheme (which I think was one of Domski's babies when he was with Gove at Education). But they're still machines without the necessary ghosts. And whilst you could replace the current model of schooling with online + human warders (because that is what it would be), I'm not sure that we'd want to, even if it was more efficient in learning per pound.
The bigger issue is- if we have sufficient intelligence in the AI to do teaching effectively, do we actually need educated humans any more? And that's where we need authors to do the thinking, not scientists...
Oh and thinking about the poll- C+6 will presumably steady some Labour nerves tonight. I'm not sure I believe it yet, but it's probably closer to reality than C+18 was. And steady nerves are always more productive than headless chickens.
If I were in charge of this (which would be a really bad idea) then I would try to move to a sort of lecture/tutorial model: use the Oak Academy stuff to introduce the ideas, perhaps replacing homework, and then reserve school time for going though questions and making sure that the ideas have been understood. The problems are obvious though: it assumes that school children have time, IT resources, and motivation to watch and take in the lecture side without the supervision of a teacher trained in the highly skilled art of making sure everyone is awake. It would also give a government immense control over exactly what was being taught.
This "flip the classroom" model (learn at home, solve problems in class) was, aiui, tried a lot in America with the Khan Academy videos, but in the end was not the hoped-for panacea. At least, that is my vague recollection of reports I was not that interested in.
"Flipped lessons"; yes, that's what they were referred to as at our school when we had a CPD session on them. If they were using Khan Academy videos then I'm not surprised it didn't work well.
Flipped lessons are not much different from how we used to be taught languages many decades ago: go home and learn the words in chapter six. We were just lucky all foreigners learn English.
Just had a text saying Boris married Carrie today... has it been confirmed?
Seems so but neither Sky or BBC are reporting it yet
If it had been bad news for HMG it would be up already
Maybe it is bad news if it reinforces notions that Boris is neither completely open nor completely focused. Congratulations anyway.
It will presumably add a couple of points from people who objected to him living in sin.
OK how long do we wait before becoming suspicious that the Boris/Carrie wedding is still not on the BBC or Sky news sites? The Sun and Telegraph have it. Is something up? Is Downing Street playing silly buggers by refusing to confirm or deny? Are we in Meghan-type waters, trying to discern when a wedding is a wedding and not a rehearsal?
ETA the Telegraph seems to be a lift from the Sun.
Maybe the Archbishop of Canterbury black-balled him. So it was either that or a Sikh temple....
Puzzled by this. As twice divorced, surely the Catholic Church can't marry him unless I've missed a very sudden change of doctrine. Given the circumstances of the end of his previous marriage, it is also against the (non-binding) advice given to CofE clergy too.
The Telegraph suggests that:- Mr Johnson renounced his mother’s Catholicism when he was confirmed in the Anglican faith whilst at Eton, according to a biography of the Prime Minister.
In order to marry in a Catholic church, Mr Johnson could have had his two previous marriages recognised as annulled.
Alternatively, sources speculated on Saturday that because he was baptised a Catholic, by not participating in Catholic ceremonies in his previous marriages, for which he would have required special dispensation from the Catholic church, those marriages would have "had a lack of canonical form" and could therefore be considered invalid. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/29/boris-wedding-did-prime-minister-marry-carrie-symonds-catholic/ (£££)
Seems Cummings has had some impact with Opinium then, a 6 point lead would still see a Tory majority but a majority halved from 2019
Might be a bit early for that- I reckon it's more the deflation of the War With France / Hartlepool Triumph / SKS Flapping Uselessly / Angie's Friends Stirring stuff from a few weeks ago.
Someone mentioned the Rob Hayward theory earlier, that it takes a couple of weeks for events to filter through to polls. It might be faster now, with insane media cycles, but there's still a lag.
Or it’s just an outlier
I would suggest we need to wait and see how the polls move over the next few weeks but my 8-10 % lead seems to about right just now
Maybe the Archbishop of Canterbury black-balled him. So it was either that or a Sikh temple....
Puzzled by this. As twice divorced, surely the Catholic Church can't marry him unless I've missed a very sudden change of doctrine. Given the circumstances of the end of his previous marriage, it is also against the (non-binding) advice given to CofE clergy too.
The Telegraph suggests that:- Mr Johnson renounced his mother’s Catholicism when he was confirmed in the Anglican faith whilst at Eton, according to a biography of the Prime Minister.
In order to marry in a Catholic church, Mr Johnson could have had his two previous marriages recognised as annulled.
Alternatively, sources speculated on Saturday that because he was baptised a Catholic, by not participating in Catholic ceremonies in his previous marriages, for which he would have required special dispensation from the Catholic church, those marriages would have "had a lack of canonical form" and could therefore be considered invalid. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/29/boris-wedding-did-prime-minister-marry-carrie-symonds-catholic/ (£££)
Well, off to do another evening shift at Daughter's establishment. First long shift of season (for me) was yesterday. Very busy - despite an early table not bothering to show up. Fortunately others came.
But - bastards! How hard is it to ring and cancel. Every no-show costs money, especially if you've turned away others to take the booking. I hope they caught food poisoning at whatever horrible establishment they went to instead.
Anyway I must be off and spread charm and cheer and delicious lamb shank to all and sundry.....
I assume that plumbers have only a 50:50 chance of turning up on the day that they say, let alone the time, so it doesn't surprise me that diners might be no-shows.
Sadly this is a nearly universal phenomenon - it relates to how people use communication. So it is entirely standard in recruitment, for example, that not getting the job means that no-one will ever call/email you. Just silence.
One entertaining version of this is that when you hire people - and I mean at a serious job level, banks, high end iT etc - a certain percentage will simply not turn up on their designated first day. Or ever....
That has recently happened to my youngest. He got to the final round to get into a graduate training programme with a government agency. Prepared for it hard - a day long event by Zoom etc. Was told that everyone would be contacted to be told whether they were on the programme or not by a certain date. The day came and went. Nothing heard so he rang to find out what was happening and was told that it was all taking much longer than expected, not to worry, he would hear in due course. Weeks have passed. Nothing has been heard. He emailed them a couple of weeks back. No reply.
It is so rude. So disheartening. He's 22 for heaven's sake. He has worked hard for his good degree from a prestigious university and graduated just before Covid struck. He has been working, applying for all sorts of jobs, has done an unpaid internship for which he got commended and commented on in the trade press etc. And these bastards can't even sum up the courtesy to give him an answer having promised they would do so.
I am furious on his behalf. How dare people attack this generation for being lazy or entitled when people who should know better behave with such callous rudeness.
Well, off to do another evening shift at Daughter's establishment. First long shift of season (for me) was yesterday. Very busy - despite an early table not bothering to show up. Fortunately others came.
But - bastards! How hard is it to ring and cancel. Every no-show costs money, especially if you've turned away others to take the booking. I hope they caught food poisoning at whatever horrible establishment they went to instead.
Anyway I must be off and spread charm and cheer and delicious lamb shank to all and sundry.....
I assume that plumbers have only a 50:50 chance of turning up on the day that they say, let alone the time, so it doesn't surprise me that diners might be no-shows.
Sadly this is a nearly universal phenomenon - it relates to how people use communication. So it is entirely standard in recruitment, for example, that not getting the job means that no-one will ever call/email you. Just silence.
One entertaining version of this is that when you hire people - and I mean at a serious job level, banks, high end iT etc - a certain percentage will simply not turn up on their designated first day. Or ever....
That has recently happened to my youngest. He got to the final round to get into a graduate training programme with a government agency. Prepared for it hard - a day long event by Zoom etc. Was told that everyone would be contacted to be told whether they were on the programme or not by a certain date. The day came and went. Nothing heard so he rang to find out what was happening and was told that it was all taking much longer than expected, not to worry, he would hear in due course. Weeks have passed. Nothing has been heard. He emailed them a couple of weeks back. No reply.
It is so rude. So disheartening. He's 22 for heaven's sake. He has worked hard for his good degree from a prestigious university and graduated just before Covid struck. He has been working, applying for all sorts of jobs, has done an unpaid internship for which he got commended and commented on in the trade press etc. And these bastards can't even sum up the courtesy to give him an answer having promised they would do so.
I am furious on his behalf. How dare people attack this generation for being lazy or entitled when people who should know better behave with such callous rudeness.
I can only assume they have no idea who his mother is.
Comments
If it had been bad news for HMG it would be up already
I hold true to the version of the tortoise and the hare where the tortoise cheated though.
Which may explain a couple of things.
If there was a truly national approach with outstanding teachers asked to prepare model lessons across the whole curriculum (and not just trying to get celebrities to condescend to show us how it is done), a sort of Open University for schools, then we might start to get somewhere. At the moment it feels like I'm having to reinvent the wheel anew each year, not helped by constant changes in the programs we use to get content to the pupils (we are on our fourth in a decade at my school).
Eg, if you brought in the ultimate in universal benefits - UBI - it would cost money that otherwise could be spent on something else.
Winners. Losers.
Will stop now because I've made the point a few times and I fear I'm sounding like Michael Barrymore.
The bigger issue is- if we have sufficient intelligence in the AI to do teaching effectively, do we actually need educated humans any more? And that's where we need authors to do the thinking, not scientists...
Oh and thinking about the poll- C+6 will presumably steady some Labour nerves tonight. I'm not sure I believe it yet, but it's probably closer to reality than C+18 was. And steady nerves are always more productive than headless chickens.
After 2024 when the centre left have lost again it may look different.
I remember when I was in primary school in the early 70s we had the odd lesson via tv. I suppose it was an experiment.
I did enjoy watching the OU on tv though. I believe a channel dedicated to it may get small but noticeable viewing figures.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/15108452/boris-johnson-marries-carrie-symonds-westminster/
So who was the Catholic priest that married the divorcé and betrothed, who had a child together already? That must have been quite the discussion beforehand, both with the couple and with the Cardinal.
Congratulations to them.
Someone mentioned the Rob Hayward theory earlier, that it takes a couple of weeks for events to filter through to polls. It might be faster now, with insane media cycles, but there's still a lag.
Indeed my son gets married in July after postponing it from last August due to Covid
That will then see my three children all married
The problems are obvious though: it assumes that school children have time, IT resources, and motivation to watch and take in the lecture side without the supervision of a teacher trained in the highly skilled art of making sure everyone is awake. It would also give a government immense control over exactly what was being taught.
If they were using Khan Academy videos then I'm not surprised it didn't work well.
ETA the Telegraph seems to be a lift from the Sun.
(Yes I know there were no PMs at or before the Reformation).
Mr Johnson renounced his mother’s Catholicism when he was confirmed in the Anglican faith whilst at Eton, according to a biography of the Prime Minister.
In order to marry in a Catholic church, Mr Johnson could have had his two previous marriages recognised as annulled.
Alternatively, sources speculated on Saturday that because he was baptised a Catholic, by not participating in Catholic ceremonies in his previous marriages, for which he would have required special dispensation from the Catholic church, those marriages would have "had a lack of canonical form" and could therefore be considered invalid.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/29/boris-wedding-did-prime-minister-marry-carrie-symonds-catholic/ (£££)
It is so rude. So disheartening. He's 22 for heaven's sake. He has worked hard for his good degree from a prestigious university and graduated just before Covid struck. He has been working, applying for all sorts of jobs, has done an unpaid internship for which he got commended and commented on in the trade press etc. And these bastards can't even sum up the courtesy to give him an answer having promised they would do so.
I am furious on his behalf. How dare people attack this generation for being lazy or entitled when people who should know better behave with such callous rudeness.
Or what she is capable of.....