It's good to see everyone of influence now is on the same page on the important stuff, even as they can (and should) still disagree on so many other policy matters.
David Lammy: "For too long, parts of the left, even some members of my own party, falsely divided the world into two camps. America and the West on one side, and their victims on the other. This has never been right, but this view has now been exposed for all to see as a farce."
I think they've all retreated. Some say they had gone from Hostomel airport on Monday.
The Russians get to do a bit of a stock-take now. Word is that Putin won't see the comparison between troops and equipment sent across the border and the numbers that came back.
Maybe they'll stick the numbers in an appendix and put a bar chart together instead.
Maybe they did all go, but I am not so sure. If they had, the Ukrainians would be posting about all those villages and towns between Ivankiv and Irpin that have been liberated - just as they have posted pictures of liberated Ivankiv. They have not, which leads me to think that there is a considerable Russian pocket now encircled.
Edit: or perhaps it's the photoshop. Wine bottles, aircraft carriers...
That shows only two carriers. It is the French carrier in the middle that looks too small compared with the aircraft on the British carrier. Hence, photoshop?
The CdG is only 20m shorter than a QE class in reality.
It is reminiscent of that famous and undoctored photo of Lusty looking a bit sheepish next to the Johnny Reb.
Anecdotage, but the released candidates list for Aberdeenshire council is interesting. There are fewer Tory and SNP candidates than previously - and some other northern councils have not only seen people elected uncontested but some wards have fewer candidates than there are seats.
There does appear to be a real problem, a democratic deficit where councils get stymied by national government and fewer people want to get the grief that comes from cuts to services that you can't avoid.
I’m surprised that the Tories are standing fewer candidates, especially because there are wards where they could have gained two councillors last time, but lost out because they only nominated one.
RU moaning that the Ukr has had the effrontery to attack something inside Russian border seems a bit "they don't like it up 'em, sir" from Dad's Army.
Its odd that a town so near to the Ukrainain border at a time of war had no air defence
Mayor of Mikolaiv. "Today is April Fool's Day. So two pieces of news, one of which is true. Putin had a stroke, and Russia has good air defenses at the border, so no need to worry."
Second joke: You can take the Russians out of Chernobyl, but you can't take the Chernobyl out of Russians.
As someone upthread said, there are going to be an awful lot of dark humour jokes coming out now.
It's good to see everyone of influence now is on the same page on the important stuff, even as they can (and should) still disagree on so many other policy matters.
David Lammy: "For too long, parts of the left, even some members of my own party, falsely divided the world into two camps. America and the West on one side, and their victims on the other. This has never been right, but this view has now been exposed for all to see as a farce."
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
We've lost some overambitious suppliers (= for those their capital investment has reduced your prices at their cost), and the strong regulation has ensured that stronger players have picked up the customers at no loss to the customers.
We still have a large number of players in the market, and post the current couple of years of crisis it will work well again.
Nationalising anything is usually a pretty good way to stop it functioning effectively.
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
You should have a bit more humility having supported Corbyn last time. Seriously, imagine Ukraine with a Corbyn PM.
He was the guy who championed the uswitch model of energy supply when he should have been asking how these companies were structured and how robust they would be under various energy price scenarios.
Why?
It wasn't his job to do that. Where was offgas or offlec, that's their job.
Actually it is the fundamental description of what his main job was, he had / has a commercial interest in exactly people constantly switching (he setup up MoneySavingExpert which merged with moneysupermarket) and become very wealthy of the back of it.
I disagree. His job was to organise the cheapest and best deal for his clients. It wasn't to act as a regulator. That should be a quango or government job. Deflecting blame perhaps?
Rubbish. Listen to him for five minutes. He is a self-appointed consumer champion and invited onto consumer programmes on precisely that basis. As @FrancisUrquhart notes, he made squillions (brazilians, even) on the back of those switching websites. There was never a caveat emptor or if it was you could ask if it was akin to the PPI phenomenon.
When he started I don't think there was an issue as such, although I always a bit uncomfortable with stuff like his standard "trick" of keep switching your credit card.
When he took a large stake and active role in moneysupermarket, that is the absolute definition of conflict of interest i.e. owns a large stake in a business who whole revenue model is to take commission from providers to get consumers to switch.
Why were you uncomfortable about keeping switching your credit card? Through this model, I haven't paid any interest on credit for years...
However, I do have sympathy with your views on switching energy supplier – it's landed me knee deep in admin these last two years with very little financial benefit. That said, it's a symptom of a moronic system – a casino based on energy price speculation is simple madness.
Renationalise it FFS. It's all the same juice.
I am uncomfortable because if you have run up a big balance on your credit card you can't repay that is a debt hanging over your head. Now switching say once to try and get your finances in order and repay that debt is one thing, but Lewis advice could easily be seen as no problem keep jumping every 6 months and you will never have to worry.....that was pretty much his catchphrase for ages, every appearance, switching your credit card for a 0%, keep doing it.
The worry is of course those 0% offers end / your financial situation changes for the worse and in the meantime people haven't taken action to repay the debt (or worse spent more money they don't have) or they forget to switch once and get hit.
I notice a number on the left have are very concerned over these providers like Klarna. Don't worry, you don't need to pay any interest, just pay up 3 times in the future. There is a similar concern that people just bounce it all down the road, spending on other things in the meantime and then the road runs out.
Sure but you are conflating two different things:
1. People taking on debt they can’t afford 2. People paying interest on loans unnecessarily
Switching is a remedy for 2 - nothing to do with 1.
The point is by advocating a message that basically you can get paying 0% interest on an existing debt, many will take that opportunity to rack up more debt. I never felt Lewis was advocating strongly enough that for many having credit card debt for an extended period isn't ideal, instead easily taken as selling a message of you can bash the banks at their own game and have their money for nothing. The worry is that many whose incomes are less stable or there is change in financial markets, the sea is going to go out and they will be left naked. The fact that interest rates have remained historically way below norms means that hasn't happened yet, but if they had gone up to 3-5%, all those 0% offers would be less likely to be about.
You are still conflating 1 with 2. I make no comment on Lewis, merely that switching your credit card is eminently sensible whoever advocates it.
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
We've lost some overambitious suppliers (= for those their capital investment has reduced your prices at their cost), and the strong regulation has ensured that stronger players have picked up the customers at no loss to the customers.
We still have a large number of players in the market, and post the current couple of years of crisis it will work well again.
Nationalising anything is usually a pretty good way to stop it functioning effectively.
Nope. It hasn’t worked well. It’s resulted in needless admin and confusion for me for no benefit. It’s the same juice ffs — a casino on energy price speculation is crackers.
He was the guy who championed the uswitch model of energy supply when he should have been asking how these companies were structured and how robust they would be under various energy price scenarios.
Why?
It wasn't his job to do that. Where was offgas or offlec, that's their job.
Actually it is the fundamental description of what his main job was, he had / has a commercial interest in exactly people constantly switching (he setup up MoneySavingExpert which merged with moneysupermarket) and become very wealthy of the back of it.
I disagree. His job was to organise the cheapest and best deal for his clients. It wasn't to act as a regulator. That should be a quango or government job. Deflecting blame perhaps?
No. I said on here before that the regulator have absolutely failed. A totally lubricious situation has arisen, where far too many of these companies are just a joke, literally one of them was owned by a 20 something with zero experience in the industry and no finance behind him. Just a laptop and his mums back bedroom and a willingness to think he can predict the world energy markets better than professional energy traders.
But, Martin Lewis, for all his I am saying everybody money shtick, has become very wealthy by having a large stake in a website that advocated constant switching of not just energy, but credit cards, etc etc etc, and the business model of these sites is such that what drives the traffic is guiding towards those paying best commission.
We were always told even by government to switch regularly. Why is it wrong for him to have made money from his website, are you socialist or something?
These websites are incentivised by the commission structures they receive. It has been shown in the past that they have on regular occasions pushed consumers towards deals which best reward the website not the consumer.
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
No it hasn't. It's all fucked. It's all so (intentionally) complex that you can't tell whether you're getting a good deal or getting done up the shitpipe. See also mobile phone tariffs.
They should nationalise it all, let the government set the price and take the electoral consequences for it.
Anecdotage, but the released candidates list for Aberdeenshire council is interesting. There are fewer Tory and SNP candidates than previously - and some other northern councils have not only seen people elected uncontested but some wards have fewer candidates than there are seats.
There does appear to be a real problem, a democratic deficit where councils get stymied by national government and fewer people want to get the grief that comes from cuts to services that you can't avoid.
I’m surprised that the Tories are standing fewer candidates, especially because there are wards where they could have gained two councillors last time, but lost out because they only nominated one.
Perhaps the SCons now have a more rigorous vetting policy* on sectarianism and dodgy tattoos and are stuggling to get the candidates? Rumours that Cllr Good has joined the Wagner Group have yet to be confirmed.
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
We've lost some overambitious suppliers (= for those their capital investment has reduced your prices at their cost), and the strong regulation has ensured that stronger players have picked up the customers at no loss to the customers.
We still have a large number of players in the market, and post the current couple of years of crisis it will work well again.
Nationalising anything is usually a pretty good way to stop it functioning effectively.
Nope. It hasn’t worked well. It’s resulted in needless admin and confusion for me for no benefit. It’s the same juice ffs — a casino on energy price speculation is crackers.
I have tended to review around once a year.
I'm not sure where the needless admin comes from.
My only issue was when EON got the wrong house and switched the neighbour's supply by mistake.
But for a bill about 20-25% below market average for a decade that's a small price to pay.
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
No it hasn't. It's all fucked. It's all so (intentionally) complex that you can't tell whether you're getting a good deal or getting done up the shitpipe. See also mobile phone tariffs.
They should nationalise it all, let the government set the price and take the electoral consequences for it.
I just don't recognise that.
And - in case you run away abroad again - most of them have been following our example to various degrees.
I think they've all retreated. Some say they had gone from Hostomel airport on Monday.
The Russians get to do a bit of a stock-take now. Word is that Putin won't see the comparison between troops and equipment sent across the border and the numbers that came back.
Maybe they'll stick the numbers in an appendix and put a bar chart together instead.
Maybe they did all go, but I am not so sure. If they had, the Ukrainians would be posting about all those villages and towns between Ivankiv and Irpin that have been liberated - just as they have posted pictures of liberated Ivankiv. They have not, which leads me to think that there is a considerable Russian pocket now encircled.
I've seen reports of Ukrainians entering Hostomel and Dymer, for example. I think they're being cautious, so they're some way behind the Russian retreat.
It's suggested that household energy costs are going up towards £3000 pa. While this is terrible it may be worth bearing in mind proportionality. 10 fags, and a single daily pint in a pub will set you back about £3250 pa.
Fags are a niche luxury purchase these days. In my student days a bottle of wine cost about 2 packets of cigarettes. That has now inverted, 2 bottles of drinkable wine = 20 B&H. even quite rich smokers smoke smuggled rolling tobacco if they smoke at all.
It's my single biggest line of personal expenditure and by quite a long way. A great pity I can afford it, in a sense.
E cigarettes are much more affordable and I found to be a 'good enough' replacement. Took some getting used to as the patterns of use aren't quite the same (best to think of the e-cigarette as a pipe rather than a cigarette).
Yes, works for some. I want to kick the nicotine addiction though. I'm psyching up to go cold turkey.
I fell off the wagon quite spectacularly recently after having a few blasts on my mate's blueberry vape whilst down the pub. Gone cold turkey again this week.
If you're still on the fags my advice is get vaping, then drop the strength of the juice down gradually. Start at 20% and drop yourself down gradually to 3%. The cold turkey's not so bad then, you've weaned yourself off most of it.
And try not to give in to temptation when you're full of beer.
Thanks. I'm a hardcase but I do sense my mindset coming around to where it needs to be.
Wind power by contrast had a death tally of 150 deaths per trillion kWh.
Not to mention the bird life.
I don't mind wind power but it's not the greatest thing if you're being authentic about green life.
The number of birds killed by wind turbines is insignificant compared to the numbers killed by glass-fronted buildings and domestic cats. Not to mention the ones that will die out due to loss of habitat resulting from climate change which, of course, wind power is intended to counter.
Sounds like whataboutery to me.
Estimates put the number of birds killed by wind turbines as between 10,000 and 100,000 a year in the UK.
I'm not anti wind turbines. I actually think they can look quite cool. But they're not particularly efficient at around 30%.
I'm struggling to understand why efficiency is of any relevance whatsoever.
It does matter because it's a basic tenet of economics and because we should be seeking the most efficient energy sources we can in our move to more sustainable and long-term viable ways of producing energy. That's why energy efficiency is such a huge topic in the global discussion and in policy setting by governments.
One of the problems we have is that some of the so-called greener forms of energy are not particularly efficient. So, for example, you have to build one hell of a lot of wind turbines, or install field loads of solar panels, in order to yield the kind of comparable results with other, less sustainable, forms of energy.
The more efficient we can make things like solar panels, the more we solve the energy crisis. If we could get a solar panel that was 50% efficient, then 70% etc. then we really are getting close to cracking the energy crisis. Not only can all homes be lit and heated by solar but we may well get solar powered cars. That's just one example of why the efficiency chase is so hot at the moment.
Homes will never be heated by solar in the UK. Heating is overwhelmingly needed in winter, when solar energy available is around 90% lower. Homes being cooled by solar is far more likely.
On bird killing by wind turbines I think that complaint is just a red herring and a rounding error, and a soundbite for activists who have no case left. 10-100k per annum in the UK vs an estimated 50 million killed by domestic cats; if you want to save birds, ban pussies. And tens of millions of songbirds caught by hunters especially in southern and eastern europe.
On efficiency, clearly it matters as twice the efficiency, or half the demand, reduces the amount of wind turbines or solar panels or whatever you need by 50%.
One of our aces in the hole as the UK is that our energy demand per pop is low compared to our peer countries.
On wind efficiency, offshore wine is about twice as efficient as onshore wind in the UK - roughly 50%+ vs 25-30%. We should not really need to be doing any onshore wind these days imo.
And solar is for roofs and perhaps airfields, not farms. Unless it can be shown to be combined with other suitable land uses.
Solar farms can work quite nicely in sunny spacious locations like Australia, Saudi Arabia or California.
Not the UK though. The UK is a wet and windy country needing heating not a dry sunny one needing air conditioning. So water and wind make sense for our energy far, far more than solar ever will - except as a nice toy for some to cut their bills.
We have a lot of space over our car parks that could be used to collect solar power.
Having written the above I got interested so I looked at the numbers of off-street car parking spaces and used about a third of that area for solar roof. I also exclude the feeder roads etc. The numbers are from a twenty year old CPRE document so I'm confident that they are on the low side. Definitely back of an envelope stuff.
All numbers are in Square Km.
24 Local Authority ground level public space car parks in the UK. 1.5 top level of multi-storey car parks -UK footprint of multi storey car parks is 4. 8.5 big shops. 8 business customer parking 120 business parking but there are no figures on how much is underground. 125 HGV parking. Ports and rest stops not included. 20 car dealers, distributors, petrol sales. 12 schools 1.3 university parking 8.8 hospital parking 383 off street domestic hard standing. 6.3 sports centre, racecourse, similar 3.2 airport parking + 610 square kilometres.
Which would produce >35GW. (10% UK leccy)
Currently all the existing solar farms and rooftop installations produce 13GW. Asking people to add a solar car port at home is a bit of a push but public realm and commercial car parks would not cost us any green space whatsoever. And they would certainly undermine Mad Vlad's business plan.
All numbers are wildly approximate, but they err on the side of caution. And I'm sure that there is a better done calc somewhere, but I like to lurk in details.
Anecdotage, but the released candidates list for Aberdeenshire council is interesting. There are fewer Tory and SNP candidates than previously - and some other northern councils have not only seen people elected uncontested but some wards have fewer candidates than there are seats.
There does appear to be a real problem, a democratic deficit where councils get stymied by national government and fewer people want to get the grief that comes from cuts to services that you can't avoid.
Eh? The Tories stood 23 last time and and are standing 34 this time. They should be able to pick up an extra few such as Aboyne, Banchory etc where they under nominated last time quite easily. The lack of SNP candidates in rural councils is interesting though particularly Moray, Borders (where they are not standing in a couple of wards) and the fact they are missing one ward in the Highlands. The sole Labour councillor in North Kincardine ward is also now standing as an independent in Mearns ward.
Not going to lie but I'm positively tumescent that our aircraft carriers are much bigger than the French one.
Don’t we have to buy carrier planes from the French now as we don’t have planes which can land on ours?
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
None of that is true.
The QE/CdG comparison does illustrate how lack of pan-European defence integration is hurting everyone. The French have ended up with a 100% capable carrier and air wing that's available 50% of the time and the British have got a 50% capable carrier and air wing that's available 100% of the time because there is two of them.
Anecdotage, but the released candidates list for Aberdeenshire council is interesting. There are fewer Tory and SNP candidates than previously - and some other northern councils have not only seen people elected uncontested but some wards have fewer candidates than there are seats.
There does appear to be a real problem, a democratic deficit where councils get stymied by national government and fewer people want to get the grief that comes from cuts to services that you can't avoid.
I’m surprised that the Tories are standing fewer candidates, especially because there are wards where they could have gained two councillors last time, but lost out because they only nominated one.
Perhaps the SCons now have a more rigorous vetting policy* on sectarianism and dodgy tattoos and are stuggling to get the candidates? Rumours that Cllr Good has joined the Wagner Group have yet to be confirmed.
*Only joking, they still won't give a fuck.
If tattoos had been more popular amongst the general population in the 1930s I wonder whether Arthur Donaldson ( a man still revered by SNPers despite his links to fascism) would have had one ?
Gérard Dépardieu, who once received a Russian passport from Putin personally and praised him for years, now denounces Russia’s "crazy and unacceptable excesses" in Ukraine.
The Kremlin comments: "I suppose Depardieu does not fully understand what is happening," Dmitry Peskov says. "If necessary, we are ready to explain all of this to him so that he does. If he wants."
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so? Aircraft carriers, portable runways you can float around the world where you need it sound like a good idea to me - but now that everything Russia put in air above Ukraine got shot down so easy, if airplanes are not much use in war zone anymore we could always use them as dronecraft carriers instead? And they can’t go on their own, they need protection and other ships all around them in flotilla, which sounds expensive?
Comfortable Labour hold in Doncaster. Small swing from Tories.
The outgoing Labour councillor (who was the chair of the crime committee) is wanted for extradition to the US on drugs charges, hence the by-election. Seems to have made no difference.
The red wall clearly still exists in some form, although the turnout was < 14%.
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
We've lost some overambitious suppliers (= for those their capital investment has reduced your prices at their cost), and the strong regulation has ensured that stronger players have picked up the customers at no loss to the customers.
We still have a large number of players in the market, and post the current couple of years of crisis it will work well again.
Nationalising anything is usually a pretty good way to stop it functioning effectively.
Nope. It hasn’t worked well. It’s resulted in needless admin and confusion for me for no benefit. It’s the same juice ffs — a casino on energy price speculation is crackers.
I have tended to review around once a year.
I'm not sure where the needless admin comes from.
My only issue was when EON got the wrong house and switched the neighbour's supply by mistake.
But for a bill about 20-25% below market average for a decade that's a small price to pay.
Crawling around on my hands and needs trying (and often failing) to read a smart meter that these clowns should be able to read themselves... waiting for refunds from one supplier that has gone bust and thus paying two full bills in a single month... then repeat... then repeat again...I've been switched four effing times in 18th months because some comedian has gone bust yet again and it's been a bloody hassle every time. I have tried to be as green as possible with my fictional 'supplier' – now I have been bounced into Shell!
Comfortable Labour hold in Doncaster. Small swing from Tories.
The outgoing Labour councillor (who was the chair of the crime committee) is wanted for extradition to the US on drugs charges, hence the by-election. Seems to have made no difference.
The red wall clearly still exists in some form, although the turnout was < 14%.
I wonder what proportion were postal votes...
I've been wondering about turnout in some of these by-elections. Some of the numbers look suspiciously small.
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so? Aircraft carriers, portable runways you can float around the world where you need it sound like a good idea to me - but now that everything Russia put in air above Ukraine got shot down so easy, if airplanes are not much use in war zone anymore we could always use them as dronecraft carriers instead? And they can’t go on their own, they need protection and other ships all around them in flotilla, which sounds expensive?
It won't be after it has been Photoshopped , and perhaps that is just Russian aircraft?
Not going to lie but I'm positively tumescent that our aircraft carriers are much bigger than the French one.
Don’t we have to buy carrier planes from the French now as we don’t have planes which can land on ours?
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
The UK is buying the aircraft fairly steadily - we have around 25 at the moment.
The tories have throttled back the F-35 deliveries to save money. They cut the 2021 purchase from 6 to 3 and the 2022 ones from 8 to 3. There are 5 scheduled for 2023 and then no more are contracted after despite a 'commitment' to buy another 13.
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
In any case: it is (rightly, IMV) SNP policy not to interfere in English internal matters, except where there is some knockon effect on Scotland. So Cookie's fretting is characteristic Tory panicmongering (not by Cookie himself I am sure). Especially as the Tories have pointedly deleted the one mechanism devised to control that issue, EVEL, other than the SNP's self-abnegation on the matter. Grievance manufacturing on their part. It's logical enough though for a British nationalist party - they can't complain if the SNP were in fact to have the balancing vote on an English-only policy, they were content to control Scots law and administration [edit] even when they did not have a majority of the vote in Scotland , and would still be, given what Mr Johnson has said about wanting to abolish devolution, which he retains the power to do.
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so? Aircraft carriers, portable runways you can float around the world where you need it sound like a good idea to me - but now that everything Russia put in air above Ukraine got shot down so easy, if airplanes are not much use in war zone anymore we could always use them as dronecraft carriers instead? And they can’t go on their own, they need protection and other ships all around them in flotilla, which sounds expensive?
Every single study of aircraft carriers since their invention has found that it is more efficient to have bigger ones - the cost per aircraft goes down.
The Charles De Gaulle had to have it's flight deck lengthened after trials.
The American carriers are actually limited by the size of dry docks.
Wind power by contrast had a death tally of 150 deaths per trillion kWh.
Not to mention the bird life.
I don't mind wind power but it's not the greatest thing if you're being authentic about green life.
The number of birds killed by wind turbines is insignificant compared to the numbers killed by glass-fronted buildings and domestic cats. Not to mention the ones that will die out due to loss of habitat resulting from climate change which, of course, wind power is intended to counter.
Sounds like whataboutery to me.
Estimates put the number of birds killed by wind turbines as between 10,000 and 100,000 a year in the UK.
I'm not anti wind turbines. I actually think they can look quite cool. But they're not particularly efficient at around 30%.
I'm struggling to understand why efficiency is of any relevance whatsoever.
It does matter because it's a basic tenet of economics and because we should be seeking the most efficient energy sources we can in our move to more sustainable and long-term viable ways of producing energy. That's why energy efficiency is such a huge topic in the global discussion and in policy setting by governments.
One of the problems we have is that some of the so-called greener forms of energy are not particularly efficient. So, for example, you have to build one hell of a lot of wind turbines, or install field loads of solar panels, in order to yield the kind of comparable results with other, less sustainable, forms of energy.
The more efficient we can make things like solar panels, the more we solve the energy crisis. If we could get a solar panel that was 50% efficient, then 70% etc. then we really are getting close to cracking the energy crisis. Not only can all homes be lit and heated by solar but we may well get solar powered cars. That's just one example of why the efficiency chase is so hot at the moment.
Homes will never be heated by solar in the UK. Heating is overwhelmingly needed in winter, when solar energy available is around 90% lower. Homes being cooled by solar is far more likely.
On bird killing by wind turbines I think that complaint is just a red herring and a rounding error, and a soundbite for activists who have no case left. 10-100k per annum in the UK vs an estimated 50 million killed by domestic cats; if you want to save birds, ban pussies. And tens of millions of songbirds caught by hunters especially in southern and eastern europe.
On efficiency, clearly it matters as twice the efficiency, or half the demand, reduces the amount of wind turbines or solar panels or whatever you need by 50%.
One of our aces in the hole as the UK is that our energy demand per pop is low compared to our peer countries.
On wind efficiency, offshore wine is about twice as efficient as onshore wind in the UK - roughly 50%+ vs 25-30%. We should not really need to be doing any onshore wind these days imo.
And solar is for roofs and perhaps airfields, not farms. Unless it can be shown to be combined with other suitable land uses.
Solar farms can work quite nicely in sunny spacious locations like Australia, Saudi Arabia or California.
Not the UK though. The UK is a wet and windy country needing heating not a dry sunny one needing air conditioning. So water and wind make sense for our energy far, far more than solar ever will - except as a nice toy for some to cut their bills.
We have a lot of space over our car parks that could be used to collect solar power.
Having written the above I got interested so I looked at the numbers of off-street car parking spaces and used about a third of that area for solar roof. I also exclude the feeder roads etc. The numbers are from a twenty year old CPRE document so I'm confident that they are on the low side. Definitely back of an envelope stuff.
All numbers are in Square Km.
24 Local Authority ground level public space car parks in the UK. 1.5 top level of multi-storey car parks -UK footprint of multi storey car parks is 4. 8.5 big shops. 8 business customer parking 120 business parking but there are no figures on how much is underground. 125 HGV parking. Ports and rest stops not included. 20 car dealers, distributors, petrol sales. 12 schools 1.3 university parking 8.8 hospital parking 383 off street domestic hard standing. 6.3 sports centre, racecourse, similar 3.2 airport parking + 610 square kilometres.
Which would produce >35GW. (10% UK leccy)
Currently all the existing solar farms and rooftop installations produce 13GW. Asking people to add a solar car port at home is a bit of a push but public realm and commercial car parks would not cost us any green space whatsoever. And they would certainly undermine Mad Vlad's business plan.
All numbers are wildly approximate, but they err on the side of caution. And I'm sure that there is a better done calc somewhere, but I like to lurk in details.
"Which would produce >35GW. (10% UK leccy)" ...in the middle of a sunny summer's day, when we don't really need it.
I'm all for adding solar panels to new builds when the incremental costs are minimal but until we find a way of storing summer electricity for use in the winter, solar panels are not a solution to our needs.
Comfortable Labour hold in Doncaster. Small swing from Tories.
The outgoing Labour councillor (who was the chair of the crime committee) is wanted for extradition to the US on drugs charges, hence the by-election. Seems to have made no difference.
The red wall clearly still exists in some form, although the turnout was < 14%.
I wonder what proportion were postal votes...
Whatever the proportion, with it being Donny I hope the envelopes were pre-addressed. They could cope with scrawling an X somewhere but anything beyond that is pushing it. Bloody southerners. (It's about 15 miles away from me but still, South Yorks innit?)
Not going to lie but I'm positively tumescent that our aircraft carriers are much bigger than the French one.
Don’t we have to buy carrier planes from the French now as we don’t have planes which can land on ours?
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
The UK is buying the aircraft fairly steadily - we have around 25 at the moment.
The tories have throttled back the F-35 deliveries to save money. They cut the 2021 purchase from 6 to 3 and the 2022 ones from 8 to 3. There are 5 scheduled for 2023 and then no more are contracted after despite a 'commitment' to buy another 13.
Is that not related to waiting for Block 4 aircraft, rather than pay the extra to get block 3 and upgrade them later?
Not going to lie but I'm positively tumescent that our aircraft carriers are much bigger than the French one.
Don’t we have to buy carrier planes from the French now as we don’t have planes which can land on ours?
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
No. Ours don't have cats and traps.
I'm not aware that aircraft carriers have ever used magnetic traps; I thought it was cables. @Dura_Ace may advise differently.
I don't think magnetic stopping is quite here yet.
USS Gerald Ford is now operational with AAG which uses a combination of water turbines and an induction motor the size of a house for arresting recovered aircraft.
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so? Aircraft carriers, portable runways you can float around the world where you need it sound like a good idea to me - but now that everything Russia put in air above Ukraine got shot down so easy, if airplanes are not much use in war zone anymore we could always use them as dronecraft carriers instead? And they can’t go on their own, they need protection and other ships all around them in flotilla, which sounds expensive?
It is expensive, and uses up most of what is left of thew Royal Navy in the case of the British 'targets' (as an ex submariner colleague of mine used to say when we went over the Forth Bridge and saw the carriers in the distance - his eyes would light up and he would salivate, very Pavlovian). And if they are close enough to the enemy to send drones, then the enemy are close enough to ...
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
You should have a bit more humility having supported Corbyn last time. Seriously, imagine Ukraine with a Corbyn PM.
Hardly something to drench the sheets thinking about. We're bit players in this. The fact of the invasion wasn't influenced by who the British PM is and neither will be how it pans out.
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so? Aircraft carriers, portable runways you can float around the world where you need it sound like a good idea to me - but now that everything Russia put in air above Ukraine got shot down so easy, if airplanes are not much use in war zone anymore we could always use them as dronecraft carriers instead? And they can’t go on their own, they need protection and other ships all around them in flotilla, which sounds expensive?
Every single study of aircraft carriers since their invention has found that it is more efficient to have bigger ones - the cost per aircraft goes down.
The Charles De Gaulle had to have it's flight deck lengthened after trials.
The American carriers are actually limited by the size of dry docks.
The CdG make out carriers look like a brilliantly-handed project. The farce over the loss of the prop and the need to lengthen the flight deck to support the Hawkeye make it look particularly ill-managed.
That is simply in response to the jibe, "Big_G won't be posting this" isn't it!
As to BritainElects, like their (& New Statesman's) State of the Nation council ward map. Last time first placed winner in every unitary and district ward in the country. Hope they can enhance with years / votes / last time out national shares etc., all that good stuff. Maybe pay Mr Teale some moolah.
That is simply in response to the jibe, "Big_G won't be posting this" isn't it!
In truth I have been out in town and have been waiting to post it when I came back, but of course @CorrectHorseBattery prompted me to check it and post it
Anecdotage, but the released candidates list for Aberdeenshire council is interesting. There are fewer Tory and SNP candidates than previously - and some other northern councils have not only seen people elected uncontested but some wards have fewer candidates than there are seats.
There does appear to be a real problem, a democratic deficit where councils get stymied by national government and fewer people want to get the grief that comes from cuts to services that you can't avoid.
I’m surprised that the Tories are standing fewer candidates, especially because there are wards where they could have gained two councillors last time, but lost out because they only nominated one.
Perhaps the SCons now have a more rigorous vetting policy* on sectarianism and dodgy tattoos and are stuggling to get the candidates? Rumours that Cllr Good has joined the Wagner Group have yet to be confirmed.
*Only joking, they still won't give a fuck.
If tattoos had been more popular amongst the general population in the 1930s I wonder whether Arthur Donaldson ( a man still revered by SNPers despite his links to fascism) would have had one ?
You're mixing him up with Archibald [edit] Ramsay, Tory MP, who was the one who got banged up without being let out when they realised he was falsely accused (that was Donaldson).
I think they've all retreated. Some say they had gone from Hostomel airport on Monday.
The Russians get to do a bit of a stock-take now. Word is that Putin won't see the comparison between troops and equipment sent across the border and the numbers that came back.
Maybe they'll stick the numbers in an appendix and put a bar chart together instead.
Maybe they did all go, but I am not so sure. If they had, the Ukrainians would be posting about all those villages and towns between Ivankiv and Irpin that have been liberated - just as they have posted pictures of liberated Ivankiv. They have not, which leads me to think that there is a considerable Russian pocket now encircled.
I've seen reports of Ukrainians entering Hostomel and Dymer, for example. I think they're being cautious, so they're some way behind the Russian retreat.
Rightly cautious. They are going to be mined and booby-trapped to hell.
The Russian mindset is "If we can't have it, you can't have it either...."
Wind power by contrast had a death tally of 150 deaths per trillion kWh.
Not to mention the bird life.
I don't mind wind power but it's not the greatest thing if you're being authentic about green life.
The number of birds killed by wind turbines is insignificant compared to the numbers killed by glass-fronted buildings and domestic cats. Not to mention the ones that will die out due to loss of habitat resulting from climate change which, of course, wind power is intended to counter.
Sounds like whataboutery to me.
Estimates put the number of birds killed by wind turbines as between 10,000 and 100,000 a year in the UK.
I'm not anti wind turbines. I actually think they can look quite cool. But they're not particularly efficient at around 30%.
I'm struggling to understand why efficiency is of any relevance whatsoever.
It does matter because it's a basic tenet of economics and because we should be seeking the most efficient energy sources we can in our move to more sustainable and long-term viable ways of producing energy. That's why energy efficiency is such a huge topic in the global discussion and in policy setting by governments.
One of the problems we have is that some of the so-called greener forms of energy are not particularly efficient. So, for example, you have to build one hell of a lot of wind turbines, or install field loads of solar panels, in order to yield the kind of comparable results with other, less sustainable, forms of energy.
The more efficient we can make things like solar panels, the more we solve the energy crisis. If we could get a solar panel that was 50% efficient, then 70% etc. then we really are getting close to cracking the energy crisis. Not only can all homes be lit and heated by solar but we may well get solar powered cars. That's just one example of why the efficiency chase is so hot at the moment.
Homes will never be heated by solar in the UK. Heating is overwhelmingly needed in winter, when solar energy available is around 90% lower. Homes being cooled by solar is far more likely.
On bird killing by wind turbines I think that complaint is just a red herring and a rounding error, and a soundbite for activists who have no case left. 10-100k per annum in the UK vs an estimated 50 million killed by domestic cats; if you want to save birds, ban pussies. And tens of millions of songbirds caught by hunters especially in southern and eastern europe.
On efficiency, clearly it matters as twice the efficiency, or half the demand, reduces the amount of wind turbines or solar panels or whatever you need by 50%.
One of our aces in the hole as the UK is that our energy demand per pop is low compared to our peer countries.
On wind efficiency, offshore wine is about twice as efficient as onshore wind in the UK - roughly 50%+ vs 25-30%. We should not really need to be doing any onshore wind these days imo.
And solar is for roofs and perhaps airfields, not farms. Unless it can be shown to be combined with other suitable land uses.
Solar farms can work quite nicely in sunny spacious locations like Australia, Saudi Arabia or California.
Not the UK though. The UK is a wet and windy country needing heating not a dry sunny one needing air conditioning. So water and wind make sense for our energy far, far more than solar ever will - except as a nice toy for some to cut their bills.
We have a lot of space over our car parks that could be used to collect solar power.
Having written the above I got interested so I looked at the numbers of off-street car parking spaces and used about a third of that area for solar roof. I also exclude the feeder roads etc. The numbers are from a twenty year old CPRE document so I'm confident that they are on the low side. Definitely back of an envelope stuff.
All numbers are in Square Km.
24 Local Authority ground level public space car parks in the UK. 1.5 top level of multi-storey car parks -UK footprint of multi storey car parks is 4. 8.5 big shops. 8 business customer parking 120 business parking but there are no figures on how much is underground. 125 HGV parking. Ports and rest stops not included. 20 car dealers, distributors, petrol sales. 12 schools 1.3 university parking 8.8 hospital parking 383 off street domestic hard standing. 6.3 sports centre, racecourse, similar 3.2 airport parking + 610 square kilometres.
Which would produce >35GW. (10% UK leccy)
Currently all the existing solar farms and rooftop installations produce 13GW. Asking people to add a solar car port at home is a bit of a push but public realm and commercial car parks would not cost us any green space whatsoever. And they would certainly undermine Mad Vlad's business plan.
All numbers are wildly approximate, but they err on the side of caution. And I'm sure that there is a better done calc somewhere, but I like to lurk in details.
"Which would produce >35GW. (10% UK leccy)" ...in the middle of a sunny summer's day, when we don't really need it.
I'm all for adding solar panels to new builds when the incremental costs are minimal but until we find a way of storing summer electricity for use in the winter, solar panels are not a solution to our needs.
I think you have a stock/flow confusion with GW/TWh.
UK normal lecky demand is about 35GW (power), whilst annual electrical energy use is around 350 TWh (energy).
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so? Aircraft carriers, portable runways you can float around the world where you need it sound like a good idea to me - but now that everything Russia put in air above Ukraine got shot down so easy, if airplanes are not much use in war zone anymore we could always use them as dronecraft carriers instead? And they can’t go on their own, they need protection and other ships all around them in flotilla, which sounds expensive?
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so?
I suspect the some reason for France is that they want to do extended operations in the Pacific which is also why they will go for nuclear power.
The British QE class was designed way before the tories got obsessed with the Pacific and is, in some ways, optimised for Atlantic operations with its shorter logistical trail. A QE can bunker only about a quarter of the aviation fuel of a Nimitz or the CdG, for example, because it's conventionally powered (the QE/PoW need to carry 4,000 tons of fuel just to make the ship go) and it's assumed it will always be accompanied by an oiler.
Not going to lie but I'm positively tumescent that our aircraft carriers are much bigger than the French one.
Don’t we have to buy carrier planes from the French now as we don’t have planes which can land on ours?
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
No. Ours don't have cats and traps.
I'm not aware that aircraft carriers have ever used magnetic traps; I thought it was cables. @Dura_Ace may advise differently.
I don't think magnetic stopping is quite here yet.
USS Gerald Ford is now operational with AAG which uses a combination of water turbines and an induction motor the size of a house for arresting recovered aircraft.
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so? Aircraft carriers, portable runways you can float around the world where you need it sound like a good idea to me - but now that everything Russia put in air above Ukraine got shot down so easy, if airplanes are not much use in war zone anymore we could always use them as dronecraft carriers instead? And they can’t go on their own, they need protection and other ships all around them in flotilla, which sounds expensive?
Every single study of aircraft carriers since their invention has found that it is more efficient to have bigger ones - the cost per aircraft goes down.
The Charles De Gaulle had to have it's flight deck lengthened after trials.
The American carriers are actually limited by the size of dry docks.
The CdG make out carriers look like a brilliantly-handed project. The farce over the loss of the prop and the need to lengthen the flight deck to support the Hawkeye make it look particularly ill-managed.
It is of note that that the CdG is pretty much a match for the "obvious alternative" to the QEs - nuclear powered, conventional carrier.
The fire which destroyed the filling cabinet with the paperwork for the propellors for the CdG was impressive. It managed to leave every other filling cabinet around it untouched.
Wind power by contrast had a death tally of 150 deaths per trillion kWh.
Not to mention the bird life.
I don't mind wind power but it's not the greatest thing if you're being authentic about green life.
The number of birds killed by wind turbines is insignificant compared to the numbers killed by glass-fronted buildings and domestic cats. Not to mention the ones that will die out due to loss of habitat resulting from climate change which, of course, wind power is intended to counter.
Sounds like whataboutery to me.
Estimates put the number of birds killed by wind turbines as between 10,000 and 100,000 a year in the UK.
I'm not anti wind turbines. I actually think they can look quite cool. But they're not particularly efficient at around 30%.
I'm struggling to understand why efficiency is of any relevance whatsoever.
It does matter because it's a basic tenet of economics and because we should be seeking the most efficient energy sources we can in our move to more sustainable and long-term viable ways of producing energy. That's why energy efficiency is such a huge topic in the global discussion and in policy setting by governments.
One of the problems we have is that some of the so-called greener forms of energy are not particularly efficient. So, for example, you have to build one hell of a lot of wind turbines, or install field loads of solar panels, in order to yield the kind of comparable results with other, less sustainable, forms of energy.
The more efficient we can make things like solar panels, the more we solve the energy crisis. If we could get a solar panel that was 50% efficient, then 70% etc. then we really are getting close to cracking the energy crisis. Not only can all homes be lit and heated by solar but we may well get solar powered cars. That's just one example of why the efficiency chase is so hot at the moment.
Homes will never be heated by solar in the UK. Heating is overwhelmingly needed in winter, when solar energy available is around 90% lower. Homes being cooled by solar is far more likely.
On bird killing by wind turbines I think that complaint is just a red herring and a rounding error, and a soundbite for activists who have no case left. 10-100k per annum in the UK vs an estimated 50 million killed by domestic cats; if you want to save birds, ban pussies. And tens of millions of songbirds caught by hunters especially in southern and eastern europe.
On efficiency, clearly it matters as twice the efficiency, or half the demand, reduces the amount of wind turbines or solar panels or whatever you need by 50%.
One of our aces in the hole as the UK is that our energy demand per pop is low compared to our peer countries.
On wind efficiency, offshore wine is about twice as efficient as onshore wind in the UK - roughly 50%+ vs 25-30%. We should not really need to be doing any onshore wind these days imo.
And solar is for roofs and perhaps airfields, not farms. Unless it can be shown to be combined with other suitable land uses.
Solar farms can work quite nicely in sunny spacious locations like Australia, Saudi Arabia or California.
Not the UK though. The UK is a wet and windy country needing heating not a dry sunny one needing air conditioning. So water and wind make sense for our energy far, far more than solar ever will - except as a nice toy for some to cut their bills.
We have a lot of space over our car parks that could be used to collect solar power.
Having written the above I got interested so I looked at the numbers of off-street car parking spaces and used about a third of that area for solar roof. I also exclude the feeder roads etc. The numbers are from a twenty year old CPRE document so I'm confident that they are on the low side. Definitely back of an envelope stuff.
All numbers are in Square Km.
24 Local Authority ground level public space car parks in the UK. 1.5 top level of multi-storey car parks -UK footprint of multi storey car parks is 4. 8.5 big shops. 8 business customer parking 120 business parking but there are no figures on how much is underground. 125 HGV parking. Ports and rest stops not included. 20 car dealers, distributors, petrol sales. 12 schools 1.3 university parking 8.8 hospital parking 383 off street domestic hard standing. 6.3 sports centre, racecourse, similar 3.2 airport parking + 610 square kilometres.
Which would produce >35GW. (10% UK leccy)
Currently all the existing solar farms and rooftop installations produce 13GW. Asking people to add a solar car port at home is a bit of a push but public realm and commercial car parks would not cost us any green space whatsoever. And they would certainly undermine Mad Vlad's business plan.
All numbers are wildly approximate, but they err on the side of caution. And I'm sure that there is a better done calc somewhere, but I like to lurk in details.
"Which would produce >35GW. (10% UK leccy)" ...in the middle of a sunny summer's day, when we don't really need it.
I'm all for adding solar panels to new builds when the incremental costs are minimal but until we find a way of storing summer electricity for use in the winter, solar panels are not a solution to our needs.
I think you have a stock/flow confusion with GW/TWh.
UK normal lecky demand is about 35GW (power), whilst annual electrical energy use is around 350 TWh (energy).
10000 hours in a year is a big round up there: or is the 35GW a slight round down, the 350TWh a slight round up and twixt the two a middle is met?
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
We've lost some overambitious suppliers (= for those their capital investment has reduced your prices at their cost), and the strong regulation has ensured that stronger players have picked up the customers at no loss to the customers.
We still have a large number of players in the market, and post the current couple of years of crisis it will work well again.
Nationalising anything is usually a pretty good way to stop it functioning effectively.
Nope. It hasn’t worked well. It’s resulted in needless admin and confusion for me for no benefit. It’s the same juice ffs — a casino on energy price speculation is crackers.
It's sort of a potemkin market. Upshot is froth & speculation & needless complexity instead of the no-frills efficient provision of a uniform utility product that everybody needs and for which price and availability are the only important metrics.
When you have people over do you show them *your* gas? How pretty it looks? How strong the flow to your hob? The sweet sweet smell of it, so much sweeter than the sort they have next door? No, you don't.
In England, the estimated number of people testing positive for #COVID19 increased to a record level (week ending 26 March 2022). Around 1 in 13 people, not in care homes, hospitals or other institutional settings would have tested positive for COVID-19
Not going to lie but I'm positively tumescent that our aircraft carriers are much bigger than the French one.
Don’t we have to buy carrier planes from the French now as we don’t have planes which can land on ours?
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
No. Ours don't have cats and traps.
I'm not aware that aircraft carriers have ever used magnetic traps; I thought it was cables. @Dura_Ace may advise differently.
I don't think magnetic stopping is quite here yet.
USS Gerald Ford is now operational with AAG which uses a combination of water turbines and an induction motor the size of a house for arresting recovered aircraft.
Are aluminium planes magnetic?
AIUI the new AAG uses 'traditional' wires that the aircraft have to snag. What differs is the system they use to slow down the speed the wires spool out - in other words, to remove the energy from the aircraft. I've no idea how it works, but would be fascinated to know.
I think they've all retreated. Some say they had gone from Hostomel airport on Monday.
The Russians get to do a bit of a stock-take now. Word is that Putin won't see the comparison between troops and equipment sent across the border and the numbers that came back.
Maybe they'll stick the numbers in an appendix and put a bar chart together instead.
Maybe they did all go, but I am not so sure. If they had, the Ukrainians would be posting about all those villages and towns between Ivankiv and Irpin that have been liberated - just as they have posted pictures of liberated Ivankiv. They have not, which leads me to think that there is a considerable Russian pocket now encircled.
I've seen reports of Ukrainians entering Hostomel and Dymer, for example. I think they're being cautious, so they're some way behind the Russian retreat.
Rightly cautious. They are going to be mined and booby-trapped to hell.
The Russian mindset is "If we can't have it, you can't have it either...."
Borodyanka and Vorzel now get mentions of being liberated, and the highway between them.
Claims of 700 Russian vehicles being seen driven towards Belarus north of Ivankiv before the Ukrainians took it back. Anyone know how many headed south in the first place?
"We’re having an absolutely incredible day. I just can’t keep up drawing a map with new towns and cities of the Kyiv region, from which Russia has withdrawn its forces."
Not going to lie but I'm positively tumescent that our aircraft carriers are much bigger than the French one.
Don’t we have to buy carrier planes from the French now as we don’t have planes which can land on ours?
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
No. Ours don't have cats and traps.
I'm not aware that aircraft carriers have ever used magnetic traps; I thought it was cables. @Dura_Ace may advise differently.
I don't think magnetic stopping is quite here yet.
USS Gerald Ford is now operational with AAG which uses a combination of water turbines and an induction motor the size of a house for arresting recovered aircraft.
Are aluminium planes magnetic?
AIUI the new AAG uses 'traditional' wires that the aircraft have to snag. What differs is the system they use to slow down the speed the wires spool out - in other words, to remove the energy from the aircraft. I've no idea how it works, but would be fascinated to know.
It certainly looks like someone will have fun maintaining it....
Anecdotage, but the released candidates list for Aberdeenshire council is interesting. There are fewer Tory and SNP candidates than previously - and some other northern councils have not only seen people elected uncontested but some wards have fewer candidates than there are seats.
There does appear to be a real problem, a democratic deficit where councils get stymied by national government and fewer people want to get the grief that comes from cuts to services that you can't avoid.
Eh? The Tories stood 23 last time and and are standing 34 this time. They should be able to pick up an extra few such as Aboyne, Banchory etc where they under nominated last time quite easily. The lack of SNP candidates in rural councils is interesting though particularly Moray, Borders (where they are not standing in a couple of wards) and the fact they are missing one ward in the Highlands. The sole Labour councillor in North Kincardine ward is also now standing as an independent in Mearns ward.
Tory nominations up in Moray as well as Aberdeenshire. They gained a seat in Highland (Caol and Mallaig) as SNP failed to nominate a candidate, and their one sitting councillor in the Western Isles was unopposed. So not doing too badly given that it's over a month til polling day...
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so? Aircraft carriers, portable runways you can float around the world where you need it sound like a good idea to me - but now that everything Russia put in air above Ukraine got shot down so easy, if airplanes are not much use in war zone anymore we could always use them as dronecraft carriers instead? And they can’t go on their own, they need protection and other ships all around them in flotilla, which sounds expensive?
The new French carrier (probably called Richelieu) is going to be fucking enormous for some reason. Bigger than a QE and only 10m short of a Ford.
I note the “for some reason” in your post, So are countries getting into big aircraft carriers just as it’s unfashionable to do so?
I suspect the some reason for France is that they want to do extended operations in the Pacific which is also why they will go for nuclear power.
The British QE class was designed way before the tories got obsessed with the Pacific and is, in some ways, optimised for Atlantic operations with its shorter logistical trail. A QE can bunker only about a quarter of the aviation fuel of a Nimitz or the CdG, for example, because it's conventionally powered (the QE/PoW need to carry 4,000 tons of fuel just to make the ship go) and it's assumed it will always be accompanied by an oiler.
I do quite like the "Sacre Coeur" island, and Papa/Nicole bustle back on the new French Carrier.
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
We've lost some overambitious suppliers (= for those their capital investment has reduced your prices at their cost), and the strong regulation has ensured that stronger players have picked up the customers at no loss to the customers.
We still have a large number of players in the market, and post the current couple of years of crisis it will work well again.
Nationalising anything is usually a pretty good way to stop it functioning effectively.
Nope. It hasn’t worked well. It’s resulted in needless admin and confusion for me for no benefit. It’s the same juice ffs — a casino on energy price speculation is crackers.
It's sort of a potemkin market. Upshot is froth & speculation & needless complexity instead of the no-frills efficient provision of a uniform utility product that everybody needs and for which price and availability are the only important metrics.
When you have people over do you show them *your* gas? How pretty it looks? How strong the flow to your hob? The sweet sweet smell of it, so much sweeter than the sort they have next door? No, you don't.
"France’s ‘Iron Lady’: Inspired by Margaret Thatcher, could Valérie Pécresse succeed Macron? The chic mother-of-three pledges to create a ‘new France’ if elected the country’s first female head of state"
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
We've lost some overambitious suppliers (= for those their capital investment has reduced your prices at their cost), and the strong regulation has ensured that stronger players have picked up the customers at no loss to the customers.
We still have a large number of players in the market, and post the current couple of years of crisis it will work well again.
Nationalising anything is usually a pretty good way to stop it functioning effectively.
Nope. It hasn’t worked well. It’s resulted in needless admin and confusion for me for no benefit. It’s the same juice ffs — a casino on energy price speculation is crackers.
It's sort of a potemkin market. Upshot is froth & speculation & needless complexity instead of the no-frills efficient provision of a uniform utility product that everybody needs and for which price and availability are the only important metrics.
When you have people over do you show them *your* gas? How pretty it looks? How strong the flow to your hob? The sweet sweet smell of it, so much sweeter than the sort they have next door? No, you don't.
"France’s ‘Iron Lady’: Inspired by Margaret Thatcher, could Valérie Pécresse succeed Macron? The chic mother-of-three pledges to create a ‘new France’ if elected the country’s first female head of state"
Martin Lewis was not the energy regulator. Just like the FCA under Bailey vis a vis p2p lending, OFGEM catastrophically mis-regulated UK energy markets.
Why have a market at all? What is the bloody point of it? Nationalise it.
Because it has worked well.
We've lost some overambitious suppliers (= for those their capital investment has reduced your prices at their cost), and the strong regulation has ensured that stronger players have picked up the customers at no loss to the customers.
We still have a large number of players in the market, and post the current couple of years of crisis it will work well again.
Nationalising anything is usually a pretty good way to stop it functioning effectively.
Nope. It hasn’t worked well. It’s resulted in needless admin and confusion for me for no benefit. It’s the same juice ffs — a casino on energy price speculation is crackers.
It's sort of a potemkin market. Upshot is froth & speculation & needless complexity instead of the no-frills efficient provision of a uniform utility product that everybody needs and for which price and availability are the only important metrics.
When you have people over do you show them *your* gas? How pretty it looks? How strong the flow to your hob? The sweet sweet smell of it, so much sweeter than the sort they have next door? No, you don't.
Ha! Exactly.
Nope. It has worked well on the whole.
It is a bonkers – a selection of 'brands' selling exactly the same product. Casino capitalism. Crackers.
Not going to lie but I'm positively tumescent that our aircraft carriers are much bigger than the French one.
Don’t we have to buy carrier planes from the French now as we don’t have planes which can land on ours?
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
No. Ours don't have cats and traps.
I'm not aware that aircraft carriers have ever used magnetic traps; I thought it was cables. @Dura_Ace may advise differently.
I don't think magnetic stopping is quite here yet.
USS Gerald Ford is now operational with AAG which uses a combination of water turbines and an induction motor the size of a house for arresting recovered aircraft.
Are aluminium planes magnetic?
AIUI the new AAG uses 'traditional' wires that the aircraft have to snag. What differs is the system they use to slow down the speed the wires spool out - in other words, to remove the energy from the aircraft. I've no idea how it works, but would be fascinated to know.
Wouldn't mind knowing. I'd assumed it was basically resistive braking - connect the cables to electric motors/dynamos and turbines to pump water through narrow holes (like the recoil buffer and recuperator on a 1900-standard field gun, in analogy). And launching by linear motor. But they seem remarkably coy in saying just what it is. Some pretty films though.
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
In any case: it is (rightly, IMV) SNP policy not to interfere in English internal matters, except where there is some knockon effect on Scotland. So Cookie's fretting is characteristic Tory panicmongering (not by Cookie himself I am sure). Especially as the Tories have pointedly deleted the one mechanism devised to control that issue, EVEL, other than the SNP's self-abnegation on the matter. Grievance manufacturing on their part. It's logical enough though for a British nationalist party - they can't complain if the SNP were in fact to have the balancing vote on an English-only policy, they were content to control Scots law and administration [edit] even when they did not have a majority of the vote in Scotland , and would still be, given what Mr Johnson has said about wanting to abolish devolution, which he retains the power to do.
Do they stick to that though? My recollection is that the SNP are very happy to vote on theings in parliament that are devolved matters and so don't affect their own constituents. Admittedly the only example which springs to mind is something to do with hunting. And I don't think Nicola Sturgeon is benign to England. The way she ran the pandemic showed that. Do you remember the barring of people from Greater Manchester (where rates were lower than in Scotland)?
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
Fair enough. But don't make the mistake of thinking LDs is one step along the road to Labour. On the metric of liberty, LDs are at one end of the spectrum and Labour at the other. The point is, I suppose, that very few votes are baked in - they need to be won all over again each time.
LDs and Labour poles apart on liberty? No way. I think you're being unduly influenced by the pandemic. What essentially happened there was the core policy - enforced distancing to manage the virus - was adopted almost everywhere that had the wherewithall to do it, inc by our government. Opposition parties supported it and tried every now and gain, but just on the margins and on the fine detail, to create a little attention and kudos for themselves by suggesting some variations. Labour tended to pitch themselves on the prudent side. The LDs less so. I really wouldn't read too much into all that. And definitely not some Big Brother vs Liberty Rules! split between those 2 parties. None of this IS to say, btw, that I think you're on a journey to Labour. In fact I'd be very surprised if that were to happen. You have virtually no leftist instincts that I can detect.
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
In any case: it is (rightly, IMV) SNP policy not to interfere in English internal matters, except where there is some knockon effect on Scotland. So Cookie's fretting is characteristic Tory panicmongering (not by Cookie himself I am sure). Especially as the Tories have pointedly deleted the one mechanism devised to control that issue, EVEL, other than the SNP's self-abnegation on the matter. Grievance manufacturing on their part. It's logical enough though for a British nationalist party - they can't complain if the SNP were in fact to have the balancing vote on an English-only policy, they were content to control Scots law and administration [edit] even when they did not have a majority of the vote in Scotland , and would still be, given what Mr Johnson has said about wanting to abolish devolution, which he retains the power to do.
Do they stick to that though? My recollection is that the SNP are very happy to vote on theings in parliament that are devolved matters and so don't affect their own constituents. Admittedly the only example which springs to mind is something to do with hunting. And I don't think Nicola Sturgeon is benign to England. The way she ran the pandemic showed that. Do you remember the barring of people from Greater Manchester (where rates were lower than in Scotland)?
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
In any case: it is (rightly, IMV) SNP policy not to interfere in English internal matters, except where there is some knockon effect on Scotland. So Cookie's fretting is characteristic Tory panicmongering (not by Cookie himself I am sure). Especially as the Tories have pointedly deleted the one mechanism devised to control that issue, EVEL, other than the SNP's self-abnegation on the matter. Grievance manufacturing on their part. It's logical enough though for a British nationalist party - they can't complain if the SNP were in fact to have the balancing vote on an English-only policy, they were content to control Scots law and administration [edit] even when they did not have a majority of the vote in Scotland , and would still be, given what Mr Johnson has said about wanting to abolish devolution, which he retains the power to do.
Do they stick to that though? My recollection is that the SNP are very happy to vote on theings in parliament that are devolved matters and so don't affect their own constituents. Admittedly the only example which springs to mind is something to do with hunting. And I don't think Nicola Sturgeon is benign to England. The way she ran the pandemic showed that. Do you remember the barring of people from Greater Manchester (where rates were lower than in Scotland)?
THat is about the only example PBTories can remember, foxhunting, which is banned in ENgland anyway so it never actually arose. There was also a problem with a London-based company trying to mandate opening patterns UK wide. But that's about it.
There's quite a bit on twitter of abandoned Russian vehicles in Kyiv Oblast, and of ambushes on Russian columns, but nothing on captured Russian soldiers.
So it looks like they took some losses as they retreated, had to abandon some vehicles, but don't seem to have had any units cut off.
Given how low opinion of the Russian army has fallen, that would seem to be a reasonably well-executed retreat. A humiliating defeat, but could have been worse.
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
In any case: it is (rightly, IMV) SNP policy not to interfere in English internal matters, except where there is some knockon effect on Scotland. So Cookie's fretting is characteristic Tory panicmongering (not by Cookie himself I am sure). Especially as the Tories have pointedly deleted the one mechanism devised to control that issue, EVEL, other than the SNP's self-abnegation on the matter. Grievance manufacturing on their part. It's logical enough though for a British nationalist party - they can't complain if the SNP were in fact to have the balancing vote on an English-only policy, they were content to control Scots law and administration [edit] even when they did not have a majority of the vote in Scotland , and would still be, given what Mr Johnson has said about wanting to abolish devolution, which he retains the power to do.
Do they stick to that though? My recollection is that the SNP are very happy to vote on theings in parliament that are devolved matters and so don't affect their own constituents. Admittedly the only example which springs to mind is something to do with hunting. And I don't think Nicola Sturgeon is benign to England. The way she ran the pandemic showed that. Do you remember the barring of people from Greater Manchester (where rates were lower than in Scotland)?
Sunday trading laws were another.
Yes, because of effects in Scotland by means of UK-wide company policies (very much at the TU's request IIRC).
Comfortable Labour hold in Doncaster. Small swing from Tories.
The outgoing Labour councillor (who was the chair of the crime committee) is wanted for extradition to the US on drugs charges, hence the by-election. Seems to have made no difference.
The red wall clearly still exists in some form, although the turnout was < 14%.
I wonder what proportion were postal votes...
Whatever the proportion, with it being Donny I hope the envelopes were pre-addressed. They could cope with scrawling an X somewhere but anything beyond that is pushing it. Bloody southerners. (It's about 15 miles away from me but still, South Yorks innit?)
I know that's meant to be a joke, but it gets a bit old after a while.
Not everyone is an ex-miner and "strong in arm and thick in 'ead".
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
In any case: it is (rightly, IMV) SNP policy not to interfere in English internal matters, except where there is some knockon effect on Scotland. So Cookie's fretting is characteristic Tory panicmongering (not by Cookie himself I am sure). Especially as the Tories have pointedly deleted the one mechanism devised to control that issue, EVEL, other than the SNP's self-abnegation on the matter. Grievance manufacturing on their part. It's logical enough though for a British nationalist party - they can't complain if the SNP were in fact to have the balancing vote on an English-only policy, they were content to control Scots law and administration [edit] even when they did not have a majority of the vote in Scotland , and would still be, given what Mr Johnson has said about wanting to abolish devolution, which he retains the power to do.
Do they stick to that though? My recollection is that the SNP are very happy to vote on theings in parliament that are devolved matters and so don't affect their own constituents. Admittedly the only example which springs to mind is something to do with hunting. And I don't think Nicola Sturgeon is benign to England. The way she ran the pandemic showed that. Do you remember the barring of people from Greater Manchester (where rates were lower than in Scotland)?
Sunday trading laws were another.
Yes, because of effects in Scotland by means of UK-wide company policies (very much at the TU's request IIRC).
Isn't it a devolved matter? The Scottish parliament could legislate for whatever restrictions it wanted.
In England, the estimated number of people testing positive for #COVID19 increased to a record level (week ending 26 March 2022). Around 1 in 13 people, not in care homes, hospitals or other institutional settings would have tested positive for COVID-19
Suggests positive test rates are down to only 10% of cases, not seen since the first wave with limited testing. Was somewhere close to the 50% mark in the second wave and early in this wave.
It's OK, hospitalisations and deaths remain bell weathers. Although the 34000* deaths and counting of the third wave are not to be sniffed at:
* June 21-current, ONS COVID on death certificate, counting a wave as a full continuous period of high incidence: (i.e. Delta and Omicron as a and b subdivisions of the same wave).
A simple way to understand which seats the Lib Dems are focusing their limited resources is to identify which seats have already got prospective parliamentary candidates selected.
That is simply in response to the jibe, "Big_G won't be posting this" isn't it!
In truth I have been out in town and have been waiting to post it when I came back, but of course @CorrectHorseBattery prompted me to check it and post it
I am not as partisan as some may think
Just post it for completeness, it won’t change other results or overall picture this one one result.
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
In any case: it is (rightly, IMV) SNP policy not to interfere in English internal matters, except where there is some knockon effect on Scotland. So Cookie's fretting is characteristic Tory panicmongering (not by Cookie himself I am sure). Especially as the Tories have pointedly deleted the one mechanism devised to control that issue, EVEL, other than the SNP's self-abnegation on the matter. Grievance manufacturing on their part. It's logical enough though for a British nationalist party - they can't complain if the SNP were in fact to have the balancing vote on an English-only policy, they were content to control Scots law and administration [edit] even when they did not have a majority of the vote in Scotland , and would still be, given what Mr Johnson has said about wanting to abolish devolution, which he retains the power to do.
Gosh has he said he wants to abolish devolution? Was that a piece of performative reactionary blurt-out at a Speccy dinner or something more than that?
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
In any case: it is (rightly, IMV) SNP policy not to interfere in English internal matters, except where there is some knockon effect on Scotland. So Cookie's fretting is characteristic Tory panicmongering (not by Cookie himself I am sure). Especially as the Tories have pointedly deleted the one mechanism devised to control that issue, EVEL, other than the SNP's self-abnegation on the matter. Grievance manufacturing on their part. It's logical enough though for a British nationalist party - they can't complain if the SNP were in fact to have the balancing vote on an English-only policy, they were content to control Scots law and administration [edit] even when they did not have a majority of the vote in Scotland , and would still be, given what Mr Johnson has said about wanting to abolish devolution, which he retains the power to do.
Do they stick to that though? My recollection is that the SNP are very happy to vote on theings in parliament that are devolved matters and so don't affect their own constituents. Admittedly the only example which springs to mind is something to do with hunting. And I don't think Nicola Sturgeon is benign to England. The way she ran the pandemic showed that. Do you remember the barring of people from Greater Manchester (where rates were lower than in Scotland)?
Sunday trading laws were another.
Yes, because of effects in Scotland by means of UK-wide company policies (very much at the TU's request IIRC).
Isn't it a devolved matter? The Scottish parliament could legislate for whatever restrictions it wanted.
Couldn't make the businesses behave themselves and treat their workers fairly. It was actually quite unusual but a case where the businesses IIRC were trying to erase the Sunday pay for their workers in Scotland by means of doing things down south, as I recall.
Comfortable Labour hold in Doncaster. Small swing from Tories.
The outgoing Labour councillor (who was the chair of the crime committee) is wanted for extradition to the US on drugs charges, hence the by-election. Seems to have made no difference.
The red wall clearly still exists in some form, although the turnout was < 14%.
I wonder what proportion were postal votes...
Whatever the proportion, with it being Donny I hope the envelopes were pre-addressed. They could cope with scrawling an X somewhere but anything beyond that is pushing it. Bloody southerners. (It's about 15 miles away from me but still, South Yorks innit?)
I know that's meant to be a joke, but it gets a bit old after a while.
Not everyone is an ex-miner and "strong in arm and thick in 'ead".
Ah sorry mate I'm only messing. If it's any consolation, I'm from Knottingley. Ex-miners are ten a penny here, tons of whom are Geordies, Mackems and Scots. We are nothing if not multi-cultural in our post-industrial bleakness.
That is simply in response to the jibe, "Big_G won't be posting this" isn't it!
In truth I have been out in town and have been waiting to post it when I came back, but of course @CorrectHorseBattery prompted me to check it and post it
I am not as partisan as some may think
Look, we all know you are not partisan, as you are not a true Tory. HYUFD has told us so many times.
Not going to lie but I'm positively tumescent that our aircraft carriers are much bigger than the French one.
Don’t we have to buy carrier planes from the French now as we don’t have planes which can land on ours?
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
No. Ours don't have cats and traps.
I'm not aware that aircraft carriers have ever used magnetic traps; I thought it was cables. @Dura_Ace may advise differently.
I don't think magnetic stopping is quite here yet.
USS Gerald Ford is now operational with AAG which uses a combination of water turbines and an induction motor the size of a house for arresting recovered aircraft.
Are aluminium planes magnetic?
AIUI the new AAG uses 'traditional' wires that the aircraft have to snag. What differs is the system they use to slow down the speed the wires spool out - in other words, to remove the energy from the aircraft. I've no idea how it works, but would be fascinated to know.
Wouldn't mind knowing. I'd assumed it was basically resistive braking - connect the cables to electric motors/dynamos and turbines to pump water through narrow holes (like the recoil buffer and recuperator on a 1900-standard field gun, in analogy). And launching by linear motor. But they seem remarkably coy in saying just what it is. Some pretty films though.
I feel kind of proud I have kicked this discussion off. Electro magnet traps. I have liked every post replying to me, putting me right, I can go on pointless now and not be afraid if carriers come up 🙂
That is simply in response to the jibe, "Big_G won't be posting this" isn't it!
In truth I have been out in town and have been waiting to post it when I came back, but of course @CorrectHorseBattery prompted me to check it and post it
I am not as partisan as some may think
Just post it for completeness, it won’t change other results or overall picture this one one result.
As I said it was my intention to do so, but hardly possible when I was in M & S looking for a weekend treat to cook for my special lady
HY was spot on actually with a post yesterday, you only get 4%+ Labour lead at the moment by stealing from Lib Dems and greens to a degree that looks unreal. I’ll add the fact the combined Lab, ldem, and green total has been dropping quite sharply recently, nearer just 50 now than 57. I’ll also throw in, in this yougov poll, reform + Tory = labour Behind?
I follow the aggregate Lab/Lib/Green share. It's important because in our polarized politics, with wedge issues and 'values' trumping more traditional debates around tax & spend, people having to choose a side even if they'd rather not, what we could be looking at at the next election is a bit of an American type 'trads v progs' situation, a binary fight where one of the 2 sides will prevail and form the government, Tories outright or Labour in a loose alliance.
That's the sort of election the Tories have in mind. They'll seek to paint Labour, in an impressionistic way rather than based on official policy positions, as unsafe on traditional values, and other parties on the centre left as enablers of this. This, plus "vote Starmer get Sturgeon" is going to be the Tory pitch. It's unedifying but they have no choice, really, because with their Brexitification, and the man they've embraced as leader, on most substantial issues they've become, not to put too fine a point on it, intellectually vacant.
I wonder if, when push comes to shove, a lot of 'Conservative' voters will be 'unable' to vote for the current PM & cabinet and simply stay at home.
I wonder that too. I wonder it very intensely!
We can get a handle on it from here. Let's see when the GE is upon us how many PB Tories, many of whom by that time will have written squillions of posts saying what a disgrace Johnson is, are nevertheless planning to 'hold their nose' because the prospect of a Labour government relying on SNP support is just *too* horrendous for words.
See, I'm getting pissed off already.
*Raises hand*
I don't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson. It's not his record - which I maintain is ok on the big stuff - I just don't want him as Prime Minister. But in all honesty I didn't want to vote for a Conservative Party led by Boris Johnson last time, and still did because the alternative was Corbyn. And actually, Boris has more than exceeded mylow expectations. If Boris was facing a nutter again I would be more likely to vote for him, not less.
But I'm almost certainly not going to vote Labour. They appear to be going for dully competent, but it's not apparent from this angle that they'd be doing anything better than the Conservatives. And they - and particularly my local MP - were far too pro-lockdown. But yes - while the prospect of PM Starmer is no worse than underwhelming, the prospect of deputy PM Blackford or Sturgeon IS too horrendous for words. I'm not against Scottish independence on principle, but I am against the SNP having a say in the governance of the UK. The SNP have absolutely no interest in a functioning United Kingdom- in fact, it is inimical to what they are trying to achieve - and to invite them to help govern England would be insane. Plus, aside from their constitutional position, they are pretty much diametrically opposite me politically.
See, Boris is a poor PM, but that is only one of a number of issues which needs weighing up. It's not, for me, unlike you I think, 'literally anyone but Boris' in the same way that the last election was 'literally anyone but Corbyn'.
Actually, I have the luxury of living in a safe seat, so I can vote for who I want, not against who I don't want (though I still voted Con last time because the slightest chance of keeping Corbyn out was worth taking). So I'd like to give the Lib Dems a good look - I liked the approach they took to the pandemic, and if the last two years have shown us anything it's that liberty can't be taken for granted. They're probably winning for me at the moment. Not least because But if they run another campaign like last time which felt like it was designed explicitly to alienate me I expect I'll go off them.
Obviously I'm not going to vote for the Green Party and barring anyone unexpectedly suitable turning up in Wythenshawe and Sale East probably not any of the other rag, tag and bobtail parties.
I can't see as Johnson has been getting lots of big calls right and I actually reckon Nicola Sturgeon is more concerned with improving the lives of people in England than he is. For her it's a deeply secondary matter, compared to all things Scotland, but with the limited bandwidth she has left she'd probably be up for it. For him it's not on the radar. It doesn't get a look in. It's 100% about himself.
But we all vote how we want for the reasons we have. Which is great really. And if you go for LD, having done the Bad Thing last time, it's a good sign as far as I'm concerned. It'll mean Con seats (even if not yours) are going to fall to the LDs in places which don't have it in them to elect a Labour MP. This is on the critical path to GTTO. If that aspect doesn't materialize, the LDs taking a bunch of such seats, we're looking at years more of Johnson and whatever this Tory Party thinks it is after Brexit and under him.
In any case: it is (rightly, IMV) SNP policy not to interfere in English internal matters, except where there is some knockon effect on Scotland. So Cookie's fretting is characteristic Tory panicmongering (not by Cookie himself I am sure). Especially as the Tories have pointedly deleted the one mechanism devised to control that issue, EVEL, other than the SNP's self-abnegation on the matter. Grievance manufacturing on their part. It's logical enough though for a British nationalist party - they can't complain if the SNP were in fact to have the balancing vote on an English-only policy, they were content to control Scots law and administration [edit] even when they did not have a majority of the vote in Scotland , and would still be, given what Mr Johnson has said about wanting to abolish devolution, which he retains the power to do.
Gosh has he said he wants to abolish devolution? Was that a piece of performative reactionary blurt-out at a Speccy dinner or something more than that?
Given the known consequences of Speccy and DT dinners, I think we need to take it very seriously. Though on checking, I'm conflating two things - apols
That is simply in response to the jibe, "Big_G won't be posting this" isn't it!
In truth I have been out in town and have been waiting to post it when I came back, but of course @CorrectHorseBattery prompted me to check it and post it
I am not as partisan as some may think
Just post it for completeness, it won’t change other results or overall picture this one one result.
As I said it was my intention to do so, but hardly possible when I was in M & S looking for a weekend treat to cook for my special lady
I think they've all retreated. Some say they had gone from Hostomel airport on Monday.
The Russians get to do a bit of a stock-take now. Word is that Putin won't see the comparison between troops and equipment sent across the border and the numbers that came back.
Maybe they'll stick the numbers in an appendix and put a bar chart together instead.
If they get the Lib Dems to produce the bar chart, he’ll think he’s won.
Comments
It is reminiscent of that famous and undoctored photo of Lusty looking a bit sheepish next to the Johnny Reb.
Charles de Gaulle is 858 feet long
So yes, it is bollocks.
Second joke: You can take the Russians out of Chernobyl, but you can't take the Chernobyl out of Russians.
As someone upthread said, there are going to be an awful lot of dark humour jokes coming out now.
We've lost some overambitious suppliers (= for those their capital investment has reduced your prices at their cost), and the strong regulation has ensured that stronger players have picked up the customers at no loss to the customers.
We still have a large number of players in the market, and post the current couple of years of crisis it will work well again.
Nationalising anything is usually a pretty good way to stop it functioning effectively.
They should nationalise it all, let the government set the price and take the electoral consequences for it.
*Only joking, they still won't give a fuck.
https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1509872342188675072?t=3xHzGenisqz4em5OY7Mb7A&s=19
I think my dad said, for the “magnetic trap” to work each time plane lands, everything in the kitchen needs to be turned off first.
I'm not sure where the needless admin comes from.
My only issue was when EON got the wrong house and switched the neighbour's supply by mistake.
But for a bill about 20-25% below market average for a decade that's a small price to pay.
And - in case you run away abroad again - most of them have been following our example to various degrees.
We have a lot of space over our car parks that could be used to collect solar power.
Having written the above I got interested so I looked at the numbers of off-street car parking spaces and used about a third of that area for solar roof. I also exclude the feeder roads etc. The numbers are from a twenty year old CPRE document so I'm confident that they are on the low side. Definitely back of an envelope stuff.
All numbers are in Square Km.
24 Local Authority ground level public space car parks in the UK.
1.5 top level of multi-storey car parks -UK footprint of multi storey car parks is 4.
8.5 big shops.
8 business customer parking
120 business parking but there are no figures on how much is underground.
125 HGV parking. Ports and rest stops not included.
20 car dealers, distributors, petrol sales.
12 schools
1.3 university parking
8.8 hospital parking
383 off street domestic hard standing.
6.3 sports centre, racecourse, similar
3.2 airport parking
+
610 square kilometres.
Which would produce >35GW. (10% UK leccy)
Currently all the existing solar farms and rooftop installations produce 13GW. Asking people to add a solar car port at home is a bit of a push but public realm and commercial car parks would not cost us any green space whatsoever. And they would certainly undermine Mad Vlad's business plan.
All numbers are wildly approximate, but they err on the side of caution. And I'm sure that there is a better done calc somewhere, but I like to lurk in details.
The QE/CdG comparison does illustrate how lack of pan-European defence integration is hurting everyone. The French have ended up with a 100% capable carrier and air wing that's available 50% of the time and the British have got a 50% capable carrier and air wing that's available 100% of the time because there is two of them.
I think you dad is talking about https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_aircraft_launch_system - which isn't present on the UK carriers.
I'm not aware that aircraft carriers have ever used magnetic traps; I thought it was cables. @Dura_Ace may advise differently.
I don't think magnetic stopping is quite here yet.
Aircraft carriers, portable runways you can float around the world where you need it sound like a good idea to me - but now that everything Russia put in air above Ukraine got shot down so easy, if airplanes are not much use in war zone anymore we could always use them as dronecraft carriers instead? And they can’t go on their own, they need protection and other ships all around them in flotilla, which sounds expensive?
The red wall clearly still exists in some form, although the turnout was < 14%.
I wonder what proportion were postal votes...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Arresting_Gear
The entire thing is a complete shambles.
Was the decision made by Mons. Sarkozy?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/sep/07/france-sarkozy-stands-accused-height
The Charles De Gaulle had to have it's flight deck lengthened after trials.
The American carriers are actually limited by the size of dry docks.
I'm all for adding solar panels to new builds when the incremental costs are minimal but until we find a way of storing summer electricity for use in the winter, solar panels are not a solution to our needs.
AIUI the USAF have also slowed down their orders.
I am not as partisan as some may think
The Russian mindset is "If we can't have it, you can't have it either...."
UK normal lecky demand is about 35GW (power), whilst annual electrical energy use is around 350 TWh (energy).
The British QE class was designed way before the tories got obsessed with the Pacific and is, in some ways, optimised for Atlantic operations with its shorter logistical trail. A QE can bunker only about a quarter of the aviation fuel of a Nimitz or the CdG, for example, because it's conventionally powered (the QE/PoW need to carry 4,000 tons of fuel just to make the ship go) and it's assumed it will always be accompanied by an oiler.
The fire which destroyed the filling cabinet with the paperwork for the propellors for the CdG was impressive. It managed to leave every other filling cabinet around it untouched.
When you have people over do you show them *your* gas? How pretty it looks? How strong the flow to your hob? The sweet sweet smell of it, so much sweeter than the sort they have next door? No, you don't.
Claims of 700 Russian vehicles being seen driven towards Belarus north of Ivankiv before the Ukrainians took it back. Anyone know how many headed south in the first place?
There's this tweet: https://twitter.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1509879636989251584
"We’re having an absolutely incredible day.
I just can’t keep up drawing a map with new towns and cities of the Kyiv region, from which Russia has withdrawn its forces."
Voting intentions among business executives
Macron (EC-RE): 52% (+9)
Zemmour (REC-NI): 10% (-6)
Mélenchon (LFI-LEFT): 9% (+5)
Pécresse (LR-EPP): 9% (-5)
Le Pen (RN-ID): 7% (-5)
https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1509889939470700544?s=20&t=3cjBMY_l14jy89NgGn61_A
Macron (EC-RE): 28%
Le Pen (RN-ID): 20%
Mélenchon (LFI-LEFT): 15%
Zemmour (REC-NI): 10%
Pécresse (LR-EPP): 9% (-1)
...
+/- vs. 28-31 March 2022
https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1509833816982138886?s=20&t=3cjBMY_l14jy89NgGn61_A
The chic mother-of-three pledges to create a ‘new France’ if elected the country’s first female head of state"
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/0/frances-iron-lady-inspired-margaret-thatcher-could-valerie-pecresse/
https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/prediction_main.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LN3V5RETIok
And I don't think Nicola Sturgeon is benign to England. The way she ran the pandemic showed that. Do you remember the barring of people from Greater Manchester (where rates were lower than in Scotland)?
(I get the impression that the 'not many frigates being built in Scotland' fiction writers have got under his skin recently.)
So it looks like they took some losses as they retreated, had to abandon some vehicles, but don't seem to have had any units cut off.
Given how low opinion of the Russian army has fallen, that would seem to be a reasonably well-executed retreat. A humiliating defeat, but could have been worse.
https://mobile.twitter.com/ChristopherJM/status/1509857646517661698
As I’ve pointed out many times before, Ukraine’s security service, the SBU, has a long and troubled history with turncoats and double agents. Here's a Dec. 2014 story I did on the SBU’s problem with Russian infiltrators and efforts to root them out. https://mashable.com/archive/russian-vs-ukrainian-spies
And from 2019.
Mission: Impossible? Ukraine's New President Ventures To Reform Powerful State Spy Agency
https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-zelenskiy-reform-state-spy-agency-sbu-/30114589.html
(TLDR, more corrupt than a Tory PPE contract, and with even close ties to the Russian...)
Not everyone is an ex-miner and "strong in arm and thick in 'ead".
It's OK, hospitalisations and deaths remain bell weathers. Although the 34000* deaths and counting of the third wave are not to be sniffed at:
* June 21-current, ONS COVID on death certificate, counting a wave as a full continuous period of high incidence: (i.e. Delta and Omicron as a and b subdivisions of the same wave).
Helpfully, Mark Pack has a list on his website:
https://www.markpack.org.uk/167842/liberal-democrat-prospective-parliamentary-candidates/
Could only have been funnier if you posted “who?” 😆
https://twitter.com/Osinttechnical/status/1509841451164782595
I have liked every post replying to me, putting me right, I can go on pointless now and not be afraid if carriers come up 🙂
https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/claim-that-boris-johnson-wants-to-shut-down-scottish-parliament-3297208
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-54965585
Though the Conservatives have effectivcely and in practice abandoned the Sewel convention which is a major retrograde step.