By the way, taking a snide pop at educated people for daring to oppose The Leader really is the end of civilisation. It's everything that totalitarian regimes aspire to in herding unthinking masses along the great cause.
Dystopia Now.
Fortunately the wheels are already coming off the Boris Johnson bandwagon. He's too much of a serial liar for it to have stuck around for longer. Someone more wily (Tony Blair for instance) would have got away with it for a lot longer.
People confuse educated for intelligent.
People educated in the University of Life frequently make that point. It is not wrong, of course, but ...
All this demonstrates is that higher education = progressive political views, particularly amongst people lower than 60. Higher education, particularly in the humanities and social sciences, can involve a significant element of political indoctrination, and this has been increasingly so for 40+ years.
I have a degree in engineering
I was happy to vote for Major, and Hague, and Cameron and May.
BoZo is a disgrace to the office. Every day he is PM is a stain on our nation.
You voted for the person who sent this to to ethnic minority areas?
But is a stain?
You've been driven mad by Brexit.
Come on Philip. I am sure deep inside of you, you know that this is a cheap shot non-argument. Every politician campaigns hard and they are almost invariably dirty. None of them get elected through being saintly.
The difference between moments of aberration and Boris Johnson is that with the latter they are not just moments. They ARE him.
The difference between May and Boris is that Boris gets the big calls right.
He was the first leading Tory to be in favour of gay marriage. He was on the right side in the Brexit referendum. He got a far superior Brexit deal to May's.
I don't think you can use the gay marriage support as an example of Boris Johnson getting the big call right. Gay marriage was legalized in July 2014 when David Cameron was Prime Minister. Not Boris Johnson. Tacking himself is very Boris Johnson. As is re-writing history.
The Brexit referendum comment isn't an objective statement of fact. That's your viewpoint.
Likewise 'he got a far superior Brexit deal to May's.' It's becoming completely obvious to everyone outside of the far right that this is incorrect. Her deal was economically far superior for the UK on every issue going. Politically it comes down to your stance on Brexit itself. Most commentators* can see the disaster evolving with Northern Ireland and realise that her deal was far more elegant a solution. Boris Johnson is going to be responsible for the breakup of the union. Brilliant.
* But then someone posted here the other day that you would be delighted to see the Troubles return to Northern Ireland as a price worth paying for Brexit? Wow. Just wow.
The comments are rather mixed to say the least...e.g. FT journalist.
This is thoroughly unpleasant. I've written plenty of stories that have been fiercely critical of the Home Office during Patel's time there but this is an abhorrent image.
So misogyny and racism are acceptable if you don’t like the person on the receiving end.
Same goes when it is Diane a Abbott.
There’s something about strong BAME women some people find challenging.
Like rcs1000 I have little time for Patel and she shouldn’t be in the job but the point can be made without resorting to that sort of crap.
Still, if it floats your boat fill your boots.
Fuck off.
I made the point she shouldn't be in the job.
I didn't mention her gender or ethnicity.
To the point the cartoon is offensive you merely simpered ‘so is she’, a tacit justification.
Patel seems fair game to be targeted on her ethnicity and religion and it is not on. There was the guardian cartoon featuring her, a Hindu, as a bull. It’s wrong. I also find it unpleasant that she alone seems to be the one on the receiving end over this when boris and many others have said the same or worse.
She never said she agreed with the booing she just didn’t condemn it and said,correctly, people have a right to boo which they do.
Still, if swearing at me for pointing it out makes you feel happy feel free to. Perhaps you can find a twitter link to an oh so hilarious Marina Hyde column ?
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
When I was a teenager, high unemployment was seen as a very bad thing, and conversely, low unemployment a good thing. I'm not sure that holds good today, with all the moaning about labour shortages.
A combination of higher pay, corporate investment in training, and replacement of unskilled labour with capital, will sort out labour shortages - to the benefit of society overall.
I thought it wonderful when Lord Rose explained that one of the downsides to Brexit would be higher wages.
That was hillarious, on the first day of the campaign.
Rose had never really been involved in politics before, and made the schoolboy error of speaking to the audience (of business leaders) in the room, rather than the wider public.
National digital id and mass tracking comes a step close this morning. We need to wake up to what Johnson's government are planning. First it was large events and night clubs, now bars and restaurants. If you don't want to live in a biosecurity state then we must resist this now.
Restaurants, pubs and bars urged to consider using Covid passports
Steve Baker: "I am simply astonished that, after everything the Prime Minister and Michael Gove said in the past about ID cards, they are advancing this fast down this really quite appalling path."
I don't like Patel, but that cartoon is pretty offensive.
So is she.
She blew the dogwhistle, tried to piggyback on the team success, then tried some virtue signalling and was rightly smacked down for it.
It's not an amusing cartoon, but it is painfully on the nose.
May sacked her. No PM except BoZo would ever put her back in cabinet, and he should have sacked her a couple of times since.
So misogyny and racism are acceptable if you don’t like the person on the receiving end.
Same goes when it is Diane a Abbott.
There’s something about strong BAME women some people find challenging.
Like rcs1000 I have little time for Patel and she shouldn’t be in the job but the point can be made without resorting to that sort of crap.
Still, if it floats your boat fill your boots.
As I've said before I'm a Witham constituency resident. I've met her several times. Pleasant, face to face, and helpful as an MP; one one occasion very helpful indeed.
I don't like her politics though, and that's the reason I won't vote for her.
It's an interesting correlation, which is clearly there in the data as well as being supported anecdotally. Some of it will reflect the impact of another variable, age, with older cohorts less likely to have a degree, but I strongly suspect the correlation would still hold if you controlled for that. What is driving it, I wonder? I can think of a few things. Firstly, a University education tends to be associated with the kind of liberal values that Johnson's studied populism is designed to offend (the Brexit factor fits in here too). Second, pursuing an education is a search for truth, and Johnson's persistent lying is therefore offensive. Third, one reason for obtaining an education is to transcend the feudal vestiges of Britain's class system, and so the better educated are less likely to be impressed by Johnson's officer class stylings. Fourth, one is exposed to a lot of public school chancers like Johnson at University, especially at certain Universities, and so we are more likely to see him for what he is. Finally, at University you tend to see what really smart people are like - they use language to enlighten, not to confuse, for instance - and so we peg Johnson for what he is - a stupid person's idea of what a smart person looks like.
The comments are rather mixed to say the least...e.g. FT journalist.
This is thoroughly unpleasant. I've written plenty of stories that have been fiercely critical of the Home Office during Patel's time there but this is an abhorrent image.
National digital id and mass tracking comes a step close this morning. We need to wake up to what Johnson's government are planning. First it was large events and night clubs, now bars and restaurants. If you don't want to live in a biosecurity state then we must resist this now.
Restaurants, pubs and bars urged to consider using Covid passports
Steve Baker: "I am simply astonished that, after everything the Prime Minister and Michael Gove said in the past about ID cards, they are advancing this fast down this really quite appalling path."
By the way, taking a snide pop at educated people for daring to oppose The Leader really is the end of civilisation. It's everything that totalitarian regimes aspire to in herding unthinking masses along the great cause.
Dystopia Now.
Fortunately the wheels are already coming off the Boris Johnson bandwagon. He's too much of a serial liar for it to have stuck around for longer. Someone more wily (Tony Blair for instance) would have got away with it for a lot longer.
People confuse educated for intelligent.
People educated in the University of Life frequently make that point. It is not wrong, of course, but ...
But what ?
It’s not an unreasonable comment and many people of my generation just didn’t have the opportunity to go to Uni. My education was vocational. HND.
Good morning everyone. Lovely bright one here, and the forecast is excellent!
Can I, as a very old man, have a grouse. When I were a lad, as the saying goes, the f word was rarely used among my friends and associates. Indeed, it was considered extremely offensive. Now it's used as noun, adjective and verb on every possible occasion. I was always taught that to use swear words to embellish speech demonstrated a lack of vocabulary, and even more so when writing, unless of course, appropriate for the writing.
Rant over!
I try to avoid doing so, but I sometimes use that word at moments of stress.
Great if you whack your thumb with a hammer or stub your toe etc , great pain reliever.
It's worth noting that the Conservatives lead Labour by 28% among people without qualifications, 20% among people with other qualifications, and trail Labour by 12% among people with degrees, in this poll, compared to a 9% Conservative lead overall, and a 15% net dissatisfaction rating for Johnson.
Johnson's own rating, 39%, is in net negative territory, but not unusual for a Prime Minister. A lot of people who disapprove of the PM, and the government's record, still intend to vote Conservative. Again, that is not unusual, as generally, net approval ratings only move into positive territory around election times, for a winning government.
The electoral divide between people with and without degrees certainly predates Johnson. It's a feature of age, attitudes towards Brexit and related cultural issues, and the distinct culture of core cities
As a new report commissioned by CMO warns of possible huge spike in flu deaths this winter, how long before Johnson's government is demanding we all have flu vaccine and show our vaccine status via their tracking app?
Step by step by are being walked into a permanent state of biosecurity and lack of freedom.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
So misogyny and racism are acceptable if you don’t like the person on the receiving end.
Same goes when it is Diane a Abbott.
There’s something about strong BAME women some people find challenging.
Like rcs1000 I have little time for Patel and she shouldn’t be in the job but the point can be made without resorting to that sort of crap.
Still, if it floats your boat fill your boots.
Fuck off.
I made the point she shouldn't be in the job.
I didn't mention her gender or ethnicity.
She never said she agreed with the booing she just didn’t condemn it and said,correctly, people have a right to boo which they do.
She called it gesture politics. By dismissing it so airily she fanned the flames of racism.
And to anyone who doesn't get this, you can be non-white and bloody racist. I've seen it all-too-often and there's a particularly nasty, thoroughly unpleasant, kind of self-made Conservative (often Asian) who doesn't give a shit about others who haven't made it.
Incidentally, the whole caste system is deeply racist.
Another day another column from OGH bashing Boris. This must surely reflect the respective ages of the electorate and where their votes fall. More younger people support labour than older.
Labour who have been in opposition for 11 years are at 30-35% in the polls, yet OGH thinks SKS is doing well. When was the last thread header talking about Labour's woeful polling? The tories are polling between 40-44%, pretty good seeing what has happened and where we are in the electoral cycle. Its almost like writing something negative about Boris is therapy.
Good morning everyone. Lovely bright one here, and the forecast is excellent!
Can I, as a very old man, have a grouse. When I were a lad, as the saying goes, the f word was rarely used among my friends and associates. Indeed, it was considered extremely offensive. Now it's used as noun, adjective and verb on every possible occasion. I was always taught that to use swear words to embellish speech demonstrated a lack of vocabulary, and even more so when writing, unless of course, appropriate for the writing.
Rant over!
I try to avoid doing so, but I sometimes use that word at moments of stress.
Great if you whack your thumb with a hammer or stub your toe etc , great pain reliever.
Road pricing.... that's another thing that got the electorate absolutely steaming when it was talked about 15 years ago.
Talk of higher taxes on fuel / airplane travel, road pricing, id cards, those 3 things seemed to really piss a lot of people off when Labour was in power. Hence why the second two got ditched.
Maybe things have changed now among the electorate in regards to this. We will see.
It hasn't but if get £800 a car from duty on fuel and need to get that money from somewhere there really isn't that many options.
Road pricing will have to be investigated as the other options are worse in different ways
Fuel was taxed because fuel had externalities and was environmentally toxic.
Now that drivers are switching away from fuel, there seems to be a desire to keep raising revenues from drivers rather than simply accept that fuel has gone and that society as a whole needs to pay for its costs.
Its like having if smokers all quit smoking placing a tax on ex-smokers to replace tobacco taxes.
Motorists should still pay some form of tax to, as a bare minimum, fund the road network.
Absolutely that is reasonable. VED raises nearly as much as is spent on the roads. Fuel duty raises about £40bn more than is spent on the roads.
Keeping VED and having approximately half a penny per kWh would replace all of fuel duty and be "fair". Drivers would be paying via when they refuel their electric cars and would still pay more tax from that than is spent on roads - but the rest of society would pay its fair share too.
again - adding it the electricity isn't fair on those who don't have a car, it's regressive because it impacts people who don't currently pay that tax.
And it needs to raise £28bn to offset the tax fuel duty collects (2019/20 figure - last years was surprisingly £21bn)
Just because the justification for the tax has gone that doesn't mean the need for the money disappears.
Another day another column from OGH bashing Boris. This must surely reflect the respective ages of the electorate and where their votes fall. More younger people support labour than older.
Labour who have been in opposition for 11 years are at 30-35% in the polls, yet OGH thinks SKS is doing well. When was the last thread header talking about Labour's woeful polling? The tories are polling between 40-44%, pretty good seeing what has happened and where we are in the electoral cycle. Its almost like writing something negative about Boris is therapy.
'You' just took a hammering in the tory south and you failed to win in your beloved Red Wall.
The slide in tory opinion polling is well underway. It's delightful to watch it and the increasingly shrill tory supporters on here as we all watch the inevitable.
To the point the cartoon is offensive you merely simpered ‘so is she’, a tacit justification.
No
The cartoon does not rely on her gender or ethnicity to make its point.
She said and did stupid things. If another politician had done and said the same things the cartoon would have been equally valid.
She shouldn't be in the cabinet. Not because of her gender. Not because of her ethnicity. Because of her actions.
Why are you so keen to defend all of the nasty things she does by claiming misogyny or racism where none exist?
Is that the best contorting you can do. I have never supported her and have said numerous times she should not be in the cabinet. So you can FRO with that
That cartoon is vile and you merely,said ‘so is she’ as a justification. Your so keen on Twitter. Read the thread and educate yourself as to why it is problematic.
It's an interesting correlation, which is clearly there in the data as well as being supported anecdotally. Some of it will reflect the impact of another variable, age, with older cohorts less likely to have a degree, but I strongly suspect the correlation would still hold if you controlled for that. What is driving it, I wonder? I can think of a few things. Firstly, a University education tends to be associated with the kind of liberal values that Johnson's studied populism is designed to offend (the Brexit factor fits in here too). Second, pursuing an education is a search for truth, and Johnson's persistent lying is therefore offensive. Third, one reason for obtaining an education is to transcend the feudal vestiges of Britain's class system, and so the better educated are less likely to be impressed by Johnson's officer class stylings. Fourth, one is exposed to a lot of public school chancers like Johnson at University, especially at certain Universities, and so we are more likely to see him for what he is. Finally, at University you tend to see what really smart people are like - they use language to enlighten, not to confuse, for instance - and so we peg Johnson for what he is - a stupid person's idea of what a smart person looks like.
I think that's what higher education ought to be, rather than necessarily, is.
One thing I've learned from doing my MA is that I can't bullshit, can't wing it, can't dash off an essay at the last moment, and expect to get a pass. That's not true of a lot of first degrees (I don't think you can bullshit if you're doing hard science, but you can for a lot of others).
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Brexit level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
Wait until they find out that all those who just found jobs, or who are getting a pay rise because of labour shortages, also get to vote in the next election.
By the way, taking a snide pop at educated people for daring to oppose The Leader really is the end of civilisation. It's everything that totalitarian regimes aspire to in herding unthinking masses along the great cause.
Dystopia Now.
Fortunately the wheels are already coming off the Boris Johnson bandwagon. He's too much of a serial liar for it to have stuck around for longer. Someone more wily (Tony Blair for instance) would have got away with it for a lot longer.
People confuse educated for intelligent.
They do indeed. As any con artist knows, educated people are easy to con.
I don't think it is just a proxy for age, or universities being infested by marxists. Few students pay any attention to the student politicians and they are widely mocked and have been for decades.
Education is a proxy for SE class and geography too. Far more university educated in Amersham than Hartlepool. Indeed I recall that mean age in Amersham was slightly higher than Hartlepool.
Education is just one of the faultlines in our society. Where and how you live is a big predictor of voting.
All this demonstrates is that higher education = progressive political views, particularly amongst people lower than 60. Higher education, particularly in the humanities and social sciences, can involve a significant element of political indoctrination, and this has been increasingly so for 40+ years.
I have a degree in engineering
I was happy to vote for Major, and Hague, and Cameron and May.
BoZo is a disgrace to the office. Every day he is PM is a stain on our nation.
You voted for the person who sent this to to ethnic minority areas?
But is a stain?
You've been driven mad by Brexit.
Come on Philip. I am sure deep inside of you, you know that this is a cheap shot non-argument. Every politician campaigns hard and they are almost invariably dirty. None of them get elected through being saintly.
The difference between moments of aberration and Boris Johnson is that with the latter they are not just moments. They ARE him.
The difference between May and Boris is that Boris gets the big calls right.
He was the first leading Tory to be in favour of gay marriage. He was on the right side in the Brexit referendum. He got a far superior Brexit deal to May's.
I don't think you can use the gay marriage support as an example of Boris Johnson getting the big call right. Gay marriage was legalized in July 2014 when David Cameron was Prime Minister. Not Boris Johnson. Tacking himself is very Boris Johnson. As is re-writing history.
The Brexit referendum comment isn't an objective statement of fact. That's your viewpoint.
Likewise 'he got a far superior Brexit deal to May's.' It's becoming completely obvious to everyone outside of the far right that this is incorrect. Her deal was economically far superior for the UK on every issue going. Politically it comes down to your stance on Brexit itself. Most commentators* can see the disaster evolving with Northern Ireland and realise that her deal was far more elegant a solution. Boris Johnson is going to be responsible for the breakup of the union. Brilliant.
* But then someone posted here the other day that you would be delighted to see the Troubles return to Northern Ireland as a price worth paying for Brexit? Wow. Just wow.
The Brexit referendum comment isn't just my viewpoint, its most of the nation's too.
That you think Boris's deal is inferior to Mays which was thrice rejected by Parliament just shows you're like Scott a hyperpartisan in the EU debate.
As for the Troubles that's not what I said. What I actually said was that if people turn to political violence then those responsible for doing so is the people being violent - and that the threat of violence is not a justification to overturn democratic votes. I stand by that 100% do you disagree with that?
National digital id and mass tracking comes a step close this morning. We need to wake up to what Johnson's government are planning. First it was large events and night clubs, now bars and restaurants. If you don't want to live in a biosecurity state then we must resist this now.
Restaurants, pubs and bars urged to consider using Covid passports
Steve Baker: "I am simply astonished that, after everything the Prime Minister and Michael Gove said in the past about ID cards, they are advancing this fast down this really quite appalling path."
Yep. It's godawful isn't it?
Huge decision looming for Starmer. Will he back this covid id app madness? Surely there are enough freedom loving Tory backbenchers to defeat this if he opposes?
But I have no hopes in that direction really. He will dither and then at last minute back Johnson.
The comments are rather mixed to say the least...e.g. FT journalist.
This is thoroughly unpleasant. I've written plenty of stories that have been fiercely critical of the Home Office during Patel's time there but this is an abhorrent image.
National digital id and mass tracking comes a step close this morning. We need to wake up to what Johnson's government are planning. First it was large events and night clubs, now bars and restaurants. If you don't want to live in a biosecurity state then we must resist this now.
Restaurants, pubs and bars urged to consider using Covid passports
Steve Baker: "I am simply astonished that, after everything the Prime Minister and Michael Gove said in the past about ID cards, they are advancing this fast down this really quite appalling path."
Yep. It's godawful isn't it?
Huge decision looming for Starmer. Will he back this covid id app madness? Surely there are enough freedom loving Tory backbenchers to defeat this if he opposes?
But I have no hopes in that direction really. He will dither and then at last minute back Johnson.
No mention of the poll that shoes Labour is starting to lose the black vote... so long it's bedrock.. it was on Sky the other day. Diane Abott says she isn't worried.. so Labour should be....
Another day another column from OGH bashing Boris.
OGH correctly and, literally, against all the odds predicted the Lib Dems would win Chesham & Amersham. He was derived on here by the likes of you who were made to look very stupid by him.
OGH also correctly predicted that Labour would hold Batley & Spen against the odds and against what most other political commentators were saying, even members of the Labour Party.
Another day another column from OGH bashing Boris. This must surely reflect the respective ages of the electorate and where their votes fall. More younger people support labour than older.
Labour who have been in opposition for 11 years are at 30-35% in the polls, yet OGH thinks SKS is doing well. When was the last thread header talking about Labour's woeful polling? The tories are polling between 40-44%, pretty good seeing what has happened and where we are in the electoral cycle. Its almost like writing something negative about Boris is therapy.
'You' just took a hammering in the tory south and you failed to win in your beloved Red Wall.
The slide in tory opinion polling is well underway. It's delightful to watch it and the increasingly shrill tory supporters on here as we all watch the inevitable.
Road pricing.... that's another thing that got the electorate absolutely steaming when it was talked about 15 years ago.
Talk of higher taxes on fuel / airplane travel, road pricing, id cards, those 3 things seemed to really piss a lot of people off when Labour was in power. Hence why the second two got ditched.
Maybe things have changed now among the electorate in regards to this. We will see.
It hasn't but if get £800 a car from duty on fuel and need to get that money from somewhere there really isn't that many options.
Road pricing will have to be investigated as the other options are worse in different ways
Fuel was taxed because fuel had externalities and was environmentally toxic.
Now that drivers are switching away from fuel, there seems to be a desire to keep raising revenues from drivers rather than simply accept that fuel has gone and that society as a whole needs to pay for its costs.
Its like having if smokers all quit smoking placing a tax on ex-smokers to replace tobacco taxes.
Motorists should still pay some form of tax to, as a bare minimum, fund the road network.
Absolutely that is reasonable. VED raises nearly as much as is spent on the roads. Fuel duty raises about £40bn more than is spent on the roads.
Keeping VED and having approximately half a penny per kWh would replace all of fuel duty and be "fair". Drivers would be paying via when they refuel their electric cars and would still pay more tax from that than is spent on roads - but the rest of society would pay its fair share too.
again - adding it the electricity isn't fair on those who don't have a car, it's regressive because it impacts people who don't currently pay that tax.
And it needs to raise £28bn to offset the tax fuel duty collects (2019/20 figure - last years was surprisingly £21bn)
Just because the justification for the tax has gone that doesn't mean the need for the money disappears.
Why's it unfair on those who don't have a car? Considering almost all of the money raised isn't spent on the roads, why should they be exempt from paying taxes?
The need for the money to fund the NHS or pensions or whatever else you want to spend on is not the same as the need for the money to come from drivers.
And taxing driving is far more regressive than taxing electricity. Poor drivers pay an estimated 10% of their disposable income on fuel duty, that's currently justified due to the green externalities on fuel but if they cease to use fuel why should they remain so heavily taxed?
To the point the cartoon is offensive you merely simpered ‘so is she’, a tacit justification.
No
The cartoon does not rely on her gender or ethnicity to make its point.
She said and did stupid things. If another politician had done and said the same things the cartoon would have been equally valid.
She shouldn't be in the cabinet. Not because of her gender. Not because of her ethnicity. Because of her actions.
Why are you so keen to defend all of the nasty things she does by claiming misogyny or racism where none exist?
I agree with you on this one, just as I agreed with the same posters now outraged at "misogyny and racism" against Patel who rightly said it wasn't there against Abbott.
Lets be clear. Both are BAME women and shit politicians. Most of the attacks on Abbott were her ludicrous gaffs, not her skin colour or gender, and frankly this cartoon with Patel is the same. They can't have some kind of "you can't touch them" rule because of their ethnicity or gender - that would be absurd.
Can I remind some of the faux sensitive that Patel was sacked for both carrying out her own private foreign policy and for lying about it. Collusion with a foreign power against the interests of the government whilst a member of it is pretty bad. She shouldn't be Home Secretary
By the way, taking a snide pop at educated people for daring to oppose The Leader really is the end of civilisation. It's everything that totalitarian regimes aspire to in herding unthinking masses along the great cause.
Dystopia Now.
Fortunately the wheels are already coming off the Boris Johnson bandwagon. He's too much of a serial liar for it to have stuck around for longer. Someone more wily (Tony Blair for instance) would have got away with it for a lot longer.
People confuse educated for intelligent.
They do indeed. As any con artist knows, educated people are easy to con.
I don't think it is just a proxy for age, or universities being infested by marxists. Few students pay any attention to the student politicians and they are widely mocked and have been for decades.
Education is a proxy for SE class and geography too. Far more university educated in Amersham than Hartlepool. Indeed I recall that mean age in Amersham was slightly higher than Hartlepool.
Education is just one of the faultlines in our society. Where and how you live is a big predictor of voting.
Why would anyone with a degree stay in a place like Hartlepool, lovely as many parts of it are, when the opportunities for them are so limited. The demographics of places like Hartlepool and Bishop Auckland and other places like it have changed as educated younger people move away in search of opportunities not afforded them locally.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
Alternatively, the Furlough scheme is ending and people are returning to jobs that have not been "created" but are resuming. That said there are certainly a lot vacancies out there right now. The issue is whether they will be filled and what happens if they are not.
National digital id and mass tracking comes a step close this morning. We need to wake up to what Johnson's government are planning. First it was large events and night clubs, now bars and restaurants. If you don't want to live in a biosecurity state then we must resist this now.
Restaurants, pubs and bars urged to consider using Covid passports
Steve Baker: "I am simply astonished that, after everything the Prime Minister and Michael Gove said in the past about ID cards, they are advancing this fast down this really quite appalling path."
Yep. It's godawful isn't it?
Huge decision looming for Starmer. Will he back this covid id app madness? Surely there are enough freedom loving Tory backbenchers to defeat this if he opposes?
But I have no hopes in that direction really. He will dither and then at last minute back Johnson.
Only Liberals can be relied on to be honest.
It’s guidance, not law. What is there to vote on?
If a business wishes to annoy a large number of potential customers on a permanent basis they can insist on a passport check if they want.
Another day another column from OGH bashing Boris.
OGH correctly and, literally, against all the odds predicted the Lib Dems would win Chesham & Amersham. He was derived on here by the likes of you who were made to look very stupid by him.
OGH also correctly predicted that Labour would hold Batley & Spen against the odds and against what most other political commentators were saying, even members of the Labour Party.
So perhaps a little less of your crowing, hmmm?
What the hell has a couple of by elections got to do with a Govt with a huge Majority? If the Tories had held them it would have been amazing. Punters often bet with their heart not their head. That's how clever punters make money. The fact that the site is just relentlessly negative is a point that IS worth making because it is true. I dislike Boris but I don't want to read the Guardian every day.
Another day another column from OGH bashing Boris. This must surely reflect the respective ages of the electorate and where their votes fall. More younger people support labour than older.
Labour who have been in opposition for 11 years are at 30-35% in the polls, yet OGH thinks SKS is doing well. When was the last thread header talking about Labour's woeful polling? The tories are polling between 40-44%, pretty good seeing what has happened and where we are in the electoral cycle. Its almost like writing something negative about Boris is therapy.
'You' just took a hammering in the tory south and you failed to win in your beloved Red Wall.
The slide in tory opinion polling is well underway. It's delightful to watch it and the increasingly shrill tory supporters on here as we all watch the inevitable.
So you think Labour at 30% is ok?
We've had 8 polls post B & S, and the average Conservative lead is 9%. Most governments would settle for that, 18 months after an election.
Another day another column from OGH bashing Boris.
OGH correctly and, literally, against all the odds predicted the Lib Dems would win Chesham & Amersham. He was derived on here by the likes of you who were made to look very stupid by him.
OGH also correctly predicted that Labour would hold Batley & Spen against the odds and against what most other political commentators were saying, even members of the Labour Party.
So perhaps a little less of your crowing, hmmm?
I put money on labour to hold Batley and spen and the Lib Dem’s to take Chesham, and did so on Batley the day the odds got put up, and said so on here multiple times so you can FRO with that line, old chap. Nick Palmers insightful posts from the campaign convinced me to put on more. On betting I will follow,OGH gladly.
We need to be very careful about "the more intelligent you are, the more you see through Liar" arguments. There are plenty of working class people who are street smart in ways that double first at Oxford types are not. What for me seems clear is that people have been led away from their own interests by this shit Pied Piper, and that they're already questioning where the journey is taking them.
Hasn't fed through into polls or results yet - in part because Labour still repel them - but there is growing disquiet as various polls asking questions other than voting intent show. Ultimately we know this will go wrong for Johnson because like Trump he now believes his own lies, and at some point he is going to trip over himself badly.
Final point. There are some very well educated Clown Apologists on here. What is their excuse?
They are older?
I don’t see The PM as the British equivalent of Trump as some do.
He is a flawed person, yes, particularly when it comes to his approach to the truth and to details (I suspect a lot of his lies are because he haven’t paid enough attention to know what the answer actually is so he just makes something up).
But a number of the attacks are much less well founded. He is condemned as a racist for some ill chosen words in newspaper articles while he has the most ethnically diverse cabinet in our history. He is attacked over Brexit essentially because he won; there are many who will never forgive him for that.
Would I vote for him? I did last time because I feared a Corbyn lead government. I don’t fear SKS, but neither has he given me any particular reason to vote for him yet. I think of all politicians as flawed in one or more ways and I usually vote against the side I don’t want to win rather than for the one I do. This means that so far Boris has done what I wanted him to: kept JC and those like him out of power.
No mention of the poll that shoes Labour is starting to lose the black vote... so long it's bedrock.. it was on Sky the other day. Diane Abott says she isn't worried.. so Labour should be....
There definitely something of a rebellion, among those minorities who don’t subscribe to the woke BLM narrative that people should be treated according to the colour of their skin, rather than the content of their character.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
North East, North West and Midlands have more jobs now than they did before the pandemic began? 😲
But those uneducation dumb northerners oop north don't know what they're doing swinging to Boris.
It's an interesting correlation, which is clearly there in the data as well as being supported anecdotally. Some of it will reflect the impact of another variable, age, with older cohorts less likely to have a degree, but I strongly suspect the correlation would still hold if you controlled for that. What is driving it, I wonder? I can think of a few things. Firstly, a University education tends to be associated with the kind of liberal values that Johnson's studied populism is designed to offend (the Brexit factor fits in here too). Second, pursuing an education is a search for truth, and Johnson's persistent lying is therefore offensive. Third, one reason for obtaining an education is to transcend the feudal vestiges of Britain's class system, and so the better educated are less likely to be impressed by Johnson's officer class stylings. Fourth, one is exposed to a lot of public school chancers like Johnson at University, especially at certain Universities, and so we are more likely to see him for what he is. Finally, at University you tend to see what really smart people are like - they use language to enlighten, not to confuse, for instance - and so we peg Johnson for what he is - a stupid person's idea of what a smart person looks like.
The Fourth point is certainly one that applies to me. I saw a lot of entitled chancers like Johnsons at university. And I have kept on coming across them throughout my working life. They are poisonous.
National digital id and mass tracking comes a step close this morning. We need to wake up to what Johnson's government are planning. First it was large events and night clubs, now bars and restaurants. If you don't want to live in a biosecurity state then we must resist this now.
Restaurants, pubs and bars urged to consider using Covid passports
Steve Baker: "I am simply astonished that, after everything the Prime Minister and Michael Gove said in the past about ID cards, they are advancing this fast down this really quite appalling path."
Yep. It's godawful isn't it?
Huge decision looming for Starmer. Will he back this covid id app madness? Surely there are enough freedom loving Tory backbenchers to defeat this if he opposes?
But I have no hopes in that direction really. He will dither and then at last minute back Johnson.
Only Liberals can be relied on to be honest.
It’s guidance, not law. What is there to vote on?
If a business wishes to annoy a large number of potential customers on a permanent basis they can insist on a passport check if they want.
Well exactly. I can see it possibly happening at large events that attract an older crowd - but apart from that, no chance.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
North East, North West and Midlands have more jobs now than they did before the pandemic began? 😲
But those uneducation dumb northerners oop north don't know what they're doing swinging to Boris.
Food Tsar calls for salt and sugar tax to be imposed on snacks - but experts warn it will send the cost of treats soaring and slap another £172 on a household’s shopping bills
Sounds like the government are binning the Henry Dimbleby report calling for a snack tax. Says “you have to be very cautious before putting further burdens on people on low incomes.” #LBC https://twitter.com/kateferguson4/status/1415566655367811074
Discerning PBers will recall the episode of The HollowMen describing exactly this scenario
No mention of the poll that shoes Labour is starting to lose the black vote... so long it's bedrock.. it was on Sky the other day. Diane Abott says she isn't worried.. so Labour should be....
There definitely something of a rebellion, among those minorities who don’t subscribe to the woke BLM narrative that people should be treated according to the colour of their skin, rather than the content of their character.
There does seem to be a big shift underway among Indian voters, at any rate. Harrow East now looks as though it's reverted to being a safe Conservative seat. The Conservative leads in Hendon and Finchley & Golders Green aren't driven solely by Jewish voters, but by Indian voters as well. Brent North saw a sizeable swing against Labour last time, as did two Leicester seats.
It's an interesting correlation, which is clearly there in the data as well as being supported anecdotally. Some of it will reflect the impact of another variable, age, with older cohorts less likely to have a degree, but I strongly suspect the correlation would still hold if you controlled for that. What is driving it, I wonder? I can think of a few things. Firstly, a University education tends to be associated with the kind of liberal values that Johnson's studied populism is designed to offend (the Brexit factor fits in here too). Second, pursuing an education is a search for truth, and Johnson's persistent lying is therefore offensive. Third, one reason for obtaining an education is to transcend the feudal vestiges of Britain's class system, and so the better educated are less likely to be impressed by Johnson's officer class stylings. Fourth, one is exposed to a lot of public school chancers like Johnson at University, especially at certain Universities, and so we are more likely to see him for what he is. Finally, at University you tend to see what really smart people are like - they use language to enlighten, not to confuse, for instance - and so we peg Johnson for what he is - a stupid person's idea of what a smart person looks like.
The Fourth point is certainly one that applies to me. I saw a lot of entitled chancers like Johnsons at university. And I have kept on coming across them throughout my working life. They are poisonous.
Indeed. His is the sort of arrogant entitlement that really grates. I look forward to his downfall and shall dance on his political grave, but don't think it will happen for a while yet.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
Alternatively, the Furlough scheme is ending and people are returning to jobs that have not been "created" but are resuming. That said there are certainly a lot vacancies out there right now. The issue is whether they will be filled and what happens if they are not.
So the issue has changed from mass unemployment to we don't have enough people to fill the jobs in a booming economy. Do you think the Government deserves any praise for this remarkable turn round in the jobs market?
Road pricing.... that's another thing that got the electorate absolutely steaming when it was talked about 15 years ago.
Talk of higher taxes on fuel / airplane travel, road pricing, id cards, those 3 things seemed to really piss a lot of people off when Labour was in power. Hence why the second two got ditched.
Maybe things have changed now among the electorate in regards to this. We will see.
It hasn't but if get £800 a car from duty on fuel and need to get that money from somewhere there really isn't that many options.
Road pricing will have to be investigated as the other options are worse in different ways
Fuel was taxed because fuel had externalities and was environmentally toxic.
Now that drivers are switching away from fuel, there seems to be a desire to keep raising revenues from drivers rather than simply accept that fuel has gone and that society as a whole needs to pay for its costs.
Its like having if smokers all quit smoking placing a tax on ex-smokers to replace tobacco taxes.
Motorists should still pay some form of tax to, as a bare minimum, fund the road network.
Absolutely that is reasonable. VED raises nearly as much as is spent on the roads. Fuel duty raises about £40bn more than is spent on the roads.
Keeping VED and having approximately half a penny per kWh would replace all of fuel duty and be "fair". Drivers would be paying via when they refuel their electric cars and would still pay more tax from that than is spent on roads - but the rest of society would pay its fair share too.
again - adding it the electricity isn't fair on those who don't have a car, it's regressive because it impacts people who don't currently pay that tax.
And it needs to raise £28bn to offset the tax fuel duty collects (2019/20 figure - last years was surprisingly £21bn)
Just because the justification for the tax has gone that doesn't mean the need for the money disappears.
Why's it unfair on those who don't have a car? Considering almost all of the money raised isn't spent on the roads, why should they be exempt from paying taxes?
The need for the money to fund the NHS or pensions or whatever else you want to spend on is not the same as the need for the money to come from drivers.
And taxing driving is far more regressive than taxing electricity. Poor drivers pay an estimated 10% of their disposable income on fuel duty, that's currently justified due to the green externalities on fuel but if they cease to use fuel why should they remain so heavily taxed?
They aren't exempt from paying taxes but you've just increased the level of tax on the very poorest people in society.
Oh and unless I'm missing something the tax on each kwh needs to be 73p not 0.5p... 0.5p would raise £185m
National digital id and mass tracking comes a step close this morning. We need to wake up to what Johnson's government are planning. First it was large events and night clubs, now bars and restaurants. If you don't want to live in a biosecurity state then we must resist this now.
Restaurants, pubs and bars urged to consider using Covid passports
Steve Baker: "I am simply astonished that, after everything the Prime Minister and Michael Gove said in the past about ID cards, they are advancing this fast down this really quite appalling path."
Yep. It's godawful isn't it?
Huge decision looming for Starmer. Will he back this covid id app madness? Surely there are enough freedom loving Tory backbenchers to defeat this if he opposes?
But I have no hopes in that direction really. He will dither and then at last minute back Johnson.
Only Liberals can be relied on to be honest.
It’s guidance, not law. What is there to vote on?
If a business wishes to annoy a large number of potential customers on a permanent basis they can insist on a passport check if they want.
Well exactly. I can see it possibly happening at large events that attract an older crowd - but apart from that, no chance.
Guidance can become law. Johnson has already threatened the night clubs with turning it into law unless they do it as volunteers.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
North East, North West and Midlands have more jobs now than they did before the pandemic began? 😲
But those uneducation dumb northerners oop north don't know what they're doing swinging to Boris.
Pensioners tend not to work, though.
Pensioners aren't the only ones voting Tory though. Nationwide the crossover age for voting was 39 not 67.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
Alternatively, the Furlough scheme is ending and people are returning to jobs that have not been "created" but are resuming. That said there are certainly a lot vacancies out there right now. The issue is whether they will be filled and what happens if they are not.
No, those on furlough are and always have been employed. This is the re-engagement of those who were not lucky enough to be on furlough schemes either because they were casual labour or their employer went bust.
By the Autumn statement, if it is in December as usual, we will have: record employment; an economy that is just about as large as it was pre-Covid, probably slightly larger; the largest increase in real wages for the lower paid, well, ever; and a very rapidly growing economy.
There will of course be some downsides: debt will be at record levels, public spending will be at a larger than healthy part of the economy, our rapid growth is likely suck in imports and there will no doubt be some minor interruptions in trade for @Scott_P to point to but it will be a pretty phenomenal report card in the circumstances.
On topic I think it is unwise to try to say the higher educated are morally and in many ways superior to those with less educational achievements
This attitude just increases division and those highly educated should have much more empathy to the millions who are not
Turning to Boris, he has had a shocking few days and looks haunted
I have no idea whether he is suffering from long covid or just simply not enjoying the job but surely this cannot continue
There is an element in the conservative party who are so out of touch they can make idiotic public statements like Natalie Elphicke and others and just do not get it
England is a fantastic example of our country 's diversification and Marcus Rashford is an outstanding example of a talented footballer, but one who suffered terribly as a child with poverty and lack of food, and has used his experiences to waken politicians to this important issue is to be celebrated and I for one admire him in so many ways not least because he has always made the issue with him as non political
I know I am a minority in the conservative party but I do support the £20 UC uplift, free school meals, and ending the triple lock
As others have said, there are no acceptable political parties for me as I do want covid beaten, brexit trade deals expanded, and the party is far the best for the economy
The day Boris stands down will be the opportunity to reset the party and the sooner the better
We need to be very careful about "the more intelligent you are, the more you see through Liar" arguments. There are plenty of working class people who are street smart in ways that double first at Oxford types are not. What for me seems clear is that people have been led away from their own interests by this shit Pied Piper, and that they're already questioning where the journey is taking them.
Hasn't fed through into polls or results yet - in part because Labour still repel them - but there is growing disquiet as various polls asking questions other than voting intent show. Ultimately we know this will go wrong for Johnson because like Trump he now believes his own lies, and at some point he is going to trip over himself badly.
Final point. There are some very well educated Clown Apologists on here. What is their excuse?
They are older?
I don’t see The PM as the British equivalent of Trump as some do.
He is a flawed person, yes, particularly when it comes to his approach to the truth and to details (I suspect a lot of his lies are because he haven’t paid enough attention to know what the answer actually is so he just makes something up).
But a number of the attacks are much less well founded. He is condemned as a racist for some ill chosen words in newspaper articles while he has the most ethnically diverse cabinet in our history. He is attacked over Brexit essentially because he won; there are many who will never forgive him for that.
Would I vote for him? I did last time because I feared a Corbyn lead government. I don’t fear SKS, but neither has he given me any particular reason to vote for him yet. I think of all politicians as flawed in one or more ways and I usually vote against the side I don’t want to win rather than for the one I do. This means that so far Boris has done what I wanted him to: kept JC and those like him out of power.
Jeremy Corbyn had many Jewish supporters. That did not stop him being an anti-Semite. Boris Johnson said Barack Obama was anti-British because his Dad was a Kenyan. He said that Africans would be better off ruled by Europeans. He described them as picaninnies with water melon smiles. These are not ill-chosen words, they reveal a mindset. Just as Corbyn's words do.
As a new report commissioned by CMO warns of possible huge spike in flu deaths this winter, how long before Johnson's government is demanding we all have flu vaccine and show our vaccine status via their tracking app?
Step by step by are being walked into a permanent state of biosecurity and lack of freedom.
I don’t know the detail, but would I be wrong in thinking that this “possible flu spike” is based on a model with a range of scenarios from “another mild winter, possibly linked to increased working from home, greater reluctance to leave the house when ill, higher vaccine take-up, and a level of mask wearing”, to “a repeat of the 1968 flu” (or worse)?
Probably the same model they produce at this stage every summer (perhaps even with better “best case scenarios” due to factors raised above.
We need to be very careful about "the more intelligent you are, the more you see through Liar" arguments. There are plenty of working class people who are street smart in ways that double first at Oxford types are not. What for me seems clear is that people have been led away from their own interests by this shit Pied Piper, and that they're already questioning where the journey is taking them.
Hasn't fed through into polls or results yet - in part because Labour still repel them - but there is growing disquiet as various polls asking questions other than voting intent show. Ultimately we know this will go wrong for Johnson because like Trump he now believes his own lies, and at some point he is going to trip over himself badly.
Final point. There are some very well educated Clown Apologists on here. What is their excuse?
They are older?
I don’t see The PM as the British equivalent of Trump as some do.
He is a flawed person, yes, particularly when it comes to his approach to the truth and to details (I suspect a lot of his lies are because he haven’t paid enough attention to know what the answer actually is so he just makes something up).
But a number of the attacks are much less well founded. He is condemned as a racist for some ill chosen words in newspaper articles while he has the most ethnically diverse cabinet in our history. He is attacked over Brexit essentially because he won; there are many who will never forgive him for that.
Would I vote for him? I did last time because I feared a Corbyn lead government. I don’t fear SKS, but neither has he given me any particular reason to vote for him yet. I think of all politicians as flawed in one or more ways and I usually vote against the side I don’t want to win rather than for the one I do. This means that so far Boris has done what I wanted him to: kept JC and those like him out of power.
I think that Johnson is unprincipled and faithless, but that's nothing unusual in politics. I don't approve of him, but I don't get partciularly worked up about him, either. @Cyclefree makes a lot of excellent points about the shortcomings of administration in both the public and private sectors, but I don't believe that I'm living in the kind of hell hole that some posters here believe this country to be.
Road pricing.... that's another thing that got the electorate absolutely steaming when it was talked about 15 years ago.
Talk of higher taxes on fuel / airplane travel, road pricing, id cards, those 3 things seemed to really piss a lot of people off when Labour was in power. Hence why the second two got ditched.
Maybe things have changed now among the electorate in regards to this. We will see.
It hasn't but if get £800 a car from duty on fuel and need to get that money from somewhere there really isn't that many options.
Road pricing will have to be investigated as the other options are worse in different ways
Fuel was taxed because fuel had externalities and was environmentally toxic.
Now that drivers are switching away from fuel, there seems to be a desire to keep raising revenues from drivers rather than simply accept that fuel has gone and that society as a whole needs to pay for its costs.
Its like having if smokers all quit smoking placing a tax on ex-smokers to replace tobacco taxes.
Motorists should still pay some form of tax to, as a bare minimum, fund the road network.
Absolutely that is reasonable. VED raises nearly as much as is spent on the roads. Fuel duty raises about £40bn more than is spent on the roads.
Keeping VED and having approximately half a penny per kWh would replace all of fuel duty and be "fair". Drivers would be paying via when they refuel their electric cars and would still pay more tax from that than is spent on roads - but the rest of society would pay its fair share too.
again - adding it the electricity isn't fair on those who don't have a car, it's regressive because it impacts people who don't currently pay that tax.
And it needs to raise £28bn to offset the tax fuel duty collects (2019/20 figure - last years was surprisingly £21bn)
Just because the justification for the tax has gone that doesn't mean the need for the money disappears.
Why's it unfair on those who don't have a car? Considering almost all of the money raised isn't spent on the roads, why should they be exempt from paying taxes?
The need for the money to fund the NHS or pensions or whatever else you want to spend on is not the same as the need for the money to come from drivers.
And taxing driving is far more regressive than taxing electricity. Poor drivers pay an estimated 10% of their disposable income on fuel duty, that's currently justified due to the green externalities on fuel but if they cease to use fuel why should they remain so heavily taxed?
They aren't exempt from paying taxes but you've just increased the level of tax on the very poorest people in society.
Oh and unless I'm missing something the tax on each kwh needs to be 73p not 0.5p... 0.5p would raise £185m
The very poorest in society are being taxed more thanks to fuel duty if they drive.
Do you think that its right that some of the poorest in society are paying 10% of their disposable income to fuel duty while some considerably wealthier in society are getting the state funding their train journeys? If the externalities of fuel are removed by drivers switching to clean vehicles, why is it right that such a regressive situation should continue?
I'll take your word for it on the kwh. Last time we discussed this, that number was calculated and seemed to be accepted by all in the discussion and I'm just going from memory but I don't have time now to go through the calculations again.
Road pricing.... that's another thing that got the electorate absolutely steaming when it was talked about 15 years ago.
Talk of higher taxes on fuel / airplane travel, road pricing, id cards, those 3 things seemed to really piss a lot of people off when Labour was in power. Hence why the second two got ditched.
Maybe things have changed now among the electorate in regards to this. We will see.
It hasn't but if get £800 a car from duty on fuel and need to get that money from somewhere there really isn't that many options.
Road pricing will have to be investigated as the other options are worse in different ways
Fuel was taxed because fuel had externalities and was environmentally toxic.
Now that drivers are switching away from fuel, there seems to be a desire to keep raising revenues from drivers rather than simply accept that fuel has gone and that society as a whole needs to pay for its costs.
Its like having if smokers all quit smoking placing a tax on ex-smokers to replace tobacco taxes.
Motorists should still pay some form of tax to, as a bare minimum, fund the road network.
Absolutely that is reasonable. VED raises nearly as much as is spent on the roads. Fuel duty raises about £40bn more than is spent on the roads.
Keeping VED and having approximately half a penny per kWh would replace all of fuel duty and be "fair". Drivers would be paying via when they refuel their electric cars and would still pay more tax from that than is spent on roads - but the rest of society would pay its fair share too.
again - adding it the electricity isn't fair on those who don't have a car, it's regressive because it impacts people who don't currently pay that tax.
And it needs to raise £28bn to offset the tax fuel duty collects (2019/20 figure - last years was surprisingly £21bn)
Just because the justification for the tax has gone that doesn't mean the need for the money disappears.
Why's it unfair on those who don't have a car? Considering almost all of the money raised isn't spent on the roads, why should they be exempt from paying taxes?
The need for the money to fund the NHS or pensions or whatever else you want to spend on is not the same as the need for the money to come from drivers.
And taxing driving is far more regressive than taxing electricity. Poor drivers pay an estimated 10% of their disposable income on fuel duty, that's currently justified due to the green externalities on fuel but if they cease to use fuel why should they remain so heavily taxed?
They aren't exempt from paying taxes but you've just increased the level of tax on the very poorest people in society.
Oh and unless I'm missing something the tax on each kwh needs to be 8p not 0.5p... 0.5p would raise £1.8bn
The very poorest in society are being taxed more thanks to fuel duty if they drive.
Do you think that its right that some of the poorest in society are paying 10% of their disposable income to fuel duty while some considerably wealthier in society are getting the state funding their train journeys? If the externalities of fuel are removed by drivers switching to clean vehicles, why is it right that such a regressive situation should continue?
I'll take your word for it on the kwh. Last time we discussed this, that number was calculated and seemed to be accepted by all in the discussion and I'm just going from memory but I don't have time now to go through the calculations again.
Oh I just went to google asked for the UK's 2020 electricity consumption figures and did some maths. and discovered I missed placed a zero
It's 8p that needs to be added not 73p but that's still a 50% increase in electricity prices...
Now advantage is that is doable but it means those with cars are going to be taxed twice and you can't remove fuel duty as longer term we need those cars off the road.
No mention of the poll that shoes Labour is starting to lose the black vote... so long it's bedrock.. it was on Sky the other day. Diane Abott says she isn't worried.. so Labour should be....
There definitely something of a rebellion, among those minorities who don’t subscribe to the woke BLM narrative that people should be treated according to the colour of their skin, rather than the content of their character.
There does seem to be a big shift underway among Indian voters, at any rate. Harrow East now looks as though it's reverted to being a safe Conservative seat. The Conservative leads in Hendon and Finchley & Golders Green aren't driven solely by Jewish voters, but by Indian voters as well. Brent North saw a sizeable swing against Labour last time, as did two Leicester seats.
Leicester West swung Tory as the more WWC part of the city over Brexit. Leicester East was mostly a rejection of Webbe parachuted in over the local party, resented it. For all his faults, Vaz was a good constituency MP. Leicester South is dominated by the Universities, and now is the safest rather than most marginal of the Labour seats.
I agree though that ethnic patterns of voting are being eroded. All over society the tectonic plates of politics are reshaping. Ethnicity included. Not least it shows how ethnic communities are integrated into British life, the very opposite of what Enoch predicted.
As a new report commissioned by CMO warns of possible huge spike in flu deaths this winter, how long before Johnson's government is demanding we all have flu vaccine and show our vaccine status via their tracking app?
Step by step by are being walked into a permanent state of biosecurity and lack of freedom.
I don’t know the detail, but would I be wrong in thinking that this “possible flu spike” is based on a model with a range of scenarios from “another mild winter, possibly linked to increased working from home, greater reluctance to leave the house when ill, higher vaccine take-up, and a level of mask wearing”, to “a repeat of the 1968 flu” (or worse)?
Probably the same model they produce at this stage every summer (perhaps even with better “best case scenarios” due to factors raised above.
You are probably right. It's not the detail of the model or its conclusions that bothers me. It's what ministers will do in a panic of over caution as a response. They have spent so long fighting in the covid trenches that they are proposing stuff they not only powerfully objected to before they became ministers, but stuff they rejected only weeks ago.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
North East, North West and Midlands have more jobs now than they did before the pandemic began? 😲
But those uneducation dumb northerners oop north don't know what they're doing swinging to Boris.
Maybe they are being confused by their 8% wage increases, the idiots.
To the point the cartoon is offensive you merely simpered ‘so is she’, a tacit justification.
No
The cartoon does not rely on her gender or ethnicity to make its point.
She said and did stupid things. If another politician had done and said the same things the cartoon would have been equally valid.
She shouldn't be in the cabinet. Not because of her gender. Not because of her ethnicity. Because of her actions.
Why are you so keen to defend all of the nasty things she does by claiming misogyny or racism where none exist?
I have no admiration for Priti Patel but that cartoon is offensive in many ways and I just cannot understand anyone who can even try to excuse it
I can't stand Priti, but that cartoon is offensive in so many ways.
She is thick, she is a bully, she is way out of her depth dealing with complex issues and possibly the worst Home Secretary that I can remember.
That cartoon though is just wrong.
She brings out the worst in cartoonists, there was one a couple of years back from the unfunny bloke at the guardian which knocks this into a cocked hat.
Leaving aside the costs to business does anyone actually understand the supposed purpose of “vaccine passports (for domestic hospitality etc”?
Is it to protect the unvaccinated or the vaccinated? If it’s the latter then the message needs to be made more strongly that protection comes from the vaccine, not from avoiding contact with unvaccinated (and possibly infected) people. If the latter, the message should be that you are acting at your own risk and you should get vaccinated.
It seems to me that the only real purpose is to reduce problems due to mandatory self isolation for all. Which is a stupid policy which is going anyway.
By the way, taking a snide pop at educated people for daring to oppose The Leader really is the end of civilisation. It's everything that totalitarian regimes aspire to in herding unthinking masses along the great cause.
Dystopia Now.
Fortunately the wheels are already coming off the Boris Johnson bandwagon. He's too much of a serial liar for it to have stuck around for longer. Someone more wily (Tony Blair for instance) would have got away with it for a lot longer.
People confuse educated for intelligent.
People educated in the University of Life frequently make that point. It is not wrong, of course, but ...
However experience has taught me that University of Life alumni can remain as totally devoid of common sense as some of us who attended Russell Group Universities.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
Alternatively, the Furlough scheme is ending and people are returning to jobs that have not been "created" but are resuming. That said there are certainly a lot vacancies out there right now. The issue is whether they will be filled and what happens if they are not.
So the issue has changed from mass unemployment to we don't have enough people to fill the jobs in a booming economy. Do you think the Government deserves any praise for this remarkable turn round in the jobs market?
I think booming economy is pushing it! Any praise the government may deserve should be reserved for the point when we can see that its decision to make vacancies so much harder to fill has ended up benefiting the economy.
Road pricing.... that's another thing that got the electorate absolutely steaming when it was talked about 15 years ago.
Talk of higher taxes on fuel / airplane travel, road pricing, id cards, those 3 things seemed to really piss a lot of people off when Labour was in power. Hence why the second two got ditched.
Maybe things have changed now among the electorate in regards to this. We will see.
It hasn't but if get £800 a car from duty on fuel and need to get that money from somewhere there really isn't that many options.
Road pricing will have to be investigated as the other options are worse in different ways
Fuel was taxed because fuel had externalities and was environmentally toxic.
Now that drivers are switching away from fuel, there seems to be a desire to keep raising revenues from drivers rather than simply accept that fuel has gone and that society as a whole needs to pay for its costs.
Its like having if smokers all quit smoking placing a tax on ex-smokers to replace tobacco taxes.
Motorists should still pay some form of tax to, as a bare minimum, fund the road network.
Absolutely that is reasonable. VED raises nearly as much as is spent on the roads. Fuel duty raises about £40bn more than is spent on the roads.
Keeping VED and having approximately half a penny per kWh would replace all of fuel duty and be "fair". Drivers would be paying via when they refuel their electric cars and would still pay more tax from that than is spent on roads - but the rest of society would pay its fair share too.
again - adding it the electricity isn't fair on those who don't have a car, it's regressive because it impacts people who don't currently pay that tax.
And it needs to raise £28bn to offset the tax fuel duty collects (2019/20 figure - last years was surprisingly £21bn)
Just because the justification for the tax has gone that doesn't mean the need for the money disappears.
Why's it unfair on those who don't have a car? Considering almost all of the money raised isn't spent on the roads, why should they be exempt from paying taxes?
The need for the money to fund the NHS or pensions or whatever else you want to spend on is not the same as the need for the money to come from drivers.
And taxing driving is far more regressive than taxing electricity. Poor drivers pay an estimated 10% of their disposable income on fuel duty, that's currently justified due to the green externalities on fuel but if they cease to use fuel why should they remain so heavily taxed?
They aren't exempt from paying taxes but you've just increased the level of tax on the very poorest people in society.
Oh and unless I'm missing something the tax on each kwh needs to be 73p not 0.5p... 0.5p would raise £185m
Tax things you want less of, tax exempt (or subsidise) things you want more of. Price in externalities.
Most damage caused to roads is by HGVs, especially on local roads. We don’t want that. So tax the balls off them, if necessary to be replaced by smaller vehicles. Costs won’t change too much when the drivers disappear.
Things we don’t want: congestion. Things we do want: mobility. So dynamic road pricing. No need to tax the rural driver popping to the local shop. Meanwhile the person driving to Harrods…
We don’t like air pollution, noise and carbon emissions. So grade tax for all three.
We also don’t like inefficient capital allocation to underused assets. So incentivise car sharing by applying a zero income tax band to income from sharing your car. Will be even more important when autonomous driving gets here.
On topic I think it is unwise to try to say the higher educated are morally and in many ways superior to those with less educational achievements
This attitude just increases division and those highly educated should have much more empathy to the millions who are not
Turning to Boris, he has had a shocking few days and looks haunted
I have no idea whether he is suffering from long covid or just simply not enjoying the job but surely this cannot continue
There is an element in the conservative party who are so out of touch they can make idiotic public statements like Natalie Elphicke and others and just do not get it
England is a fantastic example of our country 's diversification and Marcus Rashford is an outstanding example of a talented footballer, but one who suffered terribly as a child with poverty and lack of food, and has used his experiences to waken politicians to this important issue is to be celebrated and I for one admire him in so many ways not least because he has always made the issue with him as non political
I know I am a minority in the conservative party but I do support the £20 UC uplift, free school meals, and ending the triple lock
As others have said, there are no acceptable political parties for me as I do want covid beaten, brexit trade deals expanded, and the party is far the best for the economy
The day Boris stands down will be the opportunity to reset the party and the sooner the better
I would never argue that the better educated are in any way morally superior to others. Going from a Scottish comprehensive school to an elite University, with a year off in between where I worked full time in a restaurant at £1.80 an hour, I had never come across people as arrogant, entitled and incurious as I found at University.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
Alternatively, the Furlough scheme is ending and people are returning to jobs that have not been "created" but are resuming. That said there are certainly a lot vacancies out there right now. The issue is whether they will be filled and what happens if they are not.
So the issue has changed from mass unemployment to we don't have enough people to fill the jobs in a booming economy. Do you think the Government deserves any praise for this remarkable turn round in the jobs market?
I think booming economy is pushing it! Any praise the government may deserve should be reserved for the point when we can see that its decision to make vacancies so much harder to fill has ended up benefiting the economy.
I don't think booming is pushing it at all. The jobs data this morning highlights this. There is no way Labour will be talking about the economy over the coming year.
Leaving aside the costs to business does anyone actually understand the supposed purpose of “vaccine passports (for domestic hospitality etc”?
Is it to protect the unvaccinated or the vaccinated? If it’s the latter then the message needs to be made more strongly that protection comes from the vaccine, not from avoiding contact with unvaccinated (and possibly infected) people. If the latter, the message should be that you are acting at your own risk and you should get vaccinated.
It seems to me that the only real purpose is to reduce problems due to mandatory self isolation for all. Which is a stupid policy which is going anyway.
As I pointed out yesterday 46% of men between 18 and 30 in Tayside have not been vaccinated at all. Something just under 7m adults have not been vaccinated in the UK. This is a clear and obvious medical risk and will create a pool of infection, hospitalisation and death going forward. Pretty much all of these people will now have been offered a vaccine but have declined or not bothered.
Do we (a) think that current rates are actually top of the class internationally and accept this risk or (b) try to incentivise the laggards to get their jabs after all? The government is opting for (b) and they are right to do so.
Road pricing.... that's another thing that got the electorate absolutely steaming when it was talked about 15 years ago.
Talk of higher taxes on fuel / airplane travel, road pricing, id cards, those 3 things seemed to really piss a lot of people off when Labour was in power. Hence why the second two got ditched.
Maybe things have changed now among the electorate in regards to this. We will see.
It hasn't but if get £800 a car from duty on fuel and need to get that money from somewhere there really isn't that many options.
Road pricing will have to be investigated as the other options are worse in different ways
Fuel was taxed because fuel had externalities and was environmentally toxic.
Now that drivers are switching away from fuel, there seems to be a desire to keep raising revenues from drivers rather than simply accept that fuel has gone and that society as a whole needs to pay for its costs.
Its like having if smokers all quit smoking placing a tax on ex-smokers to replace tobacco taxes.
Motorists should still pay some form of tax to, as a bare minimum, fund the road network.
Absolutely that is reasonable. VED raises nearly as much as is spent on the roads. Fuel duty raises about £40bn more than is spent on the roads.
Keeping VED and having approximately half a penny per kWh would replace all of fuel duty and be "fair". Drivers would be paying via when they refuel their electric cars and would still pay more tax from that than is spent on roads - but the rest of society would pay its fair share too.
again - adding it the electricity isn't fair on those who don't have a car, it's regressive because it impacts people who don't currently pay that tax.
And it needs to raise £28bn to offset the tax fuel duty collects (2019/20 figure - last years was surprisingly £21bn)
Just because the justification for the tax has gone that doesn't mean the need for the money disappears.
Why's it unfair on those who don't have a car? Considering almost all of the money raised isn't spent on the roads, why should they be exempt from paying taxes?
The need for the money to fund the NHS or pensions or whatever else you want to spend on is not the same as the need for the money to come from drivers.
And taxing driving is far more regressive than taxing electricity. Poor drivers pay an estimated 10% of their disposable income on fuel duty, that's currently justified due to the green externalities on fuel but if they cease to use fuel why should they remain so heavily taxed?
They aren't exempt from paying taxes but you've just increased the level of tax on the very poorest people in society.
Oh and unless I'm missing something the tax on each kwh needs to be 73p not 0.5p... 0.5p would raise £185m
Tax things you want less of, tax exempt (or subsidise) things you want more of. Price in externalities.
Most damage caused to roads is by HGVs, especially on local roads. We don’t want that. So tax the balls off them, if necessary to be replaced by smaller vehicles. Costs won’t change too much when the drivers disappear.
Things we don’t want: congestion. Things we do want: mobility. So dynamic road pricing. No need to tax the rural driver popping to the local shop. Meanwhile the person driving to Harrods…
We don’t like air pollution, noise and carbon emissions. So grade tax for all three.
We also don’t like inefficient capital allocation to underused assets. So incentivise car sharing by applying a zero income tax band to income from sharing your car. Will be even more important when autonomous driving gets here.
Think that’s it.
Unless you know something I don't (and I watch automation like a hawk) we aren't going to see fully automated driving anytime soon.
As a new report commissioned by CMO warns of possible huge spike in flu deaths this winter, how long before Johnson's government is demanding we all have flu vaccine and show our vaccine status via their tracking app?
Step by step by are being walked into a permanent state of biosecurity and lack of freedom.
I don’t know the detail, but would I be wrong in thinking that this “possible flu spike” is based on a model with a range of scenarios from “another mild winter, possibly linked to increased working from home, greater reluctance to leave the house when ill, higher vaccine take-up, and a level of mask wearing”, to “a repeat of the 1968 flu” (or worse)?
Probably the same model they produce at this stage every summer (perhaps even with better “best case scenarios” due to factors raised above.
You are probably right. It's not the detail of the model or its conclusions that bothers me. It's what ministers will do in a panic of over caution as a response. They have spent so long fighting in the covid trenches that they are proposing stuff they not only powerfully objected to before they became ministers, but stuff they rejected only weeks ago.
Johnson's cabinet have lost the plot frankly.
Meanwhile at the other extreme US politicians are increasingly proposing to re-introduce vaccine controlled childhood illnesses across their states, and right wing crazy “news” programmes are arguing against vaccination as interfering with natural selection (which of course they don’t believe in...)
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
Alternatively, the Furlough scheme is ending and people are returning to jobs that have not been "created" but are resuming. That said there are certainly a lot vacancies out there right now. The issue is whether they will be filled and what happens if they are not.
No, those on furlough are and always have been employed. This is the re-engagement of those who were not lucky enough to be on furlough schemes either because they were casual labour or their employer went bust.
By the Autumn statement, if it is in December as usual, we will have: record employment; an economy that is just about as large as it was pre-Covid, probably slightly larger; the largest increase in real wages for the lower paid, well, ever; and a very rapidly growing economy.
There will of course be some downsides: debt will be at record levels, public spending will be at a larger than healthy part of the economy, our rapid growth is likely suck in imports and there will no doubt be some minor interruptions in trade for @Scott_P to point to but it will be a pretty phenomenal report card in the circumstances.
But haters got to hate.
FWIW, I don't hate Johnson. Life is far to short for that. But I do profoundly dislike his lies, grift and racism, as well as his moves to dismantle the current checks and balances that safeguard our democracy.
The comments are rather mixed to say the least...e.g. FT journalist.
This is thoroughly unpleasant. I've written plenty of stories that have been fiercely critical of the Home Office during Patel's time there but this is an abhorrent image.
Certainly puts into perspective 'the poor have to go to McDonalds because cooking takes too long' claims on here.
The UK is a country full of starving kids who are overweight because their parents are too poor to buy cheap vegetables, or don't know how to boil a carrot because they were not shown at school, which as with everything else is the Governments fault.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
North East, North West and Midlands have more jobs now than they did before the pandemic began? 😲
But those uneducation dumb northerners oop north don't know what they're doing swinging to Boris.
Maybe they are being confused by their 8% wage increases, the idiots.
In other news, I called corruption. Outrageous said the Clown Apologists. And now that Mancock can be used as the scapegoat for all failings what do leaked emails show?
A pretty weak case from the Guardian. The AHT (Animal Health Trust) in Hancock's constituency was introduced by Hancock but after that, was not given a contract anyway.
As a new report commissioned by CMO warns of possible huge spike in flu deaths this winter, how long before Johnson's government is demanding we all have flu vaccine and show our vaccine status via their tracking app?
Step by step by are being walked into a permanent state of biosecurity and lack of freedom.
I don’t know the detail, but would I be wrong in thinking that this “possible flu spike” is based on a model with a range of scenarios from “another mild winter, possibly linked to increased working from home, greater reluctance to leave the house when ill, higher vaccine take-up, and a level of mask wearing”, to “a repeat of the 1968 flu” (or worse)?
Probably the same model they produce at this stage every summer (perhaps even with better “best case scenarios” due to factors raised above.
You are probably right. It's not the detail of the model or its conclusions that bothers me. It's what ministers will do in a panic of over caution as a response. They have spent so long fighting in the covid trenches that they are proposing stuff they not only powerfully objected to before they became ministers, but stuff they rejected only weeks ago.
Johnson's cabinet have lost the plot frankly.
Meanwhile at the other extreme US politicians are increasingly proposing to re-introduce vaccine controlled childhood illnesses across their states, and right wing crazy “news” programmes are arguing against vaccination as interfering with natural selection (which of course they don’t believe in...)
Upthread some said the educated are easy to con. The point is that Boris has deliberately found a way to, let’s be polite, play to the hearts of the less educated.
It’s a very successful act, but it is an act. Educated or not, once you see the act, it loses its potency and becomes a very cynical thing indeed.
Road pricing.... that's another thing that got the electorate absolutely steaming when it was talked about 15 years ago.
Talk of higher taxes on fuel / airplane travel, road pricing, id cards, those 3 things seemed to really piss a lot of people off when Labour was in power. Hence why the second two got ditched.
Maybe things have changed now among the electorate in regards to this. We will see.
It hasn't but if get £800 a car from duty on fuel and need to get that money from somewhere there really isn't that many options.
Road pricing will have to be investigated as the other options are worse in different ways
Fuel was taxed because fuel had externalities and was environmentally toxic.
Now that drivers are switching away from fuel, there seems to be a desire to keep raising revenues from drivers rather than simply accept that fuel has gone and that society as a whole needs to pay for its costs.
Its like having if smokers all quit smoking placing a tax on ex-smokers to replace tobacco taxes.
Motorists should still pay some form of tax to, as a bare minimum, fund the road network.
Absolutely that is reasonable. VED raises nearly as much as is spent on the roads. Fuel duty raises about £40bn more than is spent on the roads.
Keeping VED and having approximately half a penny per kWh would replace all of fuel duty and be "fair". Drivers would be paying via when they refuel their electric cars and would still pay more tax from that than is spent on roads - but the rest of society would pay its fair share too.
again - adding it the electricity isn't fair on those who don't have a car, it's regressive because it impacts people who don't currently pay that tax.
And it needs to raise £28bn to offset the tax fuel duty collects (2019/20 figure - last years was surprisingly £21bn)
Just because the justification for the tax has gone that doesn't mean the need for the money disappears.
Why's it unfair on those who don't have a car? Considering almost all of the money raised isn't spent on the roads, why should they be exempt from paying taxes?
The need for the money to fund the NHS or pensions or whatever else you want to spend on is not the same as the need for the money to come from drivers.
And taxing driving is far more regressive than taxing electricity. Poor drivers pay an estimated 10% of their disposable income on fuel duty, that's currently justified due to the green externalities on fuel but if they cease to use fuel why should they remain so heavily taxed?
They aren't exempt from paying taxes but you've just increased the level of tax on the very poorest people in society.
Oh and unless I'm missing something the tax on each kwh needs to be 73p not 0.5p... 0.5p would raise £185m
The very poorest in society are being taxed more thanks to fuel duty if they drive.
Do you think that its right that some of the poorest in society are paying 10% of their disposable income to fuel duty while some considerably wealthier in society are getting the state funding their train journeys? If the externalities of fuel are removed by drivers switching to clean vehicles, why is it right that such a regressive situation should continue?
I'll take your word for it on the kwh. Last time we discussed this, that number was calculated and seemed to be accepted by all in the discussion and I'm just going from memory but I don't have time now to go through the calculations again.
The very poorest in society tend not to have cars.
In June 2018 Ipsos-MORI had Jeremy Corbyn's Labour ahead of Theresa May's Tories by 43% to 32% among those geniuses with degrees. The more voters are educated, the more likely they are to support Marxists.
On-topic: this is excellent for Johnson then, because the population is becoming ever less educated. I didn't believe a friend of mine when she told me that most people these days don't do joined-up handwriting, but when I checked everything I'd received recently that was handwritten I found that every single item was written with the letters "printed". That explains the vibes I got in a car garage when they asked me to write a description of the problems they should take a look at and I wrote 5-6 lines of joined-up writing, consisting of sentences each beginning with a capital letter and ending with a full stop.
Meanwhile exam boards and headteachers have had analogue clocks removed from exam rooms, because so few 16-year-olds know how to tell the time. (Source.) If an exam is due to end at 1.05pm and the small hand is now between 12 and 1 and the big hand is at 10, it's too hard for many of them to work out that they've got 15 minutes left. They can't half pick those little handheld computer terminals they carry, though.
The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover.
The number of payroll employees showed another monthly increase, up 356,000 in June 2021 to 28.9 million. However, it remains 206,000 below pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic levels. For the first time since the beginning of the pandemic, some regions are now above pre-pandemic (February 2020) levels. These include North East, North West, East Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Following a period of employment growth and low unemployment, since the start of the pandemic, the employment rate has generally decreased, and the unemployment rate increased. However, since the end of 2020 both have shown signs of recovery. In the latest period (March to May 2021), there was an increase in the employment rate of 0.1 percentage points, to 74.8%, and a decrease in the unemployment rate of 0.2 percentage points, to 4.8%. The economic inactivity rate is up 0.1 percentage points on the previous quarter, to 21.3%.
It's incredible isn't it? Brexit has destroyed the economy, the country is a pariah, the government's policies are, well choose between useless, incompetent and shameful, and we create 356k jobs in a month and is doing particularly well in NI. Next month employment will exceed the pre Covid level but Sunak will no doubt still be a, checks thread, "clown" and Boris totally incompetent.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
Alternatively, the Furlough scheme is ending and people are returning to jobs that have not been "created" but are resuming. That said there are certainly a lot vacancies out there right now. The issue is whether they will be filled and what happens if they are not.
So the issue has changed from mass unemployment to we don't have enough people to fill the jobs in a booming economy. Do you think the Government deserves any praise for this remarkable turn round in the jobs market?
I think booming economy is pushing it! Any praise the government may deserve should be reserved for the point when we can see that its decision to make vacancies so much harder to fill has ended up benefiting the economy.
I don't think booming is pushing it at all. The jobs data this morning highlights this. There is no way Labour will be talking about the economy over the coming year.
Oh I think they will.
I am not sure how we return from 12 months of absolute inactivity without any economic downsides. Inflationary pressures which we are seeing now followed by interest rate increases could be over the horizon. Did you not read about John Lewis yesterday?
I have seen a post-lockdown "boom" (which has set me up to Christmas, but new orders are now quieter than I would have expected pre-pandemic).
It feels like we do this every few weeks....need to be adjusted to consider age.
That is a factor but the big expansion of UK higher education was triggered in 1962 following the Robbins report. If you were 18 then you are now 77. I was part of one of the first generations to benefit.
In 1980, it with still just 15%, 1990, it was only 25%. Its basically double that now.
Without adjusting for this, simplistic degree / no degree is strongly a proxy for age.
Chicken and egg but as long as long as voters remain poorly educated the Tories are in with a chance.
In June 2018 Ipsos-MORI had Jeremy Corbyn's Labour ahead of Theresa May's Tories by 43% to 32% among those geniuses with degrees. The more voters are educated, the more likely they are to support Marxists.
I presume that there's a correlation between age and qualifications. So this is just showing that the young are more likely to support the left? (A point I imagine may have already been made below)
Comments
The Brexit referendum comment isn't an objective statement of fact. That's your viewpoint.
Likewise 'he got a far superior Brexit deal to May's.' It's becoming completely obvious to everyone outside of the far right that this is incorrect. Her deal was economically far superior for the UK on every issue going. Politically it comes down to your stance on Brexit itself. Most commentators* can see the disaster evolving with Northern Ireland and realise that her deal was far more elegant a solution. Boris Johnson is going to be responsible for the breakup of the union. Brilliant.
* But then someone posted here the other day that you would be delighted to see the Troubles return to Northern Ireland as a price worth paying for Brexit? Wow. Just wow.
Patel seems fair game to be targeted on her ethnicity and religion and it is not on. There was the guardian cartoon featuring her, a Hindu, as a bull. It’s wrong. I also find it unpleasant that she alone seems to be the one on the receiving end over this when boris and many others have said the same or worse.
She never said she agreed with the booing she just didn’t condemn it and said,correctly, people have a right to boo which they do.
Still, if swearing at me for pointing it out makes you feel happy feel free to. Perhaps you can find a twitter link to an oh so hilarious Marina Hyde column ?
Rose had never really been involved in politics before, and made the schoolboy error of speaking to the audience (of business leaders) in the room, rather than the wider public.
Angry this morning.
National digital id and mass tracking comes a step close this morning. We need to wake up to what Johnson's government are planning. First it was large events and night clubs, now bars and restaurants. If you don't want to live in a biosecurity state then we must resist this now.
Restaurants, pubs and bars urged to consider using Covid passports
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/07/14/restaurants-pubs-bars-should-check-covid-passports-says-government/
Steve Baker: "I am simply astonished that, after everything the Prime Minister and Michael Gove said in the past about ID cards, they are advancing this fast down this really quite appalling path."
I don't like her politics though, and that's the reason I won't vote for her.
What is driving it, I wonder? I can think of a few things. Firstly, a University education tends to be associated with the kind of liberal values that Johnson's studied populism is designed to offend (the Brexit factor fits in here too). Second, pursuing an education is a search for truth, and Johnson's persistent lying is therefore offensive. Third, one reason for obtaining an education is to transcend the feudal vestiges of Britain's class system, and so the better educated are less likely to be impressed by Johnson's officer class stylings. Fourth, one is exposed to a lot of public school chancers like Johnson at University, especially at certain Universities, and so we are more likely to see him for what he is. Finally, at University you tend to see what really smart people are like - they use language to enlighten, not to confuse, for instance - and so we peg Johnson for what he is - a stupid person's idea of what a smart person looks like.
It’s not an unreasonable comment and many people of my generation just didn’t have the opportunity to go to Uni. My education was vocational. HND.
The cartoon does not rely on her gender or ethnicity to make its point.
She said and did stupid things. If another politician had done and said the same things the cartoon would have been equally valid.
She shouldn't be in the cabinet. Not because of her gender. Not because of her ethnicity. Because of her actions.
Why are you so keen to defend all of the nasty things she does by claiming misogyny or racism where none exist?
It's worth noting that the Conservatives lead Labour by 28% among people without qualifications, 20% among people with other qualifications, and trail Labour by 12% among people with degrees, in this poll, compared to a 9% Conservative lead overall, and a 15% net dissatisfaction rating for Johnson.
Johnson's own rating, 39%, is in net negative territory, but not unusual for a Prime Minister. A lot of people who disapprove of the PM, and the government's record, still intend to vote Conservative. Again, that is not unusual, as generally, net approval ratings only move into positive territory around election times, for a winning government.
The electoral divide between people with and without degrees certainly predates Johnson. It's a feature of age, attitudes towards Brexit and related cultural issues, and the distinct culture of core cities
Step by step by are being walked into a permanent state of biosecurity and lack of freedom.
Of course all these incredibly well educated people will no doubt have factored this in. Who could doubt it?
Why are you so determined to deflect?
And to anyone who doesn't get this, you can be non-white and bloody racist. I've seen it all-too-often and there's a particularly nasty, thoroughly unpleasant, kind of self-made Conservative (often Asian) who doesn't give a shit about others who haven't made it.
Incidentally, the whole caste system is deeply racist.
And it needs to raise £28bn to offset the tax fuel duty collects (2019/20 figure - last years was surprisingly £21bn)
Just because the justification for the tax has gone that doesn't mean the need for the money disappears.
The slide in tory opinion polling is well underway. It's delightful to watch it and the increasingly shrill tory supporters on here as we all watch the inevitable.
That cartoon is vile and you merely,said ‘so is she’ as a justification. Your so keen on Twitter. Read the thread and educate yourself as to why it is problematic.
One thing I've learned from doing my MA is that I can't bullshit, can't wing it, can't dash off an essay at the last moment, and expect to get a pass. That's not true of a lot of first degrees (I don't think you can bullshit if you're doing hard science, but you can for a lot of others).
I don't think it is just a proxy for age, or universities being infested by marxists. Few students pay any attention to the student politicians and they are widely mocked and have been for decades.
Education is a proxy for SE class and geography too. Far more university educated in Amersham than Hartlepool. Indeed I recall that mean age in Amersham was slightly higher than Hartlepool.
Education is just one of the faultlines in our society. Where and how you live is a big predictor of voting.
Boris voted to repeal Section 28 in 2003, in favour of Civil Partnerships in 2004, and was according to Pink News "the highest ranking Tory" to be in favour of gay marriage in 2010 - years before Cameron 'came out' in favour of gay marriage: https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2010/07/03/exclusive-boris-johnson-fully-supports-gay-marriage-and-plans-to-run-again-for-mayor/
The Brexit referendum comment isn't just my viewpoint, its most of the nation's too.
That you think Boris's deal is inferior to Mays which was thrice rejected by Parliament just shows you're like Scott a hyperpartisan in the EU debate.
As for the Troubles that's not what I said. What I actually said was that if people turn to political violence then those responsible for doing so is the people being violent - and that the threat of violence is not a justification to overturn democratic votes. I stand by that 100% do you disagree with that?
But I have no hopes in that direction really. He will dither and then at last minute back Johnson.
Only Liberals can be relied on to be honest.
Diane Abott says she isn't worried.. so Labour should be....
OGH also correctly predicted that Labour would hold Batley & Spen against the odds and against what most other political commentators were saying, even members of the Labour Party.
So perhaps a little less of your crowing, hmmm?
The need for the money to fund the NHS or pensions or whatever else you want to spend on is not the same as the need for the money to come from drivers.
And taxing driving is far more regressive than taxing electricity. Poor drivers pay an estimated 10% of their disposable income on fuel duty, that's currently justified due to the green externalities on fuel but if they cease to use fuel why should they remain so heavily taxed?
Lets be clear. Both are BAME women and shit politicians. Most of the attacks on Abbott were her ludicrous gaffs, not her skin colour or gender, and frankly this cartoon with Patel is the same. They can't have some kind of "you can't touch them" rule because of their ethnicity or gender - that would be absurd.
Can I remind some of the faux sensitive that Patel was sacked for both carrying out her own private foreign policy and for lying about it. Collusion with a foreign power against the interests of the government whilst a member of it is pretty bad. She shouldn't be Home Secretary
She is thick, she is a bully, she is way out of her depth dealing with complex issues and possibly the worst Home Secretary that I can remember.
That cartoon though is just wrong.
No surprise there as Johnson is a disingenuous racist fat fornicator - i.e. a c*nt!
I don’t see The PM as the British equivalent of Trump as some do.
He is a flawed person, yes, particularly when it comes to his approach to the truth and to details (I suspect a lot of his lies are because he haven’t paid enough attention to know what the answer actually is so he just makes something up).
But a number of the attacks are much less well founded. He is condemned as a racist for some ill chosen words in newspaper articles while he has the most ethnically diverse cabinet in our history. He is attacked over Brexit essentially because he won; there are many who will never forgive him for that.
Would I vote for him? I did last time because I feared a Corbyn lead government. I don’t fear SKS, but neither has he given me any particular reason to vote for him yet. I think of all politicians as flawed in one or more ways and I usually vote against the side I don’t want to win rather than for the one I do. This means that so far Boris has done what I wanted him to: kept JC and those like him out of power.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/07/14/time-end-toxic-narrative-britain-racist-country/
There definitely something of a rebellion, among those minorities who don’t subscribe to the woke BLM narrative that people should be treated according to the colour of their skin, rather than the content of their character.
But those uneducation dumb northerners oop north don't know what they're doing swinging to Boris.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/15594841/sugar-salt-tax-plan-cost/
Sounds like the government are binning the Henry Dimbleby report calling for a snack tax. Says “you have to be very cautious before putting further burdens on people on low incomes.” #LBC
https://twitter.com/kateferguson4/status/1415566655367811074
Discerning PBers will recall the episode of The HollowMen describing exactly this scenario
Oh and unless I'm missing something the tax on each kwh needs to be 73p not 0.5p... 0.5p would raise £185m
By the Autumn statement, if it is in December as usual, we will have:
record employment;
an economy that is just about as large as it was pre-Covid, probably slightly larger;
the largest increase in real wages for the lower paid, well, ever; and
a very rapidly growing economy.
There will of course be some downsides: debt will be at record levels, public spending will be at a larger than healthy part of the economy, our rapid growth is likely suck in imports and there will no doubt be some minor interruptions in trade for @Scott_P to point to but it will be a pretty phenomenal report card in the circumstances.
But haters got to hate.
On topic I think it is unwise to try to say the higher educated are morally and in many ways superior to those with less educational achievements
This attitude just increases division and those highly educated should have much more empathy to the millions who are not
Turning to Boris, he has had a shocking few days and looks haunted
I have no idea whether he is suffering from long covid or just simply not enjoying the job but surely this cannot continue
There is an element in the conservative party who are so out of touch they can make idiotic public statements like Natalie Elphicke and others and just do not get it
England is a fantastic example of our country 's diversification and Marcus Rashford is an outstanding example of a talented footballer, but one who suffered terribly as a child with poverty and lack of food, and has used his experiences to waken politicians to this important issue is to be celebrated and I for one admire him in so many ways not least because he has always made the issue with him as non political
I know I am a minority in the conservative party but I do support the £20 UC uplift, free school meals, and ending the triple lock
As others have said, there are no acceptable political parties for me as I do want covid beaten, brexit trade deals expanded, and the party is far the best for the economy
The day Boris stands down will be the opportunity to reset the party and the sooner the better
Probably the same model they produce at this stage every summer (perhaps even with better “best case scenarios” due to factors raised above.
Do you think that its right that some of the poorest in society are paying 10% of their disposable income to fuel duty while some considerably wealthier in society are getting the state funding their train journeys? If the externalities of fuel are removed by drivers switching to clean vehicles, why is it right that such a regressive situation should continue?
I'll take your word for it on the kwh. Last time we discussed this, that number was calculated and seemed to be accepted by all in the discussion and I'm just going from memory but I don't have time now to go through the calculations again.
It's 8p that needs to be added not 73p but that's still a 50% increase in electricity prices...
Now advantage is that is doable but it means those with cars are going to be taxed twice and you can't remove fuel duty as longer term we need those cars off the road.
I agree though that ethnic patterns of voting are being eroded. All over society the tectonic plates of politics are reshaping. Ethnicity included. Not least it shows how ethnic communities are integrated into British life, the very opposite of what Enoch predicted.
Johnson's cabinet have lost the plot frankly.
Is it to protect the unvaccinated or the vaccinated? If it’s the latter then the message needs to be made more strongly that protection comes from the vaccine, not from avoiding contact with unvaccinated (and possibly infected) people. If the latter, the message should be that you are acting at your own risk and you should get vaccinated.
It seems to me that the only real purpose is to reduce problems due to mandatory self isolation for all. Which is a stupid policy which is going anyway.
Most damage caused to roads is by HGVs, especially on local roads. We don’t want that. So tax the balls off them, if necessary to be replaced by smaller vehicles. Costs won’t change too much when the drivers disappear.
Things we don’t want: congestion. Things we do want: mobility. So dynamic road pricing. No need to tax the rural driver popping to the local shop. Meanwhile the person driving to Harrods…
We don’t like air pollution, noise and carbon emissions. So grade tax for all three.
We also don’t like inefficient capital allocation to underused assets. So incentivise car sharing by applying a zero income tax band to income from sharing your car. Will be even more important when autonomous driving gets here.
Think that’s it.
https://youtu.be/FK-cSNAas2k?t=100
Certainly puts into perspective 'the poor have to go to McDonalds because cooking takes too long' claims on here.
The jobs data this morning highlights this.
There is no way Labour will be talking about the economy over the coming year.
Do we (a) think that current rates are actually top of the class internationally and accept this risk or (b) try to incentivise the laggards to get their jabs after all? The government is opting for (b) and they are right to do so.
Does IpsosMori poll how satisfaction with Johnson varies with the frequency of changing underwear?
Re:GCMG It was a bit obscure
He said he was “walking outside his swim lane” implying he was walking on water
As far as I’m aware only Jesus has walked on water
As he self evidently isn’t Jesus then perhaps he has a God delusion… since he is a civil servant I translated that as GCMG problem…
Legend.
It’s a very successful act, but it is an act. Educated or not, once you see the act, it loses its potency and becomes a very cynical thing indeed.
https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2018-07/pm-june-2018-tables2.pdf
Dr IshmaelZ MA Oxon MA Exon PhD
Meanwhile exam boards and headteachers have had analogue clocks removed from exam rooms, because so few 16-year-olds know how to tell the time. (Source.) If an exam is due to end at 1.05pm and the small hand is now between 12 and 1 and the big hand is at 10, it's too hard for many of them to work out that they've got 15 minutes left. They can't half pick those little handheld computer terminals they carry, though.
I am not sure how we return from 12 months of absolute inactivity without any economic downsides. Inflationary pressures which we are seeing now followed by interest rate increases could be over the horizon. Did you not read about John Lewis yesterday?
I have seen a post-lockdown "boom" (which has set me up to Christmas, but new orders are now quieter than I would have expected pre-pandemic).
I hope you are right.
No wonder they've appointed Gavin Williamson