Talking of which, much as I approve of the two-stage County Championship, we may be pushing the envelope of sensible contests between bat and ball by having matches this deep into September.
11:02 Day 2 ESSEX BEAT NORTHANTS BY AN INNINGS & 44 RUNS Essex 170 v Northants 81 and 45
Husband finally managed to eat something today. Hooray!
I will forbear from sharing the recipe for chicken in a creamy leek and walnut sauce which caused such angst.
Meanwhile my day at the Chelsea Flower Show yesterday was great fun if very tiring. The gardens were not the best I have ever seen but plenty of good ideas. The people watching is great fun of course: there are 4 distinct tribes on show -
- English middle class ladies of a certain age - Middle-aged men wearing brightly coloured trousers (think the colours of Portillo's jackets), rarely seen (thank God) in other settings and, often, hats - gay men in very floral shirts - young men with floppy hair
There is also the section with garden statues which are unbelievably hideous and expensive. Who buys this stuff? Why would any sane person want to have statues of Jemima Puddleduck in their garden?
And the clothes - does anyone really wear a costume such as this - https://imgur.com/QAlPsCk - even in Scotland?
Talking of which, much as I approve of the two-stage County Championship, we may be pushing the envelope of sensible contests between bat and ball by having matches this deep into September.
11:02 Day 2 ESSEX BEAT NORTHANTS BY AN INNINGS & 44 RUNS Essex 170 v Northants 81 and 45
Yes, there should really be no cricket matches in the northern hemisphere from today until Spring, it should be football and rugby only.
Having said that the Football season should start now not in August when the Premier League restarts
Is that the same Pret A Manger who we were told in 2017 couldn't survive Brexit because it is so dependent upon low paid immigrant workers ?
The same low paid immigrant workers we're told who have all left the UK ?
I'm not sure this is the good news you are spinning it as. By the time they finish this recruitment push it only puts their workforce back where it started. Pret's strategy is "last man standing" and it seems reasonable - the fall in city working / travel means less demand for twatty coffee which means other outlets will fail. As Pret don't have as strong a coverage as Costa, Staxfbucks and Nero, this is their chance to mop up.
I'm not spinning it merely pointing out the irony of a business which is so dependent upon low paid migrant workers recruiting 3k new low paid migrant workers when we're continually told that the low paid migrant workers have all 'gone home'.
As for the various purveyors of 'twatty coffee' the only thing I can say is that their ever increasing numbers exposes the bollox of 'austerity' claims.
Lets pick this apart. The absolutism you are putting out is the problem. Nobody has said that ALL the migrant workers have gone home. More people registered with the EU settlement scheme than the government thought were here in the first place.
It is also true that the departure of migrant labour has created huge gaps in the labour force in a number of industries including leisure and QSR. With the culling of a stack of jobs in both smaller outlets and big chains there are people out there who still want the work and Pret are concentrated in areas easier to recruit for.
Given that people need to register for an National Insurance number as they begin working, how on earth did the Government not grasp how many people had arrived here to work?
Although how many people in this country work cash in hand without using an NI number? More than a few.
I'm not sure how people can get away with that these days, now that bank accounts and BACS seem to be the order of the day. I still can't get my head around how banks can commandeer our money every month, yet only give us 0.1% on anything we may be able to save.
Since covid I pay all tradesmen through bacs and they like the instant payment into their account
I do not use cash at all these days, even the gardener
I realised this morning that I don't even carry my bank cards with me any more.
The cafe I'm working in had a card-machine fail, and I had no means to pay other than my phone. I offered to pop home and get a card to get some cash out but they very sensibly just told me just to write it down and pay tomorrow when they'd fixed it.
I haven't used cash since February 2020, at least, and I don't think I've used my physical cards this year.
The only thing I've use a physical card for in months is Pay At Pump fuel. Its irritating there's no contactless version of that as a few times I've been unable to refuel at my local (newly built) Tesco's since I haven't had my wallet with me and the machines are exclusively pay at pump that require cards to be inserted.
Husband finally managed to eat something today. Hooray!
I will forbear from sharing the recipe for chicken in a creamy leek and walnut sauce which caused such angst.
Meanwhile my day at the Chelsea Flower Show yesterday was great fun if very tiring. The gardens were not the best I have ever seen but plenty of good ideas. The people watching is great fun of course: there are 4 distinct tribes on show -
- English middle class ladies of a certain age - Middle-aged men wearing brightly coloured trousers (think the colours of Portillo's jackets), rarely seen (thank God) in other settings and, often, hats - gay men in very floral shirts - young men with floppy hair
There is also the section with garden statues which are unbelievably hideous and expensive. Who buys this stuff? Why would any sane person want to have statues of Jemima Puddleduck in their garden?
And the clothes - does anyone really wear a costume such as this - https://imgur.com/QAlPsCk - even in Scotland?
I don't know about all that but I do know that when I used to live round the corner the taking up of the turf, the carnage* of the show itself, and then the replacement/repair of the turf was a fantastic process. You would never have known it had taken place.
*yes I realise it is a very enjoyable occasion for people.
Great to hear about your husband. Did you get to the bottom of it - allergy/foreign body/scar/etc?
I could see a bloc forming looking for a looser, associate membership.
It should be an implicit objective of U.K. foreign policy to find some kind of associate EU membership that works for us, along with Switzerland, Norway, the non-Euro countries (Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Sweden), and perhaps Italy.
Why?
Is NZ seeking to find some kind of Australia membership? Is Canada seeking to find some kind of USA membership?
Why can't the objective of our policy be to become friendly neighbours of the EU instead?
European market integration is fantastic, in my opinion, but I don’t believe in the case for a single currency.
Therefore I favour an outer ring of closely integrated European economies outside the Euro.
Call it associate EU membership, call it something else, I don’t care. The severing of the U.K. from the single market will see our economy fucked for years (cf the bet we have).
Why?
Why is the UK vis-a-vis Europe any different to Canada vis-a-vis the USA? Or New Zealand vis-a-vis Australia?
Why is a trade agreement insufficient, why do we need membership but those other nations don't?
You haven’t read my post properly, as befitting an anti-EU zealot.
Yes I have. You've said the UK should seek single market membership (as opposed to a trade agreement with the single market) as a foreign policy objective.
But unless I'm very much mistaken you don't think New Zealand should seek membership of Australia, or the Canada should seek membership with the USA. Trade agreements etc are sufficient for them with their neighbours - why not the same with the UK?
Australia and NZ are very closely integrated, and even have FOM. But NZ has not “joined Australia”.
I guess US and Canada do too, not sure about Mexico and whether this is a NAFTA provision.
I don’t accept your framing, it is bullshit.
US and Canada have free trade via the USMCA just like we have free trade with the EU via the TCA.
That you don't accept the framing just shows you are in denial.
A single market, as you should know (but who knows, you are deliberately obtuse most of the time) > a standard trade agreement.
As Thatcher well understood.
And yet you don't advocate Canada joining a Single Market with the USA. Why?
At the time that Thatcher sought a Single Market the European nations were in the words of Thatcher the 'richest and most prosperous people' in the planet, 'richer even than the USA'. Fast forward the better part of half a century later and the facts have changed. The EU isn't richer than the USA, its barely seven tenths of the USA in size. The richest and most prosperous people are now across the planet and not in Europe so we should pivot to deal with the world as it exists today not the world that existed four decades ago.
When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?
I would advocate a single market between Canada and the US.
As for your stuff about the EU, you can huff and puff all you like but Europe is on our doorstep and economics 101 is that you are going to trade with your neighbours.
The idea that Britain can tow itself to somewhere just east of Malacca is cloud cuckoo land.
A relevant comparison is advocacy of freedom of movement between USA, Mexico and Canada. Isn't that the point where many in the US might see where Brexit is coming from? The USA's reluctant to pool sovereignty might be something to reflect on too.
I don’t know the numbers but I’d imagine the Mexico / US income differential and the Mexico / US population shares make it much less appetising.
Of course there are degrees of FOM.
NZers have a right to live in Australia but not to receive benefits, for example.
If there had been degrees of FOM in the EU we would still without doubt be in it.
Mexico has 127 m people, the USA 328 M. The FOM problem which directly led to Brexit was 500m people having an absolutely right to live here, a 65 m population, including many millions from very different economies, which, as we are now seeing, distorted our economy to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers giving an illusion that we could have a cheaply run low wage economy for ever on the back of taking the most enterprising from poor countries.
It is as bad a model as the NHS relying on huge numbers of staff at all levels from much poorer countries whose needs are much greater than ours.
Well I personally dispute that immigration was to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers.
There’s little academic evidence to support that (and much to suggest it boosted wages, albeit more at the upper end).
But the issue (to the extent there was one) wasn’t “500m” vs “65m”.
500 included the U.K.
About 380 / 500 were “rich” About 120 / 500 were poorer Eastern European countries.
Its also about perception though. The labour government didn't expect hundreds of thousands of eastern european immigrants, they thought thousands. These were people coming here to work, earn decent money, send it home, or save it. Not scroungers for the most part, despite what some of the worst elements of the right wing press would say. But their arrival did put pressure on local services - GP's, housing, schools etc. It also led to massive change in some parts of the country. A small local town of say 20,000 gaining 500-1000 Polish people will be obvious. Its the old classic, my Polish neighbour XX is great, its the rest of them thats the problem. For many tolerant people seeing a large influx into their towns was too much and too quick. They are not intrinsically racist, but they do have a sense of home, and Britishness. You can prove all you like about the 'real' effect on wages, but that's not what counted in 2016 in the polling booth.
And now they've gone home, housing is plentiful and cheap, GP's are virtually walk-in, and schools are tranquil oases of learning with high staff to pupil ratios just like before. Perhaps other factors contribued even more heavily?
As I said - its about perception. Plus, be fair, there has been something else happening in the last 18 months which is impacting heavily on schools and GPs.
I wasn't denying it. I'm saying it wasn't necessarily entirely justifiable. The perception tended to be as strong, if not more so, in areas with very low immigration as high.
The degree of relative, rather than absolute change, may explain your last point.
It may partially. As was deliberate encouragement of this line of thought to explain away the decline in public services evident during the coalition years.
Where the fuck is the Churchill bust?! Is this a snub to Britain, a symbol of the Irish-American president’s ancestral dislike of the British empire - of which Churchill had been such a fervent defender?
Yes Bush put it there, Obama removed it, Trump put it back, Biden has removed it again.
To get the Churchill bust back in the Oval office it seems we will have to wait for the next GOP President (though Churchill himself got on as well with FDR as IKE and once holidayed in the Med with JFK on Onassis' boat shortly before he died
Is that the same Pret A Manger who we were told in 2017 couldn't survive Brexit because it is so dependent upon low paid immigrant workers ?
The same low paid immigrant workers we're told who have all left the UK ?
I'm not sure this is the good news you are spinning it as. By the time they finish this recruitment push it only puts their workforce back where it started. Pret's strategy is "last man standing" and it seems reasonable - the fall in city working / travel means less demand for twatty coffee which means other outlets will fail. As Pret don't have as strong a coverage as Costa, Staxfbucks and Nero, this is their chance to mop up.
I'm not spinning it merely pointing out the irony of a business which is so dependent upon low paid migrant workers recruiting 3k new low paid migrant workers when we're continually told that the low paid migrant workers have all 'gone home'.
As for the various purveyors of 'twatty coffee' the only thing I can say is that their ever increasing numbers exposes the bollox of 'austerity' claims.
Lets pick this apart. The absolutism you are putting out is the problem. Nobody has said that ALL the migrant workers have gone home. More people registered with the EU settlement scheme than the government thought were here in the first place.
It is also true that the departure of migrant labour has created huge gaps in the labour force in a number of industries including leisure and QSR. With the culling of a stack of jobs in both smaller outlets and big chains there are people out there who still want the work and Pret are concentrated in areas easier to recruit for.
Given that people need to register for an National Insurance number as they begin working, how on earth did the Government not grasp how many people had arrived here to work?
Although how many people in this country work cash in hand without using an NI number? More than a few.
I'm not sure how people can get away with that these days, now that bank accounts and BACS seem to be the order of the day. I still can't get my head around how banks can commandeer our money every month, yet only give us 0.1% on anything we may be able to save.
Since covid I pay all tradesmen through bacs and they like the instant payment into their account
I do not use cash at all these days, even the gardener
I realised this morning that I don't even carry my bank cards with me any more.
The cafe I'm working in had a card-machine fail, and I had no means to pay other than my phone. I offered to pop home and get a card to get some cash out but they very sensibly just told me just to write it down and pay tomorrow when they'd fixed it.
I haven't used cash since February 2020, at least, and I don't think I've used my physical cards this year.
The only thing I've use a physical card for in months is Pay At Pump fuel. Its irritating there's no contactless version of that as a few times I've been unable to refuel at my local (newly built) Tesco's since I haven't had my wallet with me and the machines are exclusively pay at pump that require cards to be inserted.
Do you use your phone in Aldi?
Yes.
One thing I haven't yet done - you have motivated me to do it. Slightly late adopter on the phone to pay front...
Kwasi Kwarteng in front of the business select committee commented that the treasury is aware of this crisis and there is a budget in October when all will be revealed
Looks like Rishi may be planning some mitigation to home owners bills
Oh no, I have a horrible feeling he's going to increase my already absurd Winter Fuel Payment. Whilst I can happily spend it on even better champagne than I would otherwise purchase, I can't help feeling that this would not be a good use of public money.
I guess you'd rather spend it on Capita and some expensive, arcane, humiliating means-testing process that denied it to people that really need it?
That is a good point. It is true that sometimes it's better to have a very simple system that costs almost nothing to administer and accept that it will involve some poor targeting. However, the Winter Fuel Payment is already badly targeted, since it's not just pensioners who really need help, and non-pensioners can get help only via other means-tested schemes. Meanwhile non-pensioners who are struggling are getting hit by the Universal Credit cut.
We'll have to see what exactly he comes up with in the Budget, of course. But the current system is a mess, with those who do need help already having to use means-tested benefits (pension credit, in the case of pensioners). At the very least it would make sense to make the Winter Fuel payment taxable for higher-rate taxpayers.
Where the fuck is the Churchill bust?! Is this a snub to Britain, a symbol of the Irish-American president’s ancestral dislike of the British empire - of which Churchill had been such a fervent defender?
Kwasi Kwarteng in front of the business select committee commented that the treasury is aware of this crisis and there is a budget in October when all will be revealed
Looks like Rishi may be planning some mitigation to home owners bills
Oh no, I have a horrible feeling he's going to increase my already absurd Winter Fuel Payment. Whilst I can happily spend it on even better champagne than I would otherwise purchase, I can't help feeling that this would not be a good use of public money.
I would hope it was targeted to the real need of the lower paid and pensioners in poverty
There's still 5% VAT on energy, right? The devious thing to do would be to scrap the VAT (and call it a brexit benefit, since it wasn't possible to do so whilst in the EU, as Tony Blair found out and denies), then slap in back on as a "green tax" next year.
Kwasi Kwarteng in front of the business select committee commented that the treasury is aware of this crisis and there is a budget in October when all will be revealed
Looks like Rishi may be planning some mitigation to home owners bills
Oh no, I have a horrible feeling he's going to increase my already absurd Winter Fuel Payment. Whilst I can happily spend it on even better champagne than I would otherwise purchase, I can't help feeling that this would not be a good use of public money.
And make sure your champagne doesn't get too cold. I regard that as literally the worst thing that can befall one.
I take it you haven't tried renting a property lately? The market is absolutely crazed.
Property prices in Somerset have gone insane in the last year. We've had unsolicited visits from estate agents asking if we want to sell. One had an AM DBS which is obviously junk but they're not cheap so he must have been coining it in.
My advice to young people is to retrain as a house.
Is that the same Pret A Manger who we were told in 2017 couldn't survive Brexit because it is so dependent upon low paid immigrant workers ?
The same low paid immigrant workers we're told who have all left the UK ?
I'm not sure this is the good news you are spinning it as. By the time they finish this recruitment push it only puts their workforce back where it started. Pret's strategy is "last man standing" and it seems reasonable - the fall in city working / travel means less demand for twatty coffee which means other outlets will fail. As Pret don't have as strong a coverage as Costa, Staxfbucks and Nero, this is their chance to mop up.
I'm not spinning it merely pointing out the irony of a business which is so dependent upon low paid migrant workers recruiting 3k new low paid migrant workers when we're continually told that the low paid migrant workers have all 'gone home'.
As for the various purveyors of 'twatty coffee' the only thing I can say is that their ever increasing numbers exposes the bollox of 'austerity' claims.
Lets pick this apart. The absolutism you are putting out is the problem. Nobody has said that ALL the migrant workers have gone home. More people registered with the EU settlement scheme than the government thought were here in the first place.
It is also true that the departure of migrant labour has created huge gaps in the labour force in a number of industries including leisure and QSR. With the culling of a stack of jobs in both smaller outlets and big chains there are people out there who still want the work and Pret are concentrated in areas easier to recruit for.
Given that people need to register for an National Insurance number as they begin working, how on earth did the Government not grasp how many people had arrived here to work?
Although how many people in this country work cash in hand without using an NI number? More than a few.
I'm not sure how people can get away with that these days, now that bank accounts and BACS seem to be the order of the day. I still can't get my head around how banks can commandeer our money every month, yet only give us 0.1% on anything we may be able to save.
Since covid I pay all tradesmen through bacs and they like the instant payment into their account
I do not use cash at all these days, even the gardener
I realised this morning that I don't even carry my bank cards with me any more.
The cafe I'm working in had a card-machine fail, and I had no means to pay other than my phone. I offered to pop home and get a card to get some cash out but they very sensibly just told me just to write it down and pay tomorrow when they'd fixed it.
I haven't used cash since February 2020, at least, and I don't think I've used my physical cards this year.
The only thing I've use a physical card for in months is Pay At Pump fuel. Its irritating there's no contactless version of that as a few times I've been unable to refuel at my local (newly built) Tesco's since I haven't had my wallet with me and the machines are exclusively pay at pump that require cards to be inserted.
Do you use your phone in Aldi?
Yes.
One thing I haven't yet done - you have motivated me to do it. Slightly late adopter on the phone to pay front...
Irritating Barclays don't (or didn't last I checked) integrate directly with Samsung Pay wanting you to use their own app instead so I use an app recommended by Samsung called Curve to deal with that. My Barclaycard, Barclays Debit and Tesco Clubcard Credit Card are all stored in the Curve app and that's used as may 'card' details for my phone. The Amex card I have integrates directly with Samsung. All of those cards are also linked (via same methods) to my watch too.
As a result then I can use any of my cards now via either swiping up from the bottom of my phone, or via my watch.
No idea if others think that's secure or not, but it got good reviews online and it works for me.
She's on the right topic. But FFS she couldn't me more tone deaf and ham fisted in delivery. I feel sorry for Raaaab and he is the shittest of the shit.
Where the fuck is the Churchill bust?! Is this a snub to Britain, a symbol of the Irish-American president’s ancestral dislike of the British empire - of which Churchill had been such a fervent defender?
Kwasi Kwarteng in front of the business select committee commented that the treasury is aware of this crisis and there is a budget in October when all will be revealed
Looks like Rishi may be planning some mitigation to home owners bills
Oh no, I have a horrible feeling he's going to increase my already absurd Winter Fuel Payment. Whilst I can happily spend it on even better champagne than I would otherwise purchase, I can't help feeling that this would not be a good use of public money.
And make sure your champagne doesn't get too cold. I regard that as literally the worst thing that can befall one.
Talking of which, much as I approve of the two-stage County Championship, we may be pushing the envelope of sensible contests between bat and ball by having matches this deep into September.
11:02 Day 2 ESSEX BEAT NORTHANTS BY AN INNINGS & 44 RUNS Essex 170 v Northants 81 and 45
Yes, there should really be no cricket matches in the northern hemisphere from today until Spring, it should be football and rugby only.
Having said that the Football season should start now not in August when the Premier League restarts
We should also hold the Football World Cup in the Northern Hemisphere in winter, as the game is supposed to be played.
She's on the right topic. But FFS she couldn't me more tone deaf and ham fisted in delivery. I feel sorry for Raaaab and he is the shittest of the shit.
She is on the right topic but Starmer would have been far more professional
The perils of being female. Less shouty. Unassertive. Lacks passion.
I don't think she is too shouty. There is a need for a bit of fire and brimstone in our politics. Its that she's ranting along a list of endless grievances in such a way that someone as shit as Raab can both bat them aside and sound the more convincing.
She's on the right topic. But FFS she couldn't me more tone deaf and ham fisted in delivery. I feel sorry for Raaaab and he is the shittest of the shit.
She is on the right topic but Starmer would have been far more professional
And actually Raab is fairly measured
Ooh that's going a bit far. Starmer professional?
The problem is that there doesn't seem to be anyone decent on the Labour front bench. Maybe the Shadow Health Secretary, I don't like his politics but he seems to have his head screwed on.
The perils of being female. Less shouty. Unassertive. Lacks passion.
I don't think she is too shouty. There is a need for a bit of fire and brimstone in our politics. Its that she's ranting along a list of endless grievances in such a way that someone as shit as Raab can both bat them aside and sound the more convincing.
Must affirm to Labour that she is no replacement for Starmer
I take it you haven't tried renting a property lately? The market is absolutely crazed.
Property prices in Somerset have gone insane in the last year. We've had unsolicited visits from estate agents asking if we want to sell. One had an AM DBS which is obviously junk but they're not cheap so he must have been coining it in.
My advice to young people is to retrain as a house.
Buy some agricultural land and rent a planning officer?
Talking of which, much as I approve of the two-stage County Championship, we may be pushing the envelope of sensible contests between bat and ball by having matches this deep into September.
11:02 Day 2 ESSEX BEAT NORTHANTS BY AN INNINGS & 44 RUNS Essex 170 v Northants 81 and 45
Yes, there should really be no cricket matches in the northern hemisphere from today until Spring, it should be football and rugby only.
Having said that the Football season should start now not in August when the Premier League restarts
In 1971 the final three day CC matches started on 11th September.
The final Test Match (of 6 that summer) started on 19th August.
The first CC matches started on 1 May (all April FC fixtures were MCC or University matches).
The perils of being female. Less shouty. Unassertive. Lacks passion.
No shouty isn't the same as assertive. Raab is speaking calmly and that comes across much more assertive.
The joy of being male. Less shouty. Calm, assertive.
There are many female MPs who can come across as calm and assertive without being shouty.
I despise her xenophobic politics and think she's the worst PM we've had in modern times but that was something Theresa May was very good at. She could stand at the dispatch box and calmly and confidently answer questions even if she was on a complete losing wicket.
The perils of being female. Less shouty. Unassertive. Lacks passion.
I don't think she is too shouty. There is a need for a bit of fire and brimstone in our politics. Its that she's ranting along a list of endless grievances in such a way that someone as shit as Raab can both bat them aside and sound the more convincing.
Must affirm to Labour that she is no replacement for Starmer
Wonderful run this morning around Grantchester. Yesterday I discovered a series of concessionary footpaths across fields that I never knew about, so I jogged along these to the M11, then north towards Cambridge, and then back along the River Cam, which was stunningly beautiful in the sunshine. Farmers toiling in the fields; the sun glinting on the water; cows farting as I passed; a heron perched a few metres away from me; a pleasant chats with tourists from Galway.
Sometimes I utterly love the Cambridge area.
Over nine miles run, and probably only a quarter of a mile on roads.
I did resist nipping into the Orchard for a cream tea, if only because I was sweaty and shirtless.
I could see a bloc forming looking for a looser, associate membership.
It should be an implicit objective of U.K. foreign policy to find some kind of associate EU membership that works for us, along with Switzerland, Norway, the non-Euro countries (Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Sweden), and perhaps Italy.
Why?
Is NZ seeking to find some kind of Australia membership? Is Canada seeking to find some kind of USA membership?
Why can't the objective of our policy be to become friendly neighbours of the EU instead?
European market integration is fantastic, in my opinion, but I don’t believe in the case for a single currency.
Therefore I favour an outer ring of closely integrated European economies outside the Euro.
Call it associate EU membership, call it something else, I don’t care. The severing of the U.K. from the single market will see our economy fucked for years (cf the bet we have).
Why?
Why is the UK vis-a-vis Europe any different to Canada vis-a-vis the USA? Or New Zealand vis-a-vis Australia?
Why is a trade agreement insufficient, why do we need membership but those other nations don't?
You haven’t read my post properly, as befitting an anti-EU zealot.
Yes I have. You've said the UK should seek single market membership (as opposed to a trade agreement with the single market) as a foreign policy objective.
But unless I'm very much mistaken you don't think New Zealand should seek membership of Australia, or the Canada should seek membership with the USA. Trade agreements etc are sufficient for them with their neighbours - why not the same with the UK?
Australia and NZ are very closely integrated, and even have FOM. But NZ has not “joined Australia”.
I guess US and Canada do too, not sure about Mexico and whether this is a NAFTA provision.
I don’t accept your framing, it is bullshit.
US and Canada have free trade via the USMCA just like we have free trade with the EU via the TCA.
That you don't accept the framing just shows you are in denial.
A single market, as you should know (but who knows, you are deliberately obtuse most of the time) > a standard trade agreement.
As Thatcher well understood.
And yet you don't advocate Canada joining a Single Market with the USA. Why?
At the time that Thatcher sought a Single Market the European nations were in the words of Thatcher the 'richest and most prosperous people' in the planet, 'richer even than the USA'. Fast forward the better part of half a century later and the facts have changed. The EU isn't richer than the USA, its barely seven tenths of the USA in size. The richest and most prosperous people are now across the planet and not in Europe so we should pivot to deal with the world as it exists today not the world that existed four decades ago.
When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?
I would advocate a single market between Canada and the US.
As for your stuff about the EU, you can huff and puff all you like but Europe is on our doorstep and economics 101 is that you are going to trade with your neighbours.
The idea that Britain can tow itself to somewhere just east of Malacca is cloud cuckoo land.
A relevant comparison is advocacy of freedom of movement between USA, Mexico and Canada. Isn't that the point where many in the US might see where Brexit is coming from? The USA's reluctant to pool sovereignty might be something to reflect on too.
I don’t know the numbers but I’d imagine the Mexico / US income differential and the Mexico / US population shares make it much less appetising.
Of course there are degrees of FOM.
NZers have a right to live in Australia but not to receive benefits, for example.
If there had been degrees of FOM in the EU we would still without doubt be in it.
Mexico has 127 m people, the USA 328 M. The FOM problem which directly led to Brexit was 500m people having an absolutely right to live here, a 65 m population, including many millions from very different economies, which, as we are now seeing, distorted our economy to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers giving an illusion that we could have a cheaply run low wage economy for ever on the back of taking the most enterprising from poor countries.
It is as bad a model as the NHS relying on huge numbers of staff at all levels from much poorer countries whose needs are much greater than ours.
Well I personally dispute that immigration was to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers.
There’s little academic evidence to support that (and much to suggest it boosted wages, albeit more at the upper end).
But the issue (to the extent there was one) wasn’t “500m” vs “65m”.
500 included the U.K.
About 380 / 500 were “rich” About 120 / 500 were poorer Eastern European countries.
Jolly good luck with that set of arguments. Especially the first and the last.
I mean, I have economic literature in support of my argument, whereas you just have whatever you divined from your toilet bowl this morning.
Despite the stunning quality of that argument, I wonder if we need to wait and see for a bit whether it turns out that lower paid workers do a little better without FOM for a few years.
There are other issues too, like bothering to train enough people in the domestic market, ensuring that there are career structures and not just reliance on here today gone tomorrow replaceable eastern Europeans.
All these good people should have exactly the same chance as, say, my Tanzanian friend who had to leave these shores a few years ago, whereas if he has been Lithuanain could have stayed permanently, and has now returned with his skills under a more relaxed regime.
BTW the chances of academic argument all being in one direction is small.
There is some data that suggests an impact in the 2-3% range for some lower skill trades.
But you really have to hunt for it.
The macro picture was that immigrants were higher skilled than the U.K. population, were less dependent on public services, improved firm productivity, and boosted native wages by allowing native workers to move up the career ladder, and take advantage of the aforementioned productivity improvements.
From a qualitative perspective, EU migration had an astonishingly positive effect on the U.K. arts and food (admittedly mostly in London).
It also slowed the U.K.‘s demographic challenges, which we are now seeing is inflating the size of the NHS in relation to the overall economy.
There were downsides, as I concede upthread, but the net impact was bonkersly positive, akin to the North Sea oil discovery of the 70s/80s.
From the perspective of someone who was in business (involved with several businesses employing lower skilled labour) the idea of a 2-3% impact is er... interesting.
A number of jobs essentially "rode" the minimum wage - which is what you'd expect, with a surplus of labour. The going rate was minimum wage.
It was wonderful if you were a consumer of labour heavy products. If you were providing the labour, not so much.
We hear two entirely contradictory arguments on this: that EU membership had no effect on low-level wages, and that Brexit has driven up these wages due to a shortage of available EU migrants.
A better criticism might be unable to ask specific question in fewer than 12 words. It seems to be a disease spread from management bullshit. More words equals more impressive the point.
She's on the right topic. But FFS she couldn't me more tone deaf and ham fisted in delivery. I feel sorry for Raaaab and he is the shittest of the shit.
She is making Raab look like a Prime Minister in waiting.
Starmer is not stuck with Rayner. He can dispense with her the same simple way Corbyn’s mob were set to dispense with Watson until they bottled it. Two thirds vote on NEC to do deputy differently, if at all.
And Starmer has to to do it. ASAP. For how Boris had trounced Starmer in recent weeks as the better PM, is Boris has amply demonstrated the killer instinct. That’s what the country is looking for from Starmer. If he is ambitious about being PM he has to show us the killer instinct. Has he got it?
This is 2021, elected deputy leader? Bonkers. Grow up Labour.
Talking of which, much as I approve of the two-stage County Championship, we may be pushing the envelope of sensible contests between bat and ball by having matches this deep into September.
11:02 Day 2 ESSEX BEAT NORTHANTS BY AN INNINGS & 44 RUNS Essex 170 v Northants 81 and 45
Yes, there should really be no cricket matches in the northern hemisphere from today until Spring, it should be football and rugby only.
Having said that the Football season should start now not in August when the Premier League restarts
In 1971 the final three day CC matches started on 11th September.
The final Test Match (of 6 that summer) started on 19th August.
The first CC matches started on 1 May (all April FC fixtures were MCC or University matches).
There is a lot to be said for it.
Yes, cricket should be a spring and summer sport, football and rugby autumn and winter sports (except for world cups)
I could see a bloc forming looking for a looser, associate membership.
It should be an implicit objective of U.K. foreign policy to find some kind of associate EU membership that works for us, along with Switzerland, Norway, the non-Euro countries (Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Sweden), and perhaps Italy.
Why?
Is NZ seeking to find some kind of Australia membership? Is Canada seeking to find some kind of USA membership?
Why can't the objective of our policy be to become friendly neighbours of the EU instead?
European market integration is fantastic, in my opinion, but I don’t believe in the case for a single currency.
Therefore I favour an outer ring of closely integrated European economies outside the Euro.
Call it associate EU membership, call it something else, I don’t care. The severing of the U.K. from the single market will see our economy fucked for years (cf the bet we have).
Why?
Why is the UK vis-a-vis Europe any different to Canada vis-a-vis the USA? Or New Zealand vis-a-vis Australia?
Why is a trade agreement insufficient, why do we need membership but those other nations don't?
You haven’t read my post properly, as befitting an anti-EU zealot.
Yes I have. You've said the UK should seek single market membership (as opposed to a trade agreement with the single market) as a foreign policy objective.
But unless I'm very much mistaken you don't think New Zealand should seek membership of Australia, or the Canada should seek membership with the USA. Trade agreements etc are sufficient for them with their neighbours - why not the same with the UK?
Australia and NZ are very closely integrated, and even have FOM. But NZ has not “joined Australia”.
I guess US and Canada do too, not sure about Mexico and whether this is a NAFTA provision.
I don’t accept your framing, it is bullshit.
US and Canada have free trade via the USMCA just like we have free trade with the EU via the TCA.
That you don't accept the framing just shows you are in denial.
A single market, as you should know (but who knows, you are deliberately obtuse most of the time) > a standard trade agreement.
As Thatcher well understood.
And yet you don't advocate Canada joining a Single Market with the USA. Why?
At the time that Thatcher sought a Single Market the European nations were in the words of Thatcher the 'richest and most prosperous people' in the planet, 'richer even than the USA'. Fast forward the better part of half a century later and the facts have changed. The EU isn't richer than the USA, its barely seven tenths of the USA in size. The richest and most prosperous people are now across the planet and not in Europe so we should pivot to deal with the world as it exists today not the world that existed four decades ago.
When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?
I would advocate a single market between Canada and the US.
As for your stuff about the EU, you can huff and puff all you like but Europe is on our doorstep and economics 101 is that you are going to trade with your neighbours.
The idea that Britain can tow itself to somewhere just east of Malacca is cloud cuckoo land.
A relevant comparison is advocacy of freedom of movement between USA, Mexico and Canada. Isn't that the point where many in the US might see where Brexit is coming from? The USA's reluctant to pool sovereignty might be something to reflect on too.
I don’t know the numbers but I’d imagine the Mexico / US income differential and the Mexico / US population shares make it much less appetising.
Of course there are degrees of FOM.
NZers have a right to live in Australia but not to receive benefits, for example.
If there had been degrees of FOM in the EU we would still without doubt be in it.
Mexico has 127 m people, the USA 328 M. The FOM problem which directly led to Brexit was 500m people having an absolutely right to live here, a 65 m population, including many millions from very different economies, which, as we are now seeing, distorted our economy to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers giving an illusion that we could have a cheaply run low wage economy for ever on the back of taking the most enterprising from poor countries.
It is as bad a model as the NHS relying on huge numbers of staff at all levels from much poorer countries whose needs are much greater than ours.
Well I personally dispute that immigration was to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers.
There’s little academic evidence to support that (and much to suggest it boosted wages, albeit more at the upper end).
But the issue (to the extent there was one) wasn’t “500m” vs “65m”.
500 included the U.K.
About 380 / 500 were “rich” About 120 / 500 were poorer Eastern European countries.
Jolly good luck with that set of arguments. Especially the first and the last.
I mean, I have economic literature in support of my argument, whereas you just have whatever you divined from your toilet bowl this morning.
Despite the stunning quality of that argument, I wonder if we need to wait and see for a bit whether it turns out that lower paid workers do a little better without FOM for a few years.
There are other issues too, like bothering to train enough people in the domestic market, ensuring that there are career structures and not just reliance on here today gone tomorrow replaceable eastern Europeans.
All these good people should have exactly the same chance as, say, my Tanzanian friend who had to leave these shores a few years ago, whereas if he has been Lithuanain could have stayed permanently, and has now returned with his skills under a more relaxed regime.
BTW the chances of academic argument all being in one direction is small.
There is some data that suggests an impact in the 2-3% range for some lower skill trades.
But you really have to hunt for it.
The macro picture was that immigrants were higher skilled than the U.K. population, were less dependent on public services, improved firm productivity, and boosted native wages by allowing native workers to move up the career ladder, and take advantage of the aforementioned productivity improvements.
From a qualitative perspective, EU migration had an astonishingly positive effect on the U.K. arts and food (admittedly mostly in London).
It also slowed the U.K.‘s demographic challenges, which we are now seeing is inflating the size of the NHS in relation to the overall economy.
There were downsides, as I concede upthread, but the net impact was bonkersly positive, akin to the North Sea oil discovery of the 70s/80s.
From the perspective of someone who was in business (involved with several businesses employing lower skilled labour) the idea of a 2-3% impact is er... interesting.
A number of jobs essentially "rode" the minimum wage - which is what you'd expect, with a surplus of labour. The going rate was minimum wage.
It was wonderful if you were a consumer of labour heavy products. If you were providing the labour, not so much.
We hear two entirely contradictory arguments on this: that EU membership had no effect on low-level wages, and that Brexit has driven up these wages due to a shortage of available EU migrants.
They can't both be true.
Even worse for the last couple of decades some people seem to have gotten the bizarre and twisted idea that rising house prices are a very good sign of "prosperity" while rising wages are a disastrous sign of "inflation".
As a result we've managed to get "high prosperity" and "low inflation" that simply means people are completely costed out of society.
Kwasi Kwarteng in front of the business select committee commented that the treasury is aware of this crisis and there is a budget in October when all will be revealed
Looks like Rishi may be planning some mitigation to home owners bills
Oh no, I have a horrible feeling he's going to increase my already absurd Winter Fuel Payment. Whilst I can happily spend it on even better champagne than I would otherwise purchase, I can't help feeling that this would not be a good use of public money.
And make sure your champagne doesn't get too cold. I regard that as literally the worst thing that can befall one.
Indeed so.
Over chilling wines is common fault.
It's easy to fix - just wait a short period of time.
New hospital possibly in Warrington? Excellent if so. The town has grown too big for its current hospital.
When my first daughter was born my wife was the last woman admitted to the maternity ward for that day before the hospital announced its ward was closed as they'd ran out of bed and all women were to be redirected to go to Manchester instead.
Husband finally managed to eat something today. Hooray!
I will forbear from sharing the recipe for chicken in a creamy leek and walnut sauce which caused such angst.
Meanwhile my day at the Chelsea Flower Show yesterday was great fun if very tiring. The gardens were not the best I have ever seen but plenty of good ideas. The people watching is great fun of course: there are 4 distinct tribes on show -
- English middle class ladies of a certain age - Middle-aged men wearing brightly coloured trousers (think the colours of Portillo's jackets), rarely seen (thank God) in other settings and, often, hats - gay men in very floral shirts - young men with floppy hair
There is also the section with garden statues which are unbelievably hideous and expensive. Who buys this stuff? Why would any sane person want to have statues of Jemima Puddleduck in their garden?
And the clothes - does anyone really wear a costume such as this - https://imgur.com/QAlPsCk - even in Scotland?
I don't know about all that but I do know that when I used to live round the corner the taking up of the turf, the carnage* of the show itself, and then the replacement/repair of the turf was a fantastic process. You would never have known it had taken place.
*yes I realise it is a very enjoyable occasion for people.
Great to hear about your husband. Did you get to the bottom of it - allergy/foreign body/scar/etc?
No - seems to have been injury caused by the walnut itself. Doc did not see anything else when he looked.
Husband finally managed to eat something today. Hooray!
I will forbear from sharing the recipe for chicken in a creamy leek and walnut sauce which caused such angst.
Meanwhile my day at the Chelsea Flower Show yesterday was great fun if very tiring. The gardens were not the best I have ever seen but plenty of good ideas. The people watching is great fun of course: there are 4 distinct tribes on show -
- English middle class ladies of a certain age - Middle-aged men wearing brightly coloured trousers (think the colours of Portillo's jackets), rarely seen (thank God) in other settings and, often, hats - gay men in very floral shirts - young men with floppy hair
There is also the section with garden statues which are unbelievably hideous and expensive. Who buys this stuff? Why would any sane person want to have statues of Jemima Puddleduck in their garden?
And the clothes - does anyone really wear a costume such as this - https://imgur.com/QAlPsCk - even in Scotland?
I don't know about all that but I do know that when I used to live round the corner the taking up of the turf, the carnage* of the show itself, and then the replacement/repair of the turf was a fantastic process. You would never have known it had taken place.
*yes I realise it is a very enjoyable occasion for people.
Great to hear about your husband. Did you get to the bottom of it - allergy/foreign body/scar/etc?
No - seems to have been injury caused by the walnut itself. Doc did not see anything else when he looked.
I hope it's just an one-off.
Glad to hear he’s on the mend. Sounds like a horrible few days for you both (apart from the flower show).
I could see a bloc forming looking for a looser, associate membership.
It should be an implicit objective of U.K. foreign policy to find some kind of associate EU membership that works for us, along with Switzerland, Norway, the non-Euro countries (Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Sweden), and perhaps Italy.
Why?
Is NZ seeking to find some kind of Australia membership? Is Canada seeking to find some kind of USA membership?
Why can't the objective of our policy be to become friendly neighbours of the EU instead?
European market integration is fantastic, in my opinion, but I don’t believe in the case for a single currency.
Therefore I favour an outer ring of closely integrated European economies outside the Euro.
Call it associate EU membership, call it something else, I don’t care. The severing of the U.K. from the single market will see our economy fucked for years (cf the bet we have).
Why?
Why is the UK vis-a-vis Europe any different to Canada vis-a-vis the USA? Or New Zealand vis-a-vis Australia?
Why is a trade agreement insufficient, why do we need membership but those other nations don't?
You haven’t read my post properly, as befitting an anti-EU zealot.
Yes I have. You've said the UK should seek single market membership (as opposed to a trade agreement with the single market) as a foreign policy objective.
But unless I'm very much mistaken you don't think New Zealand should seek membership of Australia, or the Canada should seek membership with the USA. Trade agreements etc are sufficient for them with their neighbours - why not the same with the UK?
Australia and NZ are very closely integrated, and even have FOM. But NZ has not “joined Australia”.
I guess US and Canada do too, not sure about Mexico and whether this is a NAFTA provision.
I don’t accept your framing, it is bullshit.
US and Canada have free trade via the USMCA just like we have free trade with the EU via the TCA.
That you don't accept the framing just shows you are in denial.
A single market, as you should know (but who knows, you are deliberately obtuse most of the time) > a standard trade agreement.
As Thatcher well understood.
And yet you don't advocate Canada joining a Single Market with the USA. Why?
At the time that Thatcher sought a Single Market the European nations were in the words of Thatcher the 'richest and most prosperous people' in the planet, 'richer even than the USA'. Fast forward the better part of half a century later and the facts have changed. The EU isn't richer than the USA, its barely seven tenths of the USA in size. The richest and most prosperous people are now across the planet and not in Europe so we should pivot to deal with the world as it exists today not the world that existed four decades ago.
When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?
I would advocate a single market between Canada and the US.
As for your stuff about the EU, you can huff and puff all you like but Europe is on our doorstep and economics 101 is that you are going to trade with your neighbours.
The idea that Britain can tow itself to somewhere just east of Malacca is cloud cuckoo land.
A relevant comparison is advocacy of freedom of movement between USA, Mexico and Canada. Isn't that the point where many in the US might see where Brexit is coming from? The USA's reluctant to pool sovereignty might be something to reflect on too.
I don’t know the numbers but I’d imagine the Mexico / US income differential and the Mexico / US population shares make it much less appetising.
Of course there are degrees of FOM.
NZers have a right to live in Australia but not to receive benefits, for example.
If there had been degrees of FOM in the EU we would still without doubt be in it.
Mexico has 127 m people, the USA 328 M. The FOM problem which directly led to Brexit was 500m people having an absolutely right to live here, a 65 m population, including many millions from very different economies, which, as we are now seeing, distorted our economy to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers giving an illusion that we could have a cheaply run low wage economy for ever on the back of taking the most enterprising from poor countries.
It is as bad a model as the NHS relying on huge numbers of staff at all levels from much poorer countries whose needs are much greater than ours.
Well I personally dispute that immigration was to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers.
There’s little academic evidence to support that (and much to suggest it boosted wages, albeit more at the upper end).
But the issue (to the extent there was one) wasn’t “500m” vs “65m”.
500 included the U.K.
About 380 / 500 were “rich” About 120 / 500 were poorer Eastern European countries.
Its also about perception though. The labour government didn't expect hundreds of thousands of eastern european immigrants, they thought thousands. These were people coming here to work, earn decent money, send it home, or save it. Not scroungers for the most part, despite what some of the worst elements of the right wing press would say. But their arrival did put pressure on local services - GP's, housing, schools etc. It also led to massive change in some parts of the country. A small local town of say 20,000 gaining 500-1000 Polish people will be obvious. Its the old classic, my Polish neighbour XX is great, its the rest of them thats the problem. For many tolerant people seeing a large influx into their towns was too much and too quick. They are not intrinsically racist, but they do have a sense of home, and Britishness. You can prove all you like about the 'real' effect on wages, but that's not what counted in 2016 in the polling booth.
Totally agree.
The impact on local services was critical.
I find it astonishing nothing was done about this, indeed there remained a stubborn view that to raise the question was racist.
A contributing factor to the impact on local services, was that the immigrants were living in much more densely-packed accommodation, and therefore paying considerably less per person in council tax than the native population.
A three-bedroomed family house, with eight or ten people living in it, was common in many cities.
I think if you're from a poorer Eastern European country then some of those jobs were attractive - you could earn far more than you could in the local currency and remit the rest home once converted from Sterling. By contrast, if you're born in the UK and your family live here those conditions and wages really weren't attractive, particularly since you'd be paying all the high housing and transport costs yourself, and experiencing high benefit rate withdrawal, and you'd experience a concentrated level of social change locally as a result. It would probably really piss you if other far wealthier Britons sneered at you and called you racist as a result of your compliants, as indeed many did.
Voting for Brexit in those circumstances aligns entirely with self-interest and is perfectly rational.
Talking of which, much as I approve of the two-stage County Championship, we may be pushing the envelope of sensible contests between bat and ball by having matches this deep into September.
11:02 Day 2 ESSEX BEAT NORTHANTS BY AN INNINGS & 44 RUNS Essex 170 v Northants 81 and 45
Yes, there should really be no cricket matches in the northern hemisphere from today until Spring, it should be football and rugby only.
Having said that the Football season should start now not in August when the Premier League restarts
In 1971 the final three day CC matches started on 11th September.
The final Test Match (of 6 that summer) started on 19th August.
The first CC matches started on 1 May (all April FC fixtures were MCC or University matches).
There is a lot to be said for it.
Yes, cricket should be a spring and summer sport, football and rugby autumn and winter sports (except for world cups)
I disagree. The weather is not in the least responsible for Essex win. They should be heavily docked points for producing substandard 4 day pitches in a sequence of matches.
Are you listening ECB? If you done Somerset for one substandard pitch how are you letting Essex get away with a sequence of them?
That'll cause a riot. Not for being gender neutral, just because some people have long hated the term 'batter'.
It is the right thing to do, but it sounds alien and too baseball like.
more evidence PB is becoming too woke.
Seems unlikely.
It's simpler and easier to be gender neutral is all, and in practice a lot of people use the term batter anyway.
Women's cricket has come along in incredible leaps and bounds in recent years too. I enjoyed quite a few of the women's Hundred games and had England v NZ on the other day. A gender neutral term is just logical - its just a shame its a Baseball term.
That'll cause a riot. Not for being gender neutral, just because some people have long hated the term 'batter'.
It is the right thing to do, but it sounds alien and too baseball like.
more evidence PB is becoming too woke.
Seems unlikely.
It's simpler and easier to be gender neutral is all, and in practice a lot of people use the term batter anyway.
Women's cricket has come along in incredible leaps and bounds in recent years too. I enjoyed quite a few of the women's Hundred games and had England v NZ on the other day. A gender neutral term is just logical - its just a shame its a Baseball term.
So what if Baseball got there first? Women's sport is coming on leaps and bounds in terms of public awareness. I did enjoy watching Fallon Sherrock slice her way through the PDC Nordic Masters darts to reach the final. I know its "only" darts but women were kept on their own ticket until very recently.
That'll cause a riot. Not for being gender neutral, just because some people have long hated the term 'batter'.
If they do that they are going to have to deal with the problem of "mens" and "womens" cricket, both the actuality and the 'gendered' terminology.
Trivially, what happens if the 2022 version of Willis or Botham self-declares to be a transgender woman, and expects to play for a women's team at county level, or even someone with the greater physical strength / muscularity from 20 years growing up as a boy/man?
Hmmm. At present the policy (advised by Stonewall) is that it is permitted, but hedged around with a lot of legalese and bureaucracy (individual registration with tccb, interviews, appeals process) which only applies to transgender women not men. That policy may be OK for now, but won't last - and the procedure will fall foul of equalities law.
There's also a "Wednesbury unreasonableness" test in there on decisions.
I could see a bloc forming looking for a looser, associate membership.
It should be an implicit objective of U.K. foreign policy to find some kind of associate EU membership that works for us, along with Switzerland, Norway, the non-Euro countries (Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Sweden), and perhaps Italy.
Why?
Is NZ seeking to find some kind of Australia membership? Is Canada seeking to find some kind of USA membership?
Why can't the objective of our policy be to become friendly neighbours of the EU instead?
European market integration is fantastic, in my opinion, but I don’t believe in the case for a single currency.
Therefore I favour an outer ring of closely integrated European economies outside the Euro.
Call it associate EU membership, call it something else, I don’t care. The severing of the U.K. from the single market will see our economy fucked for years (cf the bet we have).
Why?
Why is the UK vis-a-vis Europe any different to Canada vis-a-vis the USA? Or New Zealand vis-a-vis Australia?
Why is a trade agreement insufficient, why do we need membership but those other nations don't?
You haven’t read my post properly, as befitting an anti-EU zealot.
Yes I have. You've said the UK should seek single market membership (as opposed to a trade agreement with the single market) as a foreign policy objective.
But unless I'm very much mistaken you don't think New Zealand should seek membership of Australia, or the Canada should seek membership with the USA. Trade agreements etc are sufficient for them with their neighbours - why not the same with the UK?
Australia and NZ are very closely integrated, and even have FOM. But NZ has not “joined Australia”.
I guess US and Canada do too, not sure about Mexico and whether this is a NAFTA provision.
I don’t accept your framing, it is bullshit.
US and Canada have free trade via the USMCA just like we have free trade with the EU via the TCA.
That you don't accept the framing just shows you are in denial.
A single market, as you should know (but who knows, you are deliberately obtuse most of the time) > a standard trade agreement.
As Thatcher well understood.
And yet you don't advocate Canada joining a Single Market with the USA. Why?
At the time that Thatcher sought a Single Market the European nations were in the words of Thatcher the 'richest and most prosperous people' in the planet, 'richer even than the USA'. Fast forward the better part of half a century later and the facts have changed. The EU isn't richer than the USA, its barely seven tenths of the USA in size. The richest and most prosperous people are now across the planet and not in Europe so we should pivot to deal with the world as it exists today not the world that existed four decades ago.
When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?
I would advocate a single market between Canada and the US.
As for your stuff about the EU, you can huff and puff all you like but Europe is on our doorstep and economics 101 is that you are going to trade with your neighbours.
The idea that Britain can tow itself to somewhere just east of Malacca is cloud cuckoo land.
A relevant comparison is advocacy of freedom of movement between USA, Mexico and Canada. Isn't that the point where many in the US might see where Brexit is coming from? The USA's reluctant to pool sovereignty might be something to reflect on too.
I don’t know the numbers but I’d imagine the Mexico / US income differential and the Mexico / US population shares make it much less appetising.
Of course there are degrees of FOM.
NZers have a right to live in Australia but not to receive benefits, for example.
If there had been degrees of FOM in the EU we would still without doubt be in it.
Mexico has 127 m people, the USA 328 M. The FOM problem which directly led to Brexit was 500m people having an absolutely right to live here, a 65 m population, including many millions from very different economies, which, as we are now seeing, distorted our economy to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers giving an illusion that we could have a cheaply run low wage economy for ever on the back of taking the most enterprising from poor countries.
It is as bad a model as the NHS relying on huge numbers of staff at all levels from much poorer countries whose needs are much greater than ours.
Well I personally dispute that immigration was to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers.
There’s little academic evidence to support that (and much to suggest it boosted wages, albeit more at the upper end).
But the issue (to the extent there was one) wasn’t “500m” vs “65m”.
500 included the U.K.
About 380 / 500 were “rich” About 120 / 500 were poorer Eastern European countries.
Jolly good luck with that set of arguments. Especially the first and the last.
I mean, I have economic literature in support of my argument, whereas you just have whatever you divined from your toilet bowl this morning.
Despite the stunning quality of that argument, I wonder if we need to wait and see for a bit whether it turns out that lower paid workers do a little better without FOM for a few years.
There are other issues too, like bothering to train enough people in the domestic market, ensuring that there are career structures and not just reliance on here today gone tomorrow replaceable eastern Europeans.
All these good people should have exactly the same chance as, say, my Tanzanian friend who had to leave these shores a few years ago, whereas if he has been Lithuanain could have stayed permanently, and has now returned with his skills under a more relaxed regime.
BTW the chances of academic argument all being in one direction is small.
There is some data that suggests an impact in the 2-3% range for some lower skill trades.
But you really have to hunt for it.
The macro picture was that immigrants were higher skilled than the U.K. population, were less dependent on public services, improved firm productivity, and boosted native wages by allowing native workers to move up the career ladder, and take advantage of the aforementioned productivity improvements.
From a qualitative perspective, EU migration had an astonishingly positive effect on the U.K. arts and food (admittedly mostly in London).
It also slowed the U.K.‘s demographic challenges, which we are now seeing is inflating the size of the NHS in relation to the overall economy.
There were downsides, as I concede upthread, but the net impact was bonkersly positive, akin to the North Sea oil discovery of the 70s/80s.
From the perspective of someone who was in business (involved with several businesses employing lower skilled labour) the idea of a 2-3% impact is er... interesting.
A number of jobs essentially "rode" the minimum wage - which is what you'd expect, with a surplus of labour. The going rate was minimum wage.
It was wonderful if you were a consumer of labour heavy products. If you were providing the labour, not so much.
We hear two entirely contradictory arguments on this: that EU membership had no effect on low-level wages, and that Brexit has driven up these wages due to a shortage of available EU migrants.
They can't both be true.
Even worse for the last couple of decades some people seem to have gotten the bizarre and twisted idea that rising house prices are a very good sign of "prosperity" while rising wages are a disastrous sign of "inflation".
As a result we've managed to get "high prosperity" and "low inflation" that simply means people are completely costed out of society.
And, economic self-interest drives that too.
Upper-middle class property owners love their own asset values increasing, but don't care too much for paying more for their staff.
The perils of being female. Less shouty. Unassertive. Lacks passion.
No shouty isn't the same as assertive. Raab is speaking calmly and that comes across much more assertive.
Rookie mistake – she needs to trust the microphones rather than raising her voice. Ironically it was the idiots sitting behind her saying "hear hear" that first prompted her to increase the volume.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641394 ...The Times also reported that ministers were concerned that the UK might have to close its six advanced gas-cooled nuclear reactors, which also use CO2. The government announced late on Tuesday night that it would meet the full operating costs to run CF Industries' Billingham plant in Teesside for three weeks. The costs are expected to be in the "low tens of millions" and will be below £50m. Mr Eustice said that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs". At the end of the three-week period, it is hoped that the price of carbon dioxide will have risen sufficiently to make it economically viable for CF Industries to keep production running. Mr Eustice said the food industry would have to accept "a big, sharp rise" carbon dioxide prices from £200 to £1,000 a tonne....
I think a little more attention needs to be paid by government to economic resilience, which given the stresses of Brexit etc, really can't just be left to the market.
The perils of being female. Less shouty. Unassertive. Lacks passion.
No shouty isn't the same as assertive. Raab is speaking calmly and that comes across much more assertive.
The joy of being male. Less shouty. Calm, assertive.
There are many female MPs who can come across as calm and assertive without being shouty.
I despise her xenophobic politics and think she's the worst PM we've had in modern times but that was something Theresa May was very good at. She could stand at the dispatch box and calmly and confidently answer questions even if she was on a complete losing wicket.
What she was good at is being shit with people and pissing everyone off.
I doubt she was xenophobic - in the absence of having much empathy she simply reflecting back a hardline message she thought people wanted to hear.
So Brexit was about exciting new trade deals until they don't transpire, then it was never about that.
And Brexit wasn't about a tripartite military alliance with the US and Australia until this happens, then it was always about that.
I sense we'll see much of this so might as well get used to it.
It was really all about the bloody EU making us play cricket in April and September! Even now they are forcing us to stop using batsman and call them batters......
That'll cause a riot. Not for being gender neutral, just because some people have long hated the term 'batter'.
If they do that they are going to have to deal with the problem of "mens" and "womens" cricket, both the actuality and the 'gendered' terminology.
Trivially, what happens if the 2022 version of Willis or Botham self-declares to be a transgender woman, and expects to play for a women's team at county level, or even someone with the greater physical strength / muscularity from 20 years growing up as a boy/man?
Hmmm. At present the policy (advised by Stonewall) is that it is permitted, but hedged around with a lot of legalese and bureaucracy (individual registration with tccb, interviews, appeals process) which only applies to transgender women not men. That policy may be OK for now, but won't last - and the procedure will fall foul of equalities law.
There's also a "Wednesbury unreasonableness" test in there on decisions.
I think the idea will be to hedge it for as long as possible until it becomes an issue that cannot be ignored. Which is probably sensible given the debate.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641394 ...The Times also reported that ministers were concerned that the UK might have to close its six advanced gas-cooled nuclear reactors, which also use CO2. The government announced late on Tuesday night that it would meet the full operating costs to run CF Industries' Billingham plant in Teesside for three weeks. The costs are expected to be in the "low tens of millions" and will be below £50m. Mr Eustice said that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs". At the end of the three-week period, it is hoped that the price of carbon dioxide will have risen sufficiently to make it economically viable for CF Industries to keep production running. Mr Eustice said the food industry would have to accept "a big, sharp rise" carbon dioxide prices from £200 to £1,000 a tonne....
I think a little more attention needs to be paid by government to economic resilience, which given the stresses of Brexit etc, really can't just be left to the market.
Economic resilience is not the business of government. Crisis what crisis. Nothing to see here, move along now. 😆
The perils of being female. Less shouty. Unassertive. Lacks passion.
No shouty isn't the same as assertive. Raab is speaking calmly and that comes across much more assertive.
Rookie mistake – she needs to trust the microphones rather than raising her voice. Ironically it was the idiots sitting behind her saying "hear hear" that first prompted her to increase the volume.
Contrastingly a lot of places with less effective mic systems people make the opposite mistake, and assume they don't need to project more at all, and then complain about not being heard in a poor acoustic room as they assume mic=magic.
I could see a bloc forming looking for a looser, associate membership.
It should be an implicit objective of U.K. foreign policy to find some kind of associate EU membership that works for us, along with Switzerland, Norway, the non-Euro countries (Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Sweden), and perhaps Italy.
Why?
Is NZ seeking to find some kind of Australia membership? Is Canada seeking to find some kind of USA membership?
Why can't the objective of our policy be to become friendly neighbours of the EU instead?
European market integration is fantastic, in my opinion, but I don’t believe in the case for a single currency.
Therefore I favour an outer ring of closely integrated European economies outside the Euro.
Call it associate EU membership, call it something else, I don’t care. The severing of the U.K. from the single market will see our economy fucked for years (cf the bet we have).
Why?
Why is the UK vis-a-vis Europe any different to Canada vis-a-vis the USA? Or New Zealand vis-a-vis Australia?
Why is a trade agreement insufficient, why do we need membership but those other nations don't?
You haven’t read my post properly, as befitting an anti-EU zealot.
Yes I have. You've said the UK should seek single market membership (as opposed to a trade agreement with the single market) as a foreign policy objective.
But unless I'm very much mistaken you don't think New Zealand should seek membership of Australia, or the Canada should seek membership with the USA. Trade agreements etc are sufficient for them with their neighbours - why not the same with the UK?
Australia and NZ are very closely integrated, and even have FOM. But NZ has not “joined Australia”.
I guess US and Canada do too, not sure about Mexico and whether this is a NAFTA provision.
I don’t accept your framing, it is bullshit.
US and Canada have free trade via the USMCA just like we have free trade with the EU via the TCA.
That you don't accept the framing just shows you are in denial.
A single market, as you should know (but who knows, you are deliberately obtuse most of the time) > a standard trade agreement.
As Thatcher well understood.
And yet you don't advocate Canada joining a Single Market with the USA. Why?
At the time that Thatcher sought a Single Market the European nations were in the words of Thatcher the 'richest and most prosperous people' in the planet, 'richer even than the USA'. Fast forward the better part of half a century later and the facts have changed. The EU isn't richer than the USA, its barely seven tenths of the USA in size. The richest and most prosperous people are now across the planet and not in Europe so we should pivot to deal with the world as it exists today not the world that existed four decades ago.
When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?
I would advocate a single market between Canada and the US.
As for your stuff about the EU, you can huff and puff all you like but Europe is on our doorstep and economics 101 is that you are going to trade with your neighbours.
The idea that Britain can tow itself to somewhere just east of Malacca is cloud cuckoo land.
A relevant comparison is advocacy of freedom of movement between USA, Mexico and Canada. Isn't that the point where many in the US might see where Brexit is coming from? The USA's reluctant to pool sovereignty might be something to reflect on too.
I don’t know the numbers but I’d imagine the Mexico / US income differential and the Mexico / US population shares make it much less appetising.
Of course there are degrees of FOM.
NZers have a right to live in Australia but not to receive benefits, for example.
If there had been degrees of FOM in the EU we would still without doubt be in it.
Mexico has 127 m people, the USA 328 M. The FOM problem which directly led to Brexit was 500m people having an absolutely right to live here, a 65 m population, including many millions from very different economies, which, as we are now seeing, distorted our economy to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers giving an illusion that we could have a cheaply run low wage economy for ever on the back of taking the most enterprising from poor countries.
It is as bad a model as the NHS relying on huge numbers of staff at all levels from much poorer countries whose needs are much greater than ours.
Well I personally dispute that immigration was to the detriment of domestic lower paid workers.
There’s little academic evidence to support that (and much to suggest it boosted wages, albeit more at the upper end).
But the issue (to the extent there was one) wasn’t “500m” vs “65m”.
500 included the U.K.
About 380 / 500 were “rich” About 120 / 500 were poorer Eastern European countries.
Its also about perception though. The labour government didn't expect hundreds of thousands of eastern european immigrants, they thought thousands. These were people coming here to work, earn decent money, send it home, or save it. Not scroungers for the most part, despite what some of the worst elements of the right wing press would say. But their arrival did put pressure on local services - GP's, housing, schools etc. It also led to massive change in some parts of the country. A small local town of say 20,000 gaining 500-1000 Polish people will be obvious. Its the old classic, my Polish neighbour XX is great, its the rest of them thats the problem. For many tolerant people seeing a large influx into their towns was too much and too quick. They are not intrinsically racist, but they do have a sense of home, and Britishness. You can prove all you like about the 'real' effect on wages, but that's not what counted in 2016 in the polling booth.
Totally agree.
The impact on local services was critical.
I find it astonishing nothing was done about this, indeed there remained a stubborn view that to raise the question was racist.
A contributing factor to the impact on local services, was that the immigrants were living in much more densely-packed accommodation, and therefore paying considerably less per person in council tax than the native population.
A three-bedroomed family house, with eight or ten people living in it, was common in many cities.
I think if you're from a poorer Eastern European country then some of those jobs were attractive - you could earn far more than you could in the local currency and remit the rest home once converted from Sterling. By contrast, if you're born in the UK and your family live here those conditions and wages really weren't attractive, particularly since you'd be paying all the high housing and transport costs yourself, and experiencing high benefit rate withdrawal, and you'd experience a concentrated level of social change locally as a result. It would probably really piss you if other far wealthier Britons sneered at you and called you racist as a result of your compliants, as indeed many did.
Voting for Brexit in those circumstances aligns entirely with self-interest and is perfectly rational.
Oh indeed. We also see the same with farm workers, who are now expected to live in bunks and dorms for weeks on end. Not something that natives would tolerate.
Of course, no-one is blaming the immigrants themselves - they only work to the system in place, and have the opportunity to better themselves. Many young people especially, if offered the chance to earn what for them is good money, while learning a common language and making new friends, would jump at the chance. Hell, it’s a chance I took myself!
Husband finally managed to eat something today. Hooray!
I will forbear from sharing the recipe for chicken in a creamy leek and walnut sauce which caused such angst.
Meanwhile my day at the Chelsea Flower Show yesterday was great fun if very tiring. The gardens were not the best I have ever seen but plenty of good ideas. The people watching is great fun of course: there are 4 distinct tribes on show -
- English middle class ladies of a certain age - Middle-aged men wearing brightly coloured trousers (think the colours of Portillo's jackets), rarely seen (thank God) in other settings and, often, hats - gay men in very floral shirts - young men with floppy hair
There is also the section with garden statues which are unbelievably hideous and expensive. Who buys this stuff? Why would any sane person want to have statues of Jemima Puddleduck in their garden?
Since you live in Cumbria, should you not know this?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641394 ...The Times also reported that ministers were concerned that the UK might have to close its six advanced gas-cooled nuclear reactors, which also use CO2. The government announced late on Tuesday night that it would meet the full operating costs to run CF Industries' Billingham plant in Teesside for three weeks. The costs are expected to be in the "low tens of millions" and will be below £50m. Mr Eustice said that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs". At the end of the three-week period, it is hoped that the price of carbon dioxide will have risen sufficiently to make it economically viable for CF Industries to keep production running. Mr Eustice said the food industry would have to accept "a big, sharp rise" carbon dioxide prices from £200 to £1,000 a tonne....
I think a little more attention needs to be paid by government to economic resilience, which given the stresses of Brexit etc, really can't just be left to the market.
It's the problem with the Gove/Cummings "burn everything down so that good stuff can spontaneously appear in its wake" theory of government. It would be lovely not to have to plan, but before it gets to an equilibrium, a totally unfettered market can pass through some pretty hair-raising transient states.
The survivors of evolution achieve remarkable things; Matt Ridley has written tonnes of stuff on this. What gets underplayed is that natural selection needs a lot of failures to die in order that the successes can succeed.
The perils of being female. Less shouty. Unassertive. Lacks passion.
No shouty isn't the same as assertive. Raab is speaking calmly and that comes across much more assertive.
The joy of being male. Less shouty. Calm, assertive.
There are many female MPs who can come across as calm and assertive without being shouty.
I despise her xenophobic politics and think she's the worst PM we've had in modern times but that was something Theresa May was very good at. She could stand at the dispatch box and calmly and confidently answer questions even if she was on a complete losing wicket.
What she was good at is being shit with people and pissing everyone off.
I doubt she was xenophobic - in the absence of having much empathy she simply reflecting back a hardline message she thought people wanted to hear.
Like so many politicians she operates in a self-reinforcing bubble most of the time and has probabl;y lost any sense of what real people think and care about.
Looks to me like a nice bit of blackmail by CF Industries. They shut down, knowing full well that stopping production would grind things to a halt and government would have to bail them out quickly. Job done, £50 million or so gained. People would be screaming if a trades union used such tactics....
That'll cause a riot. Not for being gender neutral, just because some people have long hated the term 'batter'.
It is the right thing to do, but it sounds alien and too baseball like.
more evidence PB is becoming too woke.
Seems unlikely.
It's simpler and easier to be gender neutral is all, and in practice a lot of people use the term batter anyway.
Women's cricket has come along in incredible leaps and bounds in recent years too. I enjoyed quite a few of the women's Hundred games and had England v NZ on the other day. A gender neutral term is just logical - its just a shame its a Baseball term.
So what if Baseball got there first? Women's sport is coming on leaps and bounds in terms of public awareness. I did enjoy watching Fallon Sherrock slice her way through the PDC Nordic Masters darts to reach the final. I know its "only" darts but women were kept on their own ticket until very recently.
Women have been able to go to Q school and get a tour card for many years. Sharrock has tried several times and failed. Because she isn’t that good and Q school is several tournaments over several days rather than a 1 off competition.
Quite frankly Lisa Ashton should have got the invite as she’s a tour card holder.
Darts also had a women’s championship played on the same stage as the men, for many many years. Long before other more mainstream sports caught up.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641394 ...The Times also reported that ministers were concerned that the UK might have to close its six advanced gas-cooled nuclear reactors, which also use CO2. The government announced late on Tuesday night that it would meet the full operating costs to run CF Industries' Billingham plant in Teesside for three weeks. The costs are expected to be in the "low tens of millions" and will be below £50m. Mr Eustice said that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs". At the end of the three-week period, it is hoped that the price of carbon dioxide will have risen sufficiently to make it economically viable for CF Industries to keep production running. Mr Eustice said the food industry would have to accept "a big, sharp rise" carbon dioxide prices from £200 to £1,000 a tonne....
I think a little more attention needs to be paid by government to economic resilience, which given the stresses of Brexit etc, really can't just be left to the market.
It's the problem with the Gove/Cummings "burn everything down so that good stuff can spontaneously appear in its wake" theory of government. It would be lovely not to have to plan, but before it gets to an equilibrium, a totally unfettered market can pass through some pretty hair-raising transient states.
The survivors of evolution achieve remarkable things; Matt Ridley has written tonnes of stuff on this. What gets underplayed is that natural selection needs a lot of failures to die in order that the successes can succeed.
It's also worth pointing out the limits of natural selection: no animal ever evolved wheels or a machine gun.
Didn't watch PMQs but mildly amused at the range of opinions.
Paul Hutcheon @paulhutcheon 8m Angela Rayner was very impressive at #PMQs
I thought she was fine. A bit more feisty and class-warish than Starmer, but also quite funny, taking the piss out of Raab on his sun lounger etc. Labour are pushing hard on the cuts to UC, tax increases, rise in energy prices stuff that many think may be fruitful, and she did okay with that.
'Environment Secretary George Eustice told the BBC that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs".'
Numpty. It is their increase in variable costs that has caused them to shut down, not their fixed costs. I hope he wasn't the one to agree the deal.
Kwasi Kwarteng negotiated the deal
Aren’t they a rich American company? Why are we bunging them tax payer money?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641394 ...The Times also reported that ministers were concerned that the UK might have to close its six advanced gas-cooled nuclear reactors, which also use CO2. The government announced late on Tuesday night that it would meet the full operating costs to run CF Industries' Billingham plant in Teesside for three weeks. The costs are expected to be in the "low tens of millions" and will be below £50m. Mr Eustice said that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs". At the end of the three-week period, it is hoped that the price of carbon dioxide will have risen sufficiently to make it economically viable for CF Industries to keep production running. Mr Eustice said the food industry would have to accept "a big, sharp rise" carbon dioxide prices from £200 to £1,000 a tonne....
I think a little more attention needs to be paid by government to economic resilience, which given the stresses of Brexit etc, really can't just be left to the market.
It's the problem with the Gove/Cummings "burn everything down so that good stuff can spontaneously appear in its wake" theory of government. It would be lovely not to have to plan, but before it gets to an equilibrium, a totally unfettered market can pass through some pretty hair-raising transient states.
The survivors of evolution achieve remarkable things; Matt Ridley has written tonnes of stuff on this. What gets underplayed is that natural selection needs a lot of failures to die in order that the successes can succeed.
It's also worth pointing out the limits of natural selection: no animal ever evolved wheels or a machine gun.
Highways England got an injunction against them, so they’ve moved to Scotland.
The ones in Scotland are antivaxxers, not a lot of common travel with the climate change lot I think?
Indeed. One is a bunch of extremist zealots that aren't prepared to accept any compromises based upon the evidence of what works best and is available to us today even though doing what they want today would cause a lot of misery while the other ...
Looks to me like a nice bit of blackmail by CF Industries. They shut down, knowing full well that stopping production would grind things to a halt and government would have to bail them out quickly. Job done, £50 million or so gained. People would be screaming if a trades union used such tactics....
An enterprising competitor will likely be ‘encouraged’ to submit a planning application next week!
The pandemic has definitely shown up issues with global supply chains, utility infrastructure and interdependence.
What looks like a combination of Putin being Putin, an unseasonal lack of wind and a fire at an interconnect station, can cause a massive gas price spike, and indirectly quickly lead to something like a shortage of CO2 - most of which is produced as a minor by-product of other processes.
'Environment Secretary George Eustice told the BBC that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs".'
Numpty. It is their increase in variable costs that has caused them to shut down, not their fixed costs. I hope he wasn't the one to agree the deal.
Kwasi Kwarteng negotiated the deal
Aren’t they a rich American company? Why are we bunging them tax payer money?
So we have food? Could nationalise their plants I suppose as an alternative. Otherwise we have to suck it up and pay the ransom now.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641394 ...The Times also reported that ministers were concerned that the UK might have to close its six advanced gas-cooled nuclear reactors, which also use CO2. The government announced late on Tuesday night that it would meet the full operating costs to run CF Industries' Billingham plant in Teesside for three weeks. The costs are expected to be in the "low tens of millions" and will be below £50m. Mr Eustice said that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs". At the end of the three-week period, it is hoped that the price of carbon dioxide will have risen sufficiently to make it economically viable for CF Industries to keep production running. Mr Eustice said the food industry would have to accept "a big, sharp rise" carbon dioxide prices from £200 to £1,000 a tonne....
I think a little more attention needs to be paid by government to economic resilience, which given the stresses of Brexit etc, really can't just be left to the market.
It's the problem with the Gove/Cummings "burn everything down so that good stuff can spontaneously appear in its wake" theory of government. It would be lovely not to have to plan, but before it gets to an equilibrium, a totally unfettered market can pass through some pretty hair-raising transient states.
The survivors of evolution achieve remarkable things; Matt Ridley has written tonnes of stuff on this. What gets underplayed is that natural selection needs a lot of failures to die in order that the successes can succeed.
'Environment Secretary George Eustice told the BBC that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs".'
Numpty. It is their increase in variable costs that has caused them to shut down, not their fixed costs. I hope he wasn't the one to agree the deal.
Kwasi Kwarteng negotiated the deal
Aren’t they a rich American company? Why are we bunging them tax payer money?
So we have food? Could nationalise their plants I suppose as an alternative. Otherwise we have to suck it up and pay the ransom now.
That, ultimately, is the thing that should stop them playing silly buggers in the long-term. This has been all over the news, so if they try it on in the future, then there will - quite rightly - be calls to simply nationalise the plant.
'Environment Secretary George Eustice told the BBC that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs".'
Numpty. It is their increase in variable costs that has caused them to shut down, not their fixed costs. I hope he wasn't the one to agree the deal.
Kwasi Kwarteng negotiated the deal
Aren’t they a rich American company? Why are we bunging them tax payer money?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641394 ...The Times also reported that ministers were concerned that the UK might have to close its six advanced gas-cooled nuclear reactors, which also use CO2. The government announced late on Tuesday night that it would meet the full operating costs to run CF Industries' Billingham plant in Teesside for three weeks. The costs are expected to be in the "low tens of millions" and will be below £50m. Mr Eustice said that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs". At the end of the three-week period, it is hoped that the price of carbon dioxide will have risen sufficiently to make it economically viable for CF Industries to keep production running. Mr Eustice said the food industry would have to accept "a big, sharp rise" carbon dioxide prices from £200 to £1,000 a tonne....
I think a little more attention needs to be paid by government to economic resilience, which given the stresses of Brexit etc, really can't just be left to the market.
It's the problem with the Gove/Cummings "burn everything down so that good stuff can spontaneously appear in its wake" theory of government. It would be lovely not to have to plan, but before it gets to an equilibrium, a totally unfettered market can pass through some pretty hair-raising transient states.
The survivors of evolution achieve remarkable things; Matt Ridley has written tonnes of stuff on this. What gets underplayed is that natural selection needs a lot of failures to die in order that the successes can succeed.
It's also worth pointing out the limits of natural selection: no animal ever evolved wheels or a machine gun.
There are bacteria with rotating propellor-like “tails” aren’t there though?
Looks to me like a nice bit of blackmail by CF Industries. They shut down, knowing full well that stopping production would grind things to a halt and government would have to bail them out quickly. Job done, £50 million or so gained. People would be screaming if a trades union used such tactics....
Nice quote from their annual report... ...The report focuses on recently announced ESG goals, covering critical environmental, societal, and workforce imperatives. These commitments include a dramatic reduction in carbon emissions across its global network to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 and an intermediate goal of a 25% reduction in CO2e emissions intensity by 2030. The Company’s ESG goals also encompass other issues important to CF Industries and its stakeholders, including diversity and inclusion, safety, food security, nutrient management and community involvement....
I take the general point (and it is very general), but afaics there is zero sympathy or cooperation between Insulate Britain or XR and the antivaxxers. People at the more extreme ends of politics have always used similar methods; until arch climate change denier Piers Corbyn glues himself to a commuter train for the planet, I won't believe there's common cause there.
Looks to me like a nice bit of blackmail by CF Industries. They shut down, knowing full well that stopping production would grind things to a halt and government would have to bail them out quickly. Job done, £50 million or so gained. People would be screaming if a trades union used such tactics....
Nice quote from their annual report... ...The report focuses on recently announced ESG goals, covering critical environmental, societal, and workforce imperatives. These commitments include a dramatic reduction in carbon emissions across its global network to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 and an intermediate goal of a 25% reduction in CO2e emissions intensity by 2030. The Company’s ESG goals also encompass other issues important to CF Industries and its stakeholders, including diversity and inclusion, safety, food security, nutrient management and community involvement....
Ah, another company whose actions don’t seem to quite match their words…
Looks to me like a nice bit of blackmail by CF Industries. They shut down, knowing full well that stopping production would grind things to a halt and government would have to bail them out quickly. Job done, £50 million or so gained. People would be screaming if a trades union used such tactics....
An enterprising competitor will likely be ‘encouraged’ to submit a planning application next week!
The pandemic has definitely shown up issues with global supply chains, utility infrastructure and interdependence.
What looks like a combination of Putin being Putin, an unseasonal lack of wind and a fire at an interconnect station, can cause a massive gas price spike, and indirectly quickly lead to something like a shortage of CO2 - most of which is produced as a minor by-product of other processes.
In terms of government resilience planning, is “next week” a magnitude of years too late?
Looks to me like a nice bit of blackmail by CF Industries. They shut down, knowing full well that stopping production would grind things to a halt and government would have to bail them out quickly. Job done, £50 million or so gained. People would be screaming if a trades union used such tactics....
An enterprising competitor will likely be ‘encouraged’ to submit a planning application next week!
The pandemic has definitely shown up issues with global supply chains, utility infrastructure and interdependence.
What looks like a combination of Putin being Putin, an unseasonal lack of wind and a fire at an interconnect station, can cause a massive gas price spike, and indirectly quickly lead to something like a shortage of CO2 - most of which is produced as a minor by-product of other processes.
A brief look at the published reserves numbers gives a clue as to what is going on and why there is this issue for the UK.
Comments
11:02 Day 2
ESSEX BEAT NORTHANTS BY AN INNINGS & 44 RUNS
Essex 170 v Northants 81 and 45
I will forbear from sharing the recipe for chicken in a creamy leek and walnut sauce which caused such angst.
Meanwhile my day at the Chelsea Flower Show yesterday was great fun if very tiring. The gardens were not the best I have ever seen but plenty of good ideas. The people watching is great fun of course: there are 4 distinct tribes on show -
- English middle class ladies of a certain age
- Middle-aged men wearing brightly coloured trousers (think the colours of Portillo's jackets), rarely seen (thank God) in other settings and, often, hats
- gay men in very floral shirts
- young men with floppy hair
There is also the section with garden statues which are unbelievably hideous and expensive. Who buys this stuff? Why would any sane person want to have statues of Jemima Puddleduck in their garden?
And the clothes - does anyone really wear a costume such as this - https://imgur.com/QAlPsCk - even in Scotland?
But this sums up the day for me - https://twitter.com/cyclefree2/status/1440624354182582273?s=21
Having said that the Football season should start now not in August when the Premier League restarts
*yes I realise it is a very enjoyable occasion for people.
Great to hear about your husband. Did you get to the bottom of it - allergy/foreign body/scar/etc?
To get the Churchill bust back in the Oval office it seems we will have to wait for the next GOP President (though Churchill himself got on as well with FDR as IKE and once holidayed in the Med with JFK on Onassis' boat shortly before he died
We'll have to see what exactly he comes up with in the Budget, of course. But the current system is a mess, with those who do need help already having to use means-tested benefits (pension credit, in the case of pensioners). At the very least it would make sense to make the Winter Fuel payment taxable for higher-rate taxpayers.
My advice to young people is to retrain as a house.
As a result then I can use any of my cards now via either swiping up from the bottom of my phone, or via my watch.
No idea if others think that's secure or not, but it got good reviews online and it works for me.
And actually Raab is fairly measured
The problem is that there doesn't seem to be anyone decent on the Labour front bench. Maybe the Shadow Health Secretary, I don't like his politics but he seems to have his head screwed on.
The final Test Match (of 6 that summer) started on 19th August.
The first CC matches started on 1 May (all April FC fixtures were MCC or University matches).
There is a lot to be said for it.
I despise her xenophobic politics and think she's the worst PM we've had in modern times but that was something Theresa May was very good at. She could stand at the dispatch box and calmly and confidently answer questions even if she was on a complete losing wicket.
Sometimes I utterly love the Cambridge area.
Over nine miles run, and probably only a quarter of a mile on roads.
I did resist nipping into the Orchard for a cream tea, if only because I was sweaty and shirtless.
They can't both be true.
It seems to be a disease spread from management bullshit. More words equals more impressive the point.
Starmer is not stuck with Rayner. He can dispense with her the same simple way Corbyn’s mob were set to dispense with Watson until they bottled it. Two thirds vote on NEC to do deputy differently, if at all.
And Starmer has to to do it. ASAP. For how Boris had trounced Starmer in recent weeks as the better PM, is Boris has amply demonstrated the killer instinct. That’s what the country is looking for from Starmer. If he is ambitious about being PM he has to show us the killer instinct. Has he got it?
This is 2021, elected deputy leader? Bonkers. Grow up Labour.
As a result we've managed to get "high prosperity" and "low inflation" that simply means people are completely costed out of society.
It's easy to fix - just wait a short period of time.
more evidence PB is becoming too woke.
When my first daughter was born my wife was the last woman admitted to the maternity ward for that day before the hospital announced its ward was closed as they'd ran out of bed and all women were to be redirected to go to Manchester instead.
I hope it's just an one-off.
Voting for Brexit in those circumstances aligns entirely with self-interest and is perfectly rational.
Are you listening ECB? If you done Somerset for one substandard pitch how are you letting Essex get away with a sequence of them?
It's simpler and easier to be gender neutral is all, and in practice a lot of people use the term batter anyway.
And Brexit wasn't about a tripartite military alliance with the US and Australia until this happens, then it was always about that.
I sense we'll see much of this so might as well get used to it.
Trivially, what happens if the 2022 version of Willis or Botham self-declares to be a transgender woman, and expects to play for a women's team at county level, or even someone with the greater physical strength / muscularity from 20 years growing up as a boy/man?
Hmmm. At present the policy (advised by Stonewall) is that it is permitted, but hedged around with a lot of legalese and bureaucracy (individual registration with tccb, interviews, appeals process) which only applies to transgender women not men. That policy may be OK for now, but won't last - and the procedure will fall foul of equalities law.
There's also a "Wednesbury unreasonableness" test in there on decisions.
https://resources.ecb.co.uk/ecb/document/2020/03/16/dbf9fbc2-d56d-429a-b48d-562064b1ecc8/2020-ECB-Policy-on-Trans-People-Playing-Cricket.pdf
https://twitter.com/heraldscotland/status/1440626622344810508?s=20
Upper-middle class property owners love their own asset values increasing, but don't care too much for paying more for their staff.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641394
...The Times also reported that ministers were concerned that the UK might have to close its six advanced gas-cooled nuclear reactors, which also use CO2.
The government announced late on Tuesday night that it would meet the full operating costs to run CF Industries' Billingham plant in Teesside for three weeks. The costs are expected to be in the "low tens of millions" and will be below £50m.
Mr Eustice said that the deal with CF Industries "will be not a loan, it will be a payment to underwrite some of their fixed costs".
At the end of the three-week period, it is hoped that the price of carbon dioxide will have risen sufficiently to make it economically viable for CF Industries to keep production running.
Mr Eustice said the food industry would have to accept "a big, sharp rise" carbon dioxide prices from £200 to £1,000 a tonne....
I think a little more attention needs to be paid by government to economic resilience, which given the stresses of Brexit etc, really can't just be left to the market.
I doubt she was xenophobic - in the absence of having much empathy she simply reflecting back a hardline message she thought people wanted to hear.
Of course, no-one is blaming the immigrants themselves - they only work to the system in place, and have the opportunity to better themselves. Many young people especially, if offered the chance to earn what for them is good money, while learning a common language and making new friends, would jump at the chance. Hell, it’s a chance I took myself!
The survivors of evolution achieve remarkable things; Matt Ridley has written tonnes of stuff on this. What gets underplayed is that natural selection needs a lot of failures to die in order that the successes can succeed.
Paul Hutcheon
@paulhutcheon
8m
Angela Rayner was very impressive at #PMQs
Quite frankly Lisa Ashton should have got the invite as she’s a tour card holder.
Darts also had a women’s championship played on the same stage as the men, for many many years. Long before other more mainstream sports caught up.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/09/22/m25-protests-prompt-anger-police-chief-putting-officers-danger/
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/22/leftwingers-far-right-conspiracy-theories-anti-vaxxers-power
The pandemic has definitely shown up issues with global supply chains, utility infrastructure and interdependence.
What looks like a combination of Putin being Putin, an unseasonal lack of wind and a fire at an interconnect station, can cause a massive gas price spike, and indirectly quickly lead to something like a shortage of CO2 - most of which is produced as a minor by-product of other processes.
PM's spokesman, asked about UK wanting to join US/Mex/Can free trade area: "That's not an approach we are currently taking."
Kite downed.
https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1440647305372131332?s=21
...The report focuses on recently announced ESG goals, covering critical environmental, societal, and workforce imperatives. These commitments include a dramatic reduction in carbon emissions across its global network to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 and an intermediate goal of a 25% reduction in CO2e emissions intensity by 2030. The Company’s ESG goals also encompass other issues important to CF Industries and its stakeholders, including diversity and inclusion, safety, food security, nutrient management and community involvement....
People at the more extreme ends of politics have always used similar methods; until arch climate change denier Piers Corbyn glues himself to a commuter train for the planet, I won't believe there's common cause there.
Keep up!
https://twitter.com/dhoneyford/status/1440346160594440192?s=21