"The UK has slashed its strategic gas storage to barely 1.7pc of annual demand by closing the Rough facility off the Yorkshire coast, subcontracting the costly task of storage to Germany and the Netherlands."
Telegraph
Sounds like Business Sec could be in real shit here this winter.
Very good explanation of the sitch on R4 today at 8.10am.
Presumably (that part wasn't mentioned) the gas companies that are going bust sold long but bought short in the gas market and hence can't fulfil their obligations.
AEP's article is much gloomer than just a few smaller energy suppier's going under. Industrialists are screaming that disaster awaits this winter on a whole range of fronts. Three day week here we come.
Sounds like Business Dept over the years has made multiple mistakes and assumptions and the chickens are coming home...
Brexit wont help of course as there will be no solidarity with EU over interconnectors and contracts.
AEP of course, so gloom warning trigger.
Do you have a link to that article? Or any one giving a broader context?
This morning it was put as though "the world turned the lights back on" after the virus.
An AEP article predicting doom and gloom is the next-best-thing to a Peston article doing so as a contraindicator showing everything will ultimately be OK.
How long will 'ultimately' be, though ? For now, the UK price of gas is over four times what it was in February.
The Catholic adoption centres believed that adoption by gay couples was against their religious beliefs. When they were given no choice they closed and kids who were previously adopted were less well supported with a huge cost to them.
The compromise I pushed at the time was the requirement that if a Catholic service wasn’t willing to provide adoption services to gay couples themselves they had to have a partnership with someone who would. The Catholics were grumpy but ok with it. The activists on the gay rights side weren’t.
The kids lost out.
(FWIW my personal belief is that a stable two person parental unit is key to children’s success in life. The sex of each member of the parental unit is irrelevant)
While, again FWIW, I agree with you about the stable parental unit with two people involved, I do wonder how the children's wider social group react to it, and consequently to the children, particularly as they get towards and into their teens. It'll probably not matter too much for those who get on reasonably well with their peers, but is it another stick with which to beat the fat girl or the asthmatic boy?
I'm not aware of any work on this, and would be interested to learn of any.
I think peer pressure about gay (or mixed race or single) parents has pretty much gone away among kids. Teasing and bullying hasn't, but not much on those topics.
Incidentally, the Netflix series Sex Education (series 3 just released), while superficially comedy froth with doubtful cultural background (it's around a school in Britain with distinctly American characteristics) is praised by all my young friends as being spot on abput current social attitudes - it subtly introduces all kinds of teenage and adult angst issues, and manages to be funny, touching, unsentimental and verbally explicit without being pornographic.
The Catholic adoption centres believed that adoption by gay couples was against their religious beliefs. When they were given no choice they closed and kids who were previously adopted were less well supported with a huge cost to them.
The compromise I pushed at the time was the requirement that if a Catholic service wasn’t willing to provide adoption services to gay couples themselves they had to have a partnership with someone who would. The Catholics were grumpy but ok with it. The activists on the gay rights side weren’t.
The kids lost out.
(FWIW my personal belief is that a stable two person parental unit is key to children’s success in life. The sex of each member of the parental unit is irrelevant)
While, again FWIW, I agree with you about the stable parental unit with two people involved, I do wonder how the children's wider social group react to it, and consequently to the children, particularly as they get towards and into their teens. It'll probably not matter too much for those who get on reasonably well with their peers, but is it another stick with which to beat the fat girl or the asthmatic boy?
I'm not aware of any work on this, and would be interested to learn of any.
I think peer pressure about gay (or mixed race or single) parents has pretty much gone away among kids. Teasing and bullying hasn't, but not much on those topics.
Incidentally, the Netflix series Sex Education (series 3 just released), while superficially comedy froth with doubtful cultural background (it's around a school in Britain with distinctly American characteristics) is praised by all my young friends as being spot on abput current social attitudes - it subtly introduces all kinds of teenage and adult angst issues, and manages to be funny, touching, unsentimental and verbally explicit without being pornographic.
Yeah my 15yo daughter and her friends all love this programme. Agreed on the social attitudes too, they barely seem to register sexuality as an issue. There has been a big shift in attitudes. Much less tolerant of shitty male attitudes too, which is good to see (PB pervy old man tendency take note).
I'm curious how many of those who regret there is no Catholic exemption to equalities legislation so that Catholics can't discriminate against homosexuals ... Would also call for an Islamic exemption to equalities legislation so that Muslims could discriminate against women in accordance to Shariah law?
The law is the law and we should have equality before the law.
The issue is that these Catholic adoption agencies had been running successfully for decades. They offered to partner with other agencies who would work with gay couples, rather than turn them away, which seemed a fair compromise.
The consequences, are more abortions and more children growing up in what is euphemistically called ‘care’, including in places like Rotherham.
If there are readily made alternatives available then why should people end up in care?
Why don't they end up at the alternatives that were good enough for gays? Why can't they be good enough for everyone? If Catholic agencies aren't crowding out unbigoted ones then the unbigoted ones should be able to expand to meet the demand.
The main difference between Catholic adoption agencies, and many domestic adoption placements - mostly run by local social services - is that the Catholic agencies actually cared about, and provided pastoral support to, young pregnant women.
The vast majority of other private adoption agencies operating in the UK, are sourcing children from abroad.
They just didn't care enough about them to do the role with equality before the law?
Hopefully the people who care and have passion will take up jobs in agencies that do want to look after young women while paying full respect to everyone equally before the law.
'Equality before the law' is an extremely slippery concept. Why should it not mean that all adoption agencies have 'equality before the law' to practice what they believe is best for the welfare of children. I would describe your version of 'equality' as 'Everyone being equally told what to think by the state'.
FWIW I don't agree with RC views on same sex adoption, and think that almost any parental arrangement is better than having the state as parent, but some old fashioned classical liberalism might come in handy here.
I'm curious how many of those who regret there is no Catholic exemption to equalities legislation so that Catholics can't discriminate against homosexuals ... Would also call for an Islamic exemption to equalities legislation so that Muslims could discriminate against women in accordance to Shariah law?
The law is the law and we should have equality before the law.
Catholic churches indeed all Christian churches are also not required to provide gay marriage ceremonies either, nor are Muslim mosques or Jewish synagogues despite gay marriage being the law of the land. Though the Church in Wales has recently voted to have gay blessings in its churches
Until Canon Law changes, or the church is disestablished, it is illegal for a Church of England church to offer gay marriages.
The law of the land is gay marriage is legal, if general synod voted to allow gay marriage the law in England would be swiftly changed to accomodate that. The Methodists have already voted to have gay marriages.
However the problem for the Anglican communion is it is a broad church and while the US Episcopal Church for example has allowed gay marriage, the African Anglican churches certainly would oppose that, indeed gay marriage is not legal in most of Africa.
So at most gay blessings is the limit to what the Church of England will allow in its churches given the Archbishop of Canterbury is spiritual leader of the Anglican communion
As I said, until Canon Law is changed, it is illegal to offer gay marriages in a Church of England church.
It would require primary legislation from parliament, not only a change in Canon Law.
Which would be a formality. Once Canon law is changed, Statute law would change thereafter. The point being that it is up to the CoE to change Canon law which it currently is not minded to do. Once it has done this then the bill amending statute law would go through parliament and receive Royal Assent as a matter of course.
I'm curious how many of those who regret there is no Catholic exemption to equalities legislation so that Catholics can't discriminate against homosexuals ... Would also call for an Islamic exemption to equalities legislation so that Muslims could discriminate against women in accordance to Shariah law?
The law is the law and we should have equality before the law.
Catholic churches indeed all Christian churches are also not required to provide gay marriage ceremonies either, nor are Muslim mosques or Jewish synagogues despite gay marriage being the law of the land. Though the Church in Wales has recently voted to have gay blessings in its churches
Until Canon Law changes, or the church is disestablished, it is illegal for a Church of England church to offer gay marriages.
The law of the land is gay marriage is legal, if general synod voted to allow gay marriage the law in England would be swiftly changed to accomodate that. The Methodists have already voted to have gay marriages.
However the problem for the Anglican communion is it is a broad church and while the US Episcopal Church for example has allowed gay marriage, the African Anglican churches certainly would oppose that, indeed gay marriage is not legal in most of Africa.
So at most gay blessings is the limit to what the Church of England will allow in its churches given the Archbishop of Canterbury is spiritual leader of the Anglican communion
As I said, until Canon Law is changed, it is illegal to offer gay marriages in a Church of England church.
It would require primary legislation from parliament, not only a change in Canon Law.
Which could come in very swiftly if general synod voted for gay marriage, which it won't because of opposition from African churches within the Anglican communion as I said.
The most the C of E will ever offer is gay blessings but not full marriage
The Catholic adoption centres believed that adoption by gay couples was against their religious beliefs. When they were given no choice they closed and kids who were previously adopted were less well supported with a huge cost to them.
The compromise I pushed at the time was the requirement that if a Catholic service wasn’t willing to provide adoption services to gay couples themselves they had to have a partnership with someone who would. The Catholics were grumpy but ok with it. The activists on the gay rights side weren’t.
The kids lost out.
(FWIW my personal belief is that a stable two person parental unit is key to children’s success in life. The sex of each member of the parental unit is irrelevant)
While, again FWIW, I agree with you about the stable parental unit with two people involved, I do wonder how the children's wider social group react to it, and consequently to the children, particularly as they get towards and into their teens. It'll probably not matter too much for those who get on reasonably well with their peers, but is it another stick with which to beat the fat girl or the asthmatic boy?
I'm not aware of any work on this, and would be interested to learn of any.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
The kids and youngish people who I know see gender as more fluid than my generation, so the idea of a female role model would seem a bit quaint to them (I used to think as you do myself). "We're all somewhere on the male-female spectrum, and not always at the same point" is a very common assertion. And of course there are lots of mothers and fathers who are pretty awful at being models of anything.
I now think that having loving parents trumps everything, and their sexual preference and culture is far less important.
The Catholic adoption centres believed that adoption by gay couples was against their religious beliefs. When they were given no choice they closed and kids who were previously adopted were less well supported with a huge cost to them.
The compromise I pushed at the time was the requirement that if a Catholic service wasn’t willing to provide adoption services to gay couples themselves they had to have a partnership with someone who would. The Catholics were grumpy but ok with it. The activists on the gay rights side weren’t.
The kids lost out.
(FWIW my personal belief is that a stable two person parental unit is key to children’s success in life. The sex of each member of the parental unit is irrelevant)
While, again FWIW, I agree with you about the stable parental unit with two people involved, I do wonder how the children's wider social group react to it, and consequently to the children, particularly as they get towards and into their teens. It'll probably not matter too much for those who get on reasonably well with their peers, but is it another stick with which to beat the fat girl or the asthmatic boy?
I'm not aware of any work on this, and would be interested to learn of any.
I think peer pressure about gay (or mixed race or single) parents has pretty much gone away among kids. Teasing and bullying hasn't, but not much on those topics.
Incidentally, the Netflix series Sex Education (series 3 just released), while superficially comedy froth with doubtful cultural background (it's around a school in Britain with distinctly American characteristics) is praised by all my young friends as being spot on abput current social attitudes - it subtly introduces all kinds of teenage and adult angst issues, and manages to be funny, touching, unsentimental and verbally explicit without being pornographic.
I think bullying about sexuality has become rather alien in the space of a generation. It's something we should be really proud about.
I've told this anecdote once before but last year my daughter came home from school (in the autumn between them being closed and reclosed) and said that her friend's uncle is getting married to a man before adding crossly "but that isn't allowed".
We asked her why that wasn't allowed, and she said "because of coronavirus. People shouldn't be having weddings due to coronavirus." The idea that it was a man marrying a man that could be an issue never even entered her head, just that the virus means no weddings at the time.
Thanks for the friendly comments! Various replies:
- @DavidL I don't think relations with Britain have come up at all - most Germans don't spontaneously think about political relations with Britain one way or the other. I'd guess that Scholz will be businesslike a la Merkel with us, and will try to get on with France. He's above all a pragmatist. I agree that the FDP in government would be good news for British trade - the oft-cited but sometimes elusive influence of German car manufacturers really does exist in their case.
- @Sandpit The Greens are very pro-Ukraine for some reason, and hence Russiasceptic, perhaps to distinguish themselves from the Left or because they disapprove of Russian gas imports, or just because they think it's right, not sure. The Left (both the party and some of the SPD) deride them as latter-day cold warriors, which is a snag for an SPD-Green-Left pact, though I expect if it was the only snag they'd get over themselves. Again, I expect Scholz to be coollly pragmatic with both Russia and China.
- @OnlyLivingBoy I might be wrong but I think the CDU will want a spell in opposition if they fall behind the SPD, just to sort themselves out. And the arithmetic doesn't really work. On current polling CDU+FDP=33%. If they allied with the AfD, which they really won't, they'd reach 44%, still not enough. With the Greens they'd hit 48%, just enough, but the Green Party would be in total uproar.
- @Theuniondivvie Yes, I think the AfD are genuinely far right, though not neo-Nazi apart from the odd hothead - more like those post-fascist parties in Italy which are doing well by being polite about the past without explicitly endorsing it, and going big on national identity and anti-immigrant sentiment. There is a market for it in every country but it's quite limited in Germany.
I was trying not to get my own preference into a lead article - I'd love to see an SPD-Green-Left coalition, which would exactly cover my range of personal preferences: pragmatism, environment and a bit of leftie spice to keep them honest. Scholz is as inspiringly left-wing as Starmer, i.e. not very, but I expect he'd be good in troubled times (as would Starmer).
You need to be careful with those combined percentages for potential coalitions. About 5% or 10% of the votes go to parties who don't make it into the Bundestag, so the proportion of seats for each party is always higher than their percentage of the vote share.
And you are correct that no party will enter into a coalition with the AfD.
"The UK has slashed its strategic gas storage to barely 1.7pc of annual demand by closing the Rough facility off the Yorkshire coast, subcontracting the costly task of storage to Germany and the Netherlands."
Telegraph
Sounds like Business Sec could be in real shit here this winter.
Massive shit. As @Morris_Dancer pointed out this has been brewing for a long time. We've been making strategically stupid decisions in energy since the "dash for gas" days. You can only rely on North Sea Gas as your energy reserve if you haven't let the privatised utilities burn through it already.
For all of the bluster the UK has been increasingly and heavily reliant on exports for decades. Too much focus on prices and competition and profiteering, not enough on where the energy is coming from and what drives the prices.
So here we are. Reliant on imported gas with fuck all storage, reliant on imported electricity with no membership of the regulated European energy market (and nothing to replace it). A unique to Britain massive price spike in electricity threatening business ruin food shortages and blackouts.
We may avoid it. But why the fuck has Johnson let us slide out here to the edge? Global Britain who can't keep the lights on? Watch him spin our power crisis as some kind of environmental statement for COP26.
I don't believe Johnny Voting-Public would buy the COP26 ruse at all, particularly us oldies (Boris-voting over 55s) who are prone to the cold.
If I was Johnson I would be blaming the 22 years of Labour/Coalition/Remainer governments (none of whom, let's face it had an energy policy). This fiasco has been brewing for years. He'll get away with that, lights or no lights.
At what point, do we think the general public will start to associate all the green stuff and COP26, with their utility bills going up?
Which politician, from any party, is going to be the first to admit the correlation? Ed Miliband did try and make the positive case for higher energy bills a decade ago, but now it’s probably only Farage who will say anything.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm curious how many of those who regret there is no Catholic exemption to equalities legislation so that Catholics can't discriminate against homosexuals ... Would also call for an Islamic exemption to equalities legislation so that Muslims could discriminate against women in accordance to Shariah law?
The law is the law and we should have equality before the law.
Catholic churches indeed all Christian churches are also not required to provide gay marriage ceremonies either, nor are Muslim mosques or Jewish synagogues despite gay marriage being the law of the land. Though the Church in Wales has recently voted to have gay blessings in its churches
Until Canon Law changes, or the church is disestablished, it is illegal for a Church of England church to offer gay marriages.
The law of the land is gay marriage is legal, if general synod voted to allow gay marriage the law in England would be swiftly changed to accomodate that. The Methodists have already voted to have gay marriages.
However the problem for the Anglican communion is it is a broad church and while the US Episcopal Church for example has allowed gay marriage, the African Anglican churches certainly would oppose that, indeed gay marriage is not legal in most of Africa.
So at most gay blessings is the limit to what the Church of England will allow in its churches given the Archbishop of Canterbury is spiritual leader of the Anglican communion
As I said, until Canon Law is changed, it is illegal to offer gay marriages in a Church of England church.
It would require primary legislation from parliament, not only a change in Canon Law.
Which would be a formality. Once Canon law is changed, Statute law would change thereafter. The point being that it is up to the CoE to change Canon law which it currently is not minded to do. Once it has done this then the bill amending statute law would go through parliament and receive Royal Assent as a matter of course.
Yes. The real hurdle is elsewhere: other churches have no obligation to perform any particular marriage, they can pick and choose. Non RCs have no right to an RC marriage. Everyone has a basic right to a CoE marriage unless there is a statutory exemption.
But the bigger hurdle is in the nature of the CoE. It includes liberals who don't feel bound by the limits of bible/tradition, and large numbers of (voluble and active) members who think they can't go beyond the bible on gay, or any, issues. They are deluded of course as they routinely ignore the bible/Jesus on war, wealth, remarriage, women speaking in church and all sorts of things. At heart they are not over fond of gays.
The Catholic adoption centres believed that adoption by gay couples was against their religious beliefs. When they were given no choice they closed and kids who were previously adopted were less well supported with a huge cost to them.
The compromise I pushed at the time was the requirement that if a Catholic service wasn’t willing to provide adoption services to gay couples themselves they had to have a partnership with someone who would. The Catholics were grumpy but ok with it. The activists on the gay rights side weren’t.
The kids lost out.
(FWIW my personal belief is that a stable two person parental unit is key to children’s success in life. The sex of each member of the parental unit is irrelevant)
While, again FWIW, I agree with you about the stable parental unit with two people involved, I do wonder how the children's wider social group react to it, and consequently to the children, particularly as they get towards and into their teens. It'll probably not matter too much for those who get on reasonably well with their peers, but is it another stick with which to beat the fat girl or the asthmatic boy?
I'm not aware of any work on this, and would be interested to learn of any.
I think peer pressure about gay (or mixed race or single) parents has pretty much gone away among kids. Teasing and bullying hasn't, but not much on those topics.
Incidentally, the Netflix series Sex Education (series 3 just released), while superficially comedy froth with doubtful cultural background (it's around a school in Britain with distinctly American characteristics) is praised by all my young friends as being spot on abput current social attitudes - it subtly introduces all kinds of teenage and adult angst issues, and manages to be funny, touching, unsentimental and verbally explicit without being pornographic.
I think bullying about sexuality has become rather alien in the space of a generation. It's something we should be really proud about.
I've told this anecdote once before but last year my daughter came home from school (in the autumn between them being closed and reclosed) and said that her friend's uncle is getting married to a man before adding crossly "but that isn't allowed".
We asked her why that wasn't allowed, and she said "because of coronavirus. People shouldn't be having weddings due to coronavirus." The idea that it was a man marrying a man that could be an issue never even entered her head, just that the virus means no weddings at the time.
I think thats quite right but i think there will always be an issue of same sex "marriages" in Church .
I doubt it will happen in my lifetime if ever in the Church of England and definitely never in the Roman Catholic Church.
"The UK has slashed its strategic gas storage to barely 1.7pc of annual demand by closing the Rough facility off the Yorkshire coast, subcontracting the costly task of storage to Germany and the Netherlands."
Telegraph
Sounds like Business Sec could be in real shit here this winter.
Very good explanation of the sitch on R4 today at 8.10am.
Presumably (that part wasn't mentioned) the gas companies that are going bust sold long but bought short in the gas market and hence can't fulfil their obligations.
AEP's article is much gloomer than just a few smaller energy suppier's going under. Industrialists are screaming that disaster awaits this winter on a whole range of fronts. Three day week here we come.
Sounds like Business Dept over the years has made multiple mistakes and assumptions and the chickens are coming home...
Brexit wont help of course as there will be no solidarity with EU over interconnectors and contracts.
AEP of course, so gloom warning trigger.
Do you have a link to that article? Or any one giving a broader context?
This morning it was put as though "the world turned the lights back on" after the virus.
judging from what i have heard of johnson's comments on this crisis, he is as usual blustering his way through by blaming the virus. seems to be his standard trick now.
the failure to invest in nuclear, the removal of gas storage etc etc - not a factor in his head.
My own personal wish next week in the leaders debate one hour after the polls have closed and a very accurate picture of the next parliament is known. Assuming the SPD get the most votes but SPD+Green are under 50%: I would to see Scholz painting Laschet and Söder (CSU leader) into a horrible corner for the centre right parties. Scholz: "Seeing Die Linke in government is an anathema to you, but how far are you prepared to go to prevent Die Linke getting into govenment, the choice lies in your hands. How far are you prepared to go so that the CDU/CSU Union can enter into coalition as a junior party?"
Unfortunately yesterday both Scholz and Baerbock said that they want to see the Union in opposition, which kind of closes off that strategy.
I'm curious how many of those who regret there is no Catholic exemption to equalities legislation so that Catholics can't discriminate against homosexuals ... Would also call for an Islamic exemption to equalities legislation so that Muslims could discriminate against women in accordance to Shariah law?
The law is the law and we should have equality before the law.
Catholic churches indeed all Christian churches are also not required to provide gay marriage ceremonies either, nor are Muslim mosques or Jewish synagogues despite gay marriage being the law of the land. Though the Church in Wales has recently voted to have gay blessings in its churches
Until Canon Law changes, or the church is disestablished, it is illegal for a Church of England church to offer gay marriages.
The law of the land is gay marriage is legal, if general synod voted to allow gay marriage the law in England would be swiftly changed to accomodate that. The Methodists have already voted to have gay marriages.
However the problem for the Anglican communion is it is a broad church and while the US Episcopal Church for example has allowed gay marriage, the African Anglican churches certainly would oppose that, indeed gay marriage is not legal in most of Africa.
So at most gay blessings is the limit to what the Church of England will allow in its churches given the Archbishop of Canterbury is spiritual leader of the Anglican communion
As I said, until Canon Law is changed, it is illegal to offer gay marriages in a Church of England church.
It would require primary legislation from parliament, not only a change in Canon Law.
Which would be a formality. Once Canon law is changed, Statute law would change thereafter. The point being that it is up to the CoE to change Canon law which it currently is not minded to do. Once it has done this then the bill amending statute law would go through parliament and receive Royal Assent as a matter of course.
Yes. The real hurdle is elsewhere: other churches have no obligation to perform any particular marriage, they can pick and choose. Non RCs have no right to an RC marriage. Everyone has a basic right to a CoE marriage unless there is a statutory exemption.
But the bigger hurdle is in the nature of the CoE. It includes liberals who don't feel bound by the limits of bible/tradition, and large numbers of (voluble and active) members who think they can't go beyond the bible on gay, or any, issues. They are deluded of course as they routinely ignore the bible/Jesus on war, wealth, remarriage, women speaking in church and all sorts of things. At heart they are not over fond of gays.
Yes. And as @HYUFD has noted, it is as much to do with the broader global CoE "diaspora" as it is with the Rev. Arthur Jones in Little Nibbling, Sussex.
Edit: although there are plenty who as you say feel very strongly about it in the UK parishes also, one way or another.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
My sister was widowed at 30, and left with three small daughters. Never remarried, and worked full-time all her life. All her daughters, now in their 50's, seem to have long-term, stable relationships.
I'm curious how many of those who regret there is no Catholic exemption to equalities legislation so that Catholics can't discriminate against homosexuals ... Would also call for an Islamic exemption to equalities legislation so that Muslims could discriminate against women in accordance to Shariah law?
The law is the law and we should have equality before the law.
The issue is that these Catholic adoption agencies had been running successfully for decades. They offered to partner with other agencies who would work with gay couples, rather than turn them away, which seemed a fair compromise.
The consequences, are more abortions and more children growing up in what is euphemistically called ‘care’, including in places like Rotherham.
If there are readily made alternatives available then why should people end up in care?
Why don't they end up at the alternatives that were good enough for gays? Why can't they be good enough for everyone? If Catholic agencies aren't crowding out unbigoted ones then the unbigoted ones should be able to expand to meet the demand.
The main difference between Catholic adoption agencies, and many domestic adoption placements - mostly run by local social services - is that the Catholic agencies actually cared about, and provided pastoral support to, young pregnant women.
The vast majority of other private adoption agencies operating in the UK, are sourcing children from abroad.
They just didn't care enough about them to do the role with equality before the law?
Hopefully the people who care and have passion will take up jobs in agencies that do want to look after young women while paying full respect to everyone equally before the law.
'Equality before the law' is an extremely slippery concept. Why should it not mean that all adoption agencies have 'equality before the law' to practice what they believe is best for the welfare of children. I would describe your version of 'equality' as 'Everyone being equally told what to think by the state'.
FWIW I don't agree with RC views on same sex adoption, and think that almost any parental arrangement is better than having the state as parent, but some old fashioned classical liberalism might come in handy here.
Equality before the law should mean that the law applies to all equally.
If you mean that equality legislation should be abolished and everyone who wants to should be free to discriminate against gays, women, blacks and anyone else they feel like discriminating against then make the argument for that.
But if you don't want that, then arguing for an exemption on Shariah or Catholic or any other religious grounds is unreasonable in a secular society. Why should religious bigots be able to discriminate but non-religious bigots are in your words "told what to think by the state"?
Religious bigots and atheist bigots should be subject to the same laws. Whether that be allowing them to discriminate against gays, blacks and women ... Or not.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
"The UK has slashed its strategic gas storage to barely 1.7pc of annual demand by closing the Rough facility off the Yorkshire coast, subcontracting the costly task of storage to Germany and the Netherlands."
Telegraph
Sounds like Business Sec could be in real shit here this winter.
Massive shit. As @Morris_Dancer pointed out this has been brewing for a long time. We've been making strategically stupid decisions in energy since the "dash for gas" days. You can only rely on North Sea Gas as your energy reserve if you haven't let the privatised utilities burn through it already.
For all of the bluster the UK has been increasingly and heavily reliant on exports for decades. Too much focus on prices and competition and profiteering, not enough on where the energy is coming from and what drives the prices.
So here we are. Reliant on imported gas with fuck all storage, reliant on imported electricity with no membership of the regulated European energy market (and nothing to replace it). A unique to Britain massive price spike in electricity threatening business ruin food shortages and blackouts.
We may avoid it. But why the fuck has Johnson let us slide out here to the edge? Global Britain who can't keep the lights on? Watch him spin our power crisis as some kind of environmental statement for COP26.
I don't believe Johnny Voting-Public would buy the COP26 ruse at all, particularly us oldies (Boris-voting over 55s) who are prone to the cold.
If I was Johnson I would be blaming the 22 years of Labour/Coalition/Remainer governments (none of whom, let's face it had an energy policy). This fiasco has been brewing for years. He'll get away with that, lights or no lights.
At what point, do we think the general public will start to associate all the green stuff and COP26, with their utility bills going up?
Which politician, from any party, is going to be the first to admit the correlation?
I'm quite surprised this penny hasn't dropped already. Electricity was already far more expensive than it should have been before this latest debacle, thanks to various green taxes. I seem to recall posting on here a year or so ago pointing out the bizarre arbitrage between the domestic electricity and gas prices which had reached such a spectacular point it would have been cheaper for me to have had a gas powered generator in the garden than to buy my electricity from the grid, and pointing out (given the relative efficiencies of small generators vs power stations) that the only possible explanation for this was rampant green nonsense.
"The UK has slashed its strategic gas storage to barely 1.7pc of annual demand by closing the Rough facility off the Yorkshire coast, subcontracting the costly task of storage to Germany and the Netherlands."
Telegraph
Sounds like Business Sec could be in real shit here this winter.
Very good explanation of the sitch on R4 today at 8.10am.
Presumably (that part wasn't mentioned) the gas companies that are going bust sold long but bought short in the gas market and hence can't fulfil their obligations.
AEP's article is much gloomer than just a few smaller energy suppier's going under. Industrialists are screaming that disaster awaits this winter on a whole range of fronts. Three day week here we come.
Sounds like Business Dept over the years has made multiple mistakes and assumptions and the chickens are coming home...
Brexit wont help of course as there will be no solidarity with EU over interconnectors and contracts.
AEP of course, so gloom warning trigger.
Do you have a link to that article? Or any one giving a broader context?
This morning it was put as though "the world turned the lights back on" after the virus.
judging from what i have heard of johnson's comments on this crisis, he is as usual blustering his way through by blaming the virus. seems to be his standard trick now.
the failure to invest in nuclear, the removal of gas storage etc etc - not a factor in his head.
His comment specifically was it will all be fine the market will sort itself out.
Meanwhile hearing anecdotes on the radio of people finding that equivalent deals to the one that their now bust gascos have been offering are, typically, hundreds if not thousands of pounds more expensive.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
My sister was widowed at 30, and left with three small daughters. Never remarried, and worked full-time all her life. All her daughters, now in their 50's, seem to have long-term, stable relationships.
How horrible and that, if I might conjecture, would have provided a hugely important role model/life lesson to the daughters and, again, shown the love involved.
The "one father one mother" template is out of date. It was out of date as you note, decades ago.
I would be wary about that, given Morrison still leads Albanese as preferred PM.
At the 2019 Australian general election every final poll had Shorten's Labor ahead of Morrison's Coalition on 2PP and they were expected to win, however Morrison led Shorten as preferred PM and it was indeed Morrison who was re elected. On the primary vote the latest Morgan poll also has the LNP coalition on 39.5% to just 35% for Labor even if Labour lead on 2PP
Oh, I agree, the next Oz election is very much open. I merely meant that virtually nobody is changing their vote over submarines in 2040, however excited some people get about the deal.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
Yes. It's better to have one parent who provides a good role model, than two parents of whom one provides a dreadful role model.
“Gas crisis 'could cause three-day-week': Taxpayers face pumping billions into stricken energy companies as ministers hold more emergency talks TODAY amid chaos for customers - with fears of soaring bills and empty shelves”
As one Cabinet minister says privately, the attitude of @BorisJohnson to everything - Protocol, AUKUS, COP26 etc is: “It will be alright on the night.”
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
The Catholic adoption centres believed that adoption by gay couples was against their religious beliefs. When they were given no choice they closed and kids who were previously adopted were less well supported with a huge cost to them.
The compromise I pushed at the time was the requirement that if a Catholic service wasn’t willing to provide adoption services to gay couples themselves they had to have a partnership with someone who would. The Catholics were grumpy but ok with it. The activists on the gay rights side weren’t.
The kids lost out.
(FWIW my personal belief is that a stable two person parental unit is key to children’s success in life. The sex of each member of the parental unit is irrelevant)
While, again FWIW, I agree with you about the stable parental unit with two people involved, I do wonder how the children's wider social group react to it, and consequently to the children, particularly as they get towards and into their teens. It'll probably not matter too much for those who get on reasonably well with their peers, but is it another stick with which to beat the fat girl or the asthmatic boy?
I'm not aware of any work on this, and would be interested to learn of any.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
The kids and youngish people who I know see gender as more fluid than my generation, so the idea of a female role model would seem a bit quaint to them (I used to think as you do myself). "We're all somewhere on the male-female spectrum, and not always at the same point" is a very common assertion. And of course there are lots of mothers and fathers who are pretty awful at being models of anything.
I now think that having loving parents trumps everything, and their sexual preference and culture is far less important.
I think it's pretty natural and understandable for children to want to know their biological parents. If nothing else, they like to understand their genetic background and heritage - why they are who they are.
I'm also yet to meet a child who's experienced their parents divorcing/splitting up, or who's been adopted, who hasn't at some level been affected by it - this includes within my own extended family and circle of friends.
I think most children (even today) would in an ideal world probably prefer their biological parents to be happy together in a loving and stable relationship, although no-one likes to say so for fear of casting judgement on those who've been less fortunate.
Apart from the lessons of Northern Rock's "borrow short, lend long" collapse for domestic gas suppliers.
And all other lessons.
What's interesting is that certain companies have come out and said they have hedged against gas prices. Ecotricity for instance I believe is one who have said that.
But other companies haven't.
Paying for a hedge is a cost that those that have sensibly done so will now see the benefit for. Those who avoided paying that price are going to struggle now.
Those who failed to hedge and go bust really should be allowed to fail. Otherwise again we are going to have a moral hazard situation.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
My sister was widowed at 30, and left with three small daughters. Never remarried, and worked full-time all her life. All her daughters, now in their 50's, seem to have long-term, stable relationships.
How horrible and that, if I might conjecture, would have provided a hugely important role model/life lesson to the daughters and, again, shown the love involved.
The "one father one mother" template is out of date. It was out of date as you note, decades ago.
Thank you. At one point, during her time at Uni one daughter was in some sort of bother, together with, I gather, several of the other residents of her hall. The responsible Uni officer remarked that she was surprised at X being in trouble, but not my niece, 'as she came from a broken home'! My angry sister had to be restrained from going down to the Uni and complaining.
The Catholic adoption centres believed that adoption by gay couples was against their religious beliefs. When they were given no choice they closed and kids who were previously adopted were less well supported with a huge cost to them.
The compromise I pushed at the time was the requirement that if a Catholic service wasn’t willing to provide adoption services to gay couples themselves they had to have a partnership with someone who would. The Catholics were grumpy but ok with it. The activists on the gay rights side weren’t.
The kids lost out.
(FWIW my personal belief is that a stable two person parental unit is key to children’s success in life. The sex of each member of the parental unit is irrelevant)
While, again FWIW, I agree with you about the stable parental unit with two people involved, I do wonder how the children's wider social group react to it, and consequently to the children, particularly as they get towards and into their teens. It'll probably not matter too much for those who get on reasonably well with their peers, but is it another stick with which to beat the fat girl or the asthmatic boy?
I'm not aware of any work on this, and would be interested to learn of any.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
The kids and youngish people who I know see gender as more fluid than my generation, so the idea of a female role model would seem a bit quaint to them (I used to think as you do myself). "We're all somewhere on the male-female spectrum, and not always at the same point" is a very common assertion. And of course there are lots of mothers and fathers who are pretty awful at being models of anything.
I now think that having loving parents trumps everything, and their sexual preference and culture is far less important.
I think it's pretty natural and understandable for children to want to know their biological parents. If nothing else, they like to understand their genetic background and heritage - why they are who they are.
I'm also yet to meet a child who's experienced their parents divorcing/splitting up, or who's been adopted, who hasn't at some level been affected by it - this includes within my own extended family and circle of friends.
I think most children (even today) would in an ideal world probably prefer their biological parents to be happy together in a loving and stable relationship, although no-one likes to say so for fear of casting judgement on those who've been less fortunate.
I don't think a gay couple who decide to have a child by one means or another are "less fortunate".
That's your fuddy duddy, old school, Tory, red cord, shire inculcation talking.
I don’t think Jesus would take too kindly to discrimination against homosexuals
I don't think he ever mentioned it, the Old Testament however certainly did
To be more accurate, no-one* has any idea if Jesus mentioned it or not, but the Gospel writers didn't include it if he did.
*well no-one in the last 1900 years
Though what the Old Testament writers say that Jesus said includes gems like "let he who is without sin cast the first stone" and "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's".
Applying those principles it should be easy to follow the law. If it's too hard to follow the law even with those principles, the law shouldn't be changed just to exempt the religious from it.
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
My sister was widowed at 30, and left with three small daughters. Never remarried, and worked full-time all her life. All her daughters, now in their 50's, seem to have long-term, stable relationships.
How horrible and that, if I might conjecture, would have provided a hugely important role model/life lesson to the daughters and, again, shown the love involved.
The "one father one mother" template is out of date. It was out of date as you note, decades ago.
Thank you. At one point, during her time at Uni one daughter was in some sort of bother, together with, I gather, several of the other residents of her hall. The responsible Uni officer remarked that she was surprised at X being in trouble, but not my niece, 'as she came from a broken home'! My angry sister had to be restrained from going down to the Uni and complaining.
Yep there is a lot of latent and ingrained opinions that manifest in language. Not to say that people are "unconsciously biased" and need to go on courses but these things take time to work through.
Thankfully I think each generation jettisons a lot of this type of baggage leaving many of the oldies behind.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
The Cumbrian mine is irrelevant now - we needed to not shut the pits and then not shut the power stations.
Yes, viable green energy is a global issue. The explosive price increase in the UK and only the UK is not a global issue. We can't blame the EU or remoaners or stoppy French idiots for this. Quitting the EU regulated energy market left us wide open to this but as usual we thought it was crap as its the EU and didn't need replacing.
Apart from the lessons of Northern Rock's "borrow short, lend long" collapse for domestic gas suppliers.
And all other lessons.
What's interesting is that certain companies have come out and said they have hedged against gas prices. Ecotricity for instance I believe is one who have said that.
But other companies haven't.
Paying for a hedge is a cost that those that have sensibly done so will now see the benefit for. Those who avoided paying that price are going to struggle now.
Those who failed to hedge and go bust really should be allowed to fail. Otherwise again we are going to have a moral hazard situation.
From what I can tell - that’s only a small part of the problem. The main problem is they have to honour the cap after fixed deals end. The figures from the FT - they have to buy energy wholesale at an average of £1600 per customer - and sell it at £1277.
It’s largely the cap that is making these energy suppliers go bust, rather than the lack of hedging.
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
Apart from the lessons of Northern Rock's "borrow short, lend long" collapse for domestic gas suppliers.
And all other lessons.
UK regulators invariably spend too much time focused on consumer rights, consumer prices, customer service and the like, and far too little on things like the supply of utilities, the security and solvency of businesses, whether or not the market is actually serving any usful purpose.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
I'm curious how many of those who regret there is no Catholic exemption to equalities legislation so that Catholics can't discriminate against homosexuals ... Would also call for an Islamic exemption to equalities legislation so that Muslims could discriminate against women in accordance to Shariah law?
The law is the law and we should have equality before the law.
The issue is that these Catholic adoption agencies had been running successfully for decades. They offered to partner with other agencies who would work with gay couples, rather than turn them away, which seemed a fair compromise.
The consequences, are more abortions and more children growing up in what is euphemistically called ‘care’, including in places like Rotherham.
If there are readily made alternatives available then why should people end up in care?
Why don't they end up at the alternatives that were good enough for gays? Why can't they be good enough for everyone? If Catholic agencies aren't crowding out unbigoted ones then the unbigoted ones should be able to expand to meet the demand.
The main difference between Catholic adoption agencies, and many domestic adoption placements - mostly run by local social services - is that the Catholic agencies actually cared about, and provided pastoral support to, young pregnant women.
The vast majority of other private adoption agencies operating in the UK, are sourcing children from abroad.
They just didn't care enough about them to do the role with equality before the law?
Hopefully the people who care and have passion will take up jobs in agencies that do want to look after young women while paying full respect to everyone equally before the law.
In the case of my friend, she was an unpaid volunteer, working with a charity in her spare time at her local church. Local authority social services worked very differently.
And hopefully people like your friend can volunteer with law abiding charities, not social services, that are available instead of religious ones that don't want to care for children or young women if they aren't allowed to discriminate.
There seems a certain irony that some people are claiming there's no alternative to Catholic agencies so people lose out ... But there was no need for these agencies to have the law applied equally to then as there were alternatives instead.
That's inconsistent. If there's alternatives that could be good enough for gay couples, presumably there are alternatives that are good enough for everyone?
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
The Cumbrian mine is irrelevant now - we needed to not shut the pits and then not shut the power stations.
Yes, viable green energy is a global issue. The explosive price increase in the UK and only the UK is not a global issue. We can't blame the EU or remoaners or stoppy French idiots for this. Quitting the EU regulated energy market left us wide open to this but as usual we thought it was crap as its the EU and didn't need replacing.
Whoops.
I have been listening to the various contributors on Sky this morning and it is fiendishly complex and is not a Brexit issue
Indeed it seems that Ed Miliband's energy price cap enacted by Therese May is a factor in the crisis
The Catholic adoption centres believed that adoption by gay couples was against their religious beliefs. When they were given no choice they closed and kids who were previously adopted were less well supported with a huge cost to them.
The compromise I pushed at the time was the requirement that if a Catholic service wasn’t willing to provide adoption services to gay couples themselves they had to have a partnership with someone who would. The Catholics were grumpy but ok with it. The activists on the gay rights side weren’t.
The kids lost out.
(FWIW my personal belief is that a stable two person parental unit is key to children’s success in life. The sex of each member of the parental unit is irrelevant)
While, again FWIW, I agree with you about the stable parental unit with two people involved, I do wonder how the children's wider social group react to it, and consequently to the children, particularly as they get towards and into their teens. It'll probably not matter too much for those who get on reasonably well with their peers, but is it another stick with which to beat the fat girl or the asthmatic boy?
I'm not aware of any work on this, and would be interested to learn of any.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
The kids and youngish people who I know see gender as more fluid than my generation, so the idea of a female role model would seem a bit quaint to them (I used to think as you do myself). "We're all somewhere on the male-female spectrum, and not always at the same point" is a very common assertion. And of course there are lots of mothers and fathers who are pretty awful at being models of anything.
I now think that having loving parents trumps everything, and their sexual preference and culture is far less important.
I think it's pretty natural and understandable for children to want to know their biological parents. If nothing else, they like to understand their genetic background and heritage - why they are who they are.
I'm also yet to meet a child who's experienced their parents divorcing/splitting up, or who's been adopted, who hasn't at some level been affected by it - this includes within my own extended family and circle of friends.
I think most children (even today) would in an ideal world probably prefer their biological parents to be happy together in a loving and stable relationship, although no-one likes to say so for fear of casting judgement on those who've been less fortunate.
I don't think a gay couple who decide to have a child by one means or another are "less fortunate".
That's your fuddy duddy, old school, Tory, red cord, shire inculcation talking.
I didn't mention gay couples in my post - although I have in another one - I mentioned divorce and adoption.
Would you care to respond to what I actually wrote or stick to ad-hominem?
A Chinese student in Canada with just two Twitter followers RT'd only three posts that reflected negatively on China. Chinese authorities called his parents, reached him on WeChat. An unsettling account & excerpt from @joannachiu's new book, China Unbound.
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
Odd that IDS who fetishised the suffering of the poor is now the guy who is rallying support for the £20 a week payment. Delighted that he is doing so - forgiveness is a commandment.
Its sad that he will lose. Red Wall Sheep Tory MPs will have to face the consequences of their actions. They can actively block their critics and try to present a "look I am universally loved and supported" line, but when the rot sets in it really sets in. As James "where's" Wharton found out in 2017.
Back when British Gas was in the public sector it had the slogan 'Use gas wisely'. Indeed, it was written on the side of the gas holder next to the Oval.
Privatisation brought 'piss away as much gas as possible' as the industry mantra. Switching power generation from coal to gas gobbled up our reserves even more quickly.
So now here we are. Highly dependant on imported gas, without the scope to switch to other options as most of the coal fired stations have shut down and the wind doesn't blow on demand.
And it is only going to get worse. The reduced energy efficiency resulting from decarbonisation means that for the same supply at the consumer end, more primary energy is required up the chain. So, if we convert the gas grid to hydrogen, we'll need around 30% more natural gas, all other things being equal.
We could always consider coal gasification, but where on earth would we find the coal?
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
Hence the need for male teachers in primary schools.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
Perhaps it's time that public and politicians actually listened to the climate demonstrators.
In addition to their climate changing properties, they is also, by definition, a limited supply of fossil fuels. Gas (and ultimately coal) will inevitably become increasingly scarce and expensive in the future (as well as causing climate change). What we should be doing is straining every sinew to develop replacements for fossil fuels as quickly as possible, not trying to prolong their use and delaying (and worsening) the inevitable!
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
Odd that IDS who fetishised the suffering of the poor is now the guy who is rallying support for the £20 a week payment. Delighted that he is doing so - forgiveness is a commandment.
Its sad that he will lose. Red Wall Sheep Tory MPs will have to face the consequences of their actions. They can actively block their critics and try to present a "look I am universally loved and supported" line, but when the rot sets in it really sets in. As James "where's" Wharton found out in 2017.
I'm curious how many of those who regret there is no Catholic exemption to equalities legislation so that Catholics can't discriminate against homosexuals ... Would also call for an Islamic exemption to equalities legislation so that Muslims could discriminate against women in accordance to Shariah law?
The law is the law and we should have equality before the law.
The issue is that these Catholic adoption agencies had been running successfully for decades. They offered to partner with other agencies who would work with gay couples, rather than turn them away, which seemed a fair compromise.
The consequences, are more abortions and more children growing up in what is euphemistically called ‘care’, including in places like Rotherham.
If there are readily made alternatives available then why should people end up in care?
Why don't they end up at the alternatives that were good enough for gays? Why can't they be good enough for everyone? If Catholic agencies aren't crowding out unbigoted ones then the unbigoted ones should be able to expand to meet the demand.
The main difference between Catholic adoption agencies, and many domestic adoption placements - mostly run by local social services - is that the Catholic agencies actually cared about, and provided pastoral support to, young pregnant women.
The vast majority of other private adoption agencies operating in the UK, are sourcing children from abroad.
They just didn't care enough about them to do the role with equality before the law?
Hopefully the people who care and have passion will take up jobs in agencies that do want to look after young women while paying full respect to everyone equally before the law.
'Equality before the law' is an extremely slippery concept. Why should it not mean that all adoption agencies have 'equality before the law' to practice what they believe is best for the welfare of children. I would describe your version of 'equality' as 'Everyone being equally told what to think by the state'.
FWIW I don't agree with RC views on same sex adoption, and think that almost any parental arrangement is better than having the state as parent, but some old fashioned classical liberalism might come in handy here.
Equality before the law should mean that the law applies to all equally.
If you mean that equality legislation should be abolished and everyone who wants to should be free to discriminate against gays, women, blacks and anyone else they feel like discriminating against then make the argument for that.
But if you don't want that, then arguing for an exemption on Shariah or Catholic or any other religious grounds is unreasonable in a secular society. Why should religious bigots be able to discriminate but non-religious bigots are in your words "told what to think by the state"?
Religious bigots and atheist bigots should be subject to the same laws. Whether that be allowing them to discriminate against gays, blacks and women ... Or not.
Thanks. We are agreed on the first sentence of your response. The rest of it is an exercise in whataboutery bearing no relation to what I said.
Merely believing in equality before the law does not allow assumptions and presuppositions about how that law should be framed in a liberal society where people have different opinions and practices.
I don’t think Jesus would take too kindly to discrimination against homosexuals
I don't think he ever mentioned it, the Old Testament however certainly did
To be more accurate, no-one* has any idea if Jesus mentioned it or not, but the Gospel writers didn't include it if he did.
*well no-one in the last 1900 years
Though what the Old Testament writers say that Jesus said includes gems like "let he who is without sin cast the first stone" and "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's".
Applying those principles it should be easy to follow the law. If it's too hard to follow the law even with those principles, the law shouldn't be changed just to exempt the religious from it.
Jesus doesn't feature in the Old Testament, bar a handful of dodgy prophesies.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
It's worth pointing out that the nuclear family is also an innovation, albeit one with a slightly longer pedigree. It was essentially invented in the middle ages but the Western church as a means to break kinship groups and insert itself into property inheritance. A lot of consequences, good and bad, flowed from that, relating to feudalism, individual rights and rule of law. Society here was earlier organised in much wider family networks and role models of both sexes would have been very accessible even to children whose biological parents were dead or absent.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
Hence the need for male teachers in primary schools.
Yes, I agree. This seems to get very little air-time in the equality debate, despite still being 80%+ female.
I suspect because those that conduct it are mainly high-flying alpha-females mainly interested in salary and boardroom equity for AB professionals, who will sort of lose interest in the rest once their battle is won.
Worth remembering that France ensured Britain received several "Naval Group" sized kicks in the teeth over the last few years over Brexit, from Galileo to the trade deal, of which refusing to grant equivalence to the City of London was the biggest. Limited sympathy in government. https://twitter.com/b_judah/status/1439598214785736707?s=20
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
I see Sir Jeffrey Donaldson has also said the DUP will vote to keep the UC uplift, so that is all opposition parties for it, we will see how many Tory rebels join IDS and Green
Not posted for a while but thought I would mention that in Denmark, after we removed all final covid restrictions we continue to see declining case numbers /hospitalisations. On the metro in Copenhagen you do see a few people in masks and at the supermarket it is now just normal to keep distance in the queue but apart from that everything is normal.
A Danish view on AUKUS is that the UK's role as security partner is at risk - but that the UK has to a large extent been pushed away and the depth of its security role was ignored on the grounds that the UK would be irrelevant for the US after brexit and it wouldn't matter - starting to dawn on the government here that their tough brexit stance might have consequences they didn't expect.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
Perhaps it's time that public and politicians actually listened to the climate demonstrators.
In addition to their climate changing properties, they is also, by definition, a limited supply of fossil fuels. Gas (and ultimately coal) will inevitably become increasingly scarce and expensive in the future (as well as causing climate change). What we should be doing is straining every sinew to develop replacements for fossil fuels as quickly as possible, not trying to prolong their use and delaying (and worsening) the inevitable!
I absolutely agree but it has to be organised in a way which allows the replacement of fossil fuel by its replacements in a manner that does not create serious economic disruption
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
Odd that IDS who fetishised the suffering of the poor is now the guy who is rallying support for the £20 a week payment. Delighted that he is doing so - forgiveness is a commandment.
Its sad that he will lose. Red Wall Sheep Tory MPs will have to face the consequences of their actions. They can actively block their critics and try to present a "look I am universally loved and supported" line, but when the rot sets in it really sets in. As James "where's" Wharton found out in 2017.
It is not a given he will lose
He needs to lose as otherwise pensioners are going to be annoyed and reminded about the broken triple lock promise.
I don’t think Jesus would take too kindly to discrimination against homosexuals
I don't think he ever mentioned it, the Old Testament however certainly did
To be more accurate, no-one* has any idea if Jesus mentioned it or not, but the Gospel writers didn't include it if he did.
*well no-one in the last 1900 years
Though what the Old Testament writers say that Jesus said includes gems like "let he who is without sin cast the first stone" and "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's".
Applying those principles it should be easy to follow the law. If it's too hard to follow the law even with those principles, the law shouldn't be changed just to exempt the religious from it.
Jesus doesn't feature in the Old Testament, bar a handful of dodgy prophesies.
Indeed, hence there is no New Testament in the Torah
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
First off, define "male role model". Academia seems unsure so if you've cracked it that would be a huge step forward.
Second of all can you point to this research which shows that "male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference" and what that difference is; and finally, can you show us the research that separate out the other factors contributing to any given child's development.
The Catholic adoption centres believed that adoption by gay couples was against their religious beliefs. When they were given no choice they closed and kids who were previously adopted were less well supported with a huge cost to them.
The compromise I pushed at the time was the requirement that if a Catholic service wasn’t willing to provide adoption services to gay couples themselves they had to have a partnership with someone who would. The Catholics were grumpy but ok with it. The activists on the gay rights side weren’t.
The kids lost out.
(FWIW my personal belief is that a stable two person parental unit is key to children’s success in life. The sex of each member of the parental unit is irrelevant)
While, again FWIW, I agree with you about the stable parental unit with two people involved, I do wonder how the children's wider social group react to it, and consequently to the children, particularly as they get towards and into their teens. It'll probably not matter too much for those who get on reasonably well with their peers, but is it another stick with which to beat the fat girl or the asthmatic boy?
I'm not aware of any work on this, and would be interested to learn of any.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
The kids and youngish people who I know see gender as more fluid than my generation, so the idea of a female role model would seem a bit quaint to them (I used to think as you do myself). "We're all somewhere on the male-female spectrum, and not always at the same point" is a very common assertion. And of course there are lots of mothers and fathers who are pretty awful at being models of anything.
I now think that having loving parents trumps everything, and their sexual preference and culture is far less important.
I think it's pretty natural and understandable for children to want to know their biological parents. If nothing else, they like to understand their genetic background and heritage - why they are who they are.
I'm also yet to meet a child who's experienced their parents divorcing/splitting up, or who's been adopted, who hasn't at some level been affected by it - this includes within my own extended family and circle of friends.
I think most children (even today) would in an ideal world probably prefer their biological parents to be happy together in a loving and stable relationship, although no-one likes to say so for fear of casting judgement on those who've been less fortunate.
I don't think a gay couple who decide to have a child by one means or another are "less fortunate".
That's your fuddy duddy, old school, Tory, red cord, shire inculcation talking.
I didn't mention gay couples in my post - although I have in another one - I mentioned divorce and adoption.
Would you care to respond to what I actually wrote or stick to ad-hominem?
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
Odd that IDS who fetishised the suffering of the poor is now the guy who is rallying support for the £20 a week payment. Delighted that he is doing so - forgiveness is a commandment.
Its sad that he will lose. Red Wall Sheep Tory MPs will have to face the consequences of their actions. They can actively block their critics and try to present a "look I am universally loved and supported" line, but when the rot sets in it really sets in. As James "where's" Wharton found out in 2017.
It is not a given he will lose
He needs to lose as otherwise pensioners are going to be annoyed and reminded about the broken triple lock promise.
I don’t think Jesus would take too kindly to discrimination against homosexuals
I don't think he ever mentioned it, the Old Testament however certainly did
To be more accurate, no-one* has any idea if Jesus mentioned it or not, but the Gospel writers didn't include it if he did.
*well no-one in the last 1900 years
Though what the Old Testament writers say that Jesus said includes gems like "let he who is without sin cast the first stone" and "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's".
Applying those principles it should be easy to follow the law. If it's too hard to follow the law even with those principles, the law shouldn't be changed just to exempt the religious from it.
Jesus doesn't feature in the Old Testament, bar a handful of dodgy prophesies.
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
I see Sir Jeffrey Donaldson has also said the DUP will vote to keep the UC uplift, so that is all opposition parties for it, we will see how many Tory rebels join IDS and Green
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
It's worth pointing out that the nuclear family is also an innovation, albeit one with a slightly longer pedigree. It was essentially invented in the middle ages but the Western church as a means to break kinship groups and insert itself into property inheritance. A lot of consequences, good and bad, flowed from that, relating to feudalism, individual rights and rule of law. Society here was earlier organised in much wider family networks and role models of both sexes would have been very accessible even to children whose biological parents were dead or absent.
Well, you can go back tens of thousands of years finding evidence of family groups within tribes, and the corollary for that are the indigenous communities living in comparative isolation today in some forests and on some remote islands.
What I do think is true (and I think we're agreeing with each other here) is that in such tribes and communities extended families were far more common so you've have grandparents, aunties, uncles, cousins and siblings all mucking in to care for each other - particularly given the unpredictability of life and death, it made a lot of sense - and not just the mum, dad and kids by themselves alone.
Who's to say that system was worse? In fact, it might be the answer.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
The Cumbrian mine is irrelevant now - we needed to not shut the pits and then not shut the power stations.
Yes, viable green energy is a global issue. The explosive price increase in the UK and only the UK is not a global issue. We can't blame the EU or remoaners or stoppy French idiots for this. Quitting the EU regulated energy market left us wide open to this but as usual we thought it was crap as its the EU and didn't need replacing.
Whoops.
I have been listening to the various contributors on Sky this morning and it is fiendishly complex and is not a Brexit issue
Indeed it seems that Ed Miliband's energy price cap enacted by Therese May is a factor in the crisis
Its certainly complex, but are we really going to insist that our departure from the regulated market has nothing to do with the vast increase only in UK prices?
I'm curious how many of those who regret there is no Catholic exemption to equalities legislation so that Catholics can't discriminate against homosexuals ... Would also call for an Islamic exemption to equalities legislation so that Muslims could discriminate against women in accordance to Shariah law?
The law is the law and we should have equality before the law.
The issue is that these Catholic adoption agencies had been running successfully for decades. They offered to partner with other agencies who would work with gay couples, rather than turn them away, which seemed a fair compromise.
The consequences, are more abortions and more children growing up in what is euphemistically called ‘care’, including in places like Rotherham.
If there are readily made alternatives available then why should people end up in care?
Why don't they end up at the alternatives that were good enough for gays? Why can't they be good enough for everyone? If Catholic agencies aren't crowding out unbigoted ones then the unbigoted ones should be able to expand to meet the demand.
The main difference between Catholic adoption agencies, and many domestic adoption placements - mostly run by local social services - is that the Catholic agencies actually cared about, and provided pastoral support to, young pregnant women.
The vast majority of other private adoption agencies operating in the UK, are sourcing children from abroad.
They just didn't care enough about them to do the role with equality before the law?
Hopefully the people who care and have passion will take up jobs in agencies that do want to look after young women while paying full respect to everyone equally before the law.
'Equality before the law' is an extremely slippery concept. Why should it not mean that all adoption agencies have 'equality before the law' to practice what they believe is best for the welfare of children. I would describe your version of 'equality' as 'Everyone being equally told what to think by the state'.
FWIW I don't agree with RC views on same sex adoption, and think that almost any parental arrangement is better than having the state as parent, but some old fashioned classical liberalism might come in handy here.
Equality before the law should mean that the law applies to all equally.
If you mean that equality legislation should be abolished and everyone who wants to should be free to discriminate against gays, women, blacks and anyone else they feel like discriminating against then make the argument for that.
But if you don't want that, then arguing for an exemption on Shariah or Catholic or any other religious grounds is unreasonable in a secular society. Why should religious bigots be able to discriminate but non-religious bigots are in your words "told what to think by the state"?
Religious bigots and atheist bigots should be subject to the same laws. Whether that be allowing them to discriminate against gays, blacks and women ... Or not.
Thanks. We are agreed on the first sentence of your response. The rest of it is an exercise in whataboutery bearing no relation to what I said.
Merely believing in equality before the law does not allow assumptions and presuppositions about how that law should be framed in a liberal society where people have different opinions and practices.
It's not whataboutery since we do have equalities legislation and since this conversation began with Charles bemoaning the fact an exemption wasn't given to the equalities legislation to the Catholic agencies.
Why should Catholic agencies be exempt from the law that applies to secular agencies?
If you wish to argue equalities legislation is a bad thing then that's a position to argue. However if equalities legislation is a good thing then why shouldn't the law apply to all equally?
As it happens my view of liberalism is essentially "do whatever you want, so long as it doesn't harm others". Equalities legislation is about preventing harm to others so I'm ok with that.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
First off, define "male role model". Academia seems unsure so if you've cracked it that would be a huge step forward.
Second of all can you point to this research which shows that "male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference" and what that difference is; and finally, can you show us the research that separate out the other factors contributing to any given child's development.
TIA.
Ah, you don't want to have a real discussion - just a bit of fun.
Understood. I will limit my engagement solely to other posters who do.
Universal Credit inventor Iain Duncan Smith has tabled amendment to keep £20 pw UC uplift - with Damian Green co-signatory. So both wings of Tory ideological divide
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
Odd that IDS who fetishised the suffering of the poor is now the guy who is rallying support for the £20 a week payment. Delighted that he is doing so - forgiveness is a commandment.
Its sad that he will lose. Red Wall Sheep Tory MPs will have to face the consequences of their actions. They can actively block their critics and try to present a "look I am universally loved and supported" line, but when the rot sets in it really sets in. As James "where's" Wharton found out in 2017.
Not at all odd.
IDS designed the system to be more generous, and with a taper (iirc) of around 50%.
Then it was eviscerated by George 'vineyard in my garden' Osborne, and the benefit itself has been salami sliced by a further 10% since.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
The Cumbrian mine is irrelevant now - we needed to not shut the pits and then not shut the power stations.
Yes, viable green energy is a global issue. The explosive price increase in the UK and only the UK is not a global issue. We can't blame the EU or remoaners or stoppy French idiots for this. Quitting the EU regulated energy market left us wide open to this but as usual we thought it was crap as its the EU and didn't need replacing.
Whoops.
I have been listening to the various contributors on Sky this morning and it is fiendishly complex and is not a Brexit issue
Indeed it seems that Ed Miliband's energy price cap enacted by Therese May is a factor in the crisis
Its certainly complex, but are we really going to insist that our departure from the regulated market has nothing to do with the vast increase only in UK prices?
It was not raised in any discussion I listened to this morning
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
It's worth pointing out that the nuclear family is also an innovation, albeit one with a slightly longer pedigree. It was essentially invented in the middle ages but the Western church as a means to break kinship groups and insert itself into property inheritance. A lot of consequences, good and bad, flowed from that, relating to feudalism, individual rights and rule of law. Society here was earlier organised in much wider family networks and role models of both sexes would have been very accessible even to children whose biological parents were dead or absent.
Well, you can go back tens of thousands of years finding evidence of family groups within tribes, and the corollary for that are the indigenous communities living in comparative isolation today in some forests and on some remote islands.
What I do think is true (and I think we're agreeing with each other here) is that in such tribes and communities extended families were far more common so you've have grandparents, aunties, uncles, cousins and siblings all mucking in to care for each other - particularly given the unpredictability of life and death, it made a lot of sense - and not just the mum, dad and kids by themselves alone.
Who's to say that system was worse? In fact, it might be the answer.
Yes, and I am making no judgement whatsoever on whether the nuclear family is a good or a bad thing. A fair assessment would find evidence in both directions. I only raised it in case anybody starting creeping down the "but this is natural" route.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
First off, define "male role model". Academia seems unsure so if you've cracked it that would be a huge step forward.
Second of all can you point to this research which shows that "male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference" and what that difference is; and finally, can you show us the research that separate out the other factors contributing to any given child's development.
TIA.
Ah, you don't want to have a real discussion - just a bit of fun.
Understood. I will limit my engagement solely to other posters who do.
I'm being deadly serious. In what way is a "male role model" good or bad. Do you mean a father who is there who helps the child through difficulties and provides discipline and boundaries and insight into problems; or do you mean an abusive, drunk father, or do you mean a single parent father, or.....
You said "male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference". First off what do you mean by this?
And secondly I asked you to point me to the research as I am always interested in such things (cf the gas discussion this morning).
Back when British Gas was in the public sector it had the slogan 'Use gas wisely'. Indeed, it was written on the side of the gas holder next to the Oval.
Privatisation brought 'piss away as much gas as possible' as the industry mantra. Switching power generation from coal to gas gobbled up our reserves even more quickly.
So now here we are. Highly dependant on imported gas, without the scope to switch to other options as most of the coal fired stations have shut down and the wind doesn't blow on demand.
And it is only going to get worse. The reduced energy efficiency resulting from decarbonisation means that for the same supply at the consumer end, more primary energy is required up the chain. So, if we convert the gas grid to hydrogen, we'll need around 30% more natural gas, all other things being equal.
We could always consider coal gasification, but where on earth would we find the coal?
Why does decarbonisation reduce energy efficiency?
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
Hence the need for male teachers in primary schools.
Good luck with that. Recruitment of male teachers for young children has an unfortunate image problem, and has done since, well, probably forever. And you can't throw money at the problem because that would be illegal.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
It's worth pointing out that the nuclear family is also an innovation, albeit one with a slightly longer pedigree. It was essentially invented in the middle ages but the Western church as a means to break kinship groups and insert itself into property inheritance. A lot of consequences, good and bad, flowed from that, relating to feudalism, individual rights and rule of law. Society here was earlier organised in much wider family networks and role models of both sexes would have been very accessible even to children whose biological parents were dead or absent.
Well, you can go back tens of thousands of years finding evidence of family groups within tribes, and the corollary for that are the indigenous communities living in comparative isolation today in some forests and on some remote islands.
What I do think is true (and I think we're agreeing with each other here) is that in such tribes and communities extended families were far more common so you've have grandparents, aunties, uncles, cousins and siblings all mucking in to care for each other - particularly given the unpredictability of life and death, it made a lot of sense - and not just the mum, dad and kids by themselves alone.
Who's to say that system was worse? In fact, it might be the answer.
Doesn't take one long in Family Research to find that people tended to marry (breed with) people from their own or the next community (assuming that wasn't over a mountain).
Apart from the lessons of Northern Rock's "borrow short, lend long" collapse for domestic gas suppliers.
And all other lessons.
What's interesting is that certain companies have come out and said they have hedged against gas prices. Ecotricity for instance I believe is one who have said that.
But other companies haven't.
Paying for a hedge is a cost that those that have sensibly done so will now see the benefit for. Those who avoided paying that price are going to struggle now.
Those who failed to hedge and go bust really should be allowed to fail. Otherwise again we are going to have a moral hazard situation.
From what I can tell - that’s only a small part of the problem. The main problem is they have to honour the cap after fixed deals end. The figures from the FT - they have to buy energy wholesale at an average of £1600 per customer - and sell it at £1277.
It’s largely the cap that is making these energy suppliers go bust, rather than the lack of hedging.
While the cap was a bad policy I opposed when Ed proposed it and when May did it, it's not the issue. All of these companies were happily selling contracts, even recently, for below the cap. It's not like Universities where the cap is also the floor for many. Plus they knew they the cap was in place.
The problem is that they're buying energy wholesale at £1600 because they didn't hedge. Those who paid for hedges are not being charged £1600 wholesale as they locked in their prices in the past with a hedge.
Some companies thought they could get away without hedging as it was an unnecessary cost and they could pass on that "saving" to their customers. It wasn't an unnecessary cost and anyone in those businesses should lose their equity as a result or there will be another moral hazard failure here.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
The Cumbrian mine is irrelevant now - we needed to not shut the pits and then not shut the power stations.
Yes, viable green energy is a global issue. The explosive price increase in the UK and only the UK is not a global issue. We can't blame the EU or remoaners or stoppy French idiots for this. Quitting the EU regulated energy market left us wide open to this but as usual we thought it was crap as its the EU and didn't need replacing.
Whoops.
I have been listening to the various contributors on Sky this morning and it is fiendishly complex and is not a Brexit issue
Indeed it seems that Ed Miliband's energy price cap enacted by Therese May is a factor in the crisis
Its certainly complex, but are we really going to insist that our departure from the regulated market has nothing to do with the vast increase only in UK prices?
I've not got a detailed understanding about this, so correct me if I'm wrong, but... isn't the main driver of the difference in UK/non-UK prices rises due to an interconnector fire in Kent? That is, we're stuck having to generate more of our own electricity. That could have happened just as easily with us within the EU, right?
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
It's worth pointing out that the nuclear family is also an innovation, albeit one with a slightly longer pedigree. It was essentially invented in the middle ages but the Western church as a means to break kinship groups and insert itself into property inheritance. A lot of consequences, good and bad, flowed from that, relating to feudalism, individual rights and rule of law. Society here was earlier organised in much wider family networks and role models of both sexes would have been very accessible even to children whose biological parents were dead or absent.
Well, you can go back tens of thousands of years finding evidence of family groups within tribes, and the corollary for that are the indigenous communities living in comparative isolation today in some forests and on some remote islands.
What I do think is true (and I think we're agreeing with each other here) is that in such tribes and communities extended families were far more common so you've have grandparents, aunties, uncles, cousins and siblings all mucking in to care for each other - particularly given the unpredictability of life and death, it made a lot of sense - and not just the mum, dad and kids by themselves alone.
Who's to say that system was worse? In fact, it might be the answer.
Yes, and I am making no judgement whatsoever on whether the nuclear family is a good or a bad thing. A fair assessment would find evidence in both directions. I only raised it in case anybody starting creeping down the "but this is natural" route.
I'm inclined to think that it's probably best for our emotional wellbeing to live close to our parents, grandparents and siblings (provided they are not abusive, and they respect you and your space) wherever possible as family is what is most likely to stick with you and support you through thick and thin.
On one thing I'm clear: I will avoid putting my parents into a home at all costs.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
Hence the need for male teachers in primary schools.
Good luck with that. Recruitment of male teachers for young children has an unfortunate image problem, and has done since, well, probably forever. And you can't throw money at the problem because that would be illegal.
Eldest grandson is a primary school teacher. Happily married to a female secondary school teacher.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
The Cumbrian mine is irrelevant now - we needed to not shut the pits and then not shut the power stations.
Yes, viable green energy is a global issue. The explosive price increase in the UK and only the UK is not a global issue. We can't blame the EU or remoaners or stoppy French idiots for this. Quitting the EU regulated energy market left us wide open to this but as usual we thought it was crap as its the EU and didn't need replacing.
Whoops.
I have been listening to the various contributors on Sky this morning and it is fiendishly complex and is not a Brexit issue
Indeed it seems that Ed Miliband's energy price cap enacted by Therese May is a factor in the crisis
The "only in the UK" stuff is baloney. Here is a piece with a more European dataset:
"A fire at a National Grid site in Sellindge near Ashford in Kent has forced the shut down of the main power cable to the continent. That means reduced electricity imports from France until March.
In normal circumstances, the UK could rely on interconnectors linking to other countries such as Belgium, Norway, and the Netherlands to import electricity. But most of Europe is also experiencing a surge in energy prices.
Wholesale European electricity prices have shot up, too, and natural gas futures in the Netherlands have raced past €60/megawatt hour to hit a record high this week. Dutch gas prices have risen by around 450% over the year, and French and German wholesale electricity prices are also trading at record highs. To add to the problem, gas stockpiles are at their lowest in ten years." https://moneyweek.com/investments/commodities/energy/603857/why-are-energy-prices-going-up-so-much
Recovery from Covid is one cause. Russia cutting supply to speed up approval of Nordstream 2 is another. EuCo reducing the supply of carbon credits to make emissions more expensive is a third.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
The Cumbrian mine is irrelevant now - we needed to not shut the pits and then not shut the power stations.
Yes, viable green energy is a global issue. The explosive price increase in the UK and only the UK is not a global issue. We can't blame the EU or remoaners or stoppy French idiots for this. Quitting the EU regulated energy market left us wide open to this but as usual we thought it was crap as its the EU and didn't need replacing.
Whoops.
I have been listening to the various contributors on Sky this morning and it is fiendishly complex and is not a Brexit issue
Indeed it seems that Ed Miliband's energy price cap enacted by Therese May is a factor in the crisis
Its certainly complex, but are we really going to insist that our departure from the regulated market has nothing to do with the vast increase only in UK prices?
It was not raised in any discussion I listened to this morning
Either way this is a UK-specific issue. We aren't going to undo years of non-decisions kicking the can down the road fast enough. As EU electricity costs multiples less than ours perhaps our government may have to throw in big subsidies? Wasn't state aid one of the reasons to leave?
This is the problem with the CO2 crisis. It isn't commercially viable to produce fertiliser which produces the CO2 with gas prices as high as it is. The gas price and the loss of one interconnector has such a massive effect on the electricity price.
So how about fat subsidies to slash wholesale gas prices? Have we not now taken back control of such things?
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
It's worth pointing out that the nuclear family is also an innovation, albeit one with a slightly longer pedigree. It was essentially invented in the middle ages but the Western church as a means to break kinship groups and insert itself into property inheritance. A lot of consequences, good and bad, flowed from that, relating to feudalism, individual rights and rule of law. Society here was earlier organised in much wider family networks and role models of both sexes would have been very accessible even to children whose biological parents were dead or absent.
Well, you can go back tens of thousands of years finding evidence of family groups within tribes, and the corollary for that are the indigenous communities living in comparative isolation today in some forests and on some remote islands.
What I do think is true (and I think we're agreeing with each other here) is that in such tribes and communities extended families were far more common so you've have grandparents, aunties, uncles, cousins and siblings all mucking in to care for each other - particularly given the unpredictability of life and death, it made a lot of sense - and not just the mum, dad and kids by themselves alone.
Who's to say that system was worse? In fact, it might be the answer.
Doesn't take one long in Family Research to find that people tended to marry (breed with) people from their own or the next community (assuming that wasn't over a mountain).
Another uncomfortable truth is the myth of "the one" - it's one we tell ourselves, we all do, because we love our partners deeply but we haven't individually reviewed all 4 billion + suitable candidates to be sure, have we?
As this is a betting site it's probably more likely to be 1:10,000 - which means there are statistically a large number of suitable partners, worldwide - and that's then filtered by cultural entropy, language, compatibility and proximity to feel like they are "the one" within your realistic field of vision for your own life.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
It is an interesting question. I expect research will appear, if it has not already (as you say, relatively small samples as yet and maybe skewed towards the higher incomes, which would complicated things).
A couple of things I would note: Until fairly recently (and even now, to a lesser extent) mothers dominated childcare and the male role model was out earning the money and perhaps a fairly distant figure. That's arguably not good for either the sons (this is how you've got to be) or the daughters (you'll get to stay at home and look after children) A pair of same sex parents likely gives a different experience and different outcome to different sex parents, on average. But it's a bit like saying that there are probably intelligence differerences between ethnic groups, on average. There probably are, but it loses sight of the fact that the differences within group are very likely much much bigger than the differences between groups. So, children from a same sex couple might on average be slight better/worse on measure x than children from different sex couple. But I'd be confident that the differences within the groups will be far larger. Even if you assume that the children from the same sex couple are worse on measure x on average, there will be many children from same sex couples that are better on x than many children from different sex couples.
Good parents will be good parents; bad will be bad. I do think that will be far more important than their sex.
I also wonder about the role model question - e.g. if you've two gay blokes who adopt a girl, where is her female role model? Often the worst damage when family breakup occurs is to the kid who loses a role model of their own gender from regular family life.
What about single parent families, of which there are zillions. Short one role model. Or, arguably, long a harmful role model.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
I'm sure two parents of any sex do provide a hugely positive role model about relationships but if it's true that male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference then it stands to reason that having two parents of the same sex might make it more challenging to provide a proximate same-gender role model for a child in the same way it does within single parent families.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
It is an interesting question. I expect research will appear, if it has not already (as you say, relatively small samples as yet and maybe skewed towards the higher incomes, which would complicated things).
A couple of things I would note: Until fairly recently (and even now, to a lesser extent) mothers dominated childcare and the male role model was out earning the money and perhaps a fairly distant figure. That's arguably not good for either the sons (this is how you've got to be) or the daughters (you'll get to stay at home and look after children) A pair of same sex parents likely gives a different experience and different outcome to different sex parents, on average. But it's a bit like saying that there are probably intelligence differerences between ethnic groups, on average. There probably are, but it loses sight of the fact that the differences within group are very likely much much bigger than the differences between groups. So, children from a same sex couple might on average be slight better/worse on measure x than children from different sex couple. But I'd be confident that the differences within the groups will be far larger. Even if you assume that the children from the same sex couple are worse on measure x on average, there will be many children from same sex couples that are better on x than many children from different sex couples.
Good parents will be good parents; bad will be bad. I do think that will be far more important than their sex.
Yes, that's a fair point - and you may well be right.
The energy crisis started in the late 80s when the sector was deregulated. We've mentioned the dash for gas - not only did it help burn off our North Sea reserves it also bust the market for coal.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
There are those who are demanding Cambo is stopped and the Cumbria coal mine planning refused then complain over energy supply crisis
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
The Cumbrian mine is irrelevant now - we needed to not shut the pits and then not shut the power stations.
Yes, viable green energy is a global issue. The explosive price increase in the UK and only the UK is not a global issue. We can't blame the EU or remoaners or stoppy French idiots for this. Quitting the EU regulated energy market left us wide open to this but as usual we thought it was crap as its the EU and didn't need replacing.
Whoops.
I have been listening to the various contributors on Sky this morning and it is fiendishly complex and is not a Brexit issue
Indeed it seems that Ed Miliband's energy price cap enacted by Therese May is a factor in the crisis
The "only in the UK" stuff is baloney. Here is a piece with a more European dataset:
"A fire at a National Grid site in Sellindge near Ashford in Kent has forced the shut down of the main power cable to the continent. That means reduced electricity imports from France until March.
In normal circumstances, the UK could rely on interconnectors linking to other countries such as Belgium, Norway, and the Netherlands to import electricity. But most of Europe is also experiencing a surge in energy prices.
Wholesale European electricity prices have shot up, too, and natural gas futures in the Netherlands have raced past €60/megawatt hour to hit a record high this week. Dutch gas prices have risen by around 450% over the year, and French and German wholesale electricity prices are also trading at record highs. To add to the problem, gas stockpiles are at their lowest in ten years." https://moneyweek.com/investments/commodities/energy/603857/why-are-energy-prices-going-up-so-much
Recovery from Covid is one cause. Russia cutting supply to speed up approval of Nordstream 2 is another. EuCo reducing the supply of carbon credits to make emissions more expensive is a third.
Its the same as the wholesale price increases of everything from cardboard to aluminium. Everyone is getting a price increase, but the much bigger UK price increase is on us.
Which is why we're paying double the prices paid in France, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark etc etc
Comments
For now, the UK price of gas is over four times what it was in February.
FWIW I don't agree with RC views on same sex adoption, and think that almost any parental arrangement is better than having the state as parent, but some old fashioned classical liberalism might come in handy here.
I now think that having loving parents trumps everything, and their sexual preference and culture is far less important.
I've told this anecdote once before but last year my daughter came home from school (in the autumn between them being closed and reclosed) and said that her friend's uncle is getting married to a man before adding crossly "but that isn't allowed".
We asked her why that wasn't allowed, and she said "because of coronavirus. People shouldn't be having weddings due to coronavirus." The idea that it was a man marrying a man that could be an issue never even entered her head, just that the virus means no weddings at the time.
And you are correct that no party will enter into a coalition with the AfD.
Nut Nut should be worried.
Which politician, from any party, is going to be the first to admit the correlation? Ed Miliband did try and make the positive case for higher energy bills a decade ago, but now it’s probably only Farage who will say anything.
Two loving parents of any sex would seem to me to provide a hugely positive role model about relationships.
But the bigger hurdle is in the nature of the CoE. It includes liberals who don't feel bound by the limits of bible/tradition, and large numbers of (voluble and active) members who think they can't go beyond the bible on gay, or any, issues. They are deluded of course as they routinely ignore the bible/Jesus on war, wealth, remarriage, women speaking in church and all sorts of things. At heart they are not over fond of gays.
I doubt it will happen in my lifetime if ever in the Church of England and definitely never in the Roman Catholic Church.
Apart from the lessons of Northern Rock's "borrow short, lend long" collapse for domestic gas suppliers.
And all other lessons.
the failure to invest in nuclear, the removal of gas storage etc etc - not a factor in his head.
Assuming the SPD get the most votes but SPD+Green are under 50%: I would to see Scholz painting Laschet and Söder (CSU leader) into a horrible corner for the centre right parties.
Scholz: "Seeing Die Linke in government is an anathema to you, but how far are you prepared to go to prevent Die Linke getting into govenment, the choice lies in your hands. How far are you prepared to go so that the CDU/CSU Union can enter into coalition as a junior party?"
Unfortunately yesterday both Scholz and Baerbock said that they want to see the Union in opposition, which kind of closes off that strategy.
Edit: although there are plenty who as you say feel very strongly about it in the UK parishes also, one way or another.
If you mean that equality legislation should be abolished and everyone who wants to should be free to discriminate against gays, women, blacks and anyone else they feel like discriminating against then make the argument for that.
But if you don't want that, then arguing for an exemption on Shariah or Catholic or any other religious grounds is unreasonable in a secular society. Why should religious bigots be able to discriminate but non-religious bigots are in your words "told what to think by the state"?
Religious bigots and atheist bigots should be subject to the same laws. Whether that be allowing them to discriminate against gays, blacks and women ... Or not.
What did that mean? We went from digging coal from profitable pits a short distance from the power station to shutting the pits and importing coal from Venezuela and Brazil. Once you start importing its easy to keep doing it - suddenly imported coal is expensive so both imports and CCS are off the table and coal generation goes.
But its alright as we have all these gas power stations. Except that the gas is increasingly imported. But its alright as we have nuclear. Yeah right, we can't build new ones. But its alright as we have these interconnectors and the energy market is regulated. Until an interconnector burns out and we quit the regulated market.
Whilst there have been errors piled on errors this lot have been in government for 11 years. How will they blame someone else or what they have done - and haven't done - in that time?
Meanwhile hearing anecdotes on the radio of people finding that equivalent deals to the one that their now bust gascos have been offering are, typically, hundreds if not thousands of pounds more expensive.
That's the market for you, Boris.
The "one father one mother" template is out of date. It was out of date as you note, decades ago.
Dehenna Davison must be a possibility.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10008253/Gas-crisis-cause-three-day-week-amid-emergency-talks.html
Time to panic buy.
Until it isn't
https://twitter.com/Mij_Europe/status/1439854575507415040?s=20
https://twitter.com/TripperheadToo/status/1438381686157283334
In Hong Kong.
The great McDonald's "Crispy Chicken Wings Drought of 2021" continues.
Currently 43 of the 245 McDonald's outlets in Hong Kong have run out.
I really fear that we are all, not just here in the UK, but across the globe going to experience the clash between climate change demands (COP26) and the reality that most everyone wants to deal with it but then cannot accept an abrupt and sudden spike in energy prices which underpins all economic activity
The eco warriors on the M25 have infuriated drivers and it would appear 59/25 oppose the demonstrations again indicating that you have to take the public with you and their wallets
Sad to see Mutti go. Such a kind face. Such a good and capable person. A giant, really, and of the right sort.
I'm also yet to meet a child who's experienced their parents divorcing/splitting up, or who's been adopted, who hasn't at some level been affected by it - this includes within my own extended family and circle of friends.
I think most children (even today) would in an ideal world probably prefer their biological parents to be happy together in a loving and stable relationship, although no-one likes to say so for fear of casting judgement on those who've been less fortunate.
But other companies haven't.
Paying for a hedge is a cost that those that have sensibly done so will now see the benefit for. Those who avoided paying that price are going to struggle now.
Those who failed to hedge and go bust really should be allowed to fail. Otherwise again we are going to have a moral hazard situation.
Age-standardised #COVID19 case rates were highest among the Pakistani and Bangladeshi ethnic groups between 1 Sept 2020 and 22 May 2021.
Whereas the White British ethnic group had the highest case rate between 23 May 2021 and 25 July 2021 http://ow.ly/NNfa50GcMMI
https://twitter.com/ONS/status/1439870038031441920?s=20
*well no-one in the last 1900 years
My angry sister had to be restrained from going down to the Uni and complaining.
That's your fuddy duddy, old school, Tory, red cord, shire inculcation talking.
Applying those principles it should be easy to follow the law. If it's too hard to follow the law even with those principles, the law shouldn't be changed just to exempt the religious from it.
And WITH Stephen Timms so almost certain to have Labour support
This will be a key vote - gvt want to scrap
https://twitter.com/SamCoatesSky/status/1439877076820049922?s=20
Thankfully I think each generation jettisons a lot of this type of baggage leaving many of the oldies behind.
Yes, viable green energy is a global issue. The explosive price increase in the UK and only the UK is not a global issue. We can't blame the EU or remoaners or stoppy French idiots for this. Quitting the EU regulated energy market left us wide open to this but as usual we thought it was crap as its the EU and didn't need replacing.
Whoops.
It’s largely the cap that is making these energy suppliers go bust, rather than the lack of hedging.
We like to say that there's absolutely no difference between same-sex couples and heterosexual couples, because we want to be inclusive and don't want to discriminate, but the truth is we just don't know yet.
The former is a fairly recent development (last 15 years) and we may find the difference in datasets in future to be utterly trivial or they might identify some differences.
We don't know yet.
There seems a certain irony that some people are claiming there's no alternative to Catholic agencies so people lose out ... But there was no need for these agencies to have the law applied equally to then as there were alternatives instead.
That's inconsistent. If there's alternatives that could be good enough for gay couples, presumably there are alternatives that are good enough for everyone?
Indeed it seems that Ed Miliband's energy price cap enacted by Therese May is a factor in the crisis
Would you care to respond to what I actually wrote or stick to ad-hominem?
https://twitter.com/shtweet/status/1439802785277620227?s=20
Its sad that he will lose. Red Wall Sheep Tory MPs will have to face the consequences of their actions. They can actively block their critics and try to present a "look I am universally loved and supported" line, but when the rot sets in it really sets in. As James "where's" Wharton found out in 2017.
Privatisation brought 'piss away as much gas as possible' as the industry mantra. Switching power generation from coal to gas gobbled up our reserves even more quickly.
So now here we are. Highly dependant on imported gas, without the scope to switch to other options as most of the coal fired stations have shut down and the wind doesn't blow on demand.
And it is only going to get worse. The reduced energy efficiency resulting from decarbonisation means that for the same supply at the consumer end, more primary energy is required up the chain. So, if we convert the gas grid to hydrogen, we'll need around 30% more natural gas, all other things being equal.
We could always consider coal gasification, but where on earth would we find the coal?
In addition to their climate changing properties, they is also, by definition, a limited supply of fossil fuels. Gas (and ultimately coal) will inevitably become increasingly scarce and expensive in the future (as well as causing climate change). What we should be doing is straining every sinew to develop replacements for fossil fuels as quickly as possible, not trying to prolong their use and delaying (and worsening) the inevitable!
Merely believing in equality before the law does not allow assumptions and presuppositions about how that law should be framed in a liberal society where people have different opinions and practices.
Society here was earlier organised in much wider family networks and role models of both sexes would have been very accessible even to children whose biological parents were dead or absent.
Thanks for the piece, @NickPalmer.
I suspect because those that conduct it are mainly high-flying alpha-females mainly interested in salary and boardroom equity for AB professionals, who will sort of lose interest in the rest once their battle is won.
https://twitter.com/b_judah/status/1439598214785736707?s=20
I see Sir Jeffrey Donaldson has also said the DUP will vote to keep the UC uplift, so that is all opposition parties for it, we will see how many Tory rebels join IDS and Green
A Danish view on AUKUS is that the UK's role as security partner is at risk - but that the UK has to a large extent been pushed away and the depth of its security role was ignored on the grounds that the UK would be irrelevant for the US after brexit and it wouldn't matter - starting to dawn on the government here that their tough brexit stance might have consequences they didn't expect.
Second of all can you point to this research which shows that "male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference" and what that difference is; and finally, can you show us the research that separate out the other factors contributing to any given child's development.
TIA.
If Rishi has any sense he will concede
What I do think is true (and I think we're agreeing with each other here) is that in such tribes and communities extended families were far more common so you've have grandparents, aunties, uncles, cousins and siblings all mucking in to care for each other - particularly given the unpredictability of life and death, it made a lot of sense - and not just the mum, dad and kids by themselves alone.
Who's to say that system was worse? In fact, it might be the answer.
Why should Catholic agencies be exempt from the law that applies to secular agencies?
If you wish to argue equalities legislation is a bad thing then that's a position to argue. However if equalities legislation is a good thing then why shouldn't the law apply to all equally?
As it happens my view of liberalism is essentially "do whatever you want, so long as it doesn't harm others". Equalities legislation is about preventing harm to others so I'm ok with that.
Understood. I will limit my engagement solely to other posters who do.
IDS designed the system to be more generous, and with a taper (iirc) of around 50%.
Then it was eviscerated by George 'vineyard in my garden' Osborne, and the benefit itself has been salami sliced by a further 10% since.
Well done, IDS.
You said "male role models for boys make a difference and female role models for girls make a difference". First off what do you mean by this?
And secondly I asked you to point me to the research as I am always interested in such things (cf the gas discussion this morning).
Is that not having a real discussion.
The problem is that they're buying energy wholesale at £1600 because they didn't hedge. Those who paid for hedges are not being charged £1600 wholesale as they locked in their prices in the past with a hedge.
Some companies thought they could get away without hedging as it was an unnecessary cost and they could pass on that "saving" to their customers. It wasn't an unnecessary cost and anyone in those businesses should lose their equity as a result or there will be another moral hazard failure here.
isn't the main driver of the difference in UK/non-UK prices rises due to an interconnector fire in Kent? That is, we're stuck having to generate more of our own electricity. That could have happened just as easily with us within the EU, right?
On one thing I'm clear: I will avoid putting my parents into a home at all costs.
"A fire at a National Grid site in Sellindge near Ashford in Kent has forced the shut down of the main power cable to the continent. That means reduced electricity imports from France until March.
In normal circumstances, the UK could rely on interconnectors linking to other countries such as Belgium, Norway, and the Netherlands to import electricity. But most of Europe is also experiencing a surge in energy prices.
Wholesale European electricity prices have shot up, too, and natural gas futures in the Netherlands have raced past €60/megawatt hour to hit a record high this week. Dutch gas prices have risen by around 450% over the year, and French and German wholesale electricity prices are also trading at record highs. To add to the problem, gas stockpiles are at their lowest in ten years."
https://moneyweek.com/investments/commodities/energy/603857/why-are-energy-prices-going-up-so-much
Recovery from Covid is one cause. Russia cutting supply to speed up approval of Nordstream 2 is another. EuCo reducing the supply of carbon credits to make emissions more expensive is a third.
This is the problem with the CO2 crisis. It isn't commercially viable to produce fertiliser which produces the CO2 with gas prices as high as it is. The gas price and the loss of one interconnector has such a massive effect on the electricity price.
So how about fat subsidies to slash wholesale gas prices? Have we not now taken back control of such things?
As this is a betting site it's probably more likely to be 1:10,000 - which means there are statistically a large number of suitable partners, worldwide - and that's then filtered by cultural entropy, language, compatibility and proximity to feel like they are "the one" within your realistic field of vision for your own life.
A couple of things I would note:
Until fairly recently (and even now, to a lesser extent) mothers dominated childcare and the male role model was out earning the money and perhaps a fairly distant figure. That's arguably not good for either the sons (this is how you've got to be) or the daughters (you'll get to stay at home and look after children)
A pair of same sex parents likely gives a different experience and different outcome to different sex parents, on average. But it's a bit like saying that there are probably intelligence differerences between ethnic groups, on average. There probably are, but it loses sight of the fact that the differences within group are very likely much much bigger than the differences between groups. So, children from a same sex couple might on average be slight better/worse on measure x than children from different sex couple. But I'd be confident that the differences within the groups will be far larger. Even if you assume that the children from the same sex couple are worse on measure x on average, there will be many children from same sex couples that are better on x than many children from different sex couples.
Good parents will be good parents; bad will be bad. I do think that will be far more important than their sex.
Impressive.
Which is why we're paying double the prices paid in France, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark etc etc