Why I’m betting that Trump won’t be the WH2024 nominee – politicalbetting.com

TheScreamingEagles said:

A courageous bet from OGH.

squareroot2 said:

SouthamObserver said:

There is no PMQs that has ever taken place that Quentin Letts of The Times does not report has been won by the Tory PM.

That's not true..

Scott_xP said:

Mexicanpete said:

squareroot2 said:

SouthamObserver said:

There is no PMQs that has ever taken place that Quentin Letts of The Times does not report has been won by the Tory PM.

That's not true..

Citation needed

Some of them were won by the Tory LoTo...

Nigelb said:

TimS said:

Lib Dem policy clarification for Thursday morning.

Davey is not proposing limiting the profits of privatised companies. The Lib Dem policy on water companies is fairly clear and sensible:

- Enforce existing rules including more regularly taking companies that infringe to court, and increasing fines to levels that actually have an effect
- Replace Ofwat with a regulator with more teeth
- Set more ambitious binding water quality targets

All things that are perfectly reasonable, and if they are enough to scare off foreign investment then perhaps that’s not the kind of rent-seeking foreign investment we want.

A regulator with more teeth would limit profits.
Though I acknowledge I'm probably more hard line than Davey on this.

DavidL said:

Nigelb said:

Water companies discover all of a sudden that they could have been spending more on their crumbling infrastructure.

UK water companies offer apology and £10bn investment for sewage spills
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/may/18/uk-water-companies-offer-apology-and-10bn-investment-for-sewage-spills

What say their apologists now ?

I'm inclined to agree with this take.
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey said: “This apology and plan just don’t go far enough. For years water companies have arrogantly dismissed the public’s fears of rivers, lakes and coastlines being damaged by sewage discharges.

“This announcement does nothing to match the billions water firms have paid out in dividends to overseas investors, or stop their CEOs being handed multimillion pound bonuses.”

If we don't want "overseas investors" claiming "billions in dividends" we need to rebalance our trade deficit by reducing domestic demand and investing more. Not sure I see Ed Davey arguing for that. If we don't we have to pay rent on the assets we have sold to cover our excess expenditure. If we restrict the rent we get less for the next tranche of assets we sell. These are the facts and Ed and other politicians need to come to grips with them.

malcolmg said:

DavidL said:

Nigelb said:

Water companies discover all of a sudden that they could have been spending more on their crumbling infrastructure.

UK water companies offer apology and £10bn investment for sewage spills
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/may/18/uk-water-companies-offer-apology-and-10bn-investment-for-sewage-spills

What say their apologists now ?

I'm inclined to agree with this take.
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey said: “This apology and plan just don’t go far enough. For years water companies have arrogantly dismissed the public’s fears of rivers, lakes and coastlines being damaged by sewage discharges.

“This announcement does nothing to match the billions water firms have paid out in dividends to overseas investors, or stop their CEOs being handed multimillion pound bonuses.”

If we don't want "overseas investors" claiming "billions in dividends" we need to rebalance our trade deficit by reducing domestic demand and investing more. Not sure I see Ed Davey arguing for that. If we don't we have to pay rent on the assets we have sold to cover our excess expenditure. If we restrict the rent we get less for the next tranche of assets we sell. These are the facts and Ed and other politicians need to come to grips with them.

Surely there is nothing left to sell other than the Royal's palaces.

malcolmg said:

DavidL said:

Nigelb said:

Water companies discover all of a sudden that they could have been spending more on their crumbling infrastructure.

UK water companies offer apology and £10bn investment for sewage spills
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/may/18/uk-water-companies-offer-apology-and-10bn-investment-for-sewage-spills

What say their apologists now ?

I'm inclined to agree with this take.
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey said: “This apology and plan just don’t go far enough. For years water companies have arrogantly dismissed the public’s fears of rivers, lakes and coastlines being damaged by sewage discharges.

“This announcement does nothing to match the billions water firms have paid out in dividends to overseas investors, or stop their CEOs being handed multimillion pound bonuses.”

If we don't want "overseas investors" claiming "billions in dividends" we need to rebalance our trade deficit by reducing domestic demand and investing more. Not sure I see Ed Davey arguing for that. If we don't we have to pay rent on the assets we have sold to cover our excess expenditure. If we restrict the rent we get less for the next tranche of assets we sell. These are the facts and Ed and other politicians need to come to grips with them.

Surely there is nothing left to sell other than the Royal's palaces.

boulay said:

Nigelb said:

LostPassword said:

An interesting interpretation of recent events in Ukraine.

"Mykola Bielieskov
@MBielieskov
RU intensified 🚀 strikes after leaked grim JCS estimates of UA air
defense capacity. RU aim is simple one - deplete UA interceptors stock&open avenues for RU piloted aviation. That’s why though UA air&missile defense performed well it’s not the time to fall into complacency."

https://twitter.com/MBielieskov/status/1659081784624136193

Britain's latest package of defence assistance did include more air defence missiles, so hopefully Russia will run out of long-range missiles a long time before Ukraine runs out of air defence missiles.

The Patriot system missiles are horribly expensive, at nearly $5m a pop.
But the Russian Kinzhal they're shooting down is double that.

And whilst it’s horrific for civilians to be having these Russian missiles hitting their homes, each one is one less missile being targeted at Ukrainian military resources.

It’s almost like a rubbish re-run of the blitz/fire bombing campaign where the enemy thinks hitting the civilian population will destroy the will to fight and forgetting that you probably need to stop the things that will destroy your own military as a priority.

Fairliered said:

malcolmg said:

DavidL said:

Nigelb said:

Water companies discover all of a sudden that they could have been spending more on their crumbling infrastructure.

UK water companies offer apology and £10bn investment for sewage spills
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/may/18/uk-water-companies-offer-apology-and-10bn-investment-for-sewage-spills

What say their apologists now ?

I'm inclined to agree with this take.
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey said: “This apology and plan just don’t go far enough. For years water companies have arrogantly dismissed the public’s fears of rivers, lakes and coastlines being damaged by sewage discharges.

“This announcement does nothing to match the billions water firms have paid out in dividends to overseas investors, or stop their CEOs being handed multimillion pound bonuses.”

If we don't want "overseas investors" claiming "billions in dividends" we need to rebalance our trade deficit by reducing domestic demand and investing more. Not sure I see Ed Davey arguing for that. If we don't we have to pay rent on the assets we have sold to cover our excess expenditure. If we restrict the rent we get less for the next tranche of assets we sell. These are the facts and Ed and other politicians need to come to grips with them.

Surely there is nothing left to sell other than the Royal's palaces.

If we sold Will and Kate to the USA it would plummet Harry and Meghan’s value.

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

algarkirk said:

What a shock. R4 Today goes a bit downmarket and loses listeners.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/18/radio-4-flagship-today-loses-800000-listeners-in-a-year-to-podcasts-and-rivals

algarkirk said:

What a shock. R4 Today goes a bit downmarket and loses listeners.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/18/radio-4-flagship-today-loses-800000-listeners-in-a-year-to-podcasts-and-rivals

Richard_Tyndall said:

malcolmg said:

DavidL said:

Nigelb said:

Water companies discover all of a sudden that they could have been spending more on their crumbling infrastructure.

UK water companies offer apology and £10bn investment for sewage spills
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/may/18/uk-water-companies-offer-apology-and-10bn-investment-for-sewage-spills

What say their apologists now ?

I'm inclined to agree with this take.
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey said: “This apology and plan just don’t go far enough. For years water companies have arrogantly dismissed the public’s fears of rivers, lakes and coastlines being damaged by sewage discharges.

“This announcement does nothing to match the billions water firms have paid out in dividends to overseas investors, or stop their CEOs being handed multimillion pound bonuses.”

If we don't want "overseas investors" claiming "billions in dividends" we need to rebalance our trade deficit by reducing domestic demand and investing more. Not sure I see Ed Davey arguing for that. If we don't we have to pay rent on the assets we have sold to cover our excess expenditure. If we restrict the rent we get less for the next tranche of assets we sell. These are the facts and Ed and other politicians need to come to grips with them.

Surely there is nothing left to sell other than the Royal's palaces.

We could always sell Scotland Might get a few quid.

Selebian said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

malcolmg said:

DavidL said:

Nigelb said:

Water companies discover all of a sudden that they could have been spending more on their crumbling infrastructure.

UK water companies offer apology and £10bn investment for sewage spills
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/may/18/uk-water-companies-offer-apology-and-10bn-investment-for-sewage-spills

What say their apologists now ?

I'm inclined to agree with this take.
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey said: “This apology and plan just don’t go far enough. For years water companies have arrogantly dismissed the public’s fears of rivers, lakes and coastlines being damaged by sewage discharges.

“This announcement does nothing to match the billions water firms have paid out in dividends to overseas investors, or stop their CEOs being handed multimillion pound bonuses.”

If we don't want "overseas investors" claiming "billions in dividends" we need to rebalance our trade deficit by reducing domestic demand and investing more. Not sure I see Ed Davey arguing for that. If we don't we have to pay rent on the assets we have sold to cover our excess expenditure. If we restrict the rent we get less for the next tranche of assets we sell. These are the facts and Ed and other politicians need to come to grips with them.

Surely there is nothing left to sell other than the Royal's palaces.

We could always sell Scotland Might get a few quid.

Management buy-out? But the SNP are potless, aren't they?

Malc, I suspect, might argue that Scotland has been sold out a few times already!

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

boulay said:

algarkirk said:

What a shock. R4 Today goes a bit downmarket and loses listeners.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/18/radio-4-flagship-today-loses-800000-listeners-in-a-year-to-podcasts-and-rivals

As I am incredibly sad I have listened to Today each weekday morning since mid-teens and its evolution of presenters to its now rolling roster. I find Martha Kearney human but also disarmingly incisive in interviews, Mishal Hussein is suitably formal and stern in getting interviews done and Justin Webb seems to be balanced between being serious and uncomfortably fun. Amol Rajan is fresh but does tend to go on about his children too much - maybe he needs a Radio 2 programme as I seem to find that’s all they talk about there. Nick Robinson just needs to step away and host Manchester United Radio for the good of humanity...

Phil said:

Nigelb said:

LostPassword said:

An interesting interpretation of recent events in Ukraine.

"Mykola Bielieskov
@MBielieskov
RU intensified 🚀 strikes after leaked grim JCS estimates of UA air
defense capacity. RU aim is simple one - deplete UA interceptors stock&open avenues for RU piloted aviation. That’s why though UA air&missile defense performed well it’s not the time to fall into complacency."

https://twitter.com/MBielieskov/status/1659081784624136193

Britain's latest package of defence assistance did include more air defence missiles, so hopefully Russia will run out of long-range missiles a long time before Ukraine runs out of air defence missiles.

The Patriot system missiles are horribly expensive, at nearly $5m a pop.
But the Russian Kinzhal they're shooting down is double that.

In a competition between which Military Industrial Complex runs out of materiel first, I think I’m going to be betting on the US/EU one rather than the Russian one.

WhisperingOracle said:

As to Truss

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

You're right that Truss is probably the main cause, but it's also interesting that it seems to have also got another step worse since 2016.

I think what's happened is that you have ideologues cutting regulation, and then you have the same ideologues seeing leaving Europe as an opportunity to keep regulations low. Obviously if a different government comes in it can restore regulation at the national level, in more of a Lexiter argument, but it's interesting how, for figure like Truss, the two opportunities for lack of regulation seem to have been one and the same.

boulay said:

algarkirk said:

What a shock. R4 Today goes a bit downmarket and loses listeners.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/18/radio-4-flagship-today-loses-800000-listeners-in-a-year-to-podcasts-and-rivals

As I am incredibly sad I have listened to Today each weekday morning since mid-teens and its evolution of presenters to its now rolling roster. I find Martha Kearney human but also disarmingly incisive in interviews, Mishal Hussein is suitably formal and stern in getting interviews done and Justin Webb seems to be balanced between being serious and uncomfortably fun. Amol Rajan is fresh but does tend to go on about his children too much - maybe he needs a Radio 2 programme as I seem to find that’s all they talk about there. Nick Robinson just needs to step away and host Manchester United Radio for the good of humanity.

Apart from the variance in presenters though there does seem to have been a shift away from “hard news” to a lot more coverage of “issues” which I suppose is inevitable as it’s something all pervading in society but the one thing that has really started pissing me off is the seeming need to have something about music every fucking day where you are lying there half-asleep, gently coming round to the day and then they put some banging music on to preview a story coming up later. stop it. Leave it to music stations. Twats.

Alanbrooke said:

WhisperingOracle said:

As to Truss

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

You're right that Truss is probably the main cause, but it's also interesting that it seems to have also got another step worse since 2016.

I think what's happened is that you have ideologues cutting regulation, and then you have the same ideologues seeing leaving Europe as an opportunity to keep regulations low. Obviously if a different government comes in it can restore regulation at the national level, in more of a Lexiter argument, but it's interesting how, for figure like Truss, the two opportunities for lack of regulation seem to have been one and the same.

Alternatively if you have 7 million more people crapping in to the same infrastructure you had 50 years ago it's more than likely to be a capacity issue

Alanbrooke said:

BT plans to cut up to 55,000 jobs over the next seven years as it battles to reduce costs - and will replace around a fifth of them with artificial intelligence.

The telecoms giant said its total workforce including contractors will fall from 130,000 to between 75,000 and 90,000 by the end of the 2030 financial year - a reduction of about 42pc.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/05/18/ftse-100-markets-live-news-deutsche-bank-lawsuit-epstein/


And so it starts. Thats 11,000 jobs gone to AI

OnlyLivingBoy said:

WhisperingOracle said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Monbiot makes multiple points there, though ; budgets for monitoring at the EA have been reduced by 55% over the last ten years, prosecutions have gone down by a staggering. 98%.

This is because the Cameron administration effectively changed the entire model of monitoring to "self-reporting" and self-regulation, which must be near the root of it.

Self-regulation is an oxymoron. Don't let people mark their own homework should be one of the basic principles of government.

Nigelb said:

boulay said:

algarkirk said:

What a shock. R4 Today goes a bit downmarket and loses listeners.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/18/radio-4-flagship-today-loses-800000-listeners-in-a-year-to-podcasts-and-rivals

As I am incredibly sad I have listened to Today each weekday morning since mid-teens and its evolution of presenters to its now rolling roster. I find Martha Kearney human but also disarmingly incisive in interviews, Mishal Hussein is suitably formal and stern in getting interviews done and Justin Webb seems to be balanced between being serious and uncomfortably fun. Amol Rajan is fresh but does tend to go on about his children too much - maybe he needs a Radio 2 programme as I seem to find that’s all they talk about there. Nick Robinson just needs to step away and host Manchester United Radio for the good of humanity...

Justin is a bit thick.
Amol Rajan is actually pretty good; he seems to do his prep, as he's quite sharp.

Luckyguy1983 said:

Alanbrooke said:

WhisperingOracle said:

As to Truss

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

You're right that Truss is probably the main cause, but it's also interesting that it seems to have also got another step worse since 2016.

I think what's happened is that you have ideologues cutting regulation, and then you have the same ideologues seeing leaving Europe as an opportunity to keep regulations low. Obviously if a different government comes in it can restore regulation at the national level, in more of a Lexiter argument, but it's interesting how, for figure like Truss, the two opportunities for lack of regulation seem to have been one and the same.

Alternatively if you have 7 million more people crapping in to the same infrastructure you had 50 years ago it's more than likely to be a capacity issue

Quite. And very little new infrastructure due to the EU waterways directive, which the 'defanged' Environment Agency are still enforcing, even in their apparently toofless state.

Cookie said:

Mexicanpete said:

algarkirk said:

What a shock. R4 Today goes a bit downmarket and loses listeners.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/18/radio-4-flagship-today-loses-800000-listeners-in-a-year-to-podcasts-and-rivals

I have jumped ship from the BBC to LBC and Greatest Hits Radio not because the BBC have gone down market, but in the case of R4 their news content is so simperingly pro-Government and R2 sacked Wrighty and Ken replacing them with tosspots.

R4 is pro-government?
(This a genuine question - I haven't listened to R4 for years, but it was never pro-government when I listened. It was never pro-government during the Labour years either, but it consistently attacked the government from the left. I'm surprised it's changed its tone.)

I also lament R2 sacking Ken but I couldn't stand Steve Wright!

R6, you may be mildly interested to know, is also shifting its most treasured presenters aside. I used to be constantly tuned to R6. It's still *good*, but no longer *great*.

Malmesbury said:

Alanbrooke said:

BT plans to cut up to 55,000 jobs over the next seven years as it battles to reduce costs - and will replace around a fifth of them with artificial intelligence.

The telecoms giant said its total workforce including contractors will fall from 130,000 to between 75,000 and 90,000 by the end of the 2030 financial year - a reduction of about 42pc.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/05/18/ftse-100-markets-live-news-deutsche-bank-lawsuit-epstein/


And so it starts. Thats 11,000 jobs gone to AI

It's not AI.

What is happening is that the IT revolution is finally interconnecting systems properly. This is what I do, currently. So a lot of jobs in the "getting data from one system, hacking in Excel, pushing it into another system" category are finally going.

We are heading to a world, where in administration, 99% of operations will be human touch free. As it should be.

In banks for example - I bet you think that a trader trades on a computer and it's all sorted out by the machines? Nope - most places, lots of people in the chain, lots of manual stuff going on.

Where AI *is* being used is in fielding the first level of customer support questions - the chat bots you find online. They can solve 95% of customer problems on the spot. The tricky ones get escalated.

Taz said:

Nigelb said:

boulay said:

algarkirk said:

What a shock. R4 Today goes a bit downmarket and loses listeners.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/18/radio-4-flagship-today-loses-800000-listeners-in-a-year-to-podcasts-and-rivals

As I am incredibly sad I have listened to Today each weekday morning since mid-teens and its evolution of presenters to its now rolling roster. I find Martha Kearney human but also disarmingly incisive in interviews, Mishal Hussein is suitably formal and stern in getting interviews done and Justin Webb seems to be balanced between being serious and uncomfortably fun. Amol Rajan is fresh but does tend to go on about his children too much - maybe he needs a Radio 2 programme as I seem to find that’s all they talk about there. Nick Robinson just needs to step away and host Manchester United Radio for the good of humanity...

Justin is a bit thick.
Amol Rajan is actually pretty good; he seems to do his prep, as he's quite sharp.

Yes, he’s really good. He was wasted on The One Show, I’m glad he’s moved onto something more demanding.

Ghedebrav said:

Cookie said:

Mexicanpete said:

algarkirk said:

What a shock. R4 Today goes a bit downmarket and loses listeners.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/18/radio-4-flagship-today-loses-800000-listeners-in-a-year-to-podcasts-and-rivals

I have jumped ship from the BBC to LBC and Greatest Hits Radio not because the BBC have gone down market, but in the case of R4 their news content is so simperingly pro-Government and R2 sacked Wrighty and Ken replacing them with tosspots.

R4 is pro-government?
(This a genuine question - I haven't listened to R4 for years, but it was never pro-government when I listened. It was never pro-government during the Labour years either, but it consistently attacked the government from the left. I'm surprised it's changed its tone.)

I also lament R2 sacking Ken but I couldn't stand Steve Wright!

R6, you may be mildly interested to know, is also shifting its most treasured presenters aside. I used to be constantly tuned to R6. It's still *good*, but no longer *great*.

R6 and R2 are becoming increasingly similar. It's probably just a reflection of my tastes, but I would like 6 Music to be a *bit* weirder and a bit less cosy with its core demo of Britpop Dads.

noneoftheabove said:

Malmesbury said:

Alanbrooke said:

BT plans to cut up to 55,000 jobs over the next seven years as it battles to reduce costs - and will replace around a fifth of them with artificial intelligence.

The telecoms giant said its total workforce including contractors will fall from 130,000 to between 75,000 and 90,000 by the end of the 2030 financial year - a reduction of about 42pc.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/05/18/ftse-100-markets-live-news-deutsche-bank-lawsuit-epstein/


And so it starts. Thats 11,000 jobs gone to AI

It's not AI.

What is happening is that the IT revolution is finally interconnecting systems properly. This is what I do, currently. So a lot of jobs in the "getting data from one system, hacking in Excel, pushing it into another system" category are finally going.

We are heading to a world, where in administration, 99% of operations will be human touch free. As it should be.

In banks for example - I bet you think that a trader trades on a computer and it's all sorted out by the machines? Nope - most places, lots of people in the chain, lots of manual stuff going on.

Where AI *is* being used is in fielding the first level of customer support questions - the chat bots you find online. They can solve 95% of customer problems on the spot. The tricky ones get escalated.

95% sounds very high, even if its a potential to solve rather than currently solving. In my personal user experience more like 10-20%.

noneoftheabove said:

kinabalu said:

I agree with Mike! Trump is too short in the betting.

Kennedy Jnr and Manchin big lays in the Next President market at 22 and 65. Wouldnt be surprised if either shorten further first though so would leave some spare.

WhisperingOracle said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Alanbrooke said:

WhisperingOracle said:

As to Truss

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

You're right that Truss is probably the main cause, but it's also interesting that it seems to have also got another step worse since 2016.

I think what's happened is that you have ideologues cutting regulation, and then you have the same ideologues seeing leaving Europe as an opportunity to keep regulations low. Obviously if a different government comes in it can restore regulation at the national level, in more of a Lexiter argument, but it's interesting how, for figure like Truss, the two opportunities for lack of regulation seem to have been one and the same.

Alternatively if you have 7 million more people crapping in to the same infrastructure you had 50 years ago it's more than likely to be a capacity issue

Quite. And very little new infrastructure due to the EU waterways directive, which the 'defanged' Environment Agency are still enforcing, even in their apparently toofless state.

But that increase in population has been over many decades.

Obviously all these things play a part, but the multiply increased local reports of river and sea pollution have been primarily over the last decade. Over the last century there seemed to have been a relative but modest improvement, as I recall.

Taz said:

Cookie said:

Mexicanpete said:

algarkirk said:

What a shock. R4 Today goes a bit downmarket and loses listeners.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/18/radio-4-flagship-today-loses-800000-listeners-in-a-year-to-podcasts-and-rivals

I have jumped ship from the BBC to LBC and Greatest Hits Radio not because the BBC have gone down market, but in the case of R4 their news content is so simperingly pro-Government and R2 sacked Wrighty and Ken replacing them with tosspots.

R4 is pro-government?
(This a genuine question - I haven't listened to R4 for years, but it was never pro-government when I listened. It was never pro-government during the Labour years either, but it consistently attacked the government from the left. I'm surprised it's changed its tone.)

I also lament R2 sacking Ken but I couldn't stand Steve Wright!

R6, you may be mildly interested to know, is also shifting its most treasured presenters aside. I used to be constantly tuned to R6. It's still *good*, but no longer *great*.

We’re either Greatest Hits or Virgin Radio now when we’re driving.

Radio 2 I cannot really be doing with now. The music is just not for me.

The BBC can do what it wants and abandon a large demographic if it wants, even if they are liecense fee payers, to cater for a younger or more Niche audience. But that demographic will go elsewhere.

Spotify is also a godsend.

As for R4 being a govt mouthpiece that is absurd.

Westie said:

boulay said:

Nigelb said:

LostPassword said:

An interesting interpretation of recent events in Ukraine.

"Mykola Bielieskov
@MBielieskov
RU intensified 🚀 strikes after leaked grim JCS estimates of UA air
defense capacity. RU aim is simple one - deplete UA interceptors stock&open avenues for RU piloted aviation. That’s why though UA air&missile defense performed well it’s not the time to fall into complacency."

https://twitter.com/MBielieskov/status/1659081784624136193

Britain's latest package of defence assistance did include more air defence missiles, so hopefully Russia will run out of long-range missiles a long time before Ukraine runs out of air defence missiles.

The Patriot system missiles are horribly expensive, at nearly $5m a pop.
But the Russian Kinzhal they're shooting down is double that.

And whilst it’s horrific for civilians to be having these Russian missiles hitting their homes, each one is one less missile being targeted at Ukrainian military resources.

It’s almost like a rubbish re-run of the blitz/fire bombing campaign where the enemy thinks hitting the civilian population will destroy the will to fight and forgetting that you probably need to stop the things that will destroy your own military as a priority.

Most service personnel have civilian family members. Many of the latter haven't been through military training and what it does to the mind.

I'm a civilian and if a missile ever lands on my house because a British administration is at war with a foreign one, I'm unlikely to consider that I've simply taken one for the team without thinking of what the war is about and where it might go.

What do you make of what Prigozhin has been saying? If references to mahogany desks give way to direct criticism of Putin, one of them may be for the chop. That will probably be Prigozhin but if it's Putin then his replacement ain't going to be no peacemaker.

Ghedebrav said:

noneoftheabove said:

kinabalu said:

I agree with Mike! Trump is too short in the betting.

Kennedy Jnr and Manchin big lays in the Next President market at 22 and 65. Wouldnt be surprised if either shorten further first though so would leave some spare.

Kennedy is at 22?! Blimey. If he stays that short closer to the nominations I might invest in laying that. Brian Rose redux.

Malmesbury said:

A

WhisperingOracle said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Alanbrooke said:

WhisperingOracle said:

As to Truss

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

You're right that Truss is probably the main cause, but it's also interesting that it seems to have also got another step worse since 2016.

I think what's happened is that you have ideologues cutting regulation, and then you have the same ideologues seeing leaving Europe as an opportunity to keep regulations low. Obviously if a different government comes in it can restore regulation at the national level, in more of a Lexiter argument, but it's interesting how, for figure like Truss, the two opportunities for lack of regulation seem to have been one and the same.

Alternatively if you have 7 million more people crapping in to the same infrastructure you had 50 years ago it's more than likely to be a capacity issue

Quite. And very little new infrastructure due to the EU waterways directive, which the 'defanged' Environment Agency are still enforcing, even in their apparently toofless state.

But that increase in population has been over many decades.

Obviously all these things play a part, but the multiply increased local reports of river and sea pollution have been primarily over the last decade. Over the last century there seemed to have been a relative but modest improvement, as I recall.

The recent (major) increases in population have been going on for about 20 years.

img src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/1272C/production/_107546557_population_line_chart_640-nc.png"/>

When I spoke to some local planning officials, recently, they were almost afraid to talk about the requirements for infrastructure - apparently, suggesting that having x hundred thousand more people requires more stuff is a bit icky.

OnlyLivingBoy said:

Malmesbury said:

Alanbrooke said:

BT plans to cut up to 55,000 jobs over the next seven years as it battles to reduce costs - and will replace around a fifth of them with artificial intelligence.

The telecoms giant said its total workforce including contractors will fall from 130,000 to between 75,000 and 90,000 by the end of the 2030 financial year - a reduction of about 42pc.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/05/18/ftse-100-markets-live-news-deutsche-bank-lawsuit-epstein/


And so it starts. Thats 11,000 jobs gone to AI

It's not AI.

What is happening is that the IT revolution is finally interconnecting systems properly. This is what I do, currently. So a lot of jobs in the "getting data from one system, hacking in Excel, pushing it into another system" category are finally going.

We are heading to a world, where in administration, 99% of operations will be human touch free. As it should be.

In banks for example - I bet you think that a trader trades on a computer and it's all sorted out by the machines? Nope - most places, lots of people in the chain, lots of manual stuff going on.

Where AI *is* being used is in fielding the first level of customer support questions - the chat bots you find online. They can solve 95% of customer problems on the spot. The tricky ones get escalated.

The tricky ones get escalated very slowly, after multiple "I don't understand that, can you please tell me what your problem is, or go to our Q&As" kind of responses. I had experience of this recently, it was infuriating. Although when I did get through to an actual person they were so unhelpful I'd have been better off speaking to a ZX81.

Malmesbury said:

A

WhisperingOracle said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Alanbrooke said:

WhisperingOracle said:

As to Truss

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

You're right that Truss is probably the main cause, but it's also interesting that it seems to have also got another step worse since 2016.

I think what's happened is that you have ideologues cutting regulation, and then you have the same ideologues seeing leaving Europe as an opportunity to keep regulations low. Obviously if a different government comes in it can restore regulation at the national level, in more of a Lexiter argument, but it's interesting how, for figure like Truss, the two opportunities for lack of regulation seem to have been one and the same.

Alternatively if you have 7 million more people crapping in to the same infrastructure you had 50 years ago it's more than likely to be a capacity issue

Quite. And very little new infrastructure due to the EU waterways directive, which the 'defanged' Environment Agency are still enforcing, even in their apparently toofless state.

But that increase in population has been over many decades.

Obviously all these things play a part, but the multiply increased local reports of river and sea pollution have been primarily over the last decade. Over the last century there seemed to have been a relative but modest improvement, as I recall.

The recent (major) increases in population have been going on for about 20 years.



When I spoke to some local planning officials, recently, they were almost afraid to talk about the requirements for infrastructure - apparently, suggesting that having x hundred thousand more people requires more stuff is a bit icky.

Sandpit said:

Malmesbury said:

A

WhisperingOracle said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Alanbrooke said:

WhisperingOracle said:

As to Truss

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

You're right that Truss is probably the main cause, but it's also interesting that it seems to have also got another step worse since 2016.

I think what's happened is that you have ideologues cutting regulation, and then you have the same ideologues seeing leaving Europe as an opportunity to keep regulations low. Obviously if a different government comes in it can restore regulation at the national level, in more of a Lexiter argument, but it's interesting how, for figure like Truss, the two opportunities for lack of regulation seem to have been one and the same.

Alternatively if you have 7 million more people crapping in to the same infrastructure you had 50 years ago it's more than likely to be a capacity issue

Quite. And very little new infrastructure due to the EU waterways directive, which the 'defanged' Environment Agency are still enforcing, even in their apparently toofless state.

But that increase in population has been over many decades.

Obviously all these things play a part, but the multiply increased local reports of river and sea pollution have been primarily over the last decade. Over the last century there seemed to have been a relative but modest improvement, as I recall.

The recent (major) increases in population have been going on for about 20 years.

img src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/1272C/production/_107546557_population_line_chart_640-nc.png"/>

When I spoke to some local planning officials, recently, they were almost afraid to talk about the requirements for infrastructure - apparently, suggesting that having x hundred thousand more people requires more stuff is a bit icky.

The cognitive dissonance, when it comes to the relationship between population and the requirement for housebuilding and infrastructure, is quite something to watch.

WhisperingOracle said:

Malmesbury said:

A

WhisperingOracle said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Alanbrooke said:

WhisperingOracle said:

As to Truss

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

You're right that Truss is probably the main cause, but it's also interesting that it seems to have also got another step worse since 2016.

I think what's happened is that you have ideologues cutting regulation, and then you have the same ideologues seeing leaving Europe as an opportunity to keep regulations low. Obviously if a different government comes in it can restore regulation at the national level, in more of a Lexiter argument, but it's interesting how, for figure like Truss, the two opportunities for lack of regulation seem to have been one and the same.

Alternatively if you have 7 million more people crapping in to the same infrastructure you had 50 years ago it's more than likely to be a capacity issue

Quite. And very little new infrastructure due to the EU waterways directive, which the 'defanged' Environment Agency are still enforcing, even in their apparently toofless state.

But that increase in population has been over many decades.

Obviously all these things play a part, but the multiply increased local reports of river and sea pollution have been primarily over the last decade. Over the last century there seemed to have been a relative but modest improvement, as I recall.

The recent (major) increases in population have been going on for about 20 years.



When I spoke to some local planning officials, recently, they were almost afraid to talk about the requirements for infrastructure - apparently, suggesting that having x hundred thousand more people requires more stuff is a bit icky.

Well, though, population growth seems to have slowed a lot in the last five years or so, according to that graph, whereas it's precisely in that period, in which we're talking about, where local river and sea complaints seem to have risen most.

There doesn't seem to be a correlation there.

Carnyx said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

Malmesbury said:

Alanbrooke said:

BT plans to cut up to 55,000 jobs over the next seven years as it battles to reduce costs - and will replace around a fifth of them with artificial intelligence.

The telecoms giant said its total workforce including contractors will fall from 130,000 to between 75,000 and 90,000 by the end of the 2030 financial year - a reduction of about 42pc.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/05/18/ftse-100-markets-live-news-deutsche-bank-lawsuit-epstein/


And so it starts. Thats 11,000 jobs gone to AI

It's not AI.

What is happening is that the IT revolution is finally interconnecting systems properly. This is what I do, currently. So a lot of jobs in the "getting data from one system, hacking in Excel, pushing it into another system" category are finally going.

We are heading to a world, where in administration, 99% of operations will be human touch free. As it should be.

In banks for example - I bet you think that a trader trades on a computer and it's all sorted out by the machines? Nope - most places, lots of people in the chain, lots of manual stuff going on.

Where AI *is* being used is in fielding the first level of customer support questions - the chat bots you find online. They can solve 95% of customer problems on the spot. The tricky ones get escalated.

The tricky ones get escalated very slowly, after multiple "I don't understand that, can you please tell me what your problem is, or go to our Q&As" kind of responses. I had experience of this recently, it was infuriating. Although when I did get through to an actual person they were so unhelpful I'd have been better off speaking to a ZX81.

The one I've just been using is for a wine company - their robot says up front, to use the phrase "speak to human" at any time if one wishes.

Malmesbury said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Malmesbury said:

A

WhisperingOracle said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

Alanbrooke said:

WhisperingOracle said:

As to Truss

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

Richard_Tyndall said:

LostPassword said:

WhisperingOracle said:

Pulpstar said:

What on earth has gone on with the sewage in recent years. Plenty of the infrastructure is victorian but the dumping of raw sewage seems to have increased massively in recent years. Has the infrastructure all suddenly broken down in the last 5 to 10 years or so ?
Surely something else has been going on - infrastructure that's worked for ~ 115 to 155 years doesn't suddenly all break at once after 120 to 160.

The Cameron administration, and in particular our Lady Truss, changed the rules and de-fanged the environment agency while in charge, around 2014-16.

Monbiot has been excellent on this, and in fact probably the key voice on it, for almost three years :

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/13/water-companies-britain-seas-sewage-fines-environment-agency

If you think regulation always tends to be a bad thing, and have private natural monopolies like Water, this tends to be the result.

I'm a leftie, I accept that argument as far as it goes, but it's insufficient. What, in a practical, physical sense, has changed with the infrastructure to make it operate so much more poorly? What needs to be fixed to reverse what has gone wrong in the last 5-10 years?

Any system, ancient or modern, will only work properly if it is maintained. The changes that Cameron and Truss made which removed the powers of the Environment Agency during the tail end of the Coalition meant there was no longer the pressure on the water companies to do maintanance and so they didn't.

This is where the Brexit cause argument fails. Even inside the EU the removal of the powers of the Environment Agency meant with the best will in the world there was no enforcement powers left even if the EU jumped up and down. Truss (primarily) is the main cause of the current issues.

You're right that Truss is probably the main cause, but it's also interesting that it seems to have also got another step worse since 2016.

I think what's happened is that you have ideologues cutting regulation, and then you have the same ideologues seeing leaving Europe as an opportunity to keep regulations low. Obviously if a different government comes in it can restore regulation at the national level, in more of a Lexiter argument, but it's interesting how, for figure like Truss, the two opportunities for lack of regulation seem to have been one and the same.

Alternatively if you have 7 million more people crapping in to the same infrastructure you had 50 years ago it's more than likely to be a capacity issue

Quite. And very little new infrastructure due to the EU waterways directive, which the 'defanged' Environment Agency are still enforcing, even in their apparently toofless state.

But that increase in population has been over many decades.

Obviously all these things play a part, but the multiply increased local reports of river and sea pollution have been primarily over the last decade. Over the last century there seemed to have been a relative but modest improvement, as I recall.

The recent (major) increases in population have been going on for about 20 years.



When I spoke to some local planning officials, recently, they were almost afraid to talk about the requirements for infrastructure - apparently, suggesting that having x hundred thousand more people requires more stuff is a bit icky.

Well, though, population growth seems to have slowed a lot in the last five years or so, according to that graph, whereas it's precisely in that period, in which we're talking about, where local river and sea complaints seem to have risen most.

There doesn't seem to be a correlation there.

While it has slowed, it is still growing. Many of the underlying systems haven't expanded to match. So a reduction in the rate of population increase just slows down/puts off the point of crossover of demand vs capacity.

A classic example of this was the first round of attempts, by companies, to use Virtual Machines (VMs) for work. This is at the system where your physical computer is just a terminal connecting to a big, remote server farm. The machine you think you are working on, is actually a bit of software in that server farm.

Great for a number of reasons. Security, hardware upgrades etc.

But the first time round, the accountants realised that by not allowing the server farm to grow with the number of users, they could, apparently reduce costs. This meant that everyone using the system saw their VM run slower and slower. Until, finally, it became unusable.

Same resources, more and more people. The system struggles on....