I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
One of the things I have noticed is that Russian airlines are still flying around in their Boeings and Airbuses. I thought that they were not going to be able to repair them due to lack of spare parts? Or are they just running through what they have left and slowly they will have to be taken out of service? Interested if anyone has any ideas on this.
Cannibalising parts.
Can the Chinese make knock-off parts for Airbus and Boeing? Seems like a good business opportunity for them as Russia start to run through all the parts of the stolen planes.
Very unreliable in planes, turns them into ticking time bombs and when the first one falls out of the sky from earlier than expected part failure everyone stops flying.
I presumed that was the case. Haven't they got their own domestic plane production these days, I presume they got flog some of those to Russia.
The other thing about this Red Wall definition is that it ignores the majority of the North. (Labour still has the most seats in each of the three northern regions, contrary to the impression most commentators not from the area give). All 12 in Tyne and Wear for example. What is happening in these seats is just as important. The issues of Hartlepool and Jarrow (not Red Wall), have already been raised. Thus. Half of County Durham and half of Teesside is Red Wall. The other half isn't. Well-to-do Bury is. Wigan isn't. Wakefield constituency is. The other 2/3rds of Wakefield MBC isn't. It's a nonsense really.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
Not an expert on preteens of any gender, but ...
Thinjk about taking in Stirling for a couple of days at least - great castle, real scenery, nice town, cattle too in field or in nearby attractions. Wallace Monument, of course, and near the Trossachs for some Highland scenery. Access by train easy if that helps. That would tick the daughterly boxes pdq.
Maybe look at Oban for a cruise around Mull, if available?
The Highlands can be quite a big place in terms of driving but the Trossachs should give some heather and bumps. Train/A9 to Aviemore if you want more?
I'm tempted to say forget Ben Nevis/Fort William - not my fave area. BN is far too high/lethal for many.
Lothians and east Borders do have plenty of castles and walks and beaches and things to do. And Edinburgh as well.
Look at Historic Scotland and National Trust for Scotland websites.
Possibly also National Museum of Rural Life or whatever it is called at East Kilbride - more over to the Glasgow side but still accessible enough.
But avoid midge season in Highlands!
BN in good weather is fine but the bit you have to watch out for is the Red Burn crossing. If that's frozen over it's really quite dangerous. If you're up the mountain in summer season on a weekend, even when the clouds come in there are so many people up there it's possible to navigate just by sheer numbers of people. The same does not apply during quieter times and getting lost up there is remarkably easy. It's a gruelling climb and for the safest experience go there late in the summer when you're less likely to have much snow up top. I've seen very young children with no experience manage the whole climb, but 7 really on the young side of it.
Yes, BN would be too much, especially in October. She can do a 300m ascent, but I wouldn't push her much more than that. I reckon my oldest two could do it on a good day - one for another year.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
The point I am making is yes there are winners and losers. But there are equally winners and losers with the status quo of high house price inflation.
There is nothing unfair about switching things around so that some of the losers of the last couple of decades get to win in the next decade.
Whatever path is chosen, some people will lose out and it would be tough for them, but someone has to lose regardless.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
Which do you think has caused more misery in the past thirty years - people struggling due to negative equity, or people struggling to pay their rent or save a deposit against ever increasing house prices? Don't the latter matter to you at all?
But as you think, hey fuck 'em, investments should only ever go up in value.
The other thing about this Red Wall definition is that it ignores the majority of the North. (Labour still has the most seats in each of the three northern regions, contrary to the impression most commentators not from the area give). All 12 in Tyne and Wear for example. What is happening in these seats is just as important. The issues of Hartlepool and Jarrow (not Red Wall, have already been raised). Thus. Half of County Durham and half of Teesside is Red Wall. The other half isn't. Well-to-do Bury is. Wigan isn't. Wakefield constituency is. The other 2/3rds of Wakefield MBC isn't. It's a nonsense really.
The media tend to really mean anywhere they expect people to wear flat caps and walk whippets whilst displaying their famous hospitality and voting tribally labour. Not Islington or Pebble Mill basically.
One of the things I have noticed is that Russian airlines are still flying around in their Boeings and Airbuses. I thought that they were not going to be able to repair them due to lack of spare parts? Or are they just running through what they have left and slowly they will have to be taken out of service? Interested if anyone has any ideas on this.
Cannibalising parts.
Can the Chinese make knock-off parts for Airbus and Boeing?
Yes and shitloads of them. Usually not whole LRUs but smaller electronic components. The US DoD once estimated they had over 100,000 counterfeit parts (installed on their C-130 and C-17 fleets) that had made their way into the supply chain.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
Which do you think has caused more misery in the past thirty years - people struggling due to negative equity, or people struggling to pay their rent or save a deposit against ever increasing house prices? Don't the latter matter to you at all?
But as you think, hey fuck 'em, investments should only ever go up in value.
Come now, it's OGH's birthday, you two go and talk about recipes or trains or something.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
On Wes Streeting, he's nearly as old as Tony Blair was when he became leader of the Labour Party, yet it doesn't feel like that. I'm not sure if it hurts his chances, but he just doesn't come across as a "proper grown up" who might be about to become Leader of the Opposition.
Sky making a bit of a scene over Priti Patel congratulating Richard Holden for his Starmer "gotcha". I may be wrong, but I haven't noticed you bigging this up like you were Kay Burley's hatchet job on Starmer.
One of the things I have noticed is that Russian airlines are still flying around in their Boeings and Airbuses. I thought that they were not going to be able to repair them due to lack of spare parts? Or are they just running through what they have left and slowly they will have to be taken out of service? Interested if anyone has any ideas on this.
Western planes leased to Russian airlines and registered outside Russia, have had their leases and registrations cancelled.
The Russian government has given them permission to fly inside Russia, but they’ll soon be out of spares and will have to start cannibalising them to keep them serviceable. Perhaps they can find some dodgy Chinese fake spares, these do exist.
If they land outside Russia, they’ll be immediately repossessed by the banks. Russian airlines are flying to a few interenational destinations who have not imposed sanctions, but are doing so with Russian owned and built aircraft.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
Which do you think has caused more misery in the past thirty years - people struggling due to negative equity, or people struggling to pay their rent or save a deposit against ever increasing house prices? Don't the latter matter to you at all?
But as you think, hey fuck 'em, investments should only ever go up in value.
In the dog-eat-dog world that you would like for the rest, reflect on the fact that if you want something you just need to get on your bike a Norman once said. Owning a house is not essential Bart. Don't beat yourself up so much.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
Approaching? - in some parts of the country that's been the case since 2002....
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
Not an expert on preteens of any gender, but ...
Thinjk about taking in Stirling for a couple of days at least - great castle, real scenery, nice town, cattle too in field or in nearby attractions. Wallace Monument, of course, and near the Trossachs for some Highland scenery. Access by train easy if that helps. That would tick the daughterly boxes pdq.
Maybe look at Oban for a cruise around Mull, if available?
The Highlands can be quite a big place in terms of driving but the Trossachs should give some heather and bumps. Train/A9 to Aviemore if you want more?
I'm tempted to say forget Ben Nevis/Fort William - not my fave area. BN is far too high/lethal for many.
Lothians and east Borders do have plenty of castles and walks and beaches and things to do. And Edinburgh as well.
Look at Historic Scotland and National Trust for Scotland websites.
Possibly also National Museum of Rural Life or whatever it is called at East Kilbride - more over to the Glasgow side but still accessible enough.
But avoid midge season in Highlands!
BN in good weather is fine but the bit you have to watch out for is the Red Burn crossing. If that's frozen over it's really quite dangerous. If you're up the mountain in summer season on a weekend, even when the clouds come in there are so many people up there it's possible to navigate just by sheer numbers of people. The same does not apply during quieter times and getting lost up there is remarkably easy. It's a gruelling climb and for the safest experience go there late in the summer when you're less likely to have much snow up top. I've seen very young children with no experience manage the whole climb, but 7 really on the young side of it.
Yes, BN would be too much, especially in October. She can do a 300m ascent, but I wouldn't push her much more than that. I reckon my oldest two could do it on a good day - one for another year.
To take in everything suggested, I recommend a stay in the Cluanie Inn on the A87 to Skye. Plenty of bracing walks amazing views, out in the wilds with nothing much about and a shortish drive from Skye and the Loch Ness fun and games
Surely the logic of Burnham is if Labour loses the next election many of the current leadership team will be party to it. Burnham returning as an MP can say he was no part of it.
After the next election, the leadership contest would start... and Burnham would have no seat.
So he would have to return as an MP before Labour loses the next election. And where is the vacancy for him to come in?
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
In London and the South East that has been the case for at least a decade, also the same in nice coastal areas albeit for different reasons.
Edinburgh appears to be edging towards a minority SNP-Green coalition running the city after Scottish Labour bosses made clear they would block a continuation of the SNP-Labour partnership which has been in power for the past five years.
Sources said the Capital's Labour group leader Cammy Day had been in talks with Scottish party headquarters about the possibility of renewing the SNP-Labour coalition, but it was made clear such a move would be vetoed.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said ahead of last week's elections he did not want formal council coalitions between Labour and other parties, especially the Tories or SNP. But it is understood Councillor Day was keen to see if there could be some flexibility. However, a source said: “The message he got back was No.”
The SNP won 19 seats at the election, Labour 13, the Lib Dems 12, Greens 10 and Tories nine.
Other potential combinations which have been floated include a Labour, Lib Dem, Green coalition, which would add up to a majority or a Labour-Lib Dem minority coalition, but it has not been clear whether such arrangements would also fall foul of Labour’s coalition ban.
If there's no chance of a Lab/LD coalition that doesn't bode well for Starmer as PM 2024. (Or, more likely, early 2025.)
Agreed. If SLab can’t even work with their best pals the SLDs then there is no hope for them. With nearly every Scottish council being NOC it would exclude SLab from every administration except West Dunbartonshire.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
You force me to link this once again
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
Possibly, but any government that was seen to enact policies that caused repossessions would be out of office quicker than they could say free market.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
In London and the South East that has been the case for at least a decade, also the same in nice coastal areas albeit for different reasons.
Even the Telegraph now reports increases in house price with ambivalence nowadays.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
You force me to link this once again
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
That was, actually, not about Wick per se but the lack of Afghans there already. It is not a large place, any more than you would find many Camdenites in a small rural centre up the Panjshir Valley.
As for you yourself: Quot homines tot sententiae: suus cuique mos.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
I would suggest Glencoe. It has an excellent castle, the hidden valley is not too strenuous a walk and the countryside is probably the best in the UK (if you like mountains). The visitor centre is quite good too.
If they land outside Russia, they’ll be immediately repossessed by the banks. Russian airlines are flying to a few interenational destinations who have not imposed sanctions, but are doing so with Russian owned and built aircraft.
SU have been operating them to countries on the Don't-Give-A-Fuck Axis like India, Turkey and China.
Edinburgh appears to be edging towards a minority SNP-Green coalition running the city after Scottish Labour bosses made clear they would block a continuation of the SNP-Labour partnership which has been in power for the past five years.
Sources said the Capital's Labour group leader Cammy Day had been in talks with Scottish party headquarters about the possibility of renewing the SNP-Labour coalition, but it was made clear such a move would be vetoed.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said ahead of last week's elections he did not want formal council coalitions between Labour and other parties, especially the Tories or SNP. But it is understood Councillor Day was keen to see if there could be some flexibility. However, a source said: “The message he got back was No.”
The SNP won 19 seats at the election, Labour 13, the Lib Dems 12, Greens 10 and Tories nine.
Other potential combinations which have been floated include a Labour, Lib Dem, Green coalition, which would add up to a majority or a Labour-Lib Dem minority coalition, but it has not been clear whether such arrangements would also fall foul of Labour’s coalition ban.
If there's no chance of a Lab/LD coalition that doesn't bode well for Starmer as PM 2024. (Or, more likely, early 2025.)
Agreed. If SLab can’t even work with their best pals the SLDs then there is no hope for them. With nearly every Scottish council being NOC it would exclude SLab from every administration except West Dunbartonshire.
Ironic really considering that Labour's policy for Scotland was to rely on eternal Slab-SLD coalitions. Hence the Holyrood and, IIRC, local gmt voting systems.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
Approaching? - in some parts of the country that's been the case since 2002....
Well I agree. But it's easy to underestimate the number of homeowners who like to see the value of their investments rise. Even so, it feels to me that this has finally topped out - almost no-one now welcomes house price increases in a way that they did in the 2000s and even in the 2010s.
Edinburgh appears to be edging towards a minority SNP-Green coalition running the city after Scottish Labour bosses made clear they would block a continuation of the SNP-Labour partnership which has been in power for the past five years.
Sources said the Capital's Labour group leader Cammy Day had been in talks with Scottish party headquarters about the possibility of renewing the SNP-Labour coalition, but it was made clear such a move would be vetoed.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said ahead of last week's elections he did not want formal council coalitions between Labour and other parties, especially the Tories or SNP. But it is understood Councillor Day was keen to see if there could be some flexibility. However, a source said: “The message he got back was No.”
The SNP won 19 seats at the election, Labour 13, the Lib Dems 12, Greens 10 and Tories nine.
Other potential combinations which have been floated include a Labour, Lib Dem, Green coalition, which would add up to a majority or a Labour-Lib Dem minority coalition, but it has not been clear whether such arrangements would also fall foul of Labour’s coalition ban.
Refusing to work with opposition parties at the local level is dumb, especially in Scotland where a large proportion of councils are NOC.
I can understand the non-Tory parties vetoing any coalitions with the Tories: it is after all the national Zeitgeist. But the 4 main centre-left parties are just being childish if they refuse to work together at local level. Predictably, Labour are being the most childish. It’ll seriously piss off their grassroots activists, locking them out of power in most areas.
Remember when Slab would veto their own proposals at Holyrood and collapse the budget just because the SNP administration had put them in the budget at their request?
I sometimes think we’re nice to them just to wind them up.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Really? I think it is one of the dullest parts of Scotland, if not the UK. There are excellent reasons why it has really few visitors and it is a hell of a long way from anywhere. If you like your isolation really profound then fair enough but for your average 7 year old...
Edinburgh appears to be edging towards a minority SNP-Green coalition running the city after Scottish Labour bosses made clear they would block a continuation of the SNP-Labour partnership which has been in power for the past five years.
Sources said the Capital's Labour group leader Cammy Day had been in talks with Scottish party headquarters about the possibility of renewing the SNP-Labour coalition, but it was made clear such a move would be vetoed.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said ahead of last week's elections he did not want formal council coalitions between Labour and other parties, especially the Tories or SNP. But it is understood Councillor Day was keen to see if there could be some flexibility. However, a source said: “The message he got back was No.”
The SNP won 19 seats at the election, Labour 13, the Lib Dems 12, Greens 10 and Tories nine.
Other potential combinations which have been floated include a Labour, Lib Dem, Green coalition, which would add up to a majority or a Labour-Lib Dem minority coalition, but it has not been clear whether such arrangements would also fall foul of Labour’s coalition ban.
Refusing to work with opposition parties at the local level is dumb, especially in Scotland where a large proportion of councils are NOC.
I can understand the non-Tory parties vetoing any coalitions with the Tories: it is after all the national Zeitgeist. But the 4 main centre-left parties are just being childish if they refuse to work together at local level. Predictably, Labour are being the most childish. It’ll seriously piss off their grassroots activists, locking them out of power in most areas.
Remember when Slab would veto their own proposals at Holyrood and collapse the budget just because the SNP administration had put them in the budget at their request?
I sometimes think we’re nice to them just to wind them up.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
You force me to link this once again
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
That was, actually, not about Wick per se but the lack of Afghans there already. It is not a large place, any more than you would find many Camdenites in a small rural centre up the Panjshir Valley.
As for you yourself: Quot homines tot sententiae: suus cuique mos.
My older daughter and I now have an excellent private joke. Whenever we encounter something awful or terrible or dire we look at each other and say “but at least we’re not in…. Wick”
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Really? I think it is one of the dullest parts of Scotland, if not the UK. There are excellent reasons why it has really few visitors and it is a hell of a long way from anywhere. If you like your isolation really profound then fair enough but for your average 7 year old...
Agreed re the marshlands proper. But the Old Red Sandstone tablelands of Caithness as a whole plus Orkney are actually much better than many realise - as Leon discovered, his views on harling apart. The area's entire gestalt is so unique to itself.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
You force me to link this once again
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
That was, actually, not about Wick per se but the lack of Afghans there already. It is not a large place, any more than you would find many Camdenites in a small rural centre up the Panjshir Valley.
As for you yourself: Quot homines tot sententiae: suus cuique mos.
My older daughter and I now have an excellent private joke. Whenever we encounter something awful or terrible or dire we look at each other and say “but at least we’re not in…. Wick”
It's odd, but the thought of living in Camden fills me with agitated horror! Still, full credit to you for making it up there.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
You force me to link this once again
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
That was, actually, not about Wick per se but the lack of Afghans there already. It is not a large place, any more than you would find many Camdenites in a small rural centre up the Panjshir Valley.
As for you yourself: Quot homines tot sententiae: suus cuique mos.
My older daughter and I now have an excellent private joke. Whenever we encounter something awful or terrible or dire we look at each other and say “but at least we’re not in…. Wick”
You haven't heard what the private joke is from the people of Wick.
Edinburgh appears to be edging towards a minority SNP-Green coalition running the city after Scottish Labour bosses made clear they would block a continuation of the SNP-Labour partnership which has been in power for the past five years.
Sources said the Capital's Labour group leader Cammy Day had been in talks with Scottish party headquarters about the possibility of renewing the SNP-Labour coalition, but it was made clear such a move would be vetoed.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said ahead of last week's elections he did not want formal council coalitions between Labour and other parties, especially the Tories or SNP. But it is understood Councillor Day was keen to see if there could be some flexibility. However, a source said: “The message he got back was No.”
The SNP won 19 seats at the election, Labour 13, the Lib Dems 12, Greens 10 and Tories nine.
Other potential combinations which have been floated include a Labour, Lib Dem, Green coalition, which would add up to a majority or a Labour-Lib Dem minority coalition, but it has not been clear whether such arrangements would also fall foul of Labour’s coalition ban.
If there's no chance of a Lab/LD coalition that doesn't bode well for Starmer as PM 2024. (Or, more likely, early 2025.)
Agreed. If SLab can’t even work with their best pals the SLDs then there is no hope for them. With nearly every Scottish council being NOC it would exclude SLab from every administration except West Dunbartonshire.
Ironic really considering that Labour's policy for Scotland was to rely on eternal Slab-SLD coalitions. Hence the Holyrood and, IIRC, local gmt voting systems.
The close personal friendships between Donald Dewar, Gordon Brown, Robin Cook, George Robertson et al and Menzies Campbell, Charlie Kennedy, David Steel, Malcolm Bruce et al is now ancient history. Those guys worked as a proper team. I’m sure that Anas and Alex do talk to each other, but I find it very hard to believe that they are chums outwith the office.
Surely the logic of Burnham is if Labour loses the next election many of the current leadership team will be party to it. Burnham returning as an MP can say he was no part of it.
After the next election, the leadership contest would start... and Burnham would have no seat.
So he would have to return as an MP before Labour loses the next election. And where is the vacancy for him to come in?
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Really? I think it is one of the dullest parts of Scotland, if not the UK. There are excellent reasons why it has really few visitors and it is a hell of a long way from anywhere. If you like your isolation really profound then fair enough but for your average 7 year old...
Not for the average 7 year old unless they enjoy wilderness and nature.
Sounds a bit like what Cameron wanted a decade ago.....
If it had been offered as a third choice it would have probably got a majority
Not sure that many people would rank it their first choice, but something like this would have satisficed 80%+ of the country in a way that neither remain or hard Brexit can.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
You force me to link this once again
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
That was, actually, not about Wick per se but the lack of Afghans there already. It is not a large place, any more than you would find many Camdenites in a small rural centre up the Panjshir Valley.
As for you yourself: Quot homines tot sententiae: suus cuique mos.
My older daughter and I now have an excellent private joke. Whenever we encounter something awful or terrible or dire we look at each other and say “but at least we’re not in…. Wick”
It's odd, but the thought of living in Camden fills me with agitated horror! Still, full credit to you for making it up there.
Wick does manage to make John O Groats vaguely tolerable. Which it isn’t, really
Beyond the marshes the Far North of Scotland is indeed terrific. Better the further west you go
It’s majestic in any weather - except maybe intense mist when you can’t see anything - but if you catch a bright blue summer’s day it is epic. Britain does not have many world class landscapes - the beauty is usually quieter - but that’s one of them
Trying to think of others.
Hebrides throughout
Cornwall arguably has two: west penwith. Then the UNESCO listed tinning areas.
Dorset at its intricate hilly best down to Lyme?
The Lakes I guess
Herefordshire hard by the Welsh border maybe? But I might be biased. Grew up in Herefordshire
Edinburgh appears to be edging towards a minority SNP-Green coalition running the city after Scottish Labour bosses made clear they would block a continuation of the SNP-Labour partnership which has been in power for the past five years.
Sources said the Capital's Labour group leader Cammy Day had been in talks with Scottish party headquarters about the possibility of renewing the SNP-Labour coalition, but it was made clear such a move would be vetoed.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said ahead of last week's elections he did not want formal council coalitions between Labour and other parties, especially the Tories or SNP. But it is understood Councillor Day was keen to see if there could be some flexibility. However, a source said: “The message he got back was No.”
The SNP won 19 seats at the election, Labour 13, the Lib Dems 12, Greens 10 and Tories nine.
Other potential combinations which have been floated include a Labour, Lib Dem, Green coalition, which would add up to a majority or a Labour-Lib Dem minority coalition, but it has not been clear whether such arrangements would also fall foul of Labour’s coalition ban.
If there's no chance of a Lab/LD coalition that doesn't bode well for Starmer as PM 2024. (Or, more likely, early 2025.)
Agreed. If SLab can’t even work with their best pals the SLDs then there is no hope for them. With nearly every Scottish council being NOC it would exclude SLab from every administration except West Dunbartonshire.
Ironic really considering that Labour's policy for Scotland was to rely on eternal Slab-SLD coalitions. Hence the Holyrood and, IIRC, local gmt voting systems.
The close personal friendships between Donald Dewar, Gordon Brown, Robin Cook, George Robertson et al and Menzies Campbell, Charlie Kennedy, David Steel, Malcolm Bruce et al is now ancient history. Those guys worked as a proper team. I’m sure that Anas and Alex do talk to each other, but I find it very hard to believe that they are chums outwith the office.
Edinburgh appears to be edging towards a minority SNP-Green coalition running the city after Scottish Labour bosses made clear they would block a continuation of the SNP-Labour partnership which has been in power for the past five years.
Sources said the Capital's Labour group leader Cammy Day had been in talks with Scottish party headquarters about the possibility of renewing the SNP-Labour coalition, but it was made clear such a move would be vetoed.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said ahead of last week's elections he did not want formal council coalitions between Labour and other parties, especially the Tories or SNP. But it is understood Councillor Day was keen to see if there could be some flexibility. However, a source said: “The message he got back was No.”
The SNP won 19 seats at the election, Labour 13, the Lib Dems 12, Greens 10 and Tories nine.
Other potential combinations which have been floated include a Labour, Lib Dem, Green coalition, which would add up to a majority or a Labour-Lib Dem minority coalition, but it has not been clear whether such arrangements would also fall foul of Labour’s coalition ban.
If there's no chance of a Lab/LD coalition that doesn't bode well for Starmer as PM 2024. (Or, more likely, early 2025.)
Agreed. If SLab can’t even work with their best pals the SLDs then there is no hope for them. With nearly every Scottish council being NOC it would exclude SLab from every administration except West Dunbartonshire.
Ironic really considering that Labour's policy for Scotland was to rely on eternal Slab-SLD coalitions. Hence the Holyrood and, IIRC, local gmt voting systems.
The close personal friendships between Donald Dewar, Gordon Brown, Robin Cook, George Robertson et al and Menzies Campbell, Charlie Kennedy, David Steel, Malcolm Bruce et al is now ancient history. Those guys worked as a proper team. I’m sure that Anas and Alex do talk to each other, but I find it very hard to believe that they are chums outwith the office.
It's still an odd decision by Slab. NOC, as others have said, is almsot inevitable. You don't get to demonstrate your power to fix things. Okay, so they don't get contaminated by the Tories, or by the SNP, but the LDs?
And what was Mr Sarwar doing being so relaxed about the Aberdeen cooncillors who went all Labour going on junior Tory and got suspended, if he now comes out with this? Come to think of it, does anyone know what is happening in Aberdeen re the Slab-Tory alliance?
Been struggling with my success rate on Quordle, so I got together a standard first 4 words covering 20 separate letters and that has been helping. (I don't necessarily have to use all 4).
I'll leave it at that, and let anyone interested imagine or come up with 4 such five letter words if they fancy.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Really? I think it is one of the dullest parts of Scotland, if not the UK. There are excellent reasons why it has really few visitors and it is a hell of a long way from anywhere. If you like your isolation really profound then fair enough but for your average 7 year old...
Agreed re the marshlands proper. But the Old Red Sandstone tablelands of Caithness as a whole plus Orkney are actually much better than many realise - as Leon discovered, his views on harling apart. The area's entire gestalt is so unique to itself.
It is a little like something I heard said of the East Anglian Fens: It is easy to appreciate hills and mountains, but you have to be a real connoisseur to love the fens.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Really? I think it is one of the dullest parts of Scotland, if not the UK. There are excellent reasons why it has really few visitors and it is a hell of a long way from anywhere. If you like your isolation really profound then fair enough but for your average 7 year old...
Agreed re the marshlands proper. But the Old Red Sandstone tablelands of Caithness as a whole plus Orkney are actually much better than many realise - as Leon discovered, his views on harling apart. The area's entire gestalt is so unique to itself.
A good friend of mine just had a week as a Sheriff in Orkney. Absolutely loved it, especially Scara Brae. I have never made it that far but it is definitely on my bucket list. I have a proof in Lerwick in the summer which I am kinda hoping won't settle...
Edinburgh appears to be edging towards a minority SNP-Green coalition running the city after Scottish Labour bosses made clear they would block a continuation of the SNP-Labour partnership which has been in power for the past five years.
Sources said the Capital's Labour group leader Cammy Day had been in talks with Scottish party headquarters about the possibility of renewing the SNP-Labour coalition, but it was made clear such a move would be vetoed.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said ahead of last week's elections he did not want formal council coalitions between Labour and other parties, especially the Tories or SNP. But it is understood Councillor Day was keen to see if there could be some flexibility. However, a source said: “The message he got back was No.”
The SNP won 19 seats at the election, Labour 13, the Lib Dems 12, Greens 10 and Tories nine.
Other potential combinations which have been floated include a Labour, Lib Dem, Green coalition, which would add up to a majority or a Labour-Lib Dem minority coalition, but it has not been clear whether such arrangements would also fall foul of Labour’s coalition ban.
Refusing to work with opposition parties at the local level is dumb, especially in Scotland where a large proportion of councils are NOC.
I can understand the non-Tory parties vetoing any coalitions with the Tories: it is after all the national Zeitgeist. But the 4 main centre-left parties are just being childish if they refuse to work together at local level. Predictably, Labour are being the most childish. It’ll seriously piss off their grassroots activists, locking them out of power in most areas.
Remember when Slab would veto their own proposals at Holyrood and collapse the budget just because the SNP administration had put them in the budget at their request?
I sometimes think we’re nice to them just to wind them up.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
I would suggest Glencoe. It has an excellent castle, the hidden valley is not too strenuous a walk and the countryside is probably the best in the UK (if you like mountains). The visitor centre is quite good too.
And if you stay at Kingshouse, she can have the best experience of Scottish midges!
(I think they've renovated the Kingshouse Hotel in the last few years; anyone know if it's lost its (ahem) character?
Been struggling with my success rate on Quordle, so I got together a standard first 4 words covering 20 separate letters and that has been helping. (I don't necessarily have to use all 4).
I'll leave it at that, and let anyone interested imagine or come up with 4 such five letter words if they fancy.
I generally start Wordle with 'Early' and Quordle with 'Early, Pitch, Mound'. That covers the vowels and generally enough to get me going.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Really? I think it is one of the dullest parts of Scotland, if not the UK. There are excellent reasons why it has really few visitors and it is a hell of a long way from anywhere. If you like your isolation really profound then fair enough but for your average 7 year old...
Agreed re the marshlands proper. But the Old Red Sandstone tablelands of Caithness as a whole plus Orkney are actually much better than many realise - as Leon discovered, his views on harling apart. The area's entire gestalt is so unique to itself.
A good friend of mine just had a week as a Sheriff in Orkney. Absolutely loved it, especially Scara Brae. I have never made it that far but it is definitely on my bucket list. I have a proof in Lerwick in the summer which I am kinda hoping won't settle...
The only negative for me with that area is the fecking midges, but then you can get those anywhere in Scotland or northern Europe
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
You force me to link this once again
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
That was, actually, not about Wick per se but the lack of Afghans there already. It is not a large place, any more than you would find many Camdenites in a small rural centre up the Panjshir Valley.
As for you yourself: Quot homines tot sententiae: suus cuique mos.
My older daughter and I now have an excellent private joke. Whenever we encounter something awful or terrible or dire we look at each other and say “but at least we’re not in…. Wick”
It's odd, but the thought of living in Camden fills me with agitated horror! Still, full credit to you for making it up there.
Wick does manage to make John O Groats vaguely tolerable. Which it isn’t, really
Beyond the marshes the Far North of Scotland is indeed terrific. Better the further west you go
It’s majestic in any weather - except maybe intense mist when you can’t see anything - but if you catch a bright blue summer’s day it is epic. Britain does not have many world class landscapes - the beauty is usually quieter - but that’s one of them
Trying to think of others.
Hebrides throughout
Cornwall arguably has two: west penwith. Then the UNESCO listed tinning areas.
Dorset at its intricate hilly best down to Lyme?
The Lakes I guess
Herefordshire hard by the Welsh border maybe? But I might be biased. Grew up in Herefordshire
After that, hmmm
I don't like JoG either - but in any case if the bairn wants to be the northernmost person in the island of Britain, Duncansby Head is the place to go.
Go beyond Lyme a bit more to the Landslip complex and Beer Head ... and there is, I agree, a lot to be said for the tract from Bredon Hill over to the west. The views from Worcestershire Beacon or Hay Bluff.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
Possibly, but any government that was seen to enact policies that caused repossessions would be out of office quicker than they could say free market.
And that is part of the problem.
Yes, high house prices are a drag on the whole economy; The House Price Theory of Everything (Bad) is pretty compelling.
No, we can't carry on like this.
But doing the right thing for the hive will be politically suicidal, and will wipe some people out completely. Mostly youngish homeowners with hefty mortgages, who aren't really to blame for this. And that ought to give us all pause for thought.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
I would suggest Glencoe. It has an excellent castle, the hidden valley is not too strenuous a walk and the countryside is probably the best in the UK (if you like mountains). The visitor centre is quite good too.
And if you stay at Kingshouse, she can have the best experience of Scottish midges!
(I think they've renovated the Kingshouse Hotel in the last few years; anyone know if it's lost its (ahem) character?
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
Possibly, but any government that was seen to enact policies that caused repossessions would be out of office quicker than they could say free market.
And that is part of the problem.
Yes, high house prices are a drag on the whole economy; The House Price Theory of Everything (Bad) is pretty compelling.
No, we can't carry on like this.
But doing the right thing for the hive will be politically suicidal, and will wipe some people out completely. Mostly youngish homeowners with hefty mortgages, who aren't really to blame for this. And that ought to give us all pause for thought.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
I would suggest Glencoe. It has an excellent castle, the hidden valley is not too strenuous a walk and the countryside is probably the best in the UK (if you like mountains). The visitor centre is quite good too.
And if you stay at Kingshouse, she can have the best experience of Scottish midges!
(I think they've renovated the Kingshouse Hotel in the last few years; anyone know if it's lost its (ahem) character?
October should be OK midge-wise? But take some Avon Skin So Soft anyway,for the wind etc. as well.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Really? I think it is one of the dullest parts of Scotland, if not the UK. There are excellent reasons why it has really few visitors and it is a hell of a long way from anywhere. If you like your isolation really profound then fair enough but for your average 7 year old...
Agreed re the marshlands proper. But the Old Red Sandstone tablelands of Caithness as a whole plus Orkney are actually much better than many realise - as Leon discovered, his views on harling apart. The area's entire gestalt is so unique to itself.
A good friend of mine just had a week as a Sheriff in Orkney. Absolutely loved it, especially Scara Brae. I have never made it that far but it is definitely on my bucket list. I have a proof in Lerwick in the summer which I am kinda hoping won't settle...
The standing stones and circles of Orkney are also hugely impressive. Not quite Callanish or Stonehenge, let alone Karahan Tepe, but still wow
I’ve been over mailonline twice, it must be there somewhere 🤷♀️ Isn’t this the week Starmer gets hounded everywhere “are you going to resign if you get a FPN you fucking hypocrite?”
What’s going on? Do you think the police would investigate a missing Beergate?
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
Possibly, but any government that was seen to enact policies that caused repossessions would be out of office quicker than they could say free market.
And that is part of the problem.
Yes, high house prices are a drag on the whole economy; The House Price Theory of Everything (Bad) is pretty compelling.
No, we can't carry on like this.
But doing the right thing for the hive will be politically suicidal, and will wipe some people out completely. Mostly youngish homeowners with hefty mortgages, who aren't really to blame for this. And that ought to give us all pause for thought.
Bart says caveat emptor and fuck em.
Bart says not fixing the problem hurts and wipes out even more people than who will be hurt when their investments go down instead of up.
There's harm either way, but you say fuck 'em to the others. Without even being able to say caveat emptor to them.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
I would suggest Glencoe. It has an excellent castle, the hidden valley is not too strenuous a walk and the countryside is probably the best in the UK (if you like mountains). The visitor centre is quite good too.
And if you stay at Kingshouse, she can have the best experience of Scottish midges!
(I think they've renovated the Kingshouse Hotel in the last few years; anyone know if it's lost its (ahem) character?
When I have been over there in recent years I have stayed at the Isles of Glencoe hotel which is good and has a brilliant location. When I was much younger and into hillwalking we once camped out in the glen in late summer. I am not sure what the bastards ate before I came along.
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
Possibly, but any government that was seen to enact policies that caused repossessions would be out of office quicker than they could say free market.
And that is part of the problem.
Yes, high house prices are a drag on the whole economy; The House Price Theory of Everything (Bad) is pretty compelling.
No, we can't carry on like this.
But doing the right thing for the hive will be politically suicidal, and will wipe some people out completely. Mostly youngish homeowners with hefty mortgages, who aren't really to blame for this. And that ought to give us all pause for thought.
Showing my ignorance here, but isn't negative equity only an issue if you want to move house?
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
I would suggest Glencoe. It has an excellent castle, the hidden valley is not too strenuous a walk and the countryside is probably the best in the UK (if you like mountains). The visitor centre is quite good too.
And if you stay at Kingshouse, she can have the best experience of Scottish midges!
(I think they've renovated the Kingshouse Hotel in the last few years; anyone know if it's lost its (ahem) character?
October should be OK midge-wise? But take some Avon Skin So Soft anyway,for the wind etc. as well.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
You force me to link this once again
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
That was, actually, not about Wick per se but the lack of Afghans there already. It is not a large place, any more than you would find many Camdenites in a small rural centre up the Panjshir Valley.
As for you yourself: Quot homines tot sententiae: suus cuique mos.
My older daughter and I now have an excellent private joke. Whenever we encounter something awful or terrible or dire we look at each other and say “but at least we’re not in…. Wick”
It's odd, but the thought of living in Camden fills me with agitated horror! Still, full credit to you for making it up there.
Wick does manage to make John O Groats vaguely tolerable. Which it isn’t, really
Beyond the marshes the Far North of Scotland is indeed terrific. Better the further west you go
It’s majestic in any weather - except maybe intense mist when you can’t see anything - but if you catch a bright blue summer’s day it is epic. Britain does not have many world class landscapes - the beauty is usually quieter - but that’s one of them
Trying to think of others.
Hebrides throughout
Cornwall arguably has two: west penwith. Then the UNESCO listed tinning areas.
Dorset at its intricate hilly best down to Lyme?
The Lakes I guess
Herefordshire hard by the Welsh border maybe? But I might be biased. Grew up in Herefordshire
After that, hmmm
The Lake 'I guess'?
I'd also add the Yorkshire Dales. Particularly Wharfedale and Swaledale and their tributaries.
But even in the Lakes and the Dales, while there is beauty - as much beauty as any landscape in the world, to my eyes - it's a homely, cosy, lived-in beauty, in contrast to what the north of Scotland offers us. I'd also add in Loch Linnhe/Loch Eil to your Scottish landscapes, which is I think the most sublime scenery I have ever come across.
I'd say this is all pretty good for a country which in terms of size is at best mid-ranking though!
I’ve been over mailonline twice, it must be there somewhere 🤷♀️ Isn’t this the week Starmer gets hounded everywhere “are you going to resign if you get a FPN you fucking hypocrite?”
What’s going on? Do you think the police would investigate a missing Beergate?
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
I would suggest Glencoe. It has an excellent castle, the hidden valley is not too strenuous a walk and the countryside is probably the best in the UK (if you like mountains). The visitor centre is quite good too.
And if you stay at Kingshouse, she can have the best experience of Scottish midges!
(I think they've renovated the Kingshouse Hotel in the last few years; anyone know if it's lost its (ahem) character?
When I have been over there in recent years I have stayed at the Isles of Glencoe hotel which is good and has a brilliant location. When I was much younger and into hillwalking we once camped out in the glen in late summer. I am not sure what the bastards ate before I came along.
What is it with Scotland and midges? I’ve been to Denmark, Sweden, Ireland etc in summer and not really experienced anything similar yet they share latitud and climate (or maybe I just got lucky)
If you want a truly shocking insect experience Siberia in summer is up there, or the tsetse flies of Kafue, Zambia. Special
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
Possibly, but any government that was seen to enact policies that caused repossessions would be out of office quicker than they could say free market.
And that is part of the problem.
Yes, high house prices are a drag on the whole economy; The House Price Theory of Everything (Bad) is pretty compelling.
No, we can't carry on like this.
But doing the right thing for the hive will be politically suicidal, and will wipe some people out completely. Mostly youngish homeowners with hefty mortgages, who aren't really to blame for this. And that ought to give us all pause for thought.
Bart says caveat emptor and fuck em.
Bart says not fixing the problem hurts and wipes out even more people than who will be hurt when their investments go down instead of up.
There's harm either way, but you say fuck 'em to the others. Without even being able to say caveat emptor to them.
No, I just think these things are complex. You think there are easy options based on a back of a fag packet gut instinct. It is why you are a fan of The Clown.
Been struggling with my success rate on Quordle, so I got together a standard first 4 words covering 20 separate letters and that has been helping. (I don't necessarily have to use all 4).
I'll leave it at that, and let anyone interested imagine or come up with 4 such five letter words if they fancy.
My two standard starting words today really helped, giving me all the letters for bottom right (which sonmeone said on the last thread was tricky) and also only one real option for top right. Should have been 6 and 7 for the two on the left but I made a silly mistake,
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
I've never had a problem with Wick before now, and I've quietly been a little dismayed at Leon's trolling of it. But I hate Lowry more than anything, so fuck Wick. May its dreary walls crumble and a Biblican wave wash the crumbs away.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
I would suggest Glencoe. It has an excellent castle, the hidden valley is not too strenuous a walk and the countryside is probably the best in the UK (if you like mountains). The visitor centre is quite good too.
And if you stay at Kingshouse, she can have the best experience of Scottish midges!
(I think they've renovated the Kingshouse Hotel in the last few years; anyone know if it's lost its (ahem) character?
When I have been over there in recent years I have stayed at the Isles of Glencoe hotel which is good and has a brilliant location. When I was much younger and into hillwalking we once camped out in the glen in late summer. I am not sure what the bastards ate before I came along.
What is it with Scotland and midges? I’ve been to Denmark, Sweden, Ireland etc in summer and not really experienced anything similar yet they share latitud and climate (or maybe I just got lucky)
If you want a truly shocking insect experience Siberia in summer is up there, or the tsetse flies of Kafue, Zambia. Special
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
You force me to link this once again
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
That was, actually, not about Wick per se but the lack of Afghans there already. It is not a large place, any more than you would find many Camdenites in a small rural centre up the Panjshir Valley.
As for you yourself: Quot homines tot sententiae: suus cuique mos.
My older daughter and I now have an excellent private joke. Whenever we encounter something awful or terrible or dire we look at each other and say “but at least we’re not in…. Wick”
It's odd, but the thought of living in Camden fills me with agitated horror! Still, full credit to you for making it up there.
Wick does manage to make John O Groats vaguely tolerable. Which it isn’t, really
Beyond the marshes the Far North of Scotland is indeed terrific. Better the further west you go
It’s majestic in any weather - except maybe intense mist when you can’t see anything - but if you catch a bright blue summer’s day it is epic. Britain does not have many world class landscapes - the beauty is usually quieter - but that’s one of them
Trying to think of others.
Hebrides throughout
Cornwall arguably has two: west penwith. Then the UNESCO listed tinning areas.
Dorset at its intricate hilly best down to Lyme?
The Lakes I guess
Herefordshire hard by the Welsh border maybe? But I might be biased. Grew up in Herefordshire
After that, hmmm
The Lake 'I guess'?
I'd also add the Yorkshire Dales. Particularly Wharfedale and Swaledale and their tributaries.
But even in the Lakes and the Dales, while there is beauty - as much beauty as any landscape in the world, to my eyes - it's a homely, cosy, lived-in beauty, in contrast to what the north of Scotland offers us. I'd also add in Loch Linnhe/Loch Eil to your Scottish landscapes, which is I think the most sublime scenery I have ever come across.
I said “I guess” merely because it is a cliche, but then the lavender fields of Provence are a cliche yet they are still gorgeous
I agree the Lakes aren’t sublime like the Highlanda and Islands. What the Lakes are is *exquisite*
Some of the most exquisite countryside on earth. Add that to their enormous literary/artistic heft and they have to be in a “world Top 100 landscapes”
Edinburgh appears to be edging towards a minority SNP-Green coalition running the city after Scottish Labour bosses made clear they would block a continuation of the SNP-Labour partnership which has been in power for the past five years.
Sources said the Capital's Labour group leader Cammy Day had been in talks with Scottish party headquarters about the possibility of renewing the SNP-Labour coalition, but it was made clear such a move would be vetoed.
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said ahead of last week's elections he did not want formal council coalitions between Labour and other parties, especially the Tories or SNP. But it is understood Councillor Day was keen to see if there could be some flexibility. However, a source said: “The message he got back was No.”
The SNP won 19 seats at the election, Labour 13, the Lib Dems 12, Greens 10 and Tories nine.
Other potential combinations which have been floated include a Labour, Lib Dem, Green coalition, which would add up to a majority or a Labour-Lib Dem minority coalition, but it has not been clear whether such arrangements would also fall foul of Labour’s coalition ban.
If there's no chance of a Lab/LD coalition that doesn't bode well for Starmer as PM 2024. (Or, more likely, early 2025.)
Agreed. If SLab can’t even work with their best pals the SLDs then there is no hope for them. With nearly every Scottish council being NOC it would exclude SLab from every administration except West Dunbartonshire.
Ironic really considering that Labour's policy for Scotland was to rely on eternal Slab-SLD coalitions. Hence the Holyrood and, IIRC, local gmt voting systems.
The close personal friendships between Donald Dewar, Gordon Brown, Robin Cook, George Robertson et al and Menzies Campbell, Charlie Kennedy, David Steel, Malcolm Bruce et al is now ancient history. Those guys worked as a proper team. I’m sure that Anas and Alex do talk to each other, but I find it very hard to believe that they are chums outwith the office.
It's still an odd decision by Slab. NOC, as others have said, is almsot inevitable. You don't get to demonstrate your power to fix things. Okay, so they don't get contaminated by the Tories, or by the SNP, but the LDs?
And what was Mr Sarwar doing being so relaxed about the Aberdeen cooncillors who went all Labour going on junior Tory and got suspended, if he now comes out with this? Come to think of it, does anyone know what is happening in Aberdeen re the Slab-Tory alliance?
The Labour/Conservative coalition looks like it’s history.
Aberdeen election result
SNP 20 councillors (+1) Lab 11 (+2) Con 8 (-3) LD 4 (nc) Ind 2 (nc)
I’ve been over mailonline twice, it must be there somewhere 🤷♀️ Isn’t this the week Starmer gets hounded everywhere “are you going to resign if you get a FPN you fucking hypocrite?”
What’s going on? Do you think the police would investigate a missing Beergate?
Which part of "control our borders" included "zero border checks" ?
Brexit is a shitshow, and will remain so long after those who voted for it are dead.
“Control our borders” including having “zero border checks” is by definition controlling our borders.
We control whether we check or don’t. Not a complicated concept.
You control your front door - you can choose to lock it or leave the door swinging open - whatever option you choose based on what’s best for your family - you are controlling it - your neighbour isn’t.
This is true enough. However, I am pretty sure that "wide open with no checks" was neither what the Vote Leave campaign were proposing nor what leave voters believed they would get.
If we choose to maintain the same control of our borders (none) but suffer greatly from the other side controlling their border (goods and people) then what have we gained? Brexit was supposed to make people's lived experience better, not worse.
Vote Leave and Boris Johnson specifically proposed shedding the EU's protectionism.
We're doing exactly that in dropping the EU's checks with non-EU produce, where its not necessary. Something we couldn't do as EU members. This is exactly what I voted for and what swung me from Remain to Leave.
Vote Leave to create 300,000 British jobs May 12, 2016 In the last few years, the EU has sought to complete five key trade deals, with the USA, Japan, ASEAN, India and Mercosur. Because of protectionism in other European countries, the EU has failed to get a trade deal with any of these countries. When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly. According to the EU’s own figures this will create 284,000 new jobs in the UK. Commenting, Boris Johnson said:
'If we Vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world. These are deals that the EU has tried and failed to achieve due to protectionist forces in Europe.
‘After we liberate ourselves from the shackles of Brussels we will be able to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs right across the UK.
‘Predictably the gloomsters want to do down Britain - they claim we are not strong enough to stand on our own two feet. What total tosh. There is a huge world of opportunity and prosperity out there if we take this opportunity to take back control.’
Oh do stop it. Brexit was pointless. There are no upsides unless you are Boris Johnson, Boris Johnson's band of hopeless-cases-who-wouldn't-be-appointed-by-anyone-else, and a few hedge funds. I know you don't want to accept you were gulled, but you were.
We all now have to live with it, but trying to invent "benefits of Brexit" is about as absurd as Putin trying to invent benefits from his invasion.
Oh give over.
We already have a trade deal agreed with the country I grew up in. That didn't exist pre-Brexit and wasn't possible as an EU member. That is a real benefit, right there.
Its certainly a benefit to New Zealand! Or will be in a decade when it comes into effect. Less of a benefit for British farmers though, which is who the government claimed to be helping by quitting the (massively flawed) CAP.
Bart doesn't like farmers or anyone else that isn't like him (a very small clique), so he doesn't care.
You're kind of right actually.
Why should I like farmers? Or anyone else I don't know, whether they're like me or not?
I neither like nor dislike farmers, I am entirely agnostic to them and everyone else I don't know. If farmers do well then great, good for them. If they don't, then that's OK too, let them get out of business and let a more productive farmer use the land or find an alternative use for the land instead.
I don't care about farmers any more than I would have cared about miners had I not been a baby when that was happening. We needed coal for electricity for three decades after the miners lost their jobs - did you care about them enough to think we should have prevented the closure of the mines?
You prove my point; you are like a stereotype of an extreme left winger; completely devoid of empathy for anyone, unless you feel that they are a bit like you. You are in favour of all sorts of privilege unless they are privileges you can't access yourself. Pretty sad outlook on life really.
I have empathy for others, I just don't cherrypick farmers (or any other self-interested group) over others.
Were we wrong to let the mines close in the 80s?
Was it wrong to let British Leyland ultimately fail?
Was it wrong to allow the Luddites not to succeed in blocking new technology that put them out of work?
I don't believe in Ludditism. I believe that chaotic evolution and the free market allows the best for all in the long run - and that support should be offered as a safety net for those who struggle as opposed to a way of life or "picking winners".
Lol. You will soon be bleating about house prices or some other thing that "is not fair", and how the state should intervene on your behalf to redress the balance. Good post though, almost made you sound pseudo-intellectual, even though it was all bollox that will change with the wind no doubt.
My objection is to the state interfering in the market preventing people building homes.
I extend my belief in the free market to land. Anyone should be able to use their own land for whatever they choose, including constructing homes, if they prefer that, within reason.
I don't want the state interfering getting into construction or anything else. I want deregulation and the state to get out of the way.
You want something that you think might benefit you personally. Pure and simple.
No, I'm consistent. I don't believe the state should be telling us how to run our lives, or the economy.
If someone wants a home, they should be able to build one, wherever they want if the land is theirs.
If someone wants to sleep with a consenting adult, they should be able to do so, so long as both consent.
Etc etc - its not the state's business what adults do with their own property or their own lives.
Thankfully for the rest of us we are happy to delegate a certain amount of freedom so that our next door neighbour on one side doesn't decide it is their right to build a glue factory next to our garden and the neighbour on the other side set up a 24 hour brothel with outdoor music venue.
There are reasons why your simplistic views tend to be regarded as a bit silly.
I'd have no objection to a 24 hour brothel opening near me, so long as everyone there is a consenting adult, but there are noise pollution regulations regarding outdoor music which are regulated by the Environmental Health Agency. I've never proposed getting rid of anti-pollution regulations.
So long as the brothel, or the glue factory, aren't polluting absolutely holding back development is a bad thing. If they are polluting, then special zoning and regulations for polluting industries makes a lot of sense.
If your residential next door neighbour is a twat who makes a lot of outdoor noise 24/7 they'll swiftly get visited by the Police or similar because the noise pollution rules apply to all including residential neighbours too.
In what ways are planning rules any more anti-libertarian than the rules you have just suggested? Keep the planning laws, by all means reform, but no planning is about as silly as removing the restrictions you just mentioned. Good attempt though "Bart", but nil points for debate!
Because rules on pollution are about protecting others from the harm of pollution and setting standards that anyone can operate by, so long as they don't pollute.
Restrictions in order to inflate certain people's assets and take away the rights of others to act, even if they're not harming others, is not the same thing.
As you've said, you don't want housing assets to fall in value. That's just protectionism and market rigging - let the free market determine the fair free value of housing, the state shouldn't be involved in price gouging.
There are potential benefits of house prices falling. From a selfish point of view, that could be good for me, I could buy more property, but I wouldn't wish for it. It would be a disaster for many families that might find themselves in negative equity, and maybe be victims of repossession. But you wouldn't care about them. For people like you they are just a statistic as long as you are not one of the stats yourself. Having seen it happen to people in the 80s and 90s, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on an opinionated selfish oaf like yourself.
65% of households are homeowners. Another 20% want to be.
1. For those who aren't planning to move and have paid off their mortgage it makes little difference. 2. Those with a manageable mortgage and looking to upsize benefit from lower prices. 3. Potential first time buyers gain from lower prices. 4. Those who have a maxed out mortgage lose out from lower prices. 5. Those with multiple properties lose out.
Group 1 is quite large. It would be surprising if groups 2 and 3 are not bigger than group 4. Group 5 deserve no sympathy if prices fall.
You might want to sell the benefits to those that were repossessed back in the day when it happened before.
A large part of Group 5 does not lose, because they are often in group 1. They may use the situation to buy more property.
The ideal situation would be house price stagnation, allowing salaries to catch up. House price collapse causes major disruption and stimulates recession. It is why successive governments desperately try to avoid it.
Successive governments avoid it because older people own homes, are addicted to house price inflation, and are by far the most consistent at actually turning out to vote.
To some extent true, but also of concern was that the people who got burned last time were middle income families. But as Bart thinks, hey fuck 'em, let the market decide.
We must be approaching a point though where high house prices hurt more people than a drop in house prices would hurt?
Possibly, but any government that was seen to enact policies that caused repossessions would be out of office quicker than they could say free market.
And that is part of the problem.
Yes, high house prices are a drag on the whole economy; The House Price Theory of Everything (Bad) is pretty compelling.
No, we can't carry on like this.
But doing the right thing for the hive will be politically suicidal, and will wipe some people out completely. Mostly youngish homeowners with hefty mortgages, who aren't really to blame for this. And that ought to give us all pause for thought.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
I've never had a problem with Wick before now, and I've quietly been a little dismayed at Leon's trolling of it. But I hate Lowry more than anything, so fuck Wick. May its dreary walls crumble and a Biblican wave wash the crumbs away.
I thought it was horrible but I may have been influenced by a local Sheriff who seemed to be of the view that firing a shotgun at the man who had been carrying on with his wife was the least he deserved and certainly not the basis for any court order.
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
The difficulty is the balance between things to do, and "things to do". If "moderately active" and great scenery is the goal, can I recommend a trip up to the Black Isle - loads of great walks but not mountains. And you can have a stop-off in e.g. Edinburgh on the way up and back, and do "City things" (museums, galleries, etc.) for a change in pace.
It surely has to be Skye
Mountains: the Cuillins, some of the most impressive in Europe, despite their small size
Highland cattle: everywhere
Awesomeness: lochs and forests and sea and the old man of Storr
Castles: Dunvegan! (And others)
I took my older daughter there when she was about 8 and she adored it
We had good weather tho…
That is a very good call.
That said, next on my list is to take the 8yo to Orkney as soon as I can find some time. (On which neolithic note, I'm just about to have another quick potter round the BM Stonehenge exhibition.)
I did the Orkneys with my same older daughter (now 15) last summer. It was fab. But we stayed in john o groats so we could also tour the mainland
It’s a cliche but that drive around the top of Scotland is truly amazing (again we got lucky with the weather)
John o groats itself is so hideous it’s funny. Likewise Wick and the flow country. But that makes it quite a cheap place to stay….
The Flow Country has a beauty that only a Philistine would not recognise. Generally not full of tourists and journalists too.
Indeed. And a certain Lowry loved Wick and came back again and again to paint it.
I've never had a problem with Wick before now, and I've quietly been a little dismayed at Leon's trolling of it. But I hate Lowry more than anything, so fuck Wick. May its dreary walls crumble and a Biblican wave wash the crumbs away.
A trip from Inverness to the Far North used to be a very pleasurable experience when the train was a set of Mark 1 coaches with a Class 37 on the front.
I've got good money that says it's not a cheque that will ever need to be cashed. There is literally nobody interested in territorial expansion into Sweden
I'm going to ask a totally OT travel advice question because everyone would rather talk about coffee machines and a very personal argument I'm not really following or basically anything except Andy Burnham.
I've got a week free in Europe in September, Berlin at one end and Amsterdam at the other and just need to hang out somewhere in between. I'll mostly be working instead of running around committing tourism but I want somewhere that's just an interesting place to be for a week or so, preferably a single flight up to 3/4 hours long from both Berlin and Amsterdam and a few hours travel max from the airport (train or rentacar or whatever). UK/France/Belgium/Holland/Germany are out because I've been to them too much before. Somewhere that's kind of a bargain because it's a little bit out-of-season is also good.
Where to go?
Bled (Slovenia) if you like chilling by a lake and/or a bit of walking - easy to get out of the main touristy bit, even on foot. Cheap transfer from Ljubljana.
Aeolian islands, but likely too much faff to get to - don't know whether there are diect flights to Sicily, but you still have to cross Sicily and then get a boat.
Edit: And second? Love and peaceful thoughts to all
How recent is the Slovenia tip? Cos tourism there just exploded 2016-18
Personally I am going riding in Sicily for a week in June and then want to spend a week there with a car. If I want to start in Syracuse and end up at Palermo do PBers recommend driving round the bottom, round the top or across the middle? bearing in mind I will have seen a bit of the interior (Madonie to Etna) from my horse.
On a similar question, by youngest daughter has recently got a real bee in her bonnet about going to Scotland. She wants to see a mountain and a castle and a Highland Cow. Which is all very nice, but she is only seven and too small for munro bagging or too much history all in one go. Still, I'd like to take her (and her sisters, 10 and 12, and my wife) to Scotland in October. Somewhere with things to do for moderately active pre-teen girls, and somewhere where they can take in the scale of the place and be suitably awestruck. Any thoughts?
I would suggest Glencoe. It has an excellent castle, the hidden valley is not too strenuous a walk and the countryside is probably the best in the UK (if you like mountains). The visitor centre is quite good too.
And if you stay at Kingshouse, she can have the best experience of Scottish midges!
(I think they've renovated the Kingshouse Hotel in the last few years; anyone know if it's lost its (ahem) character?
When I have been over there in recent years I have stayed at the Isles of Glencoe hotel which is good and has a brilliant location. When I was much younger and into hillwalking we once camped out in the glen in late summer. I am not sure what the bastards ate before I came along.
What is it with Scotland and midges? I’ve been to Denmark, Sweden, Ireland etc in summer and not really experienced anything similar yet they share latitud and climate (or maybe I just got lucky)
If you want a truly shocking insect experience Siberia in summer is up there, or the tsetse flies of Kafue, Zambia. Special
Comments
All 12 in Tyne and Wear for example. What is happening in these seats is just as important. The issues of Hartlepool and Jarrow (not Red Wall), have already been raised.
Thus. Half of County Durham and half of Teesside is Red Wall. The other half isn't.
Well-to-do Bury is. Wigan isn't. Wakefield constituency is. The other 2/3rds of Wakefield MBC isn't.
It's a nonsense really.
There is nothing unfair about switching things around so that some of the losers of the last couple of decades get to win in the next decade.
Whatever path is chosen, some people will lose out and it would be tough for them, but someone has to lose regardless.
But as you think, hey fuck 'em, investments should only ever go up in value.
Not Islington or Pebble Mill basically.
Paging BigG.
Sky making a bit of a scene over Priti Patel congratulating Richard Holden for his Starmer "gotcha". I may be wrong, but I haven't noticed you bigging this up like you were Kay Burley's hatchet job on Starmer.
The Russian government has given them permission to fly inside Russia, but they’ll soon be out of spares and will have to start cannibalising them to keep them serviceable. Perhaps they can find some dodgy Chinese fake spares, these do exist.
If they land outside Russia, they’ll be immediately repossessed by the banks. Russian airlines are flying to a few interenational destinations who have not imposed sanctions, but are doing so with Russian owned and built aircraft.
So he would have to return as an MP before Labour loses the next election.
And where is the vacancy for him to come in?
I think it's extremely unlikely.
“I’d rather risk beheading by Taliban than live in Wick”
https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/8113251/afghanistan-refugee-taliban-scotland/
As for you yourself: Quot homines tot sententiae: suus cuique mos.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/tory-brexiteers-fume-at-macron-s-plan-for-uk-to-join-new-eu-lite/ar-AAX77iv?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=a5427a55f95548f881c64df9c1ba2e6c
Especially when those investments are in a Ponzi scheme.
Beyond the marshes the Far North of Scotland is indeed terrific. Better the further west you go
It’s majestic in any weather - except maybe intense mist when you can’t see anything - but if you catch a bright blue summer’s day it is epic. Britain does not have many world class landscapes - the beauty is usually quieter - but that’s one of them
Trying to think of others.
Hebrides throughout
Cornwall arguably has two: west penwith. Then the UNESCO listed tinning areas.
Dorset at its intricate hilly best down to Lyme?
The Lakes I guess
Herefordshire hard by the Welsh border maybe? But I might be biased. Grew up in Herefordshire
After that, hmmm
And what was Mr Sarwar doing being so relaxed about the Aberdeen cooncillors who went all Labour going on junior Tory and got suspended, if he now comes out with this? Come to think of it, does anyone know what is happening in Aberdeen re the Slab-Tory alliance?
I'll leave it at that, and let anyone interested imagine or come up with 4 such five letter words if they fancy.
(I think they've renovated the Kingshouse Hotel in the last few years; anyone know if it's lost its (ahem) character?
Go beyond Lyme a bit more to the Landslip complex and Beer Head ... and there is, I agree, a lot to be said for the tract from Bredon Hill over to the west. The views from Worcestershire Beacon or Hay Bluff.
Yes, high house prices are a drag on the whole economy; The House Price Theory of Everything (Bad) is pretty compelling.
No, we can't carry on like this.
But doing the right thing for the hive will be politically suicidal, and will wipe some people out completely. Mostly youngish homeowners with hefty mortgages, who aren't really to blame for this. And that ought to give us all pause for thought.
https://twitter.com/exit266/status/1524291377479094272
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/index.html
I’ve been over mailonline twice, it must be there somewhere 🤷♀️ Isn’t this the week Starmer gets hounded everywhere “are you going to resign if you get a FPN you fucking hypocrite?”
What’s going on? Do you think the police would investigate a missing Beergate?
There's harm either way, but you say fuck 'em to the others. Without even being able to say caveat emptor to them.
I'd also add the Yorkshire Dales. Particularly Wharfedale and Swaledale and their tributaries.
But even in the Lakes and the Dales, while there is beauty - as much beauty as any landscape in the world, to my eyes - it's a homely, cosy, lived-in beauty, in contrast to what the north of Scotland offers us. I'd also add in Loch Linnhe/Loch Eil to your Scottish landscapes, which is I think the most sublime scenery I have ever come across.
I'd say this is all pretty good for a country which in terms of size is at best mid-ranking though!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-europe-61404062
If you want a truly shocking insect experience Siberia in summer is up there, or the tsetse flies of Kafue, Zambia. Special
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Anyway take that HYUFD, they ain’t even in NATO but Boris prepared to start world 3 for them.
I agree the Lakes aren’t sublime like the Highlanda and Islands. What the Lakes are is *exquisite*
Some of the most exquisite countryside on earth. Add that to their enormous literary/artistic heft and they have to be in a “world Top 100 landscapes”
Ooh. I love a list. And I love travel.
Aberdeen election result
SNP 20 councillors (+1)
Lab 11 (+2)
Con 8 (-3)
LD 4 (nc)
Ind 2 (nc)
23 needed for majority
These days on a Sprinter? Not much fun.
"This will annoy the right people."