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  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 121,688
    edited February 2017
    You need to click on the tweet itself to enjoy its full majesty.

    https://twitter.com/CashsteinJ/status/831020866926424064
  • MTimTMTimT Posts: 7,034



    Automation has increased for a couple of centuries, yet more people are employed than ever in the UK, and in a vastly increased range of jobs. Whilst some occupations have died out, many more have been created..

    Even Obama did not get this basic point about progress. He lamented the loss of bank tellers. Do we really want a world where we daily rely on wainwrights, and cartwrights and farriers and blacksmiths, and a good job is considered to be a coal miner? Not me. Give me a job in nano tech or IT or synthetic biology any day.

    And for those who argue that I am comparing physical labour to knowledge-based, I'd suggest they try shoeing a horse without knowledge, or making a barrel or a cartwheel, or mining a deep shaft. All of the lost professions required knowledge, both explicit and tacit.
  • DavidL said:

    Not suggesting that. Just suggesting that putting the PM up there suggests the Tories think that they are at least in with a shout and, just possibly, something better than that.
    I have more faith in the Conservatives getting this one right than Labour. But it's less important on this occasion for the Conservatives to get this right than it is for Labour.

    Tony Blair's honeymoon didn't end when the voters of Uxbridge rebuffed him in the summer of 1997.
  • Mr. Thompson, one cafe (I think, Deets, or suchlike) has said it won't take cash any more, payment will only be permitted via apps etc.

    That's barking mad.

    That's the future.

    For businesses cash has a lot of major problems. It is the biggest risk as far as theft is concerned (from both external and internal causes). Mistakes made in giving out change can lead to major cash shortages. The cost, safety and security implications of getting the cash from the business to the bank.

    Electronic transactions are so much simpler. You do the transaction and the money is in your bank. Since businesses likely make virtually all their payments via bank transfer eliminating cash as an issue is cleaner and easier.

    One day cash will be as obsolete as a check book.
  • CyclefreeCyclefree Posts: 25,651
    Jobabob said:

    That's true. Lots of myths about currency and money. Another one you regularly encounter is that if a good is displayed at a certain price in a shop, the shop has to sell you it at that price. That's false. The vendor can sell it the product at any price they choose, regardless of what is shown on the ticket. They can also choose not to sell it at all.
    That's not quite correct. If the shop owner makes an offer and it is accepted by the customer i.e. I will buy those nails you are selling me for 20 pence each then they have entered into a contract.

    For a contract to exist, there must be an intention to enter into legal relations, sufficient consideration and the terms must be clear.

    The first is present when a shopkeeper sets out a good with a price attached. So is the second: the price the customer pays. And so is the third. See the famous Carbolic Smoke Ball Company case.



  • rural_voterrural_voter Posts: 2,038

    I think the EU needs to admit that becoming a Federal state is its ultimate goal with nations being reduced to states within the Federal structure rather than edging on a bit with "ever closer union".

    Proper external borders properly policed would be a good idea too
    I think the Eurocrats have tacitly acknowledged the rights of peripheral northern states to be awkward since Denmark and the UK each attained four opt-outs. No-one else has more than one, i.e. suggests the other 26 don't object as strongly to the EU's general direction.

    The reason the UK may end up half in/half out is that from where we now are the two other alternatives are so problematic. Below is an e-mail from an Irish friend who lives and works in Scotland on the recent link http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-38949539

    "I predict big trouble. Where there is a 500km border with a huge amount of traffic crossing and recrossing, and a 20% tariff chargeable on goods crossing it, there will be a huge amount of money to be made from smuggling. So there will be corruption and delegitimisation of the police and security forces. And Irish nationalists who never wanted the border and who have had their case strengthened by Northern Irleand having voted to remain in the EC, will have something concrete to start attacking, something disliked by the local community because of the unwanted inconvenience it causes, and will have access to lots of smuggling money. And once the rot starts...

    There are similar problems in Moldova and Transnistria:
    http://www.ponarseurasia.org/sites/default/files/policy-memos-pdf/Pepm_307_Gavrilis_Jan2014.pdf"

    So, it's Moldova here we come ... unless someone comes to their senses and ensures a tariff-free border.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 79,235
    (((Sjöfn)))
    @CashsteinJ
    Zionist,arch-Blairite,European,Deep House Junkie,don't do the 52, trumpsters,corborg or antisemites

    Proof that loons don't just inhabit the far left and far right.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 54,859

    The EU doesn't turn. At all. We only suspected that before Cameron's "negotiation"; we know it for certain now.
    So this organisation that you think has surreptitiously evolved from a coal and steel community to a quasi-federal state is incapable of transforming itself? Sounds like cognitive dissonance.
  • felixfelix Posts: 15,180
    DavidL said:

    Not suggesting that. Just suggesting that putting the PM up there suggests the Tories think that they are at least in with a shout and, just possibly, something better than that.
    Indeed - but no-one anywhere seems to be saying all that much about Copeland. Suggests it could be really close....or a non-event.
  • Mr. Thompson, a nightmarish and dystopian future, then.

    The bank would be able to charge on every transaction. Your movements would be logged. Those without mobile telephones would be denied the right to, er, spend their own damned money.

    Get your phone hacked and you can't pay for anything. Get mugged and you won't be able to get a taxi home or pay for a train ticket. If we have virtual train tickets you'd lose that too.

    People get carried away with the capabilities of technology that they fail to consider the drawbacks.
  • Cyclefree said:

    See the famous Carbolic Smoke Ball Company case.

    Thank you for that! I hadn't come across it before, but I love those Victorian court cases.
  • But there would have been fewer wasted votes, less people feeling disenfranchised.
    Would it? I doubt that there are that many who feel 'disenfranchised' anyway, and of those who do, I'm not sure that having their third- or fourth-choice elected will do much about it.

    If you want to resolve that problem then PR or STV is what you need.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 79,235
    MTimT said:

    Even Obama did not get this basic point about progress. He lamented the loss of bank tellers. Do we really want a world where we daily rely on wainwrights, and cartwrights and farriers and blacksmiths, and a good job is considered to be a coal miner? Not me. Give me a job in nano tech or IT or synthetic biology any day.

    And for those who argue that I am comparing physical labour to knowledge-based, I'd suggest they try shoeing a horse without knowledge, or making a barrel or a cartwheel, or mining a deep shaft. All of the lost professions required knowledge, both explicit and tacit.
    Can you point me to this post farrier world ?
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 55,191

    The fundamental problem for remain was the disconnect between what the EU is and what British politicians of all stripes have been claiming it is for the last 40 years. That disconnect was highlighted and exposed by the feeble package of reforms Cameron was able to extract. There was no inclination in the majority of the EU to change direction from the quasi-state that they have created and they either did not understand or were not willing to accept that the British populace wanted no part of it.

    Their problem may prove to be that the British people are not the only populace who have been unwittingly led in that direction but it may not. It may be that despite the noise the majority in the other countries do favour such a direction in which case good luck to them and it is as well that the UK left now.
  • foxinsoxukfoxinsoxuk Posts: 23,548

    Or - Labour think it may be in the bag and think Corbyn can be risked so that he can claim it as a personal victory.

    I wouldn't read so much into it. Jezza likes grass roots campaigning and has already appeared alongside both byelection candidates in their twitter.

    Lib Dems in second place to Labour in Stoke would be a nail in the coffin of the purple pestilence, I do hope Conhome is accurate. Is there a second place market up?
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 44,107

    So you would be happy if this person (born female, XX chromosomes, etc) shared the toilet with you?

    image
    Do people share toilets, I must lead a sheltered life.
  • MTimTMTimT Posts: 7,034
    Patrick said:

    Unless the only options being available are Brexit vs Superstate.
    Both Dave AND the EU fucked up big time.
    The EU for being so utterly inflexible and intransigent - did they really want to make being in the EU something so annoying that the majority of its 2nd economy and contributor could no longer stomach? Do the Brussels apparatchiks prefer Superstate without us to 2-speed and us still in? Who knows. Maybe the French wanted us out and blocked all reform. Can't blame them!
    Dave for failing to sniff the zeitgeist and making a serious effort to get reform or persuade the EU that we would otherwise actually have to leave. He came to a gunfight with a knife and failed to represent the pre-existing will of the people.
    Dave's tactics made a lot of sense if his intention all along was to justify Leave. But it wasn't, so his approach was just a total farce. Negotation 101 failure big time. And if Sir Ivan was advising, good riddance ahead of the serious negotiations.
  • The EU doesn't turn. At all. We only suspected that before Cameron's "negotiation"; we know it for certain now.
    It does and it has - but rarely. It turned under Delors, when it seriously embraced both the federalist project (which it had paid lip-service to before while making fairly glacial progress - it took 35 years before it even got close to completing the Single Market), and also the social agenda.

    At some point, it will need to address the concerns that Cameron raised because at present, both the politics and the economics are failing - or it will collapse in tears.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 44,107

    She has probably put you on ignore like I am about to :)
    When beaten , retreat to your cave
  • Beverley_CBeverley_C Posts: 6,256

    Below is an e-mail from an Irish friend who lives and works in Scotland on the recent link http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-38949539

    Previously it was cattle and livestock scams, creaming subsidies off on one side of the border and then sending the same animals back over a quiet road and re-importing them. Carousel Fraud with cattle :-)

    There is also this issue to muddy the waters further (from downthread)


    The situation in Ireland has some nuances. For example everybody born there (north OR south) is a citizen of the Republic and thus is an EU citizen too.

    Anyone born on the "island of Ireland" before 2005 is an Irish Citizen. Anyone in the North and born to Irish parents or grandparents is also an Irish citizen. That means that almost everyone in the north is an EU citizen.

    That makes for an interesting border situation... :)


  • JobabobJobabob Posts: 3,807
    Cyclefree said:

    That's not quite correct. If the shop owner makes an offer and it is accepted by the customer i.e. I will buy those nails you are selling me for 20 pence each then they have entered into a contract.

    For a contract to exist, there must be an intention to enter into legal relations, sufficient consideration and the terms must be clear.

    The first is present when a shopkeeper sets out a good with a price attached. So is the second: the price the customer pays. And so is the third. See the famous Carbolic Smoke Ball Company case.



    If they have made an agreement, of course. But if no conversation has taken place then the price on the ticket can be ignored.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 44,107

    One circumstance is that any reference to "independence" being gained rather than lost by a vote to secede would post Brexit be highly misleading, when the argument for a second referendum in short succession rests on transferring national independence back to the EU.

    The UK government should this time put a robust case to the Electoral Commission that the question should be put in terms of Scotland leaving the UK.

    In any case the UK might be a tiny bit resistant to the SNP being allowed to roll the dice again and again in short succession, EU style, until they get the answer they want.
    Keep polishing those Jackboots, we will obey you.
  • MTimTMTimT Posts: 7,034

    So this organisation that you think has surreptitiously evolved from a coal and steel community to a quasi-federal state is incapable of transforming itself? Sounds like cognitive dissonance.

    Turning and transforming are two totally different things. Both entail change. But in this case, one requires acknowledging reality and adapting to it, whereas the other entails continuing down the same, predetermined path blindly, willfully ignoring all the evidence as the evidence is so loud it cannot be otherwise unnoticed.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 55,191

    I have more faith in the Conservatives getting this one right than Labour. But it's less important on this occasion for the Conservatives to get this right than it is for Labour.

    Tony Blair's honeymoon didn't end when the voters of Uxbridge rebuffed him in the summer of 1997.
    I agree that they have a lot less at stake. To win a bye election from Labour in government would be a very unusual event. I just don't think that May would have been taking time out of what is a very, very busy schedule at the moment as some sort of a gesture unless there was a good chance of it coming up Trumps (so to speak). It suggests to me that the Tories are perhaps a tad underpriced.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 79,235
    DavidL said:

    I agree that they have a lot less at stake. To win a bye election from Labour in government would be a very unusual event. I just don't think that May would have been taking time out of what is a very, very busy schedule at the moment as some sort of a gesture unless there was a good chance of it coming up Trumps (so to speak). It suggests to me that the Tories are perhaps a tad underpriced.
    At 1-2 on ?????

    Are you having a giraffe ?
  • Mr. G, the Romans had communal lavatories.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 44,107

    That's the future.

    For businesses cash has a lot of major problems. It is the biggest risk as far as theft is concerned (from both external and internal causes). Mistakes made in giving out change can lead to major cash shortages. The cost, safety and security implications of getting the cash from the business to the bank.

    Electronic transactions are so much simpler. You do the transaction and the money is in your bank. Since businesses likely make virtually all their payments via bank transfer eliminating cash as an issue is cleaner and easier.

    One day cash will be as obsolete as a check book.
    Perchance do you mean "cheque"
  • MTimTMTimT Posts: 7,034
    Pulpstar said:

    Can you point me to this post farrier world ?
    I was talking about daily life reliance. Now we could not cope without farriers here on the farm. But I doubt most city dwellers even know what a farrier is.
  • Carolus_RexCarolus_Rex Posts: 1,414

    Thank you for that! I hadn't come across it before, but I love those Victorian court cases.
    Carlill v the Carbolic Smoke Ball Company.

    It's the only case whose name any lawyer can remember 5 minutes after sitting their last law exam.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 55,191
    Pulpstar said:

    At 1-2 on ?????

    Are you having a giraffe ?
    That's not a bad price if it is a pretty sure thing.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 55,191

    Carlill v the Carbolic Smoke Ball Company.

    It's the only case whose name any lawyer can remember 5 minutes after sitting their last law exam.
    Donaghue-v-Stevenson?
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 79,235
    DavidL said:

    That's not a bad price if it is a pretty sure thing.
    It is definitely not a sure thing though is it ?

    At best it is a 50-50 shot.
  • foxinsoxukfoxinsoxuk Posts: 23,548

    Mr. G, the Romans had communal lavatories.

    UEA does too, albeit with stalls, in their SU. Seemed fine to me.
  • ArtistArtist Posts: 1,893
    edited February 2017
    One Westminster insider said: “The Tories have got Copeland in the bag. Everyone in the Cabinet has been up there. They’re throwing everything at it.”

    http://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2854120/theresa-may-set-for-first-by-election-victory-after-disastrous-poll-reveals-third-of-labour-voters-in-copeland-are-deserting-jeremy-corbyn/

    Could be Labour expectation management.
  • AlsoIndigoAlsoIndigo Posts: 1,852

    Quite right. Dave got it in writing that we need not submit to any further integration. He essentially secured agreement for a two-speed Europe - something once unthinkable amongst EU fundamentalists. With that victory in his back pocket, who knows what other goodies he could have wrangled for us at a later date.
    Except it was worthless.

    This is Denmark's deal with the Council of Europe because they rejected Maastricht, following exactly the same ratifications and agreements as the deal Dave was offered.

    http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:41992X1231:EN:HTML

    This is the same deal being struck down by the ECJ

    http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?qid=1443963656228&uri=CELEX:61999CJ0184

    Treaties > Backroom deals by the Council of Europe
  • DavidL said:

    That's not a bad price if it is a pretty sure thing.
    To put that in context, I think that the last time the Conservatives increased their vote share while in government was in Beaconsfield in 1982 (where they did so by 0.1%). They were 7% behind Labour at the general election, so to take the seat they will either need to break this 35 year streak or they will need to see Labour's share drop by more than their own.

    Either is possible but neither sounds like a pretty sure thing to me.

    Put another way, a Conservative win in Copeland would be an exceptionally good result for them (and appalling for Labour).
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 55,191
    Pulpstar said:

    It is definitely not a sure thing though is it ?

    At best it is a 50-50 shot.
    What we know recently (ignoring the Sun for the moment) is that Corbyn is going to Stoke and not to Copeland. May is going to Copeland and not to Stoke. I agree with the comments downthread that where the leaders were going in 2015 was, not entirely with the benefit of hindsight, pretty good evidence of how the campaigns thought things were going.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,572
    Artist said:

    One Westminster insider said: “The Tories have got Copeland in the bag. Everyone in the Cabinet has been up there. They’re throwing everything at it.”

    http://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2854120/theresa-may-set-for-first-by-election-victory-after-disastrous-poll-reveals-third-of-labour-voters-in-copeland-are-deserting-jeremy-corbyn/

    Could be Labour expectation management.

    No, THIS was expectation management!

    https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2668829/copeland-by-election-labour-ukip-paul-nuttall/
  • Mr. Indigo, quite.

    I don't think the deal was worth much, but when the other side can't be trusted, a deal is worth nothing.

  • Carolus_RexCarolus_Rex Posts: 1,414
    DavidL said:

    Donaghue-v-Stevenson?
    Oh, all right. That one too.

    Oh, and R v Dudley and Stephens - now there's one for Mr Nabavi to chew over... as it were...
  • stodgestodge Posts: 14,485


    It does and it has - but rarely. It turned under Delors, when it seriously embraced both the federalist project (which it had paid lip-service to before while making fairly glacial progress - it took 35 years before it even got close to completing the Single Market), and also the social agenda.

    At some point, it will need to address the concerns that Cameron raised because at present, both the politics and the economics are failing - or it will collapse in tears.

    I think the Monnet ideal was always there primarily as a Franco-German axis to replace the rivalry which had torn Europe apart from 1870 to 1945. The logic of western European integration as a bulwark to the advance of Communism was also ever present.

    The British could have shaped the future EU much more strongly had we got more involved at Messina but our stand-offish approach meant Paris and Bonn built the "Common Market" without much involvement from London.
  • mattmatt Posts: 3,789
    edited February 2017

    Thank you for that! I hadn't come across it before, but I love those Victorian court cases.
    It's up there with Donoguhue's snail in his ginger beer as foundations of English commercial and tort law.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,572
    DavidL said:

    Donaghue-v-Stevenson?
    R v Collins

    http://www.e-lawresources.co.uk/R-v-Collins.php
  • Ishmael_ZIshmael_Z Posts: 8,981
    matt said:

    It's up there with Donoguhue's snail in his ginger beer as foundations of English commercial and tort law.
    Her ginger beer, I think.
  • foxinsoxukfoxinsoxuk Posts: 23,548
    Artist said:

    One Westminster insider said: “The Tories have got Copeland in the bag. Everyone in the Cabinet has been up there. They’re throwing everything at it.”

    http://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2854120/theresa-may-set-for-first-by-election-victory-after-disastrous-poll-reveals-third-of-labour-voters-in-copeland-are-deserting-jeremy-corbyn/

    Could be Labour expectation management.

    The idea that Labour have abandoned Copeland is nonsense.

    https://twitter.com/GillTroughton/status/830812892052209665?s=09

    https://twitter.com/JimfromOldham/status/830492022956052480
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 43,724
    MTimT said:

    I was talking about daily life reliance. Now we could not cope without farriers here on the farm. But I doubt most city dwellers even know what a farrier is.
    Farriers are rarely seen in the countryside. Because they are all on holiday in the Caribbean.
  • mattmatt Posts: 3,789
    Jobabob said:

    If they have made an agreement, of course. But if no conversation has taken place then the price on the ticket can be ignored.
    The ticket's the offer. The taking to the counter is acceptance. Putting forward payment is consideration.
  • sarissasarissa Posts: 2,108

    They can't adopt the Euro without first having their own currency and going through the stages of Economic and Monetary Union. One of those is a deficit of less than 3%. Even with the help of those creative people at Goldman Sachs, they'd be miles off that target.

    A further problem is that a Scottish Pound would probably be a very weak currency. Pegging it to the pound would simply invite speculators to try to break the peg (a one-way bet). The speculators would win.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_convergence_criteria
    Like they won against Denmark?

    https://www.ft.com/content/24f43be7-ea08-389d-bb3a-b404bf8e4d54
  • MTimTMTimT Posts: 7,034
    Don't you just love headline writers. According to the EU, the UK's economy is about to slump while the EU on average will see growth pick up.

    The growth rates after slump and pick up? 1.5% and 1.8%.
  • Carolus_RexCarolus_Rex Posts: 1,414

    R v Collins

    http://www.e-lawresources.co.uk/R-v-Collins.php
    Ha! The socks maniac case, as my criminal law lecturer insisted on calling it.
  • matt said:

    It's up there with Donoguhue's snail in his ginger beer as foundations of English commercial and tort law.
    The snail might never have been there. History does not relate.
  • PAWPAW Posts: 1,074
    Zerohedge believes the drive to cashless is to enable substantial negative interest rates, and prevent people from removing money from the country.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 44,107

    Mr. G, the Romans had communal lavatories.

    MD , that may be so , luckily we have progressed. Cannot say I would like to share with most of the great unwashed.
  • matt said:

    It's up there with Donoguhue's snail in his ginger beer as foundations of English commercial and tort law.
    As a company director, I have a particular fondness for Foss vs Harbottle.
  • DanSmithDanSmith Posts: 1,215

    The idea that Labour have abandoned Copeland is nonsense.

    https://twitter.com/GillTroughton/status/830812892052209665?s=09

    https://twitter.com/JimfromOldham/status/830492022956052480
    MacMahon and Prescott, big guns ! (not).
  • AlsoIndigoAlsoIndigo Posts: 1,852

    One day cash will be as obsolete as a check book.

    Might be a while in some parts of the world. I dont possess a cheque book, and the only time I use a credit card is buying airline tickets!

  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 79,235
    The Conservatives with Coral, Sky Bet and some others are now 2-5.

    That is the same price as they were in 'Somerton and Frome' last GE with Ladbrokes. That is the sort of constituency bet that I like to take at 2-5, not this one.
    If the Conservatives win Copeland by the same margin at this BE that Somerton and Frome was taken at the last GE (53 - 19) then Labour might as well pack up. I'll pack up political betting too.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 55,191

    R v Collins

    http://www.e-lawresources.co.uk/R-v-Collins.php
    I can see why the facts of that might have appealed but we didn't cover that in Scotland.
  • Worth recalling technology can curtail freedom and impose restrictions as much as it can free people.

    We need only look at social media's shenanigans in this regard. Getting drunk on technology leads to The Machine Stops [which I still need to read...].
  • MTimTMTimT Posts: 7,034

    Might be a while in some parts of the world. I dont possess a cheque book, and the only time I use a credit card is buying airline tickets!

    I don't used credit cards at all. It's nearly all on the debit card now. Just visited the UK, UAE and Pakistan for a total of 3 weeks. Used no cash (didn't even have local bank notes) or credit.
  • As a company director, I have a particular fondness for Foss vs Harbottle.
    Foss vs Harbottle is a pile of tosh!! I mean, ushered in a period of utter and needless complexity which is yet to be fully resolved.
  • rural_voterrural_voter Posts: 2,038
    stodge said:

    I think the Monnet ideal was always there primarily as a Franco-German axis to replace the rivalry which had torn Europe apart from 1870 to 1945. The logic of western European integration as a bulwark to the advance of Communism was also ever present.

    The British could have shaped the future EU much more strongly had we got more involved at Messina but our stand-offish approach meant Paris and Bonn built the "Common Market" without much involvement from London.
    A lot of countries could have got more involved, including all seven members of EFTA - probably six, Switzerland wouldn't have wanted to join such a close alliance.

    However, the UK set EFTA up as a rival to the EEC and then ... left it.

    The reason the economics are failing is trying to have a currency union before a political union. I actually agree with John Redwood on that - it's insane! The US of A got it the right way round.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 55,191

    The snail might never have been there. History does not relate.
    Pretty sure there was something there because she died, allegedly of poisoning. You are right that the case never went to trial and the facts were never established.
  • foxinsoxukfoxinsoxuk Posts: 23,548
    DanSmith said:

    MacMahon and Prescott, big guns ! (not).
    Richard Burgon and Andy MacDonald, both from the Shadow Cabinet have been there the last couple of days too. You may not like them, or think much of them, but it is certainly evidence of effort.

    Though it is Gill Troughton's long history of local campaigning that will see her over the line.
  • GeoffMGeoffM Posts: 6,071

    Might be a while in some parts of the world. I dont possess a cheque book, and the only time I use a credit card is buying airline tickets!

    On my invoices I say that I accept cash/transfer/paypal and bitcoin.
    I have a note respectfully saying that I don't take cheques. Nobody has ever mentioned that limitation, let alone had a problem with it.
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207
    MTimT said:

    Don't you just love headline writers. According to the EU, the UK's economy is about to slump while the EU on average will see growth pick up.

    The growth rates after slump and pick up? 1.5% and 1.8%.

    Err even the 1.5% for the uk is a 50% increase in what they claimed it would be in November.

  • MTimTMTimT Posts: 7,034
    TOPPING said:

    Farriers are rarely seen in the countryside. Because they are all on holiday in the Caribbean.
    LOL. Ours certainly charges an hourly rate that is higher than I get consulting or my wife gets as a physician.
  • isamisam Posts: 41,348
    edited February 2017
    Something Nuttall mentions that I think is relevant, a lot of 2015 Conservative/UKIP waverers stayed Con as there was a decent chance that Labour would be in power w the SNP if they voted UKIP. That isn't the case now.
  • AlsoIndigoAlsoIndigo Posts: 1,852
    DavidL said:

    Donaghue-v-Stevenson?
    Kadi-v-Commission ? :smirk:
  • On the subject of by-election visits, I'll be going to Copeland this weekend, which will probably mean no Saturday piece from me but I will aim to write something for monday.
  • JobabobJobabob Posts: 3,807
    DavidL said:

    I can see why the facts of that might have appealed but we didn't cover that in Scotland.
    I can only assume it would have been too cold in Scotland for the incident to occur, David.
  • A lot of countries could have got more involved, including all seven members of EFTA - probably six, Switzerland wouldn't have wanted to join such a close alliance.

    However, the UK set EFTA up as a rival to the EEC and then ... left it.

    The reason the economics are failing is trying to have a currency union before a political union. I actually agree with John Redwood on that - it's insane! The US of A got it the right way round.
    No they didn't. They declared independence in 1776 and didn't form a political union until 1789. The problems with federal debt and paper money in the interim were a prime driver to union.
  • justin124justin124 Posts: 11,527
    An appalling poll for Labour - though the fieldwork is a week old and overlapped with ICM which had Labour on 27% last week. Comres is more recent and has Labour on 26% - despite a very odd Scotland subsample. Over the last five months Yougov has pretty consistently been giving the lowest Labour voting share - a bit like Angus Reid before the 2010 election. What I find puzzling is that since mid-September Yougov shows Labour dropping 6 points from 30% to 24%. No other pollster is showing any meanigful change in the Labour share over that period - indeed some have them now a bit higher. ICM had Labour on 26% in mid September - Mori had them on 29% compared with their most recent finding of 31% - in late July Opinium had Labour on 31% little changed from its last finding of 30%. I have no explanation to offer but something about Yougov's surveys in recent months just does not smell right. It sticks out like a sore thumb when compared with the other pollsters. Moreover, as recently as last March/April it was producing the most favourable Labour ratings - including three consecutive Labour leads! Very strange.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 54,859
    stodge said:

    I think the Monnet ideal was always there primarily as a Franco-German axis to replace the rivalry which had torn Europe apart from 1870 to 1945. The logic of western European integration as a bulwark to the advance of Communism was also ever present.

    The British could have shaped the future EU much more strongly had we got more involved at Messina but our stand-offish approach meant Paris and Bonn built the "Common Market" without much involvement from London.
    Monnet's genius wasn't in articulating an ideal but in designing a practical mechanism for setting it in motion. The idea of a peaceful federal Europe had been around for a long time before then, not least in Aristide Briand's plan in the late 20s.
  • AlsoIndigoAlsoIndigo Posts: 1,852
    edited February 2017
    MTimT said:

    I don't used credit cards at all. It's nearly all on the debit card now. Just visited the UK, UAE and Pakistan for a total of 3 weeks. Used no cash (didn't even have local bank notes) or credit.
    My world is almost entirely cash. The ATM on the island I live on isn't even connected to the international network, so I use a passbook. Once every 6-8 weeks I fly to the city to see my bank manager, attorney etc, and use the debit card a bit.
  • MarkSeniorMarkSenior Posts: 4,699
    Pulpstar said:

    The Conservatives with Coral, Sky Bet and some others are now 2-5.

    That is the same price as they were in 'Somerton and Frome' last GE with Ladbrokes. That is the sort of constituency bet that I like to take at 2-5, not this one.
    If the Conservatives win Copeland by the same margin at this BE that Somerton and Frome was taken at the last GE (53 - 19) then Labour might as well pack up. I'll pack up political betting too.

    Is Not that a similar price to the Conservatives ( Zac ) at Richmond ?
  • Is Not that a similar price to the Conservatives ( Zac ) at Richmond ?
    Not 10 days before the poll, I don't think?
  • isamisam Posts: 41,348

    Not 10 days before the poll, I don't think?
    The Lib Dems were about 2.7ish on the day of the poll I think, so pretty plausible Zac was 2/5, esp as the opinion pol had him walking it
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,572
    isam said:

    Something Nuttall mentions that I think is relevant, a lot of 2015 Conservative/UKIP waverers stayed Con as there was a decent chance that Labour would be in power w the SNP if they voted UKIP. That isn't the case now.
    Set against that, the Conservatives are getting on with Leaving the EU.

    UKIP fox, meet bullet....
  • MarkSeniorMarkSenior Posts: 4,699

    Not 10 days before the poll, I don't think?
    10 days before the poll Zac was around 1/3 on .
  • RoyalBlueRoyalBlue Posts: 3,223

    Monnet's genius wasn't in articulating an ideal but in designing a practical mechanism for setting it in motion. The idea of a peaceful federal Europe had been around for a long time before then, not least in Aristide Briand's plan in the late 20s.
    Jean Monnet manoeuvred to exclude the U.K. from certain deliberations in the 50s because he knew we would never sign up to supranationalism.

    It's all set out in Booker and North's brilliant book, 'The Great Deception'.

    The real villains in the UK's relationship with the EU are Macmillan and Heath for not being honest about the long-term implications of membership.
  • Mr. T, if it sells well there, that might outweigh all your other sales everywhere else :p
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,572
    SeanT said:

    Got an unexpected item in the post this morning. The mainland Mandarin Chinese edition of THE ICE TWINS.

    Absolutely beautiful. Delicate and haunting. It is by a distance the best of all the foreign covers of my book, and somehow symbolic, in its tiny way, of China's ascent.

    https://twitter.com/thomasknox/status/831177614740054017

    That really is a thing of beauty. Good luck with sales there.
  • isamisam Posts: 41,348

    Set against that, the Conservatives are getting on with Leaving the EU.

    UKIP fox, meet bullet....
    Possibly, although it seems the Cons aren't really trying too hard in Stoke, and the picked a Remainer.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 79,235

    10 days before the poll Zac was around 1/3 on .
    That was a genuine surprise, I don't think anyone suggested that Olney ought to have been odds on there !
    I think the 1-3, 3-1 pricing was correct there though.

    Somerton and Frome at the GE was more like 1-10, I think this by-election is surely more Lab 5-6, Tories 6-5 though ?

    Note in Richmond the pseudo Conservative candidate underperformed.
  • A beautiful cover.
    I'm interested to note that the girls are beautiful westerners - I suppose that adds to the allure for a Chinese market - and that they have transliterated Lydia and Kirsty as the names rather than Sinofying them - also makes sense. Also interested that you went with a Sichuan publisher rather than Beijing. There is life and art beyond the capital!
    Good luck with it.
  • Miss Vance, could be poor expectations management. A government taking an opposition seat is a damned rare thing.
  • SquareRootSquareRoot Posts: 7,095
    justin124 said:

    An appalling poll for Labour - though the fieldwork is a week old and overlapped with ICM which had Labour on 27% last week. Comres is more recent and has Labour on 26% - despite a very odd Scotland subsample. Over the last five months Yougov has pretty consistently been giving the lowest Labour voting share - a bit like Angus Reid before the 2010 election. What I find puzzling is that since mid-September Yougov shows Labour dropping 6 points from 30% to 24%. No other pollster is showing any meanigful change in the Labour share over that period - indeed some have them now a bit higher. ICM had Labour on 26% in mid September - Mori had them on 29% compared with their most recent finding of 31% - in late July Opinium had Labour on 31% little changed from its last finding of 30%. I have no explanation to offer but something about Yougov's surveys in recent months just does not smell right. It sticks out like a sore thumb when compared with the other pollsters. Moreover, as recently as last March/April it was producing the most favourable Labour ratings - including three consecutive Labour leads! Very strange.

    All of them overstate Labour polling when the time comes for people to actually vote. Labour will be 19/20% if Corbyn is in charge. People just wont vote for Corbyn, end of.
  • Carolus_RexCarolus_Rex Posts: 1,414

    Worth recalling technology can curtail freedom and impose restrictions as much as it can free people.

    We need only look at social media's shenanigans in this regard. Getting drunk on technology leads to The Machine Stops [which I still need to read...].

    You absolutely do need to read it. Possibly the greatest SF story ever written.

    Read it and then reflect on the fact that E M Forster predicted all the downsides of the internet... in 1909!
  • Carolus_RexCarolus_Rex Posts: 1,414

    Mr. T, if it sells well there, that might outweigh all your other sales everywhere else :p

    Mind you, it'll be pirated to buggery.
  • I wouldn't read so much into it. Jezza likes grass roots campaigning and has already appeared alongside both byelection candidates in their twitter.

    Lib Dems in second place to Labour in Stoke would be a nail in the coffin of the purple pestilence, I do hope Conhome is accurate. Is there a second place market up?

    If UKIP cannot win in Stoke they are basically finished as a party with Parliamentary ambitions - unless the Tories totally cave on the Brexit negotiations, which is highly unlikely. What they will do, though, is help the Tories win Labour marginals.

  • Miss Vance, could be poor expectations management. A government taking an opposition seat is a damned rare thing.

    Yes, that struck me too. Hello, Tories, time to meet Mr Hubris. Mr Gravity will be along shortly.....
  • Mr. T, interesting stats. Surprised China is behind America given they have roughly four times as many people.

    I'm not surprised by South Korea, to be honest, a little more so by Brazil.

    Anyway, best of luck (not that you need it).
  • malcolmg said:

    Perchance do you mean "cheque"
    No I mean "obsolete", however you choose your ye olde spelling that you want to use on something that doesn't exist anymore
  • Mr. Rex, that's a big problem, especially in an age of e-books. Hard to do much about it, though.
  • Mr. Patrick, it's a while ago now, but when I was in China there was a piece on the news about the most popular cosmetic surgery being double eyelids (which Westerners have).
  • isamisam Posts: 41,348
    dr_spyn said:
    Snell in 2014 "We will have to look at why Labour voters are turning to Ukip."
    Snell post referendum "patriotism is a competition won by seeing who is the most inward looking”
This discussion has been closed.