Since Zak Crawley's 267 against Pakistan, he has scored 156 runs at an average of 11.1.
Oof, that's a drop in form alright!
Other than Bracey and Hameed, another possibility might be Nick Gubbins, although he more usually bats at 4.
Otherwise I don’t see lots of top order batsmen banging down the door for inclusion. Phil Salt perhaps, but he’s very hit and miss in first class cricket. If he continues his current form Ben Charlesworth might come into the reckoning in a year or so, but aged 20 and having not played for nine months due to injury, he won’t be coming in this summer.
If they recall Vince should the Ashes go ahead we’ll know they’re absolutely desperate.
Wine man thread. TLDR, it’s still a nightmare to import wine into the U.K. due to a failing logistics industry and complicated, country-by-country paperwork.
Definitely worth a read. I hadn't appreciated fully that it's not just motor car manufacturers who have to have much bigger stocks because of the much greater transit delays involved, but everyone else selling stuff from the EU (which makes sense if one thinks about it for about 30 seconds, raising interesting questions about UKG planning ...).
Thank you leave and tory voters for your marvellous 'brexit'.
At least if Scotland goes independent it will all be much easier and cause no disruption at all.
That’s right, isn’t it? Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon have both said it so it must be true as they never lie.
Not sure where you've gotten that from, if I had a vote I would have voted No in 2014.
At least in financial services, firms have been steadily reducing their operations in Scotland since 2014 and the handing over of extra powers to the Scottish Government, in anticipation of an eventual split.
It was gentle sarcasm and not particularly aimed at you.
One of the things that led me to vote Remain in 2016 was a realisation that pretty much every argument implausibly advanced for Scottish independence in 2014 was being advanced for leaving the EU as well.
Is there any data on whether the weather in London has been more extreme this year ?
I don't remember any other part of the country continually complaining.
What's your problem?
Who is continually complaining - the only thing I'm complaining about is some boring poster going on about how people in London are complaining about the weather?
No need to get touchy.
From April onwards PB has been treated to regular negative reports of the London weather.
I'm just asking if there is any meteorological data to back this up.
Because it doesn't seem to be happening elsewhere.
We are used to fabulous summers here in London, and are now having to suffer a northern summer thanks to Boris' levelling down agenda kicking in.
Serious point - does anyone in London actually want a hot summer ?
It must be pretty unpleasant because of the urban heat island effect combined with smaller homes and greater use of public transport.
Personally ambivalent about the use of staycation; thoroughly irritated, however, by the misuse of “carrot and stick”…
… on another subject, the Archbishop of York needs to have a long hard look at the Diocese of Leeds and ask why they need six bishops…
A Presbyterian would wonder why they need bishops at all, never mind something so centralising as archbishops and a London-based mortal as the head of the C of E (though I do understand that the Cantuar:/Ebor: division deviates from neat centralisation).
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
Didn't William Rees-Mogg write a Times leader predicting an imminent ice age based on the behaviour of snails in his garden? We shall not see his like again. Oh, actually....
Is there any data on whether the weather in London has been more extreme this year ?
I don't remember any other part of the country continually complaining.
What's your problem?
Who is continually complaining - the only thing I'm complaining about is some boring poster going on about how people in London are complaining about the weather?
No need to get touchy.
From April onwards PB has been treated to regular negative reports of the London weather.
I'm just asking if there is any meteorological data to back this up.
Because it doesn't seem to be happening elsewhere.
We are used to fabulous summers here in London, and are now having to suffer a northern summer thanks to Boris' levelling down agenda kicking in.
Lol - don't tell Scott'n'Paste - he'll think you mean it.
Is there any data on whether the weather in London has been more extreme this year ?
I don't remember any other part of the country continually complaining.
What's your problem?
Who is continually complaining - the only thing I'm complaining about is some boring poster going on about how people in London are complaining about the weather?
No need to get touchy.
From April onwards PB has been treated to regular negative reports of the London weather.
I'm just asking if there is any meteorological data to back this up.
Because it doesn't seem to be happening elsewhere.
We are used to fabulous summers here in London, and are now having to suffer a northern summer thanks to Boris' levelling down agenda kicking in.
More like his lack of a climate agenda.
I know, I know, not literally true much, he hasn't been in power long enough, but sooner or later the issue really will resonate. Maybe we should be hoping for another 3 months of this weather pattern - sun and showers here in Scotland, and repeated thunderstorms in the Home Counties - to encourage Mr Johnson to get his act together before November in Glasgow.
The purpose of Glasgow is to have Boris on the World Stage making detail-free meandering speeches. I know its called COP26 but we've had enough of experts or whatever.
Is there any data on whether the weather in London has been more extreme this year ?
I don't remember any other part of the country continually complaining.
What's your problem?
Who is continually complaining - the only thing I'm complaining about is some boring poster going on about how people in London are complaining about the weather?
No need to get touchy.
From April onwards PB has been treated to regular negative reports of the London weather.
I'm just asking if there is any meteorological data to back this up.
Because it doesn't seem to be happening elsewhere.
It makes a change about boasting of how wonderful London is , weather up her has been lovely and the shower last night was only rain we have had for more than a month , saves me watering garden today.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
Is there any data on whether the weather in London has been more extreme this year ?
I don't remember any other part of the country continually complaining.
What's your problem?
Who is continually complaining - the only thing I'm complaining about is some boring poster going on about how people in London are complaining about the weather?
No need to get touchy.
From April onwards PB has been treated to regular negative reports of the London weather.
I'm just asking if there is any meteorological data to back this up.
Because it doesn't seem to be happening elsewhere.
We are used to fabulous summers here in London, and are now having to suffer a northern summer thanks to Boris' levelling down agenda kicking in.
Serious point - does anyone in London actually want a hot summer ?
It must be pretty unpleasant because of the urban heat island effect combined with smaller homes and greater use of public transport.
20-28 mostly sunny would do me fine. This year one of the few mostly sunny spells was 30-35. According to my car London is generally about 3-4 degrees than countryside just outside the M25 so yes, it definitely can and does get too hot at times.
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Of course, as you well know, they already do but the essence is not the fact they do it but the fact central Government dictates how it should be done and also dictates how much funding is available for each authority.
It also means authorities are hugely limited in their capacity to raise additional funding through direct taxation.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
Is there any data on whether the weather in London has been more extreme this year ?
I don't remember any other part of the country continually complaining.
What's your problem?
Who is continually complaining - the only thing I'm complaining about is some boring poster going on about how people in London are complaining about the weather?
No need to get touchy.
From April onwards PB has been treated to regular negative reports of the London weather.
I'm just asking if there is any meteorological data to back this up.
Because it doesn't seem to be happening elsewhere.
It makes a change about boasting of how wonderful London is , weather up her has been lovely and the shower last night was only rain we have had for more than a month , saves me watering garden today.
My niece and family have had a week in West Kilbride, following their attendance at my sons wedding here in North Wales, celebrating her father and mother in laws golden wedding and the weather has been excellent, though that changed yesterday when she helped her daughter and partner move into their new flat in Glasgow and the heavens opened
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
Boris Johnson writing in the Telegraph, 25th October 2007:
"The world's population is now 6.7bn, roughly double what it was when I was born. If I live to be in my mid-eighties, then it will have trebled in my lifetime... I simply cannot understand why no one discusses this impending calamity, and why no world statesmen have the guts to treat the issue with the seriousness it deserves. How the hell can we witter on about tackling global warming, and reducing consumption, when we are continuing to add so relentlessly to the number of consumers? The answer is politics, and political cowardice... We seem to have given up on population control."
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
I suspect even that won't work/
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
It included the journalists working for New Scientist at the time.
But (presumably) simply reporting what was being mooted?
Even back then there were far more papers on warming than cooling.
Yes, but New Sci would have reported both. They were always fairly good at differentiating between straight journalistic reportage and review pieces, and articles actually written by the scientists active in a given field. More so than many newspapers.
Since Zak Crawley's 267 against Pakistan, he has scored 156 runs at an average of 11.1.
Oof, that's a drop in form alright!
Other than Bracey and Hameed, another possibility might be Nick Gubbins, although he more usually bats at 4.
Otherwise I don’t see lots of top order batsmen banging down the door for inclusion. Phil Salt perhaps, but he’s very hit and miss in first class cricket. If he continues his current form Ben Charlesworth might come into the reckoning in a year or so, but aged 20 and having not played for nine months due to injury, he won’t be coming in this summer.
If they recall Vince should the Ashes go ahead we’ll know they’re absolutely desperate.
Moeen Ali would probably make a better opener than our current ones at this rate.
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
I suspect even that won't work/
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
I haven’t heard many people with good words to say about any reorganisation of local or indeed National government. Which is why it seems to happen piecemeal, incompetently and more or less by accident faute de mieux.
That’s not to say there doesn’t need to be one. The county/district model from the 1970s simply isn’t working and the unitaries seem to me to be even worse.
Boris Johnson writing in the Telegraph, 25th October 2007:
"The world's population is now 6.7bn, roughly double what it was when I was born. If I live to be in my mid-eighties, then it will have trebled in my lifetime... I simply cannot understand why no one discusses this impending calamity, and why no world statesmen have the guts to treat the issue with the seriousness it deserves. How the hell can we witter on about tackling global warming, and reducing consumption, when we are continuing to add so relentlessly to the number of consumers? The answer is politics, and political cowardice... We seem to have given up on population control."
Mr. 86, aye, I was just referring to the general reverence when he did exactly the same thing as Schumacher did but Senna was almost always portrayed in a good light/as a true racer, and Schumacher, to an extent, vilified.
Ironically, Hamilton, who does exalt Senna, appears to be a better character (Verstappen crash was not deliberate, I think, unlike when Senna struck Prost).
I always thought of Schumacher and Senna similarly. Great drivers; poor sportsmen.
Senna was a man of contrasts; his actions towards Erik Comas were superb and caring.
Yet he was also willing to cause crashes to get what he wants. I was lucky enough to know Prof Watkins a little, and he seemed almost to love Senna. I think there may have been a personal magnetism about him that many other drivers lack.
Oh, the two were very different personalities - Senna more noticeably possessing one - but the two showed a similar disdain for the rules which applied to ordinary mortals.
Since Zak Crawley's 267 against Pakistan, he has scored 156 runs at an average of 11.1.
Oof, that's a drop in form alright!
Other than Bracey and Hameed, another possibility might be Nick Gubbins, although he more usually bats at 4.
Otherwise I don’t see lots of top order batsmen banging down the door for inclusion. Phil Salt perhaps, but he’s very hit and miss in first class cricket. If he continues his current form Ben Charlesworth might come into the reckoning in a year or so, but aged 20 and having not played for nine months due to injury, he won’t be coming in this summer.
If they recall Vince should the Ashes go ahead we’ll know they’re absolutely desperate.
Moeen Ali would probably make a better opener than our current ones at this rate.
I still can’t understand why he wasn’t given a year at no. 5 and told to justify his place as a batsman who bowled decidedly helpful extra overs with the old ball.
Since Zak Crawley's 267 against Pakistan, he has scored 156 runs at an average of 11.1.
Oof, that's a drop in form alright!
Other than Bracey and Hameed, another possibility might be Nick Gubbins, although he more usually bats at 4.
Otherwise I don’t see lots of top order batsmen banging down the door for inclusion. Phil Salt perhaps, but he’s very hit and miss in first class cricket. If he continues his current form Ben Charlesworth might come into the reckoning in a year or so, but aged 20 and having not played for nine months due to injury, he won’t be coming in this summer.
If they recall Vince should the Ashes go ahead we’ll know they’re absolutely desperate.
Moeen Ali would probably make a better opener than our current ones at this rate.
Boris Johnson writing in the Telegraph, 25th October 2007:
"The world's population is now 6.7bn, roughly double what it was when I was born. If I live to be in my mid-eighties, then it will have trebled in my lifetime... I simply cannot understand why no one discusses this impending calamity, and why no world statesmen have the guts to treat the issue with the seriousness it deserves. How the hell can we witter on about tackling global warming, and reducing consumption, when we are continuing to add so relentlessly to the number of consumers? The answer is politics, and political cowardice... We seem to have given up on population control."
From page 7 of this week's Private Eye.
Wow he called that one wrong. 👎
In retrospect the population explosion turned out to be the antidote to global cooling.
Boris Johnson writing in the Telegraph, 25th October 2007:
"The world's population is now 6.7bn, roughly double what it was when I was born. If I live to be in my mid-eighties, then it will have trebled in my lifetime... I simply cannot understand why no one discusses this impending calamity, and why no world statesmen have the guts to treat the issue with the seriousness it deserves. How the hell can we witter on about tackling global warming, and reducing consumption, when we are continuing to add so relentlessly to the number of consumers? The answer is politics, and political cowardice... We seem to have given up on population control."
From page 7 of this week's Private Eye.
I think we can all agree that any self-pitying complaining about his future poverty from Boris is bollox.
Of course it was always bollox to begin but a surprising number of people seemed to believe it.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
It included the journalists working for New Scientist at the time.
But (presumably) simply reporting what was being mooted?
At the end of the decade I was ten, but I used to read the New Scientists that my sister (who is seven years older than me and was an A-level student doing three science) had. At the time I certainly got the impression that people were worried about the next ice-age rather than a warming effect, but I was, as I say, ten.
Since Zak Crawley's 267 against Pakistan, he has scored 156 runs at an average of 11.1.
Oof, that's a drop in form alright!
Other than Bracey and Hameed, another possibility might be Nick Gubbins, although he more usually bats at 4.
Otherwise I don’t see lots of top order batsmen banging down the door for inclusion. Phil Salt perhaps, but he’s very hit and miss in first class cricket. If he continues his current form Ben Charlesworth might come into the reckoning in a year or so, but aged 20 and having not played for nine months due to injury, he won’t be coming in this summer.
If they recall Vince should the Ashes go ahead we’ll know they’re absolutely desperate.
Moeen Ali would probably make a better opener than our current ones at this rate.
Even I would !!!!!!
Montgomery Burns could do better and he's 104 years old. And a cartoon character.
Getting to 20 Golds psycologically feels significant.
It does. It’s vindication for brexit. It also means we are very unlikely to be bested by Oz, so we will finish in the top 5. Again.
Not just Brexit! None of it would be possible if Boris had not been personally responsible for winning the London Olympics bid! Bravo brave Sir Boris - A true Olympian!
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
I suspect even that won't work/
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
It included the journalists working for New Scientist at the time.
But (presumably) simply reporting what was being mooted?
Even back then there were far more papers on warming than cooling.
Yes, but New Sci would have reported both. They were always fairly good at differentiating between straight journalistic reportage and review pieces, and articles actually written by the scientists active in a given field. More so than many newspapers.
A few years ago I met a New Scientist journalist in an unexpected location. I said that I didn't think it was up to much nowadays: he actually agreed, and said they'd dumbed down massively.
But for me, it was Scientific American every time. I used to read it in the coll's library, and loved the mathematical recreations section. Back when I could do maths ...
The magazine I miss most was Byte. even without Jerry Pournelle, it had amazing and generally accurate articles on the latest in computing. Reading back copies from the late 1970s and 1980s revealed the development of the modern industry. Sadly, it stopped years ago, becoming online only for a few years before stopping. The same with Dr Dobbs Journal ...
I wouldn’t have thought it would be that far off in terms of golds, actually. After all, the best athletes from the member states would be selected for the EU and statistically you would expect a majority of them still win.
But there would be far fewer silvers and bronzes due to the what, 80% reduction in the number of athletes?
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
I suspect even that won't work/
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
40 to 50 counties or metros. The largest Greater London, the smallest Rutland.
200 districts or metropolitan boroughs, responsible *only* for maintaining a local plan ans keeping the local neighbourhoods tidy.
Proper local taxation, inc ability to borrow. Direct elections for mayor (metro) or sheriff (county).
PR for local elections to avoid rotten boroughs.
End of.
I don’t see how the smallest counties - Rutland, Herefordshire, Shropshire, Northumberland, North Yorkshire* - could survive as metro areas. They’re just too small.
*I’m obviously talking about population, not geographical size.
I wouldn’t have thought it would be that far off in terms of golds, actually. After all, the best athletes from the member states would be selected for the EU and statistically you would expect a majority of them still win.
But there would be far fewer silvers and bronzes due to the what, 80% reduction in the number of athletes?
It is very hard to know. In US athletics they have a big problem with their athletes having to first peak around May to qualify in their trials. If the EU had the same system it puts stress on the athletes training and also those who are doing well in May are often not the same as those in August, I think this would cost quite a few golds. On the flip side the EU would be stronger in any team events and relays.
I wouldn’t have thought it would be that far off in terms of golds, actually. After all, the best athletes from the member states would be selected for the EU and statistically you would expect a majority of them still win.
But there would be far fewer silvers and bronzes due to the what, 80% reduction in the number of athletes?
EU gets penalised for having their team entries unfairly diluted across 20+ nations though.
I wouldn’t have thought it would be that far off in terms of golds, actually. After all, the best athletes from the member states would be selected for the EU and statistically you would expect a majority of them still win.
But there would be far fewer silvers and bronzes due to the what, 80% reduction in the number of athletes?
I think it would be miles off in terms of golds.
At almost every event going into it there was more than one contender capable of winning gold. To be able to enter potentially 27 contenders instead of 3 is a huge advantage and why they're not a team.
It'd be interesting to know how many gold medal winners were the favourites going into their competition.
I wouldn’t have thought it would be that far off in terms of golds, actually. After all, the best athletes from the member states would be selected for the EU and statistically you would expect a majority of them still win.
But there would be far fewer silvers and bronzes due to the what, 80% reduction in the number of athletes?
I think it would be miles off in terms of golds.
At almost every event going into it there was more than one contender capable of winning gold. To be able to enter potentially 27 contenders instead of 3 is a huge advantage and why they're not a team.
It'd be interesting to know how many gold medal winners were the favourites going into their competition.
Only an advantage in the individual events, not the team events.
I wouldn’t have thought it would be that far off in terms of golds, actually. After all, the best athletes from the member states would be selected for the EU and statistically you would expect a majority of them still win.
But there would be far fewer silvers and bronzes due to the what, 80% reduction in the number of athletes?
EU gets penalised for having their team entries unfairly diluted across 20+ nations though.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
... but due to the use of the scientific method, satellites and data gathering, science does what it is supposed to do and corrected earlier mistakes as more information was gathered.
Boris Johnson writing in the Telegraph, 25th October 2007:
"The world's population is now 6.7bn, roughly double what it was when I was born. If I live to be in my mid-eighties, then it will have trebled in my lifetime... I simply cannot understand why no one discusses this impending calamity, and why no world statesmen have the guts to treat the issue with the seriousness it deserves. How the hell can we witter on about tackling global warming, and reducing consumption, when we are continuing to add so relentlessly to the number of consumers? The answer is politics, and political cowardice... We seem to have given up on population control."
The vote swing in the Scottish byelection in Livingston was interesting.
Not the vote swing from 2017 but from 2012:
SCON +18.2% SLAB -21.8%
That's not tactical voting as its a traditional SLAB area and even in 2017 SLAB were ahead of SCON.
Now we know that SLAB have problems but I'll suggest that Scots found the Cameron-Osborne gang detestable in a way they no longer do.
mental assumption
The facts are the facts Malcy.
And SCON are doing much better in areas where they shouldn't even be the main unionist option.
Gosh, if only there was some kind of event or events that occurred between 2012 and 2017?
SIndy and Brexit realigned Scottish voting coalitions quite dramatically.
To the benefit of SCON.
Something PB's SCON haters didn't predict.
Are you shitting me?
I liked the one earlier about Unionists (from the left and right) coalescing in their droves around Johnson, when they had previously rejected Cameron. That was a cracker!
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
Half a million might be a bit low, but I think you're onto something with the resentment at imposed regions. And messy though the size range is, counties have to be the building blocks if we're going to get anywhere.
So I'd start with something like your idea- have an English Parliament for the bits of England that don't have a metro mayor, and transfer most personal service stuff to the Parliament or mayors. If a large county (1.5 million gets you Hampshire, Kent, Essex if include their unitary cities to go alongside the existing metros) or group of counties wishes to take control of the relevant services instead of the EP, they can after a fairly easy application.
It's basically how Spain managed to create regions post-Franco. The structure isn't perfectly symmetrical (Catalonia has more powers than, say, Extremadura), but the differences don't chafe, and the regions were set up bottom-up not top-down. Critically, both big parties have regions where they dominate, so the setup sticks politically.
Do that, and I suspect the best plan would be to rent an English Parliament building, rather than buy.
Getting to 20 Golds psycologically feels significant.
It does. It’s vindication for brexit. It also means we are very unlikely to be bested by Oz, so we will finish in the top 5. Again.
I really should know better than to ask, but in what way is it 'vindication" for Brexit?
I would have said it was 'in spite of'.
I know you’re all going to scoff, but I do feel the beginnings of a swagger about Brexit Britain. Yeah. We did it. Yeah. Everyone hates us. But yeah, one big reason they hate us is because we had the mad crazy bollocks to do what they would like to do, deep down, but do not dare to do
Anecdote: I was watching a TV cooking show broadcasting from Catalonia recently. The local chef was trying to describe the Catalonian character. Then he realised what he meant. ‘Catalans like to be themselves, they are fiercely independent, they won’t be bullied. We’re like you Brits, doing Brexit. You won’t be pushed around’.
It was just a cooking show and the chef was clearly trying to charm the British presenter. It is almost meaningless. And yet….
I wouldn’t have thought it would be that far off in terms of golds, actually. After all, the best athletes from the member states would be selected for the EU and statistically you would expect a majority of them still win.
But there would be far fewer silvers and bronzes due to the what, 80% reduction in the number of athletes?
I think it would be miles off in terms of golds.
At almost every event going into it there was more than one contender capable of winning gold. To be able to enter potentially 27 contenders instead of 3 is a huge advantage and why they're not a team.
It'd be interesting to know how many gold medal winners were the favourites going into their competition.
Only an advantage in the individual events, not the team events.
Not really. While one team may be stronger (it may not) by merging them into one, you're still throwing away the advantage of having many possible contenders.
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
I suspect even that won't work/
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
Jesus. Steve "Mayor for Life" Walmsley seems up for it. Though “It [Thornaby joining] could even enhance Middlesbrough’s bid for city status.” is laughable. How does a "South Tees" council resolve any issues anyway? Cut Stockton off from Middlesbrough and you get a border between two contiguous urban areas - exactly the kid of division which screwed Boro and Redcar in the past.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
It included the journalists working for New Scientist at the time.
But (presumably) simply reporting what was being mooted?
Even back then there were far more papers on warming than cooling.
Yes, but New Sci would have reported both. They were always fairly good at differentiating between straight journalistic reportage and review pieces, and articles actually written by the scientists active in a given field. More so than many newspapers.
A few years ago I met a New Scientist journalist in an unexpected location. I said that I didn't think it was up to much nowadays: he actually agreed, and said they'd dumbed down massively.
But for me, it was Scientific American every time. I used to read it in the coll's library, and loved the mathematical recreations section. Back when I could do maths ...
The magazine I miss most was Byte. even without Jerry Pournelle, it had amazing and generally accurate articles on the latest in computing. Reading back copies from the late 1970s and 1980s revealed the development of the modern industry. Sadly, it stopped years ago, becoming online only for a few years before stopping. The same with Dr Dobbs Journal ...
Was never into Byte myself! But I used to do a fair bit of popular writing in science in a range of periodicals. I stopped around, maybe, 2000? Partly promotion in the day job (less need for extra dosh, less spare energy in evening) but also a shift in the nature of editorial demand about that sort of time: much less use of outsiders and specialist editors, for a start, and that was before the impact of the internet on newspapers (I think).
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
I suspect even that won't work/
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
40 to 50 counties or metros. The largest Greater London, the smallest Rutland.
200 districts or metropolitan boroughs, responsible *only* for maintaining a local plan ans keeping the local neighbourhoods tidy.
Proper local taxation, inc ability to borrow. Direct elections for mayor (metro) or sheriff (county).
PR for local elections to avoid rotten boroughs.
End of.
I don’t see how the smallest counties - Rutland, Herefordshire, Shropshire, Northumberland, North Yorkshire* - could survive as metro areas. They’re just too small.
*I’m obviously talking about population, not geographical size.
There are around 40 countries with populations smaller than Herefordshire, which I think has the smallest population there.
The Channel Islands are smaller, too, and seem to do Ok, governance wise.
Incidentally I know Radek Sikorski. He’s superbly clever, a pragmatic euro-federalist, proud Pole, but also fiercely Anglophile. I suspect Brexit hit him badly and personally, and he’s still bitter. He’s also smart enough to know the short term and, even worse, long term damage that Brexit will do to the EU
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
I suspect even that won't work/
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
I haven’t heard many people with good words to say about any reorganisation of local or indeed National government. Which is why it seems to happen piecemeal, incompetently and more or less by accident faute de mieux.
That’s not to say there doesn’t need to be one. The county/district model from the 1970s simply isn’t working and the unitaries seem to me to be even worse.
Whichever council structure people have, their funds have been collapsed to the point where many struggle to do statutory activities never mind nice to haves. There needs to be proper funding for them to work, and they've all had their primary income removed over the last decade.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
It included the journalists working for New Scientist at the time.
But (presumably) simply reporting what was being mooted?
Even back then there were far more papers on warming than cooling.
Yes, but New Sci would have reported both. They were always fairly good at differentiating between straight journalistic reportage and review pieces, and articles actually written by the scientists active in a given field. More so than many newspapers.
A few years ago I met a New Scientist journalist in an unexpected location. I said that I didn't think it was up to much nowadays: he actually agreed, and said they'd dumbed down massively.
But for me, it was Scientific American every time. I used to read it in the coll's library, and loved the mathematical recreations section. Back when I could do maths ...
The magazine I miss most was Byte. even without Jerry Pournelle, it had amazing and generally accurate articles on the latest in computing. Reading back copies from the late 1970s and 1980s revealed the development of the modern industry. Sadly, it stopped years ago, becoming online only for a few years before stopping. The same with Dr Dobbs Journal ...
Byte was a superb magazine. I met Jerry Pournelle on one of my trips to the US looking at technological development, and also got to know Steve Ciacia - we hired him as a tech adviser.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
It included the journalists working for New Scientist at the time.
But (presumably) simply reporting what was being mooted?
Even back then there were far more papers on warming than cooling.
Yes, but New Sci would have reported both. They were always fairly good at differentiating between straight journalistic reportage and review pieces, and articles actually written by the scientists active in a given field. More so than many newspapers.
A few years ago I met a New Scientist journalist in an unexpected location. I said that I didn't think it was up to much nowadays: he actually agreed, and said they'd dumbed down massively.
But for me, it was Scientific American every time. I used to read it in the coll's library, and loved the mathematical recreations section. Back when I could do maths ...
The magazine I miss most was Byte. even without Jerry Pournelle, it had amazing and generally accurate articles on the latest in computing. Reading back copies from the late 1970s and 1980s revealed the development of the modern industry. Sadly, it stopped years ago, becoming online only for a few years before stopping. The same with Dr Dobbs Journal ...
Byte was a superb magazine. I met Jerry Pournelle on one of my trips to the US looking at technological development, and also got to know Steve Ciacia - we hired him as a tech adviser.
Biden might resign two years into his second term (ie late enough that Harris would qualify for a second elected term) if he wants to put a finger on the scales of the 2028 Democratic primary in favour of Harris. At which point he would be 84 (he would be 86 at the end of his second term).
But I can't see him quitting before that other than a seriously debilitating health issue that makes it literally impossible for him to do the job, and it seems pretty unlikely for that to happen without it killing him.
Getting to 20 Golds psycologically feels significant.
It does. It’s vindication for brexit. It also means we are very unlikely to be bested by Oz, so we will finish in the top 5. Again.
I really should know better than to ask, but in what way is it 'vindication" for Brexit?
I would have said it was 'in spite of'.
I know you’re all going to scoff, but I do feel the beginnings of a swagger about Brexit Britain. Yeah. We did it. Yeah. Everyone hates us. But yeah, one big reason they hate us is because we had the mad crazy bollocks to do what they would like to do, deep down, but do not dare to do
Yes. We have the same swagger as Ronnie Pickering.
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
I suspect even that won't work/
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
Jesus. Steve "Mayor for Life" Walmsley seems up for it. Though “It [Thornaby joining] could even enhance Middlesbrough’s bid for city status.” is laughable. How does a "South Tees" council resolve any issues anyway? Cut Stockton off from Middlesbrough and you get a border between two contiguous urban areas - exactly the kid of division which screwed Boro and Redcar in the past.
These petty squabbles are because people don’t like artificially imposed boundaries.
Have a single Teeside metro, with real power, doing most of the job. Then as many as you like boroughs underneath, divided as you prefer, just maintaining local plans and keeping the flower baskets watered.
Incidentally I know Radek Sikorski. He’s superbly clever, a pragmatic euro-federalist, proud Pole, but also fiercely Anglophile. I suspect Brexit hit him badly and personally, and he’s still bitter. He’s also smart enough to know the short term and, even worse, long term damage that Brexit will do to the EU
He might have to update that table, GB need to be in there
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
It included the journalists working for New Scientist at the time.
But (presumably) simply reporting what was being mooted?
Even back then there were far more papers on warming than cooling.
Yes, but New Sci would have reported both. They were always fairly good at differentiating between straight journalistic reportage and review pieces, and articles actually written by the scientists active in a given field. More so than many newspapers.
A few years ago I met a New Scientist journalist in an unexpected location. I said that I didn't think it was up to much nowadays: he actually agreed, and said they'd dumbed down massively.
But for me, it was Scientific American every time. I used to read it in the coll's library, and loved the mathematical recreations section. Back when I could do maths ...
The magazine I miss most was Byte. even without Jerry Pournelle, it had amazing and generally accurate articles on the latest in computing. Reading back copies from the late 1970s and 1980s revealed the development of the modern industry. Sadly, it stopped years ago, becoming online only for a few years before stopping. The same with Dr Dobbs Journal ...
Byte was a superb magazine. I met Jerry Pournelle on one of my trips to the US looking at technological development, and also got to know Steve Ciacia - we hired him as a tech adviser.
Back in about 1992, I was talking to one of my friends about programming. I was studying geological engineering, and he was studying aeronautical engineering. I was having problems explaining object orientation to him, so I went to the uni library, went through their Byte archive, and found an article from the ?early 1980s? that explained it perfectly. In the days before the Internet, Byte was a brilliant resource, and might be partly responsible for me entering the industry ...
Incidentally, Mrs J used to work for a very large tech company. They got every English-language scientific journal and papers they could, and quite a few non-english language ones, and made them available to all staff at request. If they were paper copies, you might have to wait a few days for them to be flown from the US, though...
It's one thing for random FBPE types to say it, quite another for actual politicians to "joke" about it. It must really burn at them that the UK has utterly decimated the rest of Europe and we're in a rebuilding cycle for rowing and track cycling which would otherwise have added another 4-7 golds to the current tally.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
According to wikipedia (I know), it was those moronic journalists at it again, not the experts.
It included the journalists working for New Scientist at the time.
But (presumably) simply reporting what was being mooted?
Even back then there were far more papers on warming than cooling.
Yes, but New Sci would have reported both. They were always fairly good at differentiating between straight journalistic reportage and review pieces, and articles actually written by the scientists active in a given field. More so than many newspapers.
A few years ago I met a New Scientist journalist in an unexpected location. I said that I didn't think it was up to much nowadays: he actually agreed, and said they'd dumbed down massively.
But for me, it was Scientific American every time. I used to read it in the coll's library, and loved the mathematical recreations section. Back when I could do maths ...
The magazine I miss most was Byte. even without Jerry Pournelle, it had amazing and generally accurate articles on the latest in computing. Reading back copies from the late 1970s and 1980s revealed the development of the modern industry. Sadly, it stopped years ago, becoming online only for a few years before stopping. The same with Dr Dobbs Journal ...
Byte was a superb magazine. I met Jerry Pournelle on one of my trips to the US looking at technological development, and also got to know Steve Ciacia - we hired him as a tech adviser.
Jerry Pournelle should have spent time finishing his Janissaries series.
It's one thing for random FBPE types to say it, quite another for actual politicians to "joke" about it. It must really burn at them that the UK has utterly decimated the rest of Europe and we're in a rebuilding cycle for rowing and track cycling which would otherwise have added another 4-7 golds to the current tally.
I wonder how the suggestion that the EU wanted to have a single team for the Olympics (which I know is NOT what is happening) would have affected the Brexit vote: I’m fairly sure it wouldn’t have helped the remain case.
"As former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel notes, the problem with the progressive [Left] base mobilization strategy is that progressives think they’re the base. But a faction that keeps losing primaries can’t be the base. Joe Biden is the base."
Getting to 20 Golds psycologically feels significant.
It does. It’s vindication for brexit. It also means we are very unlikely to be bested by Oz, so we will finish in the top 5. Again.
I really should know better than to ask, but in what way is it 'vindication" for Brexit?
I would have said it was 'in spite of'.
I know you’re all going to scoff, but I do feel the beginnings of a swagger about Brexit Britain. Yeah. We did it. Yeah. Everyone hates us. But yeah, one big reason they hate us is because we had the mad crazy bollocks to do what they would like to do, deep down, but do not dare to do
Anecdote: I was watching a TV cooking show broadcasting from Catalonia recently. The local chef was trying to describe the Catalonian character. Then he realised what he meant. ‘Catalans like to be themselves, they are fiercely independent, they won’t be bullied. We’re like you Brits, doing Brexit. You won’t be pushed around’.
It was just a cooking show and the chef was clearly trying to charm the British presenter. It is almost meaningless. And yet….
As a member of the "metropolitan elite" (though I leave lunching at The Groucho to @Leon and much prefer my cafe in the Barking Road), I probably don't get it - why would I?
I note Cottrell's point about devolution and the Prime Minister's ham-fisted attempts at this betray what I can only see as an internal contradiction. If you give more powers to elected Councils (whether Unitary, County, Borough, District or whatever), you take that power from Westminster and Whitehall.
That would be no bad thing but it goes against both the Conservative and Labour grain to give substantive power (especially financial power) to political opponents (and indeed allies).
The current Government's ethos seems to be to concentrate more powers in Whitehall and with Ministers let alone empowering local authorities so we can expect a lot of bluster from the Prime Minister but very little of substance.
Thus Cottrell's Conundrum (well, that's what I'm calling it) goes unresolved. How do you make England work fairly and reasonably for all the English? How do you decentralise England?
Why is this a conundrum?
40 odd counties or metros, to take on responsibility for local health, education, policing, economic development, transport and planning.
End of.
Really that’s the model we should probably have, but unfortunately London is obsessed with unitaries of around 300,000 not the 1.5 million odd you’re implying. That would leave around 120 authorities lacking in critical mass for such things.
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
I suspect even that won't work/
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
Jesus. Steve "Mayor for Life" Walmsley seems up for it. Though “It [Thornaby joining] could even enhance Middlesbrough’s bid for city status.” is laughable. How does a "South Tees" council resolve any issues anyway? Cut Stockton off from Middlesbrough and you get a border between two contiguous urban areas - exactly the kid of division which screwed Boro and Redcar in the past.
This is a key problem with having rivers as natural boundaries between counties/regions.
Many cities or urban areas have grown up at the rivers because that's a naturally sensible place to live and especially once bridges or tunnels are built, people on both sides of the river have more in common with each other than they do people miles away.
To take historical Lancashire as an example, Liverpool and Birkenhead have far more in common with each other as part of "Merseyside" than Liverpool does with Lancaster. The idea that Warrington should be part of Lancashire (as it historically was) and that Stockton Heath should be linked with Cheshire instead is also completely nonsensical.
Nowadays two sides of the same river tend to be a single connurbation, not two separate ones.
EDIT: Also along the Mersey, if you're going to unite places there's no reason Runcorn and Widnes should be separated from each other and linked to places miles away instead.
These petty squabbles are because people don’t like artificially imposed boundaries.
Have a single Teeside metro, with real power, doing most of the job. Then as many as you like boroughs underneath, divided as you prefer, just maintaining local plans and keeping the flower baskets watered.
I agree with this in principle. When the metropolitan councils were abolished (for the crime of not voting for Thatcher) the chaos left is a lot of today's problems. Difficult to plan and coordinate when you're all separate.
A Tees Mayor with actual power would be a good idea (instead of the pretend press release one they have instead). The problem is at the ends, with the people who don't want to be part of that with them. The parochial bigots good burghers of (the Royal Charter town of) Thornaby-on-Tees are YORKSHIRE and want nothing to do with the papist antichrists north of the river in the land of the Price Bishops.
Your "petty squabbles" are what people vote for repeatedly. A solution can be imposed over their wishes but won't resolve the problem. Only education will do that.
It's one thing for random FBPE types to say it, quite another for actual politicians to "joke" about it. It must really burn at them that the UK has utterly decimated the rest of Europe and we're in a rebuilding cycle for rowing and track cycling which would otherwise have added another 4-7 golds to the current tally.
It's all good fun but the medals table does not really matter, however you carve it up. It's not like Eurovision where the winner gets to host the next one.
The environmentalists made a mistake calling climate change global warming. They should have called it global shit weather. Global warming sounded quite good and positive to many people in colder climates, whereas the reality it is so interspersed by torrential rain, droughts, storms, cold snaps, heatwaves and unpredictability that it is good for no-one.
In the 1970s the experts were saying we were facing global cooling.
That is a mischaracterisation of the debate at the time.
It's one thing for random FBPE types to say it, quite another for actual politicians to "joke" about it. It must really burn at them that the UK has utterly decimated the rest of Europe and we're in a rebuilding cycle for rowing and track cycling which would otherwise have added another 4-7 golds to the current tally.
It's all good fun but the medals table does not really matter, however you carve it up. It's not like Eurovision where the winner gets to host the next one.
Or like the really important measure of how many world viewers a royal wedding receives (though Hazza and Megs have been expunged from the roll on that one).
It's one thing for random FBPE types to say it, quite another for actual politicians to "joke" about it. It must really burn at them that the UK has utterly decimated the rest of Europe and we're in a rebuilding cycle for rowing and track cycling which would otherwise have added another 4-7 golds to the current tally.
It's all good fun but the medals table does not really matter, however you carve it up. It's not like Eurovision where the winner gets to host the next one.
Ahem, if Team GB hadn't done well, we would be hearing plenty from FBPE types about how such a poor performance is a metaphor for a failing Britain post-Brexit etc. etc. So, what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander - we did well and we should celebrate that
It's one thing for random FBPE types to say it, quite another for actual politicians to "joke" about it. It must really burn at them that the UK has utterly decimated the rest of Europe and we're in a rebuilding cycle for rowing and track cycling which would otherwise have added another 4-7 golds to the current tally.
It's all good fun but the medals table does not really matter, however you carve it up. It's not like Eurovision where the winner gets to host the next one.
Brilliant idea. Medals tabel winner gets to host the games. That way its always the US or China and the rest of the world doesn't have the hassle of having to bribe the IOC to win the rights to build white elephant facilities they won't use after its all over.
While we are on the subject of Medals table, pity the poor French. Crap Euros, unrest at home and now - according to Nate Silver - one of the worst underperformers at the Olympics:
Comments
Otherwise I don’t see lots of top order batsmen banging down the door for inclusion. Phil Salt perhaps, but he’s very hit and miss in first class cricket. If he continues his current form Ben Charlesworth might come into the reckoning in a year or so, but aged 20 and having not played for nine months due to injury, he won’t be coming in this summer.
If they recall Vince should the Ashes go ahead we’ll know they’re absolutely desperate.
It must be pretty unpleasant because of the urban heat island effect combined with smaller homes and greater use of public transport.
https://www.netweather.tv/weather-forecasts/news/11016-july-2021-uk-heatwave-and-thundery-downpours
Looking further afield:
https://climate.copernicus.eu/surface-air-temperature-july-2021
Meanwhile, people outside London are obsessed with their local area. The 1973 Local Government Act is still credited as a key factor in Heath’s fall. They’re almost as bad as the Welsh, who had a chapel they didn’t go to.
If there is a solution - and there may not be - the solution is probably to remove all contiguous urban areas with a population of over 500,000 from the direct jurisdiction of an English Parliament, and then just create one. That way you would avoid both Balkanisation and Prussianism, as the ten urban areas in question would cover around 40% of England’s population, more of its economy, and therefore be a sizeable counterweight to any English only Parliament.
It also means authorities are hugely limited in their capacity to raise additional funding through direct taxation.
USA -17
China +5
Russia +19
GB +1
Japan -16
Australia +6
Italy +7
Germany -10
France -15
Netherlands +13
Canada +1
NZ +4
SK -8
"The world's population is now 6.7bn, roughly double what it was when I was born. If I live to be in my mid-eighties, then it will have trebled in my lifetime... I simply cannot understand why no one discusses this impending calamity, and why no world statesmen have the guts to treat the issue with the seriousness it deserves. How the hell can we witter on about tackling global warming, and reducing consumption, when we are continuing to add so relentlessly to the number of consumers? The answer is politics, and political cowardice... We seem to have given up on population control."
From page 7 of this week's Private Eye.
Round here Middlesbrough council are trying to resolve their issues by merging with Redcar via a suggestion of having 2 new councils one south of the Tees, one North of the Tees.
Apart from Thornbury's Mayor getting excited (as they wish to leave Stockton) no-one else has a good word to say about the idea.
https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/19495632.tees-mega-councils-suggested-help-middlesbrough/
That’s not to say there doesn’t need to be one. The county/district model from the 1970s simply isn’t working and the unitaries seem to me to be even worse.
Brexit Britain!
Absolutely shocking mismanagement by England.
Nation of cheats.
Jamaica -2
Fiji +1
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/olympics-medal-count/
Of course it was always bollox to begin but a surprising number of people seemed to believe it.
I would have said it was 'in spite of'.
And even worse, an American.
https://twitter.com/radeksikorski/status/1423272953106534401
Lithuiania/Luxembourg/Malta/Finland/Bulgaria/Cyprus letting the side down.
The largest Greater London, the smallest Rutland.
200 districts or metropolitan boroughs, responsible *only* for maintaining a local plan ans keeping the local neighbourhoods tidy.
Proper local taxation, inc ability to borrow.
Direct elections for mayor (metro) or sheriff (county).
PR for local elections to avoid rotten boroughs.
End of.
But for me, it was Scientific American every time. I used to read it in the coll's library, and loved the mathematical recreations section. Back when I could do maths ...
The magazine I miss most was Byte. even without Jerry Pournelle, it had amazing and generally accurate articles on the latest in computing. Reading back copies from the late 1970s and 1980s revealed the development of the modern industry. Sadly, it stopped years ago, becoming online only for a few years before stopping. The same with Dr Dobbs Journal ...
Edit: even going through the archive of Byte magazine brings back so many memories ...
https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine
I've still got this one in my bookshelf:
https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-1993-11/page/n73/mode/2up
But there would be far fewer silvers and bronzes due to the what, 80% reduction in the number of athletes?
Now if there was an EU team there would be far fewer medals because there would be only one EU entry in rowing, sailing, boxing etc
Which highlights strength from diversity.
*I’m obviously talking about population, not geographical size.
At almost every event going into it there was more than one contender capable of winning gold. To be able to enter potentially 27 contenders instead of 3 is a huge advantage and why they're not a team.
It'd be interesting to know how many gold medal winners were the favourites going into their competition.
USA 350m pop 34G, 36S 32B 102T
GB 68m pop 20G, 21S 21B 62T
Aus 25m pop 17G, 6S, 21B 44T
NZ 5m pop 7G, 6S, 7B 20T
Does anyone know how much each country spends per capita in order to gain medals per capita in order to gain population feelgood per capita ?
So I'd start with something like your idea- have an English Parliament for the bits of England that don't have a metro mayor, and transfer most personal service stuff to the Parliament or mayors. If a large county (1.5 million gets you Hampshire, Kent, Essex if include their unitary cities to go alongside the existing metros) or group of counties wishes to take control of the relevant services instead of the EP, they can after a fairly easy application.
It's basically how Spain managed to create regions post-Franco. The structure isn't perfectly symmetrical (Catalonia has more powers than, say, Extremadura), but the differences don't chafe, and the regions were set up bottom-up not top-down. Critically, both big parties have regions where they dominate, so the setup sticks politically.
Do that, and I suspect the best plan would be to rent an English Parliament building, rather than buy.
Anecdote: I was watching a TV cooking show broadcasting from Catalonia recently. The local chef was trying to describe the Catalonian character. Then he realised what he meant. ‘Catalans like to be themselves, they are fiercely independent, they won’t be bullied. We’re like you Brits, doing Brexit. You won’t be pushed around’.
It was just a cooking show and the chef was clearly trying to charm the British presenter. It is almost meaningless. And yet….
https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Tokyo-2020-Olympics/Spending-on-Olympic-medals-pays-off-in-swimming-and-track
The Channel Islands are smaller, too, and seem to do Ok, governance wise.
But I can't see him quitting before that other than a seriously debilitating health issue that makes it literally impossible for him to do the job, and it seems pretty unlikely for that to happen without it killing him.
Have a single Teeside metro, with real power, doing most of the job. Then as many as you like boroughs underneath, divided as you prefer, just maintaining local plans and keeping the flower baskets watered.
Incidentally, Mrs J used to work for a very large tech company. They got every English-language scientific journal and papers they could, and quite a few non-english language ones, and made them available to all staff at request. If they were paper copies, you might have to wait a few days for them to be flown from the US, though...
76 Silver
93 Bronze
253 total medals.
It's one thing for random FBPE types to say it, quite another for actual politicians to "joke" about it. It must really burn at them that the UK has utterly decimated the rest of Europe and we're in a rebuilding cycle for rowing and track cycling which would otherwise have added another 4-7 golds to the current tally.
No, not you Boris..
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/05/opinion/biden-bipartisan-congress.html
Many cities or urban areas have grown up at the rivers because that's a naturally sensible place to live and especially once bridges or tunnels are built, people on both sides of the river have more in common with each other than they do people miles away.
To take historical Lancashire as an example, Liverpool and Birkenhead have far more in common with each other as part of "Merseyside" than Liverpool does with Lancaster. The idea that Warrington should be part of Lancashire (as it historically was) and that Stockton Heath should be linked with Cheshire instead is also completely nonsensical.
Nowadays two sides of the same river tend to be a single connurbation, not two separate ones.
EDIT: Also along the Mersey, if you're going to unite places there's no reason Runcorn and Widnes should be separated from each other and linked to places miles away instead.
So in Olympic terms the 3 post-Brexit global power blocs rank as below:
1. Five Eyes, the chaps we can trust.
2. The EU, the chaps we don't trust.
3. China, not even chaps.
Means little, I guess, and yet ...
A Tees Mayor with actual power would be a good idea (instead of the pretend press release one they have instead). The problem is at the ends, with the people who don't want to be part of that with them. The
parochial bigotsgood burghers of (the Royal Charter town of) Thornaby-on-Tees are YORKSHIRE and want nothing to do with the papist antichrists north of the river in the land of the Price Bishops.Your "petty squabbles" are what people vote for repeatedly. A solution can be imposed over their wishes but won't resolve the problem. Only education will do that.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/russia/
That includes three days of 799.
I wonder why they decided that 800 was the line which couldn't be breached.
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/olympics-medal-count/
You would have to have a heart of stone not to feel some sympathy for poor Emmanuel...