S Times: Raab told to return on the Friday – but got back early Monday – politicalbetting.com

Northern_Al said:

Big_G_NorthWales said:

I see Tony Blair has captured all the front pages with his full on attack on Biden

While imbecile is not the language I would want to use, in every other respect he is right

Time for Boris to co-opt him as Foreign Secretary

Who, Biden???

londonpubman said:

Big_G_NorthWales said:

rottenborough said:

Blimey kids, it's a bit tetchy on here tonight.

I retired last night just before the moderator issued a warning

I hope it is not necessary two nights in a row

I thought you retired a few years ago? 😊

Casino_Royale said:

Pagan2 said:

Casino_Royale said:

@Leon is right.

There's absolutely nothing that is guaranteed about the future - nothing - and nowhere is it written that our values of individual liberty, freedom, the rule of law and democracy will ultimately win out and stay 'won out'. Nor that society will continue to advance, and the quality of life always improve.

It's quite hard work just keeping the level we have, whilst it's easy - painfully easy - to regress and go backwards, and to do so very fast.

It's up to us, and to each new generation that succeeds us, to make sure it doesn't.

You are making the assumption that most people value those things, recent polls on covid measures seems to indicate at least for the uk people enjoy authoritarianism not liberty and freedom. I believe in both however I would say I have lost faith in representative democracy and would not lift a finger to save it.

That's very sad to hear; I do hope you come to revise your view.

One of my biggest fears is that people are starting to move away from democracy to authoritarianism, either because they prioritise new dogmas above it - and view democracy as an obstacle - or they don't believe it delivers the goods and think a strong leader will.

But, let me ask you this: given that not everyone agrees with each other (but also assume their favoured policies will win out) and there can only be one authoritarian leader at a time, what happens to the rest who oppose them? And, even for those who originally supported them, but subsequently change their minds, how do you think transitions of power would work in an authoritarian system?

NickPalmer said:

Pagan2 said:

Casino_Royale said:

@Leon is right.

There's absolutely nothing that is guaranteed about the future - nothing - and nowhere is it written that our values of individual liberty, freedom, the rule of law and democracy will ultimately win out and stay 'won out'. Nor that society will continue to advance, and the quality of life always improve.

It's quite hard work just keeping the level we have, whilst it's easy - painfully easy - to regress and go backwards, and to do so very fast.

It's up to us, and to each new generation that succeeds us, to make sure it doesn't.

You are making the assumption that most people value those things, recent polls on covid measures seems to indicate at least for the uk people enjoy authoritarianism not liberty and freedom. I believe in both however I would say I have lost faith in representative democracy and would not lift a finger to save it.

What form of government do you favour? I understand you want lots of liberty. Anarchism, in the classic sense of no central government? Or if you do want a central government, how would you like it to be chosen?

Not arguing, just curious. The world seems effectively divided between people who like democracy (though not necessarily the choices) and people who like strong oligarchs (so long as they're THEIR oligarchs). Neither seems very helpful to unlimited personal freedom.

YBarddCwsc said:

IshmaelZ said:

isam said:

…

StuartDickson said:

justin124 said:

rcs1000 said:

justin124 said:

On a UNS basis the Tories would lose 46 seats to Labour , 4 to the LDs and probably a few to SNP.They would be at 310 - 312 seats.

Is that before or after boundary changes?

On the basis of existing boundaries. New boundaries have yet to be determined.

New bou

isam said:

...

Leon said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I honestly don't get it. We are facing an absolute historic nightmare

:...

Fuck, they might be right. Jeez, maybe Raab should resign? But this is so monumentally trivial and diversionary, compared to what we actually face. An epochal moment in the decline of the West.

That's the point.

We face an existential crisis, and the people we have in charge are a fucking clown and his punchbag.

Raab should resign, at a minimum. You should be demanding it.

Then BoZo should fuck off, and maybe, just maybe, we can find a grown up who can meet the scale of the challenge.

You have become a wholly tragic figure, within the tiny, trivial, necessary tragicomedy of PB. Perhaps reflect on that

Indeed so

I disagree. Scott used to be just another annoying Tory twat. Now he’s a bloody giant of the PB microstate. Brexit maketh the man.

Almost all he ever tells us, via his tweets, is that the Guardian, arch Remainers, and Centrist Labour don’t like the current govt, but presents it as some kind of surprising take.

The relevant fact this evening is that the Times, as per the header, has highlighted and criticised the conduct of the current government, with what looks like a great deal of justification. You can't just sit there playing the "You would say that, you're a remainer" blocking shot over and over and over and over again. Either we have a Foreign Secretary who responds promptly to crises in foreign affairs, or we concede that we are utterly impotent and irrelevant and don't bother with a Foreign Secretary at all, surely? What is this twat being paid for?

We are utterly impotent & irrelevant, at least as regards Afghanistan.

That is the truth.

And I am certainly against the children of the poor being sent to Afghanistan to fight for a poor salary and for reasons which they do not understand ... to salve the stinking conscience of the pampered rich.

We should not be in Afghanistan. Nor should the Americans.

IshmaelZ said:

another_richard said:

IshmaelZ said:

another_richard said:

DavidL said:

IshmaelZ said:

Leon said:

Scott_xP said:

Raab 'defied orders to cut short Crete holiday' as Taliban seized Afghanistan https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/15930633/raab-defied-orders-crete-holiday/?utm_term=Autofeed&utm_campaign=sunpoliticstwitter&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1629574316

WHO GIVES A FUCK

Is this a kind of dissonance-avoiding technique?

I honestly don't get it. We are facing an absolute historic nightmare:

"Khalil Haqqani, who has a $5 million US bounty on him, put in charge of security in new Afghani government as Biden claims terror group “gone” from Afghanistan"

https://twitter.com/AdamMilstein/status/1429095204880007172?s=20

And yet *some* PB-ers focus on the phone calls between Boris Johnson and Dominic Raab.

Fuck, they might be right. Jeez, maybe Raab should resign? But this is so monumentally trivial and diversionary, compared to what we actually face. An epochal moment in the decline of the West.

And I can't help noticing it is the pathetic Remoaners like Scott who bang on and on about this. Like it is some personal revenge that must be satisfied by swords, during the early trench warfare of World War 1. It is instructionally dumb

FWIW if Leave had narrowly lost I have no doubt there would be passionate lifelong eurosceptics who would have then spent the next ten years targetting "Jolyon Maugham" even as the world collapsed. just because. Doesn't make it any less sad

You are dead wrong about this, because the more of a fuck I give about Afghanistan, the more of a fuck I give about how little of a fuck the sleazy lazy self regarding fuckers who represent my country give about it .

Then look at the substance, not the trivia. You won't be short of material and it just might have made a difference.

The substance is so inconvenient ** that there's only trivia left.

** The USA wanted out, the Afghans wouldn't fight and the country was full of westerners who wouldn't leave when told to.

Fuck me, was the first _richard as boring and stupid as you are? Thank you for that dim, reductive and wholly inaccurate precis, but why do you despise your own country so much that you regard its handling of the situation as trivial?

You do seem to prefer abusing other PBers than offer constructive suggestions though I'm quite honoured to be treated in the same manner as cyclefree.

Now perhaps you could explain what you found 'wholly inaccurate' in my comment ? That the USA wanted out ? That the Afghans wouldn't fight ? That the country was full of westerners who wouldn't leave when told to ?

As to how this country has handled the situation maybe you can tell us what the UK should be doing ?

You were told by cyclefree that as a male PBer your attitude to women in trouble was "fuck 'em." Either that is true of you, or it is not but you are so extraordinarily dickless that you don't feel able to contradict her. Because she is obviously a clever lady who writes lovely long headers. Lovely long, long, long, long headers. Doesn't really seem worth the effort of debating with you, either way. But are you incapable of understanding that the Americans were at fault for not appreciating that the Afghans wouldn't fight, or that wanting something is different from having a moral justification for doing it? Does it not matter to you that women are raped and gays are murdered?

Big_G_NorthWales said:

NickPalmer said:

YBarddCwsc said:

Roger said:

DougSeal said:

I’m not saying this Raab chap is an

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

Anyway we have to deal with Now.

Yes, and what can 'we' do while Fuckwit von Clownstick is the man in charge?

What 'we' could practically do to improve our lot is get rid of the Clown collective.

It's a tragedy that some of those who voted for them can't let go...

You have expressed explicitly your contempt for the current Government, one I share TBF, but your problem is you have no idea what you want to replace it. Which is why your posts are so wearisome. How do ‘we’ remove the current Government? I would suggest that a suitable alternative beating it in an election might be a good way. So big up your suitable alternative.

Has anyone ever told you that you are probably the most pompous arse ever to have posted on PB? To describe someone's posts as 'wearisome' could be witty but not in your hands.

I find @DougSeal an interesting poster -- but whatever -- the point is he has only posted a couple of times on this thread.

@Scott_xP had produced a stream of wailing posts that say the same thing again and again and again and again.

Without wit, without insight, without intelligence.

It is spam.

Relentless, tedious, excessive, boring posting of the same thing again and again is spam.

Wearisome is exactly the right word.

I don't agree. I find both Scott and HYUFD useful, precisely because they pick up interesting stuff off Twitter, saving me the trouble. We're old enough to make up our own minds what we think of it (or to skip if we've seen enough).

There is a difference in the use of language and to be fair, and I do not often agree with @HYUFD, but he does not use bad language to make his points

kinabalu said:

YBarddCwsc said:

IshmaelZ said:

isam said:

…

StuartDickson said:

justin124 said:

rcs1000 said:

justin124 said:

On a UNS basis the Tories would lose 46 seats to Labour , 4 to the LDs and probably a few to SNP.They would be at 310 - 312 seats.

Is that before or after boundary changes?

On the basis of existing boundaries. New boundaries have yet to be determined.

New bou

isam said:

...

Leon said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I honestly don't get it. We are facing an absolute historic nightmare

:...

Fuck, they might be right. Jeez, maybe Raab should resign? But this is so monumentally trivial and diversionary, compared to what we actually face. An epochal moment in the decline of the West.

That's the point.

We face an existential crisis, and the people we have in charge are a fucking clown and his punchbag.

Raab should resign, at a minimum. You should be demanding it.

Then BoZo should fuck off, and maybe, just maybe, we can find a grown up who can meet the scale of the challenge.

You have become a wholly tragic figure, within the tiny, trivial, necessary tragicomedy of PB. Perhaps reflect on that

Indeed so

I disagree. Scott used to be just another annoying Tory twat. Now he’s a bloody giant of the PB microstate. Brexit maketh the man.

Almost all he ever tells us, via his tweets, is that the Guardian, arch Remainers, and Centrist Labour don’t like the current govt, but presents it as some kind of surprising take.

The relevant fact this evening is that the Times, as per the header, has highlighted and criticised the conduct of the current government, with what looks like a great deal of justification. You can't just sit there playing the "You would say that, you're a remainer" blocking shot over and over and over and over again. Either we have a Foreign Secretary who responds promptly to crises in foreign affairs, or we concede that we are utterly impotent and irrelevant and don't bother with a Foreign Secretary at all, surely? What is this twat being paid for?

We are utterly impotent & irrelevant, at least as regards Afghanistan.

That is the truth.

And I am certainly against the children of the poor being sent to Afghanistan to fight for a poor salary and for reasons which they do not understand ... to salve the stinking conscience of the pampered rich.

We should not be in Afghanistan. Nor should the Americans.

I agree we shouldn't be. But Raab and Johnson still deserve stick for being lax and lazy. They really are a shower.

another_richard said:

A few thoughts:

1) The 'political sin' is appearing lax and lazy when they don't need to.

2) So much of politics now is via the internet, text messages etc that they don't realise they are being, or appearing to be, lax and lazy.

3) As much as Conservative politicians all profess to admire Thatcher few of them emulate her workrate.

NickPalmer said:

another_richard said:

A few thoughts:

1) The 'political sin' is appearing lax and lazy when they don't need to.

2) So much of politics now is via the internet, text messages etc that they don't realise they are being, or appearing to be, lax and lazy.

3) As much as Conservative politicians all profess to admire Thatcher few of them emulate her workrate.

An odd thing about politics is that you can get away with being lazy 95% of the time. I knew a chap who delegated ALL his correspondence and ALL his press statements to assistants, and nursed a career outside politics, occasionally giving a mildly controversial TV interview to keep up appearances. He was generally respected and had a moderately senior position. Those of us who saw politics as a totally full-time thing eyed him with bemusement - perfectly nice guy, we thought, but really WTF, why is he doing the job at all? The whips didn't care as he voted the way they wanted, and the voters didn't care as he had their preferred colour. Eventually he decided he didn't care either, and stepped down.

But if there's something big going on in your area, you do need to be on the ball. Even he knew that. Some of today's crop think they can get away with nonchalance all the time, and that doesn't work.

Big_G_NorthWales said:

To each and everyone of you have a good night

and remember for all the discourse not one of us is in Kabul witnessing

'man's inhumanity to man'

Good night

And by the way my eldest son in Canada broke down on the phone tonight as he described in graphic detail his trauma at ground zero in Christchurch NZ in 2011

It is hard to listen to his PTSD and be so far away

rcs1000 said:

Pagan2 said:

Casino_Royale said:

@Leon is right.

There's absolutely nothing that is guaranteed about the future - nothing - and nowhere is it written that our values of individual liberty, freedom, the rule of law and democracy will ultimately win out and stay 'won out'. Nor that society will continue to advance, and the quality of life always improve.

It's quite hard work just keeping the level we have, whilst it's easy - painfully easy - to regress and go backwards, and to do so very fast.

It's up to us, and to each new generation that succeeds us, to make sure it doesn't.

You are making the assumption that most people value those things, recent polls on covid measures seems to indicate at least for the uk people enjoy authoritarianism not liberty and freedom. I believe in both however I would say I have lost faith in representative democracy and would not lift a finger to save it.

Ummmm:

Does this mean that when the similar measures were enacted to deal with the Spanish flu that the British / Americans [Delete as Appropriate] had lost their taste for freedom?

Or does it mean that during wars and pandemics, there can be support for extraordinary measures?

StuartDickson said:

Ex MP moves on from sex worker scandal after 'accepting sexuality and marrying lover'
- 15 years after being outed by a newspaper for a liaison with a male sex worker, Mark [Oaten, former Liberal Democrat MP], 57, says he is living his 'second life' – after marrying the man he met six years ago

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/ex-mp-mark-oaten-moves-24809097

YBarddCwsc said:

IshmaelZ said:

YBarddCwsc said:

IshmaelZ said:

isam said:

…

StuartDickson said:

justin124 said:

rcs1000 said:

justin124 said:

On a UNS basis the Tories would lose 46 seats to Labour , 4 to the LDs and probably a few to SNP.They would be at 310 - 312 seats.

Is that before or after boundary changes?

On the basis of existing boundaries. New boundaries have yet to be determined.

New bou

isam said:

...

Leon said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I honestly don't get it. We are facing an absolute historic nightmare

:...

Fuck, they might be right. Jeez, maybe Raab should resign? But this is so monumentally trivial and diversionary, compared to what we actually face. An epochal moment in the decline of the West.

That's the point.

We face an existential crisis, and the people we have in charge are a fucking clown and his punchbag.

Raab should resign, at a minimum. You should be demanding it.

Then BoZo should fuck off, and maybe, just maybe, we can find a grown up who can meet the scale of the challenge.

You have become a wholly tragic figure, within the tiny, trivial, necessary tragicomedy of PB. Perhaps reflect on that

Indeed so

I disagree. Scott used to be just another annoying Tory twat. Now he’s a bloody giant of the PB microstate. Brexit maketh the man.

Almost all he ever tells us, via his tweets, is that the Guardian, arch Remainers, and Centrist Labour don’t like the current govt, but presents it as some kind of surprising take.

The relevant fact this evening is that the Times, as per the header, has highlighted and criticised the conduct of the current government, with what looks like a great deal of justification. You can't just sit there playing the "You would say that, you're a remainer" blocking shot over and over and over and over again. Either we have a Foreign Secretary who responds promptly to crises in foreign affairs, or we concede that we are utterly impotent and irrelevant and don't bother with a Foreign Secretary at all, surely? What is this twat being paid for?

We are utterly impotent & irrelevant, at least as regards Afghanistan.

That is the truth.

And I am certainly against the children of the poor being sent to Afghanistan to fight for a poor salary and for reasons which they do not understand ... to salve the stinking conscience of the pampered rich.

We should not be in Afghanistan. Nor should the Americans.

Read an interview this morning with an Afghan man who a month ago was a university student with a boyfriend. Now in fear of summary execution. I think it was worth investing time and money in trying to arrange for him to be in the former situation rather than the latter. Is that a pampered rich sort of thing to think? Do you think our soldiers incapable of forming a view on that point? Do you realise that nobody is currently conscripted into the army?

Conscription would be far better in my view.

A conscripted army would contain the sons and daughters of the middle classes. They would never, never be sent to die in the sand.

If Blair's sons had been in the army, then we would have been spared the warmonger's disastrous interventions in the Middle East.

The problem with your simple diagnosis is that it is not just "time and money" that is involved to rescue the Afghan student.

If "time and money" were enough -- fine, spend the time and the money.

But, don't send others to die while you holiday on St Kilda and read an upsetting article.

rcs1000 said:

YBarddCwsc said:

IshmaelZ said:

YBarddCwsc said:

IshmaelZ said:

isam said:

…

StuartDickson said:

justin124 said:

rcs1000 said:

justin124 said:

On a UNS basis the Tories would lose 46 seats to Labour , 4 to the LDs and probably a few to SNP.They would be at 310 - 312 seats.

Is that before or after boundary changes?

On the basis of existing boundaries. New boundaries have yet to be determined.

New bou

isam said:

...

Leon said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I honestly don't get it. We are facing an absolute historic nightmare

:...

Fuck, they might be right. Jeez, maybe Raab should resign? But this is so monumentally trivial and diversionary, compared to what we actually face. An epochal moment in the decline of the West.

That's the point.

We face an existential crisis, and the people we have in charge are a fucking clown and his punchbag.

Raab should resign, at a minimum. You should be demanding it.

Then BoZo should fuck off, and maybe, just maybe, we can find a grown up who can meet the scale of the challenge.

You have become a wholly tragic figure, within the tiny, trivial, necessary tragicomedy of PB. Perhaps reflect on that

Indeed so

I disagree. Scott used to be just another annoying Tory twat. Now he’s a bloody giant of the PB microstate. Brexit maketh the man.

Almost all he ever tells us, via his tweets, is that the Guardian, arch Remainers, and Centrist Labour don’t like the current govt, but presents it as some kind of surprising take.

The relevant fact this evening is that the Times, as per the header, has highlighted and criticised the conduct of the current government, with what looks like a great deal of justification. You can't just sit there playing the "You would say that, you're a remainer" blocking shot over and over and over and over again. Either we have a Foreign Secretary who responds promptly to crises in foreign affairs, or we concede that we are utterly impotent and irrelevant and don't bother with a Foreign Secretary at all, surely? What is this twat being paid for?

We are utterly impotent & irrelevant, at least as regards Afghanistan.

That is the truth.

And I am certainly against the children of the poor being sent to Afghanistan to fight for a poor salary and for reasons which they do not understand ... to salve the stinking conscience of the pampered rich.

We should not be in Afghanistan. Nor should the Americans.

Read an interview this morning with an Afghan man who a month ago was a university student with a boyfriend. Now in fear of summary execution. I think it was worth investing time and money in trying to arrange for him to be in the former situation rather than the latter. Is that a pampered rich sort of thing to think? Do you think our soldiers incapable of forming a view on that point? Do you realise that nobody is currently conscripted into the army?

Conscription would be far better in my view.

A conscripted army would contain the sons and daughters of the middle classes. They would never, never be sent to die in the sand.

If Blair's sons had been in the army, then we would have been spared the warmonger's disastrous interventions in the Middle East.

The problem with your simple diagnosis is that it is not just "time and money" that is involved to rescue the Afghan student.

If "time and money" were enough -- fine, spend the time and the money.

But, don't send others to die while you holiday on St Kilda and read an upsetting article.

Hmmm: the US had the draft, and yet there didn't seem to be any shortage of ways for the well off and well connected to avoid dying in a ditch.

Pagan2 said:

rcs1000 said:

YBarddCwsc said:

IshmaelZ said:

YBarddCwsc said:

IshmaelZ said:

isam said:

…

StuartDickson said:

justin124 said:

rcs1000 said:

justin124 said:

On a UNS basis the Tories would lose 46 seats to Labour , 4 to the LDs and probably a few to SNP.They would be at 310 - 312 seats.

Is that before or after boundary changes?

On the basis of existing boundaries. New boundaries have yet to be determined.

New bou

isam said:

...

Leon said:

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

I honestly don't get it. We are facing an absolute historic nightmare

:...

Fuck, they might be right. Jeez, maybe Raab should resign? But this is so monumentally trivial and diversionary, compared to what we actually face. An epochal moment in the decline of the West.

That's the point.

We face an existential crisis, and the people we have in charge are a fucking clown and his punchbag.

Raab should resign, at a minimum. You should be demanding it.

Then BoZo should fuck off, and maybe, just maybe, we can find a grown up who can meet the scale of the challenge.

You have become a wholly tragic figure, within the tiny, trivial, necessary tragicomedy of PB. Perhaps reflect on that

Indeed so

I disagree. Scott used to be just another annoying Tory twat. Now he’s a bloody giant of the PB microstate. Brexit maketh the man.

Almost all he ever tells us, via his tweets, is that the Guardian, arch Remainers, and Centrist Labour don’t like the current govt, but presents it as some kind of surprising take.

The relevant fact this evening is that the Times, as per the header, has highlighted and criticised the conduct of the current government, with what looks like a great deal of justification. You can't just sit there playing the "You would say that, you're a remainer" blocking shot over and over and over and over again. Either we have a Foreign Secretary who responds promptly to crises in foreign affairs, or we concede that we are utterly impotent and irrelevant and don't bother with a Foreign Secretary at all, surely? What is this twat being paid for?

We are utterly impotent & irrelevant, at least as regards Afghanistan.

That is the truth.

And I am certainly against the children of the poor being sent to Afghanistan to fight for a poor salary and for reasons which they do not understand ... to salve the stinking conscience of the pampered rich.

We should not be in Afghanistan. Nor should the Americans.

Read an interview this morning with an Afghan man who a month ago was a university student with a boyfriend. Now in fear of summary execution. I think it was worth investing time and money in trying to arrange for him to be in the former situation rather than the latter. Is that a pampered rich sort of thing to think? Do you think our soldiers incapable of forming a view on that point? Do you realise that nobody is currently conscripted into the army?

Conscription would be far better in my view.

A conscripted army would contain the sons and daughters of the middle classes. They would never, never be sent to die in the sand.

If Blair's sons had been in the army, then we would have been spared the warmonger's disastrous interventions in the Middle East.

The problem with your simple diagnosis is that it is not just "time and money" that is involved to rescue the Afghan student.

If "time and money" were enough -- fine, spend the time and the money.

But, don't send others to die while you holiday on St Kilda and read an upsetting article.

Hmmm: the US had the draft, and yet there didn't seem to be any shortage of ways for the well off and well connected to avoid dying in a ditch.

In the uk during the second world war was it the same? I genuinely have no idea so just wondered

Leon said:

NickPalmer said:

YBarddCwsc said:

Roger said:

DougSeal said:

I’m not saying this Raab chap is an

Scott_xP said:

Leon said:

Anyway we have to deal with Now.

Yes, and what can 'we' do while Fuckwit von Clownstick is the man in charge?

What 'we' could practically do to improve our lot is get rid of the Clown collective.

It's a tragedy that some of those who voted for them can't let go...

You have expressed explicitly your contempt for the current Government, one I share TBF, but your problem is you have no idea what you want to replace it. Which is why your posts are so wearisome. How do ‘we’ remove the current Government? I would suggest that a suitable alternative beating it in an election might be a good way. So big up your suitable alternative.

Has anyone ever told you that you are probably the most pompous arse ever to have posted on PB? To describe someone's posts as 'wearisome' could be witty but not in your hands.

I find @DougSeal an interesting poster -- but whatever -- the point is he has only posted a couple of times on this thread.

@Scott_xP had produced a stream of wailing posts that say the same thing again and again and again and again.

Without wit, without insight, without intelligence.

It is spam.

Relentless, tedious, excessive, boring posting of the same thing again and again is spam.

Wearisome is exactly the right word.

I don't agree. I find both Scott and HYUFD useful, precisely because they pick up interesting stuff off Twitter, saving me the trouble. We're old enough to make up our own minds what we think of it (or to skip if we've seen enough).

I find Scott and HYUFD "useful", indeed, I find them beyond useful. I find their opinions valuable, cherishable, precious, and more


Because they give me an insight into a Remainer centrist ex Tory brain, and a true Tory unionist brain.

Likewise NPXMP shows me what an old eurocommie Labour loyalist ex-MP thinks, Roger tells me what a rich old europhile lefty in France thinks, Stuart Dickson tells me what a fierce expat blood n soil Scot Nat in Sweden thinks (plus he gives persuasive insights into Swedish life), TSE tells me what a sort-of ex Tory failed Muslim geeky Liverpool football fan thinks, kle tells me what a man who rarely tells us what he really thinks thinks, Pagan2 tells us what an aspiring working class native Cornish speaking linguistic-ceolacanth thinks, kinabalu tells us about his birthday, Robert Smithson tells us what a car park entrepreneur Tory Brexiteer based in Santa Monica thinks, Carnyx tells us what an urbane Scot Nat classicist with a yearning for an Athenian villa thinks, Cyclefree tells us what a newly Cumbrian lawyer with firm views of Islam, restaurants, feminism and Europe thinks, Dura Ace tells us what a greenie anti vaxxing suicidal ex-army affluent motorhead with a remarkable vocabulary thinks...

On and on. I could mention 50 more. So. Preserve. Don't ban anyone. This site is an amazing resource of human wisdom, bigotry, insight, foolishness, knowledge, wittiness, comedy, charm, madness, friendliness and entertaining inanity. Also good for bets.

Hats off to the Smithsons pere et fils. This site should have a Grade 1listing on the internet. I am entirely serious. Malcolm G would be the unsightly medieval "garderobe" toilet that must also be kept, for authenticity

Andy_JS said:

About to read through tonight's thread. I hope it's interesting...

carnforth said:

rcs1000 said:

For road haulage? Well, my guess is that an HGV average 40 mph and manages 10mpg. So, it'll get through 4 gallons of petrol in an hour on average. Which is £20/hour for fuel. So, I'd reckon it's probably:

£40 - labour
£20 - fuel
£10 - depreciation

But those are wild guesses.
(Labour includes all non-wage costs, like NI etc.)

I couldn't find UK, but for the US, per page 21 of this:

https://truckingresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/ATRI-Operational-Costs-of-Trucking-2019-1.pdf

Driver wage + benefits 43%, fuel 24%, truck loan payments 15%, maintenance 9%, insurance 5%.

Of course, their fuel is cheaper.

Pagan2 said:

Gallowgate said:

carnforth said:

Gallowgate said:

another_richard said:

Scott_xP said:

Food manufacturers and restaurants are scrambling to recruit prisoners to help ease the “desperate” shortage of workers caused by Covid-19 and Brexit.

A lack of HGV drivers, fruit pickers and factory workers has left some supermarkets struggling to keep shelves filled, with everything from fruit and vegetables to bottled water, wine and baked goods severely depleted in parts of the country.

The British Retail Consortium and the freight trade group Logistics UK have written to Kwasi Kwarteng, the business secretary, to warn that a shortfall of about 90,000 HGV drivers is “placing increasingly unsustainable pressure on retailers and their supply chains”. The situation is likely to get worse with children returning to school and workers returning to offices in September, they wrote on Friday.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/shops-farms-and-restaurants-turn-to-prisons-to-fill-staff-shortages-j2qgd38td

Delivery drivers
Fruit pickers
Factory workers
Construction workers
Restaurant workers
Hotel workers

Its revelatory to learn how much some people hate the thought of the working classes getting a pay rise.

As I explained in the other thread, the 'working classes' getting a pay rise is all well and good but not if said 'pay rise' is cancelled out by increased costs of everyday items.

Of course it's the comfortably well off who would be unaffected by such price rises.

You really think an HGV driver getting 20% pay increase will see it cancelled out by rising prices? I’d be surprised if it put the cost of supermarket goods up by 1%.

Not necessarily, no. But a minimum wage working class worker in another industry is certainly not going to be happy with increased costs, nor are they a 'middle class whiner'.

Sighs if there is a shortage of workers it will be a shortage over all minimum wage positions in all industries, these are jobs it is reasonably easy to move to, so for example if hospitality staff start earning more than minimum wage and people start moving to do it from other minimum wage jobs that causes a shortage in other industries

Pagan2 said:

Northern_Al said:

Just catching up having been away. A couple of comments if I may:

1. Lovely to see so many Tories campaigning so vigorously for significant rises in working people's wages to counter the alleged labour shortage. Something at last that the lefties on here can agree with the Tories about. Strange old world, isn't it?
2. I'd have thought the more radical Tory solution would be to lock more people up. I read on here that prisoners are much sought after. If you imprison a lot more people, then release them early, wouldn't that be a more cost effective solution to labour shortages?

I don't see any tories apart from DavidL saying pay rises for minimum wage folk is a good thing. I am not a tory neither I believe is another richard

rcs1000 said:

StuartDickson said:

Ex MP moves on from sex worker scandal after 'accepting sexuality and marrying lover'
- 15 years after being outed by a newspaper for a liaison with a male sex worker, Mark [Oaten, former Liberal Democrat MP], 57, says he is living his 'second life' – after marrying the man he met six years ago

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/ex-mp-mark-oaten-moves-24809097

Oh come on, it wasn't the "male sex worker" that was the interesting part of that story...