Sam Freedman had posted a good article, based on a detailed investigation, on what’s wrong with the NHS.
In large part, we just don’t bother investing in capital infrastructure (beds, CT machines, computer systems). We are strikingly out of sync with global norms.
But rather, it's such a large institution with no proper management or accountability that many of its employees don't really care about the level of service that is dispensed to its "customers". If they lose a few patients here and there unless they have been unplugging the life support machine to do the hoovering they know that no one will really know or care.
Apart from the family, obvs, but they, together with the patients, are the least important part of the NHS as far as the NHS is concerned.
OK. Did you read the article?
Of course not. I relied on you to precis it for me. We can't go around reading all the articles posted on PB. That is why we have posters posting posts.
Fair.
Low levels of capital investment was one of three issues cited. The others were loss of experienced staff and replacement with inexperienced ones, probably exacerbated by Brexit; and poor and under-resourced management, confounded by pisspoor target-setting by central government.
When you add the above to the massive backlog created by Covid, you get the current collapse.
The NHS's issues are the same as most public sector body's issues - a perverse incentive flow. Money comes from the Government. More money comes when the service is seen to be in need, even more comes when it is in crisis. If the money came instead from the end users, who were able to choose which treatment providers to patronise, medical treatment would be more like food shopping, and the better for it. The same goes for schools.
Putting end users anywhere near the top of the list of priorities for the NHS would be a multi-decadal task.
Our beautiful Tories, ofcourse, would never be known to have made up policy, just in short-term priorities of what looks good in the media..
No siree...
I wasn't praising the Tories. Just pointing out that the Labour Party's ecological credentials are nuts if they really think that importing oil and gas is better than producing it in the North Sea. This would have been a bad idea in 2021, in 2023 it is demonstrably dangerous as well.
Does Sir Keir not see the link, between self-sufficiency in energy and the increase in utility bills last year?
To summarise for his benefit, countries self-sufficient in energy (France, USA, sandpit) now pay a lot less than those not self-sufficient in energy, thanks to the global energy markets being turned up-side down by war and pandemic in recent times.
I think the point being, Theresa May would have launched this policy in the General Election campaign, but getting ideas out early means you can now row back, not scrap it so it looks like a climb down and defeat, keep the policy, just add a delay of 15 years to it. Watch this space.
Sam Freedman had posted a good article, based on a detailed investigation, on what’s wrong with the NHS.
In large part, we just don’t bother investing in capital infrastructure (beds, CT machines, computer systems). We are strikingly out of sync with global norms.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Not just their core vote, 59% of voters overall oppose allowing more homes to be built on the greenbelt.
If Starmer becomes PM and as he suggests he will do goes beyond building more houses on brownbelt land to allowing much more development in the greenbelt he will face huge opposition, especially in the South and outer London surbubs (even if he does win Bart's vote)
Do any of the 59% have a plan for where everyone is going to live in the decades ahead? Tent shanty-towns in Surrey I suppose.
If we cut immigration significantly we wouldn't need so many new houses.
The UK birthrate is only 1.6 now, well below replacement level
Cutting inflation doesn't reduce prices, it means prices remain high and continue to rise at a slower rate.
Cutting immigration wouldn't mean we'd need fewer houses, it'd mean we'd still having a housing shortage and we'd continue to need even more houses per annum but at a lower rate.
Though you have failed to understand maths or numbers as per usual.
Most recent data is from 2021.
2021 Live Births: 694,685 2021 Deaths: 666,659
694,65 - 666,659 = Natural population growth of 28,026
Birth rate has been below 'replacement level' in theory since 1973. In the past 50 years birth rate has exceeded death rate every single year except 2020 at the height of the pandemic and 1976, despite having a below replacement level birth rate that entire time.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
M62 - and that was there before the motorway, so not exactly relevant.
A key danger for Labour is to fall into the “Jacinda” trap.
Jacinda made a lot of promises, and pretty much failed to deliver anything except for huge increases in the number of public sector workers. NZ is a fundamentally worse-managed society than it was before she came in.
It’s clear that Labour need to be parsimonious in their promises, and aggressive in their approach to public sector reform.
Labour don't have the answers because they refuse to ask the big questions. And some of the policy details around the edges (e.g. oil) is mentalist.
But they will not be incompetent, corrupt and cruel like the current lot. So that will have to do. There's a growing prospect of a decently large Labour majority when the election finally comes, and then of them becoming massively unpopular in swift order.
Brexit has demonstrated one very clear reality - people are fed up with being promised things they can't have. More people than not think the country is going in the wrong direction, they can't agree what the correct direction is, and they won't accept further dither and drift and decay. A poisoned chalice for any incoming PM.
Maybe people shouldn't believe things they know aren't possible.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
"Vote Conservative and we'll poison your children"
there was an anti ULEZ demo near my area of outer London earlier this year. My wife overheard someone at her hairdressers the next day saying, "did you go to the protest, I could only stay 30 minutes until the fumes got too much for me".
Zero awareness.
The Just Stop Oil team were at at again on London Bridge this morning.
I suppose the point still stands that if we wanted to use our cars less (for whatever reason, global warming, fumes, whatever) then we would use them less. But we don't.
I did smile that they were also blockading double-decker buses one of them literally trumpeting its electric/green credentials with bright green paintwork proclaiming "we care..."
Without getting sucked into another tedious Just Stop Oil debate, I think it's important to point out the "if we wanted to use our cars less ... then we would use them less" argument it crap. There are many behaviours that are undesirable that people would do if given free rein: stealing, for example.
If we need to decide whether something should be mandated, encouraged, allowed, discouraged, or banned, "because people want to" is not the only argument.
The default should be towards letting people do what they want when they want, but that's the starting point, not necessarily the end point.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
ULEZ expansion is a big change and will certainly cost Labour votes.
It is probably the right thing to do but the 700,000 drivers who will have to pay or buy replacement cars are going to be far, far more likely to vote based on this issue than the several million who will gain marginally in air quality and less severe increases in fares/taxes elsewhere.
It isn't the right thing to do, it's utter bullshit. Particulate levels are far higher on the tube, which people will be forced to crowd into more by this unjust infringement of liberty.
One person's liberty to fill the air with harmful particulates takes away another person' s liberty to breathe clean air, so it is really a question of balancing competing liberties not infringing liberty. The ULEZ is an excellent policy, government action to eliminate a genuine, life-destroying problem. And I say this as someone who was forced to replace my car to comply with it.
Then you're doubly wrong. Emissions levels are not dangerously high, nor are they rising. They are, notably, orders of magnitude higher on the tube, where they are at levels recognised globally as dangerous. Doing something about this would undoubtedly be in the public interest, but there's no political effort to do so, because the LEZ policy isn't about harmful particulates, it's about taking peoples' cars away. I'm glad you were able to afford to replace your car. Many won't be, and thus a great pillar of 20th century freedom and prosperity comes under threat.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
I think the most likely Tory loss is Mid Beds to the LDs, not Uxbridge (or Selby). The choice of Conservative candidate in Uxbridge will be interesting.
Betting post, If you look at the current betting, you are dangling a great political bet in front of us.
Politics of it, if Tories hold Uxbridge they close off Starmer’s route to Lab Majority - a huge psychological shift and boost for Sunak.
Sam Freedman had posted a good article, based on a detailed investigation, on what’s wrong with the NHS.
In large part, we just don’t bother investing in capital infrastructure (beds, CT machines, computer systems). We are strikingly out of sync with global norms.
But rather, it's such a large institution with no proper management or accountability that many of its employees don't really care about the level of service that is dispensed to its "customers". If they lose a few patients here and there unless they have been unplugging the life support machine to do the hoovering they know that no one will really know or care.
Apart from the family, obvs, but they, together with the patients, are the least important part of the NHS as far as the NHS is concerned.
OK. Did you read the article?
Of course not. I relied on you to precis it for me. We can't go around reading all the articles posted on PB. That is why we have posters posting posts.
Fair.
Low levels of capital investment was one of three issues cited. The others were loss of experienced staff and replacement with inexperienced ones, probably exacerbated by Brexit; and poor and under-resourced management, confounded by pisspoor target-setting by central government.
When you add the above to the massive backlog created by Covid, you get the current collapse.
The NHS's issues are the same as most public sector body's issues - a perverse incentive flow. Money comes from the Government. More money comes when the service is seen to be in need, even more comes when it is in crisis. If the money came instead from the end users, who were able to choose which treatment providers to patronise, medical treatment would be more like food shopping, and the better for it. The same goes for schools.
If you want to see perverse incentives, check out the US health system.
The Greens should not be wibbling about civil liberties. Indeed, they should be advocating taking an eco-authoritarian approach to force right action from the population.
Maybe it's time for cannabis to be made a class A drug. Peter Hitchens could be right.
Or maybe it should be legalised and strength and safety rule applied to it.
When I go to the pub and drink a pint I can be reasonably sure its contents are safe and have a predictable effect on me. If wanted to smoke some weed I'm forced to buy it from someone whose entire business model is avoiding regulation, so it could be cut with anything and its strength could vary by orders of magnitude.
Thank you for your kind comments and I hope your trip goes well as well. As I said I could really have done with a conversation with you a few weeks ago. It would have resulted in a lot of saved time and stress. The enjoyable part of planning a trip became much less so.
Agree re Eurostar - Lets hope they get their act together in the near future.
Re your suggestion about Deutsche Bahn - Thanks for that suggestion. I didn't think of using them for the planning, yet I have done so in the past, so I don't know why I didn't think of them.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Not just their core vote, 59% of voters overall oppose allowing more homes to be built on the greenbelt.
If Starmer becomes PM and as he suggests he will do goes beyond building more houses on brownbelt land to allowing much more development in the greenbelt he will face huge opposition, especially in the South and outer London surbubs (even if he does win Bart's vote)
Do any of the 59% have a plan for where everyone is going to live in the decades ahead? Tent shanty-towns in Surrey I suppose.
If we cut immigration significantly we wouldn't need so many new houses.
The UK birthrate is only 1.6 now, well below replacement level
Cutting inflation doesn't reduce prices, it means prices remain high and continue to rise at a slower rate.
Cutting immigration wouldn't mean we'd need fewer houses, it'd mean we'd still having a housing shortage and we'd continue to need even more houses per annum but at a lower rate.
Though you have failed to understand maths or numbers as per usual.
Most recent data is from 2021.
2021 Live Births: 694,685 2021 Deaths: 666,659
694,65 - 666,659 = Natural population growth of 28,026
Birth rate has been below 'replacement level' in theory since 1973. In the past 50 years birth rate has exceeded death rate every single year except 2020 at the height of the pandemic and 1976, despite having a below replacement level birth rate that entire time.
Is it wrong to want another seven deaths?
Beastly. Beastly
Hang on. I thought I understood demographics, but I clearly don't, and if I can't ask anonymously on an internet forum when can I ask. How is that 1.6 calculated if births is exceeding deaths? I must be missing something obvious here.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
ULEZ expansion is a big change and will certainly cost Labour votes.
It is probably the right thing to do but the 700,000 drivers who will have to pay or buy replacement cars are going to be far, far more likely to vote based on this issue than the several million who will gain marginally in air quality and less severe increases in fares/taxes elsewhere.
It isn't the right thing to do, it's utter bullshit. Particulate levels are far higher on the tube, which people will be forced to crowd into more by this unjust infringement of liberty.
One person's liberty to fill the air with harmful particulates takes away another person' s liberty to breathe clean air, so it is really a question of balancing competing liberties not infringing liberty. The ULEZ is an excellent policy, government action to eliminate a genuine, life-destroying problem. And I say this as someone who was forced to replace my car to comply with it.
Then you're doubly wrong. Emissions levels are not dangerously high, nor are they rising. They are, notably, orders of magnitude higher on the tube, where they are at levels recognised globally as dangerous. Doing something about this would undoubtedly be in the public interest, but there's no political effort to do so, because the LEZ policy isn't about harmful particulates, it's about taking peoples' cars away. I'm glad you were able to afford to replace your car. Many won't be, and thus a great pillar of 20th century freedom and prosperity comes under threat.
Not many people live or spend all day in school on the Tube though.
Some people work there of course (so issues should be tackled if possible*) but a far smaller number than are affected by traffic pollution.
*I would guess train staff are not really affected - air con deals with it? Probably just those working near the lines, e.g. maintenance staff. It's a real issue that should be addressed, but that's not an argument for not addressing a different issue that affects more people.
Sam Freedman had posted a good article, based on a detailed investigation, on what’s wrong with the NHS.
In large part, we just don’t bother investing in capital infrastructure (beds, CT machines, computer systems). We are strikingly out of sync with global norms.
But rather, it's such a large institution with no proper management or accountability that many of its employees don't really care about the level of service that is dispensed to its "customers". If they lose a few patients here and there unless they have been unplugging the life support machine to do the hoovering they know that no one will really know or care.
Apart from the family, obvs, but they, together with the patients, are the least important part of the NHS as far as the NHS is concerned.
OK. Did you read the article?
Of course not. I relied on you to precis it for me. We can't go around reading all the articles posted on PB. That is why we have posters posting posts.
Fair.
Low levels of capital investment was one of three issues cited. The others were loss of experienced staff and replacement with inexperienced ones, probably exacerbated by Brexit; and poor and under-resourced management, confounded by pisspoor target-setting by central government.
When you add the above to the massive backlog created by Covid, you get the current collapse.
The NHS's issues are the same as most public sector body's issues - a perverse incentive flow. Money comes from the Government. More money comes when the service is seen to be in need, even more comes when it is in crisis. If the money came instead from the end users, who were able to choose which treatment providers to patronise, medical treatment would be more like food shopping, and the better for it. The same goes for schools.
If you want to see perverse incentives, check out the US health system.
Indeed, but again there, the incentive flow is f-d up, because most US policies are designed for someone to make a vast profit.
This was the third year in a row where prolonged serious drought had dried out large parts of the river, said Ruth Mackay, a fisheries project officer from West Cumbria Rivers Trust. ..
A key danger for Labour is to fall into the “Jacinda” trap.
Jacinda made a lot of promises, and pretty much failed to deliver anything except for huge increases in the number of public sector workers. NZ is a fundamentally worse-managed society than it was before she came in.
It’s clear that Labour need to be parsimonious in their promises, and aggressive in their approach to public sector reform.
Labour don't have the answers because they refuse to ask the big questions. And some of the policy details around the edges (e.g. oil) is mentalist.
But they will not be incompetent, corrupt and cruel like the current lot. So that will have to do. There's a growing prospect of a decently large Labour majority when the election finally comes, and then of them becoming massively unpopular in swift order.
Brexit has demonstrated one very clear reality - people are fed up with being promised things they can't have. More people than not think the country is going in the wrong direction, they can't agree what the correct direction is, and they won't accept further dither and drift and decay. A poisoned chalice for any incoming PM.
Maybe people shouldn't believe things they know aren't possible.
Usually they believe because some wazzock politician has told them it can be done and is easy - "Stop the Boats" as an example.
Sam Freedman had posted a good article, based on a detailed investigation, on what’s wrong with the NHS.
In large part, we just don’t bother investing in capital infrastructure (beds, CT machines, computer systems). We are strikingly out of sync with global norms.
But rather, it's such a large institution with no proper management or accountability that many of its employees don't really care about the level of service that is dispensed to its "customers". If they lose a few patients here and there unless they have been unplugging the life support machine to do the hoovering they know that no one will really know or care.
Apart from the family, obvs, but they, together with the patients, are the least important part of the NHS as far as the NHS is concerned.
OK. Did you read the article?
Of course not. I relied on you to precis it for me. We can't go around reading all the articles posted on PB. That is why we have posters posting posts.
Fair.
Low levels of capital investment was one of three issues cited. The others were loss of experienced staff and replacement with inexperienced ones, probably exacerbated by Brexit; and poor and under-resourced management, confounded by pisspoor target-setting by central government.
When you add the above to the massive backlog created by Covid, you get the current collapse.
The NHS's issues are the same as most public sector body's issues - a perverse incentive flow. Money comes from the Government. More money comes when the service is seen to be in need, even more comes when it is in crisis. If the money came instead from the end users, who were able to choose which treatment providers to patronise, medical treatment would be more like food shopping, and the better for it. The same goes for schools.
If you want to see perverse incentives, check out the US health system.
Indeed, but again there, the incentive flow is f-d up, because most US policies are designed for someone to make a vast profit.
The US health system is effectively a massive tax on the US economy. It likely flatters US GDP figures (in total and per capita), and takes money away from US consumers who would be even RICHER than European counterparts.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
ULEZ expansion is a big change and will certainly cost Labour votes.
It is probably the right thing to do but the 700,000 drivers who will have to pay or buy replacement cars are going to be far, far more likely to vote based on this issue than the several million who will gain marginally in air quality and less severe increases in fares/taxes elsewhere.
Mildy interestingly, SLab are majoring in doing down the ULEZ scheme in Glasgow (and I presume Edinburgh*). Quite how many 'working class people' drive to work in the centre of cities and therefore have parking provided by their employer or can afford huge parking charges is something upon which to ponder.
*Actually maybe not Edinburgh as they're in charge with help from the Tories there.
And the Edinburgh and area buses are generally very good and reasonably priced.
That’s because they’re publicly owned. If you really want to reduce the number of cars, renationalise the buses and run them as a public service.
When I joined last night i got an e mail saying thanks for joining the Party which now has over 53k Members
Cant wait for my first local meeting
I intend to become active and take a few votes of my SKS fan of an MP
Congratulations - glad you have found a new home. I believe your move is something on trend with younger Corbynistas so I doubt that you will be alone politically.
I think they would do better with a different name. "Green" makes them sound single issue which they are not.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
ULEZ expansion is a big change and will certainly cost Labour votes.
It is probably the right thing to do but the 700,000 drivers who will have to pay or buy replacement cars are going to be far, far more likely to vote based on this issue than the several million who will gain marginally in air quality and less severe increases in fares/taxes elsewhere.
It isn't the right thing to do, it's utter bullshit. Particulate levels are far higher on the tube, which people will be forced to crowd into more by this unjust infringement of liberty.
One person's liberty to fill the air with harmful particulates takes away another person' s liberty to breathe clean air, so it is really a question of balancing competing liberties not infringing liberty. The ULEZ is an excellent policy, government action to eliminate a genuine, life-destroying problem. And I say this as someone who was forced to replace my car to comply with it.
Then you're doubly wrong. Emissions levels are not dangerously high, nor are they rising. They are, notably, orders of magnitude higher on the tube, where they are at levels recognised globally as dangerous. Doing something about this would undoubtedly be in the public interest, but there's no political effort to do so, because the LEZ policy isn't about harmful particulates, it's about taking peoples' cars away. I'm glad you were able to afford to replace your car. Many won't be, and thus a great pillar of 20th century freedom and prosperity comes under threat.
Not many people live or spend all day in school on the Tube though.
Some people work there of course (so issues should be tackled if possible*) but a far smaller number than are affected by traffic pollution.
*I would guess train staff are not really affected - air con deals with it? Probably just those working near the lines, e.g. maintenance staff. It's a real issue that should be addressed, but that's not an argument for not addressing a different issue that affects more people.
Not many people live on the street, though of course sadly some do. Levels there aren't dangerously high, and they are not consistently high (whereas on the tube they are). Streets are mainly for travel, as is the tube. I think the people affected grievously by the car travel of others increasing particulate levels on the streets is very low and getting lower. But an atmosphere of 'crisis' must be maintained to push people toward accepting unpopular policies. This was true of Covid lockdowns, and it's true of this current, and in many ways similar, assault on personal mobility.
This was the third year in a row where prolonged serious drought had dried out large parts of the river, said Ruth Mackay, a fisheries project officer from West Cumbria Rivers Trust. ..
I'm unsure if this is the case here, but it's fairly common for rivers in limestone areas to dry up in summer - e.g. the Maniford or Lathkill - and run underground instead. Basically the surface rivers are just overflows.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
I think the most likely Tory loss is Mid Beds to the LDs, not Uxbridge (or Selby). The choice of Conservative candidate in Uxbridge will be interesting.
Betting post, If you look at the current betting, you are dangling a great political bet in front of us.
Politics of it, if Tories hold Uxbridge they close off Starmer’s route to Lab Majority - a huge psychological shift and boost for Sunak.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Not just their core vote, 59% of voters overall oppose allowing more homes to be built on the greenbelt.
If Starmer becomes PM and as he suggests he will do goes beyond building more houses on brownbelt land to allowing much more development in the greenbelt he will face huge opposition, especially in the South and outer London surbubs (even if he does win Bart's vote)
Do any of the 59% have a plan for where everyone is going to live in the decades ahead? Tent shanty-towns in Surrey I suppose.
If we cut immigration significantly we wouldn't need so many new houses.
The UK birthrate is only 1.6 now, well below replacement level
Cutting inflation doesn't reduce prices, it means prices remain high and continue to rise at a slower rate.
Cutting immigration wouldn't mean we'd need fewer houses, it'd mean we'd still having a housing shortage and we'd continue to need even more houses per annum but at a lower rate.
Though you have failed to understand maths or numbers as per usual.
Most recent data is from 2021.
2021 Live Births: 694,685 2021 Deaths: 666,659
694,65 - 666,659 = Natural population growth of 28,026
Birth rate has been below 'replacement level' in theory since 1973. In the past 50 years birth rate has exceeded death rate every single year except 2020 at the height of the pandemic and 1976, despite having a below replacement level birth rate that entire time.
Is it wrong to want another seven deaths?
Beastly. Beastly
Hang on. I thought I understood demographics, but I clearly don't, and if I can't ask anonymously on an internet forum when can I ask. How is that 1.6 calculated if births is exceeding deaths? I must be missing something obvious here.
The 'birthrate' here is births per woman, I think (rather than births per 1000 population, for example). As you need two people to make a child, both of whom will eventually die, you need two births per woman on average for steady state (assumes equal numbers of men and women, but it's thereabouts).
With no immigration and a fixed life expectancy, births over 2 leads to rising population, under 2 leads to falling population. If you have growing life expectancy then population could still increase, for a time, at a lower than 2 level (as babies born faster than deaths). Consider for example two couples move to an uninhabited island; each has only one child (so below replacement) but before they die those two children provide three grandchildren. The population has risen from 4 to 9, but the birth rate is only 5/3 = 1.7
ETA: Even when the four original inhabitants die, population has risen to 5, even assuming there are no more new children. But if the number of births per woman stays below 2 it will drop eventually.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
ULEZ expansion is a big change and will certainly cost Labour votes.
It is probably the right thing to do but the 700,000 drivers who will have to pay or buy replacement cars are going to be far, far more likely to vote based on this issue than the several million who will gain marginally in air quality and less severe increases in fares/taxes elsewhere.
It isn't the right thing to do, it's utter bullshit. Particulate levels are far higher on the tube, which people will be forced to crowd into more by this unjust infringement of liberty.
One person's liberty to fill the air with harmful particulates takes away another person' s liberty to breathe clean air, so it is really a question of balancing competing liberties not infringing liberty. The ULEZ is an excellent policy, government action to eliminate a genuine, life-destroying problem. And I say this as someone who was forced to replace my car to comply with it.
You’re one of the lucky ones, who could afford to replace their old car. Too many people, many of them working shifts for little above minimum wage, are not so fortunate.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
ULEZ expansion is a big change and will certainly cost Labour votes.
It is probably the right thing to do but the 700,000 drivers who will have to pay or buy replacement cars are going to be far, far more likely to vote based on this issue than the several million who will gain marginally in air quality and less severe increases in fares/taxes elsewhere.
It isn't the right thing to do, it's utter bullshit. Particulate levels are far higher on the tube, which people will be forced to crowd into more by this unjust infringement of liberty.
One person's liberty to fill the air with harmful particulates takes away another person' s liberty to breathe clean air, so it is really a question of balancing competing liberties not infringing liberty. The ULEZ is an excellent policy, government action to eliminate a genuine, life-destroying problem. And I say this as someone who was forced to replace my car to comply with it.
Then you're doubly wrong. Emissions levels are not dangerously high, nor are they rising. They are, notably, orders of magnitude higher on the tube, where they are at levels recognised globally as dangerous. Doing something about this would undoubtedly be in the public interest, but there's no political effort to do so, because the LEZ policy isn't about harmful particulates, it's about taking peoples' cars away. I'm glad you were able to afford to replace your car. Many won't be, and thus a great pillar of 20th century freedom and prosperity comes under threat.
Not many people live or spend all day in school on the Tube though.
Some people work there of course (so issues should be tackled if possible*) but a far smaller number than are affected by traffic pollution.
*I would guess train staff are not really affected - air con deals with it? Probably just those working near the lines, e.g. maintenance staff. It's a real issue that should be addressed, but that's not an argument for not addressing a different issue that affects more people.
Not many people live on the street, though of course sadly some do. Levels there aren't dangerously high, and they are not consistently high (whereas on the tube they are). Streets are mainly for travel, as is the tube. I think the people affected grievously by the car travel of others increasing particulate levels on the streets is very low and getting lower. But an atmosphere of 'crisis' must be maintained to push people toward accepting unpopular policies. This was true of Covid lockdowns, and it's true of this current, and in many ways similar, assault on personal mobility.
Many people live immediately adjacent to the streets. A fair number of people live in close linear proximity to tube lines, but the intervening bedrock, clay, topsoil etc prevents particulate pollution reaching them from that source.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
ULEZ expansion is a big change and will certainly cost Labour votes.
It is probably the right thing to do but the 700,000 drivers who will have to pay or buy replacement cars are going to be far, far more likely to vote based on this issue than the several million who will gain marginally in air quality and less severe increases in fares/taxes elsewhere.
It isn't the right thing to do, it's utter bullshit. Particulate levels are far higher on the tube, which people will be forced to crowd into more by this unjust infringement of liberty.
One person's liberty to fill the air with harmful particulates takes away another person' s liberty to breathe clean air, so it is really a question of balancing competing liberties not infringing liberty. The ULEZ is an excellent policy, government action to eliminate a genuine, life-destroying problem. And I say this as someone who was forced to replace my car to comply with it.
Then you're doubly wrong. Emissions levels are not dangerously high, nor are they rising. They are, notably, orders of magnitude higher on the tube, where they are at levels recognised globally as dangerous. Doing something about this would undoubtedly be in the public interest, but there's no political effort to do so, because the LEZ policy isn't about harmful particulates, it's about taking peoples' cars away. I'm glad you were able to afford to replace your car. Many won't be, and thus a great pillar of 20th century freedom and prosperity comes under threat.
Not many people live or spend all day in school on the Tube though.
Some people work there of course (so issues should be tackled if possible*) but a far smaller number than are affected by traffic pollution.
*I would guess train staff are not really affected - air con deals with it? Probably just those working near the lines, e.g. maintenance staff. It's a real issue that should be addressed, but that's not an argument for not addressing a different issue that affects more people.
Not many people live on the street, though of course sadly some do. Levels there aren't dangerously high, and they are not consistently high (whereas on the tube they are). Streets are mainly for travel, as is the tube. I think the people affected grievously by the car travel of others increasing particulate levels on the streets is very low and getting lower. But an atmosphere of 'crisis' must be maintained to push people toward accepting unpopular policies. This was true of Covid lockdowns, and it's true of this current, and in many ways similar, assault on personal mobility.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
"Vote Conservative and we'll poison your children"
there was an anti ULEZ demo near my area of outer London earlier this year. My wife overheard someone at her hairdressers the next day saying, "did you go to the protest, I could only stay 30 minutes until the fumes got too much for me".
Zero awareness.
The Just Stop Oil team were at at again on London Bridge this morning.
I suppose the point still stands that if we wanted to use our cars less (for whatever reason, global warming, fumes, whatever) then we would use them less. But we don't.
I did smile that they were also blockading double-decker buses one of them literally trumpeting its electric/green credentials with bright green paintwork proclaiming "we care..."
Without getting sucked into another tedious Just Stop Oil debate, I think it's important to point out the "if we wanted to use our cars less ... then we would use them less" argument it crap. There are many behaviours that are undesirable that people would do if given free rein: stealing, for example.
If we need to decide whether something should be mandated, encouraged, allowed, discouraged, or banned, "because people want to" is not the only argument.
The default should be towards letting people do what they want when they want, but that's the starting point, not necessarily the end point.
Not your best analogy. You are saying that using your car is like stealing so measures must be put in place to stop both?
The default absolutely should be towards letting people do what they want but the protestors are preventing this (what they want being to drive their Bugatti Veyrons across London Bridge in accordance with the law).
If the elected government mandates using cars less (and they are forcing people to give up ICEs by the day after tomorrow in relative terms) then fine. But not randoms off the street in bright orange jackets.
[A]ccording to new reports this week three separate Chinese government officials have all named scientist Ben Hu, who was in charge of gain of function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, as the first human to be infected with the new coronavirus disease."
"Major development: The three scientists who fell sick with Covid-like symptoms in the Wuhan Institute of Virology have today been named as Ben Hu, Yu Ping and Yan Zhu by Public/Racket. In 2019 Ben Hu was examining if two new coronaviruses could infect humans. His project titled:… Show more"
When I joined last night i got an e mail saying thanks for joining the Party which now has over 53k Members
Cant wait for my first local meeting
I intend to become active and take a few votes of my SKS fan of an MP
Best of luck with your new political party. Perhaps you can persuade your mate Boris to join?
I don't have a mate called Boris, mate but that ex PM bloke is far too left wing for the SKS Tory Party and will in any case be back in the other Tory Party soon IMO
I had a lot of Socialist mates in the Labour Party hopefully i will bump into a few of them when we meet as Greens in Chesterfield next.
Sadly I cannot wish you the best of luck with the SKS Tory Party.
A key danger for Labour is to fall into the “Jacinda” trap.
Jacinda made a lot of promises, and pretty much failed to deliver anything except for huge increases in the number of public sector workers. NZ is a fundamentally worse-managed society than it was before she came in.
It’s clear that Labour need to be parsimonious in their promises, and aggressive in their approach to public sector reform.
Labour don't have the answers because they refuse to ask the big questions. And some of the policy details around the edges (e.g. oil) is mentalist.
But they will not be incompetent, corrupt and cruel like the current lot. So that will have to do. There's a growing prospect of a decently large Labour majority when the election finally comes, and then of them becoming massively unpopular in swift order.
Brexit has demonstrated one very clear reality - people are fed up with being promised things they can't have. More people than not think the country is going in the wrong direction, they can't agree what the correct direction is, and they won't accept further dither and drift and decay. A poisoned chalice for any incoming PM.
Maybe people shouldn't believe things they know aren't possible.
Usually they believe because some wazzock politician has told them it can be done and is easy - "Stop the Boats" as an example.
The PM still doesn’t appear to understand, that the voters don’t care for talk of stopping boats, they don’t even care much for legislation on stopping boats. Rishi Sunak said he would stop the boats, and that’s now the level of expectation among the electorate.
When I joined last night i got an e mail saying thanks for joining the Party which now has over 53k Members
Cant wait for my first local meeting
I intend to become active and take a few votes of my SKS fan of an MP
Congratulations - glad you have found a new home. I believe your move is something on trend with younger Corbynistas so I doubt that you will be alone politically.
I think they would do better with a different name. "Green" makes them sound single issue which they are not.
This was the third year in a row where prolonged serious drought had dried out large parts of the river, said Ruth Mackay, a fisheries project officer from West Cumbria Rivers Trust. ..
DERWENT UNWATER apologies to Letitia Elizabeth Landon
. . .Return oh you fair lake, return, On whose green heathlands once grew the fern; And mountain heights of dry grey stone, Are a fright with lichens overthrown. Thou art too parched and bare From climate-changed cloudless air. Beauty once, but almost gone A lost world once we dreamt upon; Let thy former image with us dwell, As we fiddle on while it goes to hell
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Not just their core vote, 59% of voters overall oppose allowing more homes to be built on the greenbelt.
If Starmer becomes PM and as he suggests he will do goes beyond building more houses on brownbelt land to allowing much more development in the greenbelt he will face huge opposition, especially in the South and outer London surbubs (even if he does win Bart's vote)
Do any of the 59% have a plan for where everyone is going to live in the decades ahead? Tent shanty-towns in Surrey I suppose.
If we cut immigration significantly we wouldn't need so many new houses.
The UK birthrate is only 1.6 now, well below replacement level
Cutting inflation doesn't reduce prices, it means prices remain high and continue to rise at a slower rate.
Cutting immigration wouldn't mean we'd need fewer houses, it'd mean we'd still having a housing shortage and we'd continue to need even more houses per annum but at a lower rate.
Though you have failed to understand maths or numbers as per usual.
Most recent data is from 2021.
2021 Live Births: 694,685 2021 Deaths: 666,659
694,65 - 666,659 = Natural population growth of 28,026
Birth rate has been below 'replacement level' in theory since 1973. In the past 50 years birth rate has exceeded death rate every single year except 2020 at the height of the pandemic and 1976, despite having a below replacement level birth rate that entire time.
Is it wrong to want another seven deaths?
Beastly. Beastly
Hang on. I thought I understood demographics, but I clearly don't, and if I can't ask anonymously on an internet forum when can I ask. How is that 1.6 calculated if births is exceeding deaths? I must be missing something obvious here.
The 'birthrate' here is births per woman, I think (rather than births per 1000 population, for example). As you need two people to make a child, both of whom will eventually die, you need two births per woman on average for steady state (assumes equal numbers of men and women, but it's thereabouts).
With no immigration and a fixed life expectancy, births over 2 leads to rising population, under 2 leads to falling population. If you have growing life expectancy then population could still increase, for a time, at a lower than 2 level (as babies born faster than deaths). Consider for example two couples move to an uninhabited island; each has only one child (so below replacement) but before they die those two children provide three grandchildren. The population has risen from 4 to 9, but the birth rate is only 5/3 = 1.7
ETA: Even when the four original inhabitants die, population has risen to 5, even assuming there are no more new children. But if the number of births per woman stays below 2 it will drop eventually.
Gotcha. So number of births now is slightly greater than number of births 80-odd years ago - so births exceed deaths.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
Sam Freedman had posted a good article, based on a detailed investigation, on what’s wrong with the NHS.
In large part, we just don’t bother investing in capital infrastructure (beds, CT machines, computer systems). We are strikingly out of sync with global norms.
But rather, it's such a large institution with no proper management or accountability that many of its employees don't really care about the level of service that is dispensed to its "customers". If they lose a few patients here and there unless they have been unplugging the life support machine to do the hoovering they know that no one will really know or care.
Apart from the family, obvs, but they, together with the patients, are the least important part of the NHS as far as the NHS is concerned.
OK. Did you read the article?
Of course not. I relied on you to precis it for me. We can't go around reading all the articles posted on PB. That is why we have posters posting posts.
Fair.
Low levels of capital investment was one of three issues cited. The others were loss of experienced staff and replacement with inexperienced ones, probably exacerbated by Brexit; and poor and under-resourced management, confounded by pisspoor target-setting by central government.
When you add the above to the massive backlog created by Covid, you get the current collapse.
The NHS's issues are the same as most public sector body's issues - a perverse incentive flow. Money comes from the Government. More money comes when the service is seen to be in need, even more comes when it is in crisis. If the money came instead from the end users, who were able to choose which treatment providers to patronise, medical treatment would be more like food shopping, and the better for it. The same goes for schools.
If you want to see perverse incentives, check out the US health system.
Indeed, but again there, the incentive flow is f-d up, because most US policies are designed for someone to make a vast profit.
The US health system is effectively a massive tax on the US economy. It likely flatters US GDP figures (in total and per capita), and takes money away from US consumers who would be even RICHER than European counterparts.
I don't know enough about it to really comment, but I can well believe you. The USA system is usually held up as the bogeyman to those against the 'privatisation' of the NHS. But that's really a false choice. What the NHS needs is the empowerment of the health consumer. Health budget allotment should follow the user and be paid upon their successful departure from the system, alive and well. That would completely remove the need to battle all the dragons - waste, lack of attentiveness, lack of appropriate facilities - all of it.
When I joined last night i got an e mail saying thanks for joining the Party which now has over 53k Members
Cant wait for my first local meeting
I intend to become active and take a few votes of my SKS fan of an MP
Congratulations - glad you have found a new home. I believe your move is something on trend with younger Corbynistas so I doubt that you will be alone politically.
I think they would do better with a different name. "Green" makes them sound single issue which they are not.
A single issue which they don't seem to be bothered about these days.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
One way this works in some places is that the local authority buys the land they intend to make available for housing & then sells it with planning permission to developers large and small.
In this model the public purse gets the uplift in value that comes with planning permission & the builder gets to make their profit with the certainty that they will be able to build on the land. The LA spends (some of?) the money from selling the land on infrastructure to feed the development - roads, sewers, schools, medical facilities etc etc.
Obviously there are issues around LAs becoming dependent on building for income with this approach, but it seems better than the current system which restricts supply to the benefit of the large builders who can navigate the planning system. Also the local area sees the benefit of the infrastructure which they gain access to, which helps to blunt opposition.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Not just their core vote, 59% of voters overall oppose allowing more homes to be built on the greenbelt.
If Starmer becomes PM and as he suggests he will do goes beyond building more houses on brownbelt land to allowing much more development in the greenbelt he will face huge opposition, especially in the South and outer London surbubs (even if he does win Bart's vote)
Do any of the 59% have a plan for where everyone is going to live in the decades ahead? Tent shanty-towns in Surrey I suppose.
If we cut immigration significantly we wouldn't need so many new houses.
The UK birthrate is only 1.6 now, well below replacement level
Cutting inflation doesn't reduce prices, it means prices remain high and continue to rise at a slower rate.
Cutting immigration wouldn't mean we'd need fewer houses, it'd mean we'd still having a housing shortage and we'd continue to need even more houses per annum but at a lower rate.
Though you have failed to understand maths or numbers as per usual.
Most recent data is from 2021.
2021 Live Births: 694,685 2021 Deaths: 666,659
694,65 - 666,659 = Natural population growth of 28,026
Birth rate has been below 'replacement level' in theory since 1973. In the past 50 years birth rate has exceeded death rate every single year except 2020 at the height of the pandemic and 1976, despite having a below replacement level birth rate that entire time.
Is it wrong to want another seven deaths?
Beastly. Beastly
Hang on. I thought I understood demographics, but I clearly don't, and if I can't ask anonymously on an internet forum when can I ask. How is that 1.6 calculated if births is exceeding deaths? I must be missing something obvious here.
The 'birthrate' here is births per woman, I think (rather than births per 1000 population, for example). As you need two people to make a child, both of whom will eventually die, you need two births per woman on average for steady state (assumes equal numbers of men and women, but it's thereabouts).
With no immigration and a fixed life expectancy, births over 2 leads to rising population, under 2 leads to falling population. If you have growing life expectancy then population could still increase, for a time, at a lower than 2 level (as babies born faster than deaths). Consider for example two couples move to an uninhabited island; each has only one child (so below replacement) but before they die those two children provide three grandchildren. The population has risen from 4 to 9, but the birth rate is only 5/3 = 1.7
ETA: Even when the four original inhabitants die, population has risen to 5, even assuming there are no more new children. But if the number of births per woman stays below 2 it will drop eventually.
Gotcha. So number of births now is slightly greater than number of births 80-odd years ago - so births exceed deaths.
Exactly: even though women are - on average - having fewer that two children, population is held up by the fact that people had more children in the interim.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
"Vote Conservative and we'll poison your children"
there was an anti ULEZ demo near my area of outer London earlier this year. My wife overheard someone at her hairdressers the next day saying, "did you go to the protest, I could only stay 30 minutes until the fumes got too much for me".
Zero awareness.
The Just Stop Oil team were at at again on London Bridge this morning.
I suppose the point still stands that if we wanted to use our cars less (for whatever reason, global warming, fumes, whatever) then we would use them less. But we don't.
I did smile that they were also blockading double-decker buses one of them literally trumpeting its electric/green credentials with bright green paintwork proclaiming "we care..."
Without getting sucked into another tedious Just Stop Oil debate, I think it's important to point out the "if we wanted to use our cars less ... then we would use them less" argument it crap. There are many behaviours that are undesirable that people would do if given free rein: stealing, for example.
If we need to decide whether something should be mandated, encouraged, allowed, discouraged, or banned, "because people want to" is not the only argument.
The default should be towards letting people do what they want when they want, but that's the starting point, not necessarily the end point.
Not your best analogy. You are saying that using your car is like stealing so measures must be put in place to stop both?
The default absolutely should be towards letting people do what they want but the protestors are preventing this (what they want being to drive their Bugatti Veyrons across London Bridge in accordance with the law).
If the elected government mandates using cars less (and they are forcing people to give up ICEs by the day after tomorrow in relative terms) then fine. But not randoms off the street in bright orange jackets.
It wasn't my intention to say that driving is akin to stealing. Full disclosure: I drive but do not steal. But I absolutely would steal SOME things SOME times if I could get away with it. Not habitually, but sometimes you see something nice that someone has and you feel they don't deserve it. You know how it is. Anyway, I don't act on it due to societal and legal disincentives.
And there's a point. Not all disincentives come from legislation. There are social pressures too. And social pressures on governments to allow or disallow certain things. That's where JSO come in. They're trying to drive a change they believe in that the government obviously doesn't. Now, I'm not going to judge them either way, that's for others. But I do think a similar aim of reducing ICE use is a worthwhile goal, because the noise and pollution they create aren't very nice. I like the idea of them being discouraged. That's not the same as saying block all the bridges and tax us drivers out of existence.
My untrammelled freedom to drive is someone else trammelled freedom to breath clean air, so whatever our final views, we deserve to at least consider arguments beyond drivers just being allowed to do what they like.
If the first three people to actually catch the newly pathogenic novel bat coronavirus were the three scientists working on pathologising a novel bat coronavirus in the special "pathogenic novel bat coronavirus lab" then, I submit, the evidence that it came from a fucking pangolin stew in a random market begins to look a tiny bit thin
Posted mainly for the term 'far-right supergroup' and the very Adolf Hitler vibe that the wee nerd is giving off.
Love the ‘relaxing at the Berghof in 1937’ vibe he’s giving off. But it looks like a cop out not going with the full toothbrush ‘tache. The lads got no bollocks.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
It's a big roundabout.
But sadly, no Swiss Cottage?
It is named after the pub at the Northern end of the "Island"*, which is both (a) called The Swiss Cottage and (b) looks vaguely like one (if you've had a few).
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
It's a big roundabout.
But sadly, no Swiss Cottage?
It is named after the pub at the Northern end of the "Island"*, which is both (a) called The Swiss Cottage and (b) looks vaguely like one (if you've had a few).
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
It's a big roundabout.
But sadly, no Swiss Cottage?
There was definitely a Swiss Cottage there last time I was in London.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
ULEZ expansion is a big change and will certainly cost Labour votes.
It is probably the right thing to do but the 700,000 drivers who will have to pay or buy replacement cars are going to be far, far more likely to vote based on this issue than the several million who will gain marginally in air quality and less severe increases in fares/taxes elsewhere.
It isn't the right thing to do, it's utter bullshit. Particulate levels are far higher on the tube, which people will be forced to crowd into more by this unjust infringement of liberty.
One person's liberty to fill the air with harmful particulates takes away another person' s liberty to breathe clean air, so it is really a question of balancing competing liberties not infringing liberty. The ULEZ is an excellent policy, government action to eliminate a genuine, life-destroying problem. And I say this as someone who was forced to replace my car to comply with it.
You’re one of the lucky ones, who could afford to replace their old car. Too many people, many of them working shifts for little above minimum wage, are not so fortunate.
On average the people causing the pollution are a lot richer than the people suffering from it. And the Mayor has a scrappage scheme to help provide financial support to those affected. And second hand cars are not that expensive, so most people who can afford to run a car at all can probably afford to replace it. And for the remainder, I feel bad for them, genuinely, but I think that the gains from clean air in terms of children's health far outweigh their losses. As far as I am concerned, this kind of intervention is precisely why government is necessary and I applaud Khan for taking a principled, politically risky, stance.
Posted mainly for the term 'far-right supergroup' and the very Adolf Hitler vibe that the wee nerd is giving off.
Love the ‘relaxing at the Berghof in 1937’ vibe he’s giving off. But it looks like a cop out not going with the full toothbrush ‘tache. The lads got no bollocks.
Posted mainly for the term 'far-right supergroup' and the very Adolf Hitler vibe that the wee nerd is giving off.
Love the ‘relaxing at the Berghof in 1937’ vibe he’s giving off. But it looks like a cop out not going with the full toothbrush ‘tache. The lads got no bollocks.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
It's a big roundabout.
But sadly, no Swiss Cottage?
It is named after the pub at the Northern end of the "Island"*, which is both (a) called The Swiss Cottage and (b) looks vaguely like one (if you've had a few).
* I say "island", but it's pretty huge.
Here you go:
It has always intrigued me. For the Tube to be named after the pub that means the pub must be surprisingly old, even tho it looks like naff 1960-70s pastiche
If the first three people to actually catch the newly pathogenic novel bat coronavirus were the three scientists working on pathologising a novel bat coronavirus in the special "pathogenic novel bat coronavirus lab" then, I submit, the evidence that it came from a fucking pangolin stew in a random market begins to look a tiny bit thin
If the first three people to actually catch the newly pathogenic novel bat coronavirus were the three scientists working on pathologising a novel bat coronavirus in the special "pathogenic novel bat coronavirus lab" then, I submit, the evidence that it came from a fucking pangolin stew in a random market begins to look a tiny bit thin
“‘Oh, my God, there’s been an outbreak of chocolaty goodness near Hershey, Pa. What do you think happened?’ “Like, ‘Oh I don’t know, maybe a steam shovel mated with a cocoa bean?’ Or it’s the f…ing chocolate factory! Maybe that’s it?” - Jon Stewart.
If the first three people to actually catch the newly pathogenic novel bat coronavirus were the three scientists working on pathologising a novel bat coronavirus in the special "pathogenic novel bat coronavirus lab" then, I submit, the evidence that it came from a fucking pangolin stew in a random market begins to look a tiny bit thin
For sure, if that is the case.
This, for me, is an unexpectedly emphatic proof, should it pan out. A smoking gun. If this is verified, if, say, Chinese authorities admit this, then that is absolute 100% proof it came from the lab (whereas at the moment it is only 98% likely)
But I bet there will still be some rando nutters who will say No, it probably came from the market
If the first three people to actually catch the newly pathogenic novel bat coronavirus were the three scientists working on pathologising a novel bat coronavirus in the special "pathogenic novel bat coronavirus lab" then, I submit, the evidence that it came from a fucking pangolin stew in a random market begins to look a tiny bit thin
“‘Oh, my God, there’s been an outbreak of chocolaty goodness near Hershey, Pa. What do you think happened?’ “Like, ‘Oh I don’t know, maybe a steam shovel mated with a cocoa bean?’ Or it’s the f…ing chocolate factory! Maybe that’s it?” - Jon Stewart.
That was a brilliant riff by Stewart. Brave, as well, given the prevailing orthodoxy at the time
It is to Colbert's eternal shame that he was so obviously uncomfortable and actually tried to shut Stewart up
Posted mainly for the term 'far-right supergroup' and the very Adolf Hitler vibe that the wee nerd is giving off.
Love the ‘relaxing at the Berghof in 1937’ vibe he’s giving off. But it looks like a cop out not going with the full toothbrush ‘tache. The lads got no bollocks.
This is really interesting - the history of a lot of fascist movements is how they started out as extrajudicial strike breakers and antisocialist / anticommunists. Where the state either is unwilling or unable to commit the level of violence needed to break the strikes. Instead street fascists joined the cops and committed more violence than legally permittable, but the state essentially gave them light sentences for it, if they made it to a courtroom at all. And many of them received tactic endorsements and even funding from prominent rich typical or elite conservatives. If this movement gets off the ground and ended up with some Koch money, for example, I think that would be really illuminating about where the US is headed.
Posted mainly for the term 'far-right supergroup' and the very Adolf Hitler vibe that the wee nerd is giving off.
Love the ‘relaxing at the Berghof in 1937’ vibe he’s giving off. But it looks like a cop out not going with the full toothbrush ‘tache. The lads got no bollocks.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
It's a big roundabout.
But sadly, no Swiss Cottage?
It is named after the pub at the Northern end of the "Island"*, which is both (a) called The Swiss Cottage and (b) looks vaguely like one (if you've had a few).
* I say "island", but it's pretty huge.
Here you go:
It has always intrigued me. For the Tube to be named after the pub that means the pub must be surprisingly old, even tho it looks like naff 1960-70s pastiche
It's not the only tube station that was named after a pub.
Sam Freedman had posted a good article, based on a detailed investigation, on what’s wrong with the NHS.
In large part, we just don’t bother investing in capital infrastructure (beds, CT machines, computer systems). We are strikingly out of sync with global norms.
But rather, it's such a large institution with no proper management or accountability that many of its employees don't really care about the level of service that is dispensed to its "customers". If they lose a few patients here and there unless they have been unplugging the life support machine to do the hoovering they know that no one will really know or care.
Apart from the family, obvs, but they, together with the patients, are the least important part of the NHS as far as the NHS is concerned.
OK. Did you read the article?
Of course not. I relied on you to precis it for me. We can't go around reading all the articles posted on PB. That is why we have posters posting posts.
Fair.
Low levels of capital investment was one of three issues cited. The others were loss of experienced staff and replacement with inexperienced ones, probably exacerbated by Brexit; and poor and under-resourced management, confounded by pisspoor target-setting by central government.
When you add the above to the massive backlog created by Covid, you get the current collapse.
The NHS's issues are the same as most public sector body's issues - a perverse incentive flow. Money comes from the Government. More money comes when the service is seen to be in need, even more comes when it is in crisis. If the money came instead from the end users, who were able to choose which treatment providers to patronise, medical treatment would be more like food shopping, and the better for it. The same goes for schools.
If you want to see perverse incentives, check out the US health system.
Indeed, but again there, the incentive flow is f-d up, because most US policies are designed for someone to make a vast profit.
The US health system is effectively a massive tax on the US economy. It likely flatters US GDP figures (in total and per capita), and takes money away from US consumers who would be even RICHER than European counterparts.
I don't know enough about it to really comment, but I can well believe you. The USA system is usually held up as the bogeyman to those against the 'privatisation' of the NHS. But that's really a false choice. What the NHS needs is the empowerment of the health consumer. Health budget allotment should follow the user and be paid upon their successful departure from the system, alive and well. That would completely remove the need to battle all the dragons - waste, lack of attentiveness, lack of appropriate facilities - all of it.
Giving end users choice can be an effective way to allocate resources, but you need people to make some sort of informed choice. Healthcare is very, very technical. Most people do not have the requisite knowledge to make many of the choices. We should listen to service users more, both at an individual level and in terms of planning, but I am sceptical of these claims that if only we had individual health budgets, everything would suddenly work.
When they say a design life of 30 years, they don’t mean that it won’t last longer than 30 years, just that nobody is willing to guarantee that it will not fail after that amount of time.
I raise you the 50 year-old trains on the Bakerloo and the Piccadilly lines in London
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Not just their core vote, 59% of voters overall oppose allowing more homes to be built on the greenbelt.
If Starmer becomes PM and as he suggests he will do goes beyond building more houses on brownbelt land to allowing much more development in the greenbelt he will face huge opposition, especially in the South and outer London surbubs (even if he does win Bart's vote)
Do any of the 59% have a plan for where everyone is going to live in the decades ahead? Tent shanty-towns in Surrey I suppose.
"Brownfield", "high rise" or "overseas" seem to be the preferred options.
Not that they want those options for themselves. Oh no, there's no reason they shouldn't have a detached home with a garden but other people wanting a semi-detached with a garden is utterly unreasonable because "my view" might be impaired.
I don't know why we don't build a load of three storey terraced houses with modest gardens, they are high density housing that people actually like living in.
They might make sense in cities, but in towns and suburbs they're a terrible idea in my opinion. Homes should as standard be semi-detached with a driveway for off-road parking and most importantly for charging your car.
Where do you park your electric car and how do you charge it with new terraced homes?
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
It's a big roundabout.
But sadly, no Swiss Cottage?
It is named after the pub at the Northern end of the "Island"*, which is both (a) called The Swiss Cottage and (b) looks vaguely like one (if you've had a few).
* I say "island", but it's pretty huge.
Here you go:
It has always intrigued me. For the Tube to be named after the pub that means the pub must be surprisingly old, even tho it looks like naff 1960-70s pastiche
It's not the only tube station that was named after a pub.
Posted mainly for the term 'far-right supergroup' and the very Adolf Hitler vibe that the wee nerd is giving off.
Love the ‘relaxing at the Berghof in 1937’ vibe he’s giving off. But it looks like a cop out not going with the full toothbrush ‘tache. The lads got no bollocks.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
It's a big roundabout.
But sadly, no Swiss Cottage?
It is named after the pub at the Northern end of the "Island"*, which is both (a) called The Swiss Cottage and (b) looks vaguely like one (if you've had a few).
* I say "island", but it's pretty huge.
Here you go:
It has always intrigued me. For the Tube to be named after the pub that means the pub must be surprisingly old, even tho it looks like naff 1960-70s pastiche
The tube station opened in 1939, it was part of the Bakerloo back then. Transferred to the (then) new Jubilee line in 1979.
If the first three people to actually catch the newly pathogenic novel bat coronavirus were the three scientists working on pathologising a novel bat coronavirus in the special "pathogenic novel bat coronavirus lab" then, I submit, the evidence that it came from a fucking pangolin stew in a random market begins to look a tiny bit thin
“‘Oh, my God, there’s been an outbreak of chocolaty goodness near Hershey, Pa. What do you think happened?’ “Like, ‘Oh I don’t know, maybe a steam shovel mated with a cocoa bean?’ Or it’s the f…ing chocolate factory! Maybe that’s it?” - Jon Stewart.
I have tasted what Hershey make. It cannot be described as “chocolaty goodness”. Certainly not “goodness”. I’m not that convinced about “chocolaty”.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
ULEZ expansion is a big change and will certainly cost Labour votes.
It is probably the right thing to do but the 700,000 drivers who will have to pay or buy replacement cars are going to be far, far more likely to vote based on this issue than the several million who will gain marginally in air quality and less severe increases in fares/taxes elsewhere.
It isn't the right thing to do, it's utter bullshit. Particulate levels are far higher on the tube, which people will be forced to crowd into more by this unjust infringement of liberty.
One person's liberty to fill the air with harmful particulates takes away another person' s liberty to breathe clean air, so it is really a question of balancing competing liberties not infringing liberty. The ULEZ is an excellent policy, government action to eliminate a genuine, life-destroying problem. And I say this as someone who was forced to replace my car to comply with it.
Then you're doubly wrong. Emissions levels are not dangerously high, nor are they rising. They are, notably, orders of magnitude higher on the tube, where they are at levels recognised globally as dangerous. Doing something about this would undoubtedly be in the public interest, but there's no political effort to do so, because the LEZ policy isn't about harmful particulates, it's about taking peoples' cars away. I'm glad you were able to afford to replace your car. Many won't be, and thus a great pillar of 20th century freedom and prosperity comes under threat.
Not many people live or spend all day in school on the Tube though.
Some people work there of course (so issues should be tackled if possible*) but a far smaller number than are affected by traffic pollution.
*I would guess train staff are not really affected - air con deals with it? Probably just those working near the lines, e.g. maintenance staff. It's a real issue that should be addressed, but that's not an argument for not addressing a different issue that affects more people.
Not many people live on the street, though of course sadly some do. Levels there aren't dangerously high, and they are not consistently high (whereas on the tube they are). Streets are mainly for travel, as is the tube. I think the people affected grievously by the car travel of others increasing particulate levels on the streets is very low and getting lower. But an atmosphere of 'crisis' must be maintained to push people toward accepting unpopular policies. This was true of Covid lockdowns, and it's true of this current, and in many ways similar, assault on personal mobility.
Buried in that story is the stat that these supposedly dangerous levels have fallen 11% in the UK since 2010. If there was a particulate crisis in 2010, I must have missed it.
I am afraid all I get from that piece is the usual - a change is sought by powerful global lobby groups and the requisite 'charities' (I am sure charities used to help people - you know, charity?) and third sector organisations provide the crisis window dressing, usually, and of course tragically, featuring juvenile victims, breathlessly reported by the press. I am sorry that anyone should be taken before their time, but I would require far more detail of that case and the underlying health circumstances before I got behind a vast change, that will affect hundreds more families and children negatively. Lockdown/school closures is a clear example of where we were coralled into a draconian policy that was supposed to be about child protection, but the child victims of the policy are far more numerous and their victimhood far more acute than the benefit to the supposedly vulnerable.
We were also supposed to accept open door immigration because of a horrific image of a dead baby on a beach, but the child murders and rapes of Rotherham were politely ignored because their plight did not align with a fashionable campaign or desired change in the law. I'm sorry, but we all need to be a little less naive and a little more prepared to push back on such manipulation.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
"Vote Conservative and we'll poison your children"
there was an anti ULEZ demo near my area of outer London earlier this year. My wife overheard someone at her hairdressers the next day saying, "did you go to the protest, I could only stay 30 minutes until the fumes got too much for me".
Zero awareness.
The Just Stop Oil team were at at again on London Bridge this morning.
I suppose the point still stands that if we wanted to use our cars less (for whatever reason, global warming, fumes, whatever) then we would use them less. But we don't.
I did smile that they were also blockading double-decker buses one of them literally trumpeting its electric/green credentials with bright green paintwork proclaiming "we care..."
Without getting sucked into another tedious Just Stop Oil debate, I think it's important to point out the "if we wanted to use our cars less ... then we would use them less" argument it crap. There are many behaviours that are undesirable that people would do if given free rein: stealing, for example.
If we need to decide whether something should be mandated, encouraged, allowed, discouraged, or banned, "because people want to" is not the only argument.
The default should be towards letting people do what they want when they want, but that's the starting point, not necessarily the end point.
Not your best analogy. You are saying that using your car is like stealing so measures must be put in place to stop both?
The default absolutely should be towards letting people do what they want but the protestors are preventing this (what they want being to drive their Bugatti Veyrons across London Bridge in accordance with the law).
If the elected government mandates using cars less (and they are forcing people to give up ICEs by the day after tomorrow in relative terms) then fine. But not randoms off the street in bright orange jackets.
It wasn't my intention to say that driving is akin to stealing. Full disclosure: I drive but do not steal. But I absolutely would steal SOME things SOME times if I could get away with it. Not habitually, but sometimes you see something nice that someone has and you feel they don't deserve it. You know how it is. Anyway, I don't act on it due to societal and legal disincentives.
And there's a point. Not all disincentives come from legislation. There are social pressures too. And social pressures on governments to allow or disallow certain things. That's where JSO come in. They're trying to drive a change they believe in that the government obviously doesn't. Now, I'm not going to judge them either way, that's for others. But I do think a similar aim of reducing ICE use is a worthwhile goal, because the noise and pollution they create aren't very nice. I like the idea of them being discouraged. That's not the same as saying block all the bridges and tax us drivers out of existence.
My untrammelled freedom to drive is someone else trammelled freedom to breath clean air, so whatever our final views, we deserve to at least consider arguments beyond drivers just being allowed to do what they like.
But doesn't god say do not steal? How can you go against the Big Man?
NEW: Johnson calling for Sir Bernard Jenkin to resign from the Privileges Committee after not denying that he attended a lockdown breaking birthday party for his wife on 08 December 2020... with cake.
If the first three people to actually catch the newly pathogenic novel bat coronavirus were the three scientists working on pathologising a novel bat coronavirus in the special "pathogenic novel bat coronavirus lab" then, I submit, the evidence that it came from a fucking pangolin stew in a random market begins to look a tiny bit thin
“‘Oh, my God, there’s been an outbreak of chocolaty goodness near Hershey, Pa. What do you think happened?’ “Like, ‘Oh I don’t know, maybe a steam shovel mated with a cocoa bean?’ Or it’s the f…ing chocolate factory! Maybe that’s it?” - Jon Stewart.
That was a brilliant riff by Stewart. Brave, as well, given the prevailing orthodoxy at the time
It is to Colbert's eternal shame that he was so obviously uncomfortable and actually tried to shut Stewart up
I still can’t work out if they scripted the whole thing in advance, or if Colbert was taken totally by surprise and couldn’t quite bring out his old improv skills.
If it was off the cuff, then also pretty brave of the producers to leave it in the edit, given that the programme was recorded in advance of broadcast.
We were supposed to accept open door immigration because of a horrific image of a dead baby on a beach, but the child murders and rapes of Rotherham were politely ignored because their plight did not align with a fashionable campaign or desired change in the law.
And he's back to "respecting what local communities want" when it comes to NIMBYism and the total lack of housing.
Sunak doesn't get it and will never get my vote.
The conservatives are squeezed between what the country needs (infrastructure, housing) & what their core vote wants (build absolutely nothing anywhere).
Anyone who is fit to be Prime Minister should be able to show leadership on what the country needs.
Sunak doesn't. He's not fit to be in Downing Street.
Who is? Genuine question.
Hard to tell.
Boris did get the importance of this, though he was a coward after the by-election loss the Lib Dems and a rebellion by Theresa May and others.
Michael Gove has had good things to say in the past, but is the current relevant Secretary of State and has made things much worse not better.
Keir Starmer has said some good things recently, but he's an opportunist and has as much integrity as Boris so it will be interesting to see if he actually comes up with credible policies on this matter or whether he tacks to win the NIMBY vote too.
As much as I dislike Labour I'm starting to think the only way this issue might end up getting tackled is if there's a 1997-style Labour landslide that allows the Government to ignore the NIMBY squeals and pass the legislation the country desperately requires, putting the interests of the country ahead of NIMBY local election concerns.
An 80 seat Tory majority should have been allowed the Tories to tackle this issue themselves, but they've ran away from it instead, for shame.
What I don't get is that just about everywhere there is a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted.
So the private sector is doing its bit and we have many times rehearsed the pipeline and lifespan of a plot of ground to new house so I don't think "landbanking" is as much of a thing as people like sometimes to make out (see also: "foreign absentee landlords/empty properties").
So would you have the govt embark on a huge housebuilding programme and if so via what agents/process?
The problem is there's not a presumption in favour of planning applications being granted within a matter of days or weeks. There's the probability if you drag things out for years or decades through countless appeals that planning will eventually be granted but that's not good enough.
There should be certainty about your ability to have permission before you buy land and getting permission should not significantly change the value of land as a result, and the process should take days or weeks not years. Then small businesses can get involved.
If you're a small independent business with not much capital then you can't just build a home where its needed. You need to buy some land, hold onto it and hope that you get permission and that it doesn't take years to get that permission. And why do that without certainty you'll have the permission, which means they don't do it at all. The risk of not getting permission means it isn't worth investing your limited capital into land to develop.
In almost all the developed world without our Byzantine planning system and with a rational zoning system instead it is small developers build the majority of homes, often by only one home at a time, instead of large banks of estates by an oligopoly of large developers who control the market and face little competition thanks to the planning constraints that put off small competitors.
Hmm nothing to do with Nimbyism more to do with the significant externalities involved I wouldn't necessarily like such a system. Why wouldn't you build a house in the middle of the roundabout at the end of your road, for example?
Well I'm not sure who owns the roundabout, I'd have presumed the Council, so if the land's not for sale then I can't see it being an issue.
Also the roundabout isn't exactly big, I would have thought it'd be smaller than the plot needed to build a decent home. So again I'm doubtful it'd be an issue.
But if those obstacles can be overcome then I'm not sure I see the issue. I've seen buildings located insides roundabouts before, including pubs, Churches and others. There's even a house located within the M6 between the northbound and southbound carriages.
The Swiss Cottage roundabout has a pub in the middle of it. Quite a large one.
It also has a massive block of flats. And a cinema. And a kitchen supply store. And a Costa Coffee.
It's a big roundabout.
But sadly, no Swiss Cottage?
It is named after the pub at the Northern end of the "Island"*, which is both (a) called The Swiss Cottage and (b) looks vaguely like one (if you've had a few).
* I say "island", but it's pretty huge.
Here you go:
It has always intrigued me. For the Tube to be named after the pub that means the pub must be surprisingly old, even tho it looks like naff 1960-70s pastiche
It's not the only tube station that was named after a pub.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Another notable Q earlier from Theresa Villiers: huge Tory cheer for an attack on Sadiq Khan's Ulez scheme – they really think its unpopularity might swing the Uxbridge by-election
"Vote Conservative and we'll poison your children"
there was an anti ULEZ demo near my area of outer London earlier this year. My wife overheard someone at her hairdressers the next day saying, "did you go to the protest, I could only stay 30 minutes until the fumes got too much for me".
Zero awareness.
The Just Stop Oil team were at at again on London Bridge this morning.
I suppose the point still stands that if we wanted to use our cars less (for whatever reason, global warming, fumes, whatever) then we would use them less. But we don't.
I did smile that they were also blockading double-decker buses one of them literally trumpeting its electric/green credentials with bright green paintwork proclaiming "we care..."
Without getting sucked into another tedious Just Stop Oil debate, I think it's important to point out the "if we wanted to use our cars less ... then we would use them less" argument it crap. There are many behaviours that are undesirable that people would do if given free rein: stealing, for example.
If we need to decide whether something should be mandated, encouraged, allowed, discouraged, or banned, "because people want to" is not the only argument.
The default should be towards letting people do what they want when they want, but that's the starting point, not necessarily the end point.
It's also worth remembering that increased car use makes getting around on foot, by bicycle or by bus less desirable as it makes each mode some or all of slower, more unpleasant and/or more dangerous.
If the first three people to actually catch the newly pathogenic novel bat coronavirus were the three scientists working on pathologising a novel bat coronavirus in the special "pathogenic novel bat coronavirus lab" then, I submit, the evidence that it came from a fucking pangolin stew in a random market begins to look a tiny bit thin
“‘Oh, my God, there’s been an outbreak of chocolaty goodness near Hershey, Pa. What do you think happened?’ “Like, ‘Oh I don’t know, maybe a steam shovel mated with a cocoa bean?’ Or it’s the f…ing chocolate factory! Maybe that’s it?” - Jon Stewart.
I have tasted what Hershey make. It cannot be described as “chocolaty goodness”. Certainly not “goodness”. I’m not that convinced about “chocolaty”.
Very true, but he was talking to a mostly American audience, whose experience of ‘chocolate’ most likely emanates from that factory in Pennsylvania.
NEW: Johnson calling for Sir Bernard Jenkin to resign from the Privileges Committee after not denying that he attended a lockdown breaking birthday party for his wife on 08 December 2020... with cake.
As Churchill intended to say in the event of an invasion, You can always take one with you.
NEW: Johnson calling for Sir Bernard Jenkin to resign from the Privileges Committee after not denying that he attended a lockdown breaking birthday party for his wife on 08 December 2020... with cake.
So Bozo things attending such an event is a resignation matter.
If the first three people to actually catch the newly pathogenic novel bat coronavirus were the three scientists working on pathologising a novel bat coronavirus in the special "pathogenic novel bat coronavirus lab" then, I submit, the evidence that it came from a fucking pangolin stew in a random market begins to look a tiny bit thin
“‘Oh, my God, there’s been an outbreak of chocolaty goodness near Hershey, Pa. What do you think happened?’ “Like, ‘Oh I don’t know, maybe a steam shovel mated with a cocoa bean?’ Or it’s the f…ing chocolate factory! Maybe that’s it?” - Jon Stewart.
I have tasted what Hershey make. It cannot be described as “chocolaty goodness”. Certainly not “goodness”. I’m not that convinced about “chocolaty”.
Very true, but he was talking to a mostly American audience, whose experience of ‘chocolate’ most likely emanates from that factory in Pennsylvania.
It is a sad country in many ways (and a wonderful one in others).
Comments
After last nights HOL vote.
Prompted me to join the Greens
https://twitter.com/TheGreenParty/status/1668948153125486592
H&S didn't exist when they weren't working.
If we need to decide whether something should be mandated, encouraged, allowed, discouraged, or banned, "because people want to" is not the only argument.
The default should be towards letting people do what they want when they want, but that's the starting point, not necessarily the end point.
Politics of it, if Tories hold Uxbridge they close off Starmer’s route to Lab Majority - a huge psychological shift and boost for Sunak.
When I go to the pub and drink a pint I can be reasonably sure its contents are safe and have a predictable effect on me. If wanted to smoke some weed I'm forced to buy it from someone whose entire business model is avoiding regulation, so it could be cut with anything and its strength could vary by orders of magnitude.
Thank you for your kind comments and I hope your trip goes well as well. As I said I could really have done with a conversation with you a few weeks ago. It would have resulted in a lot of saved time and stress. The enjoyable part of planning a trip became much less so.
Agree re Eurostar - Lets hope they get their act together in the near future.
Re your suggestion about Deutsche Bahn - Thanks for that suggestion. I didn't think of using them for the planning, yet I have done so in the past, so I don't know why I didn't think of them.
Some people work there of course (so issues should be tackled if possible*) but a far smaller number than are affected by traffic pollution.
*I would guess train staff are not really affected - air con deals with it? Probably just those working near the lines, e.g. maintenance staff. It's a real issue that should be addressed, but that's not an argument for not addressing a different issue that affects more people.
Cant wait for my first local meeting
I intend to become active and take a few votes of my SKS fan of an MP
Kan wants to dispel negative stereotypes of French soldiers that Americans have due to the history of World War II.
"I know that the Americans think we're cowards," explains Kan.
But he points out that many French people fought against Nazism and died in the name of freedom.
https://twitter.com/timkmak/status/1668975631869018114
https://policy.greenparty.org.uk/our-policies/long-term-goals/rights-and-responsibilities/#:~:text=Trans rights&text=We shall respect transgender and,within all areas of society.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jun/14/wettest-place-in-england-lake-district-almost-completely-dry-river-derwent-borrowdale
The upper River Derwent in Borrowdale in the Lake District – famous for its reputation as the wettest place in England – is almost completely dry, leading experts to warn of “disastrous conditions for wildlife”.
This was the third year in a row where prolonged serious drought had dried out large parts of the river, said Ruth Mackay, a fisheries project officer from West Cumbria Rivers Trust. ..
I think they would do better with a different name. "Green" makes them sound single issue which they are not.
With no immigration and a fixed life expectancy, births over 2 leads to rising population, under 2 leads to falling population. If you have growing life expectancy then population could still increase, for a time, at a lower than 2 level (as babies born faster than deaths). Consider for example two couples move to an uninhabited island; each has only one child (so below replacement) but before they die those two children provide three grandchildren. The population has risen from 4 to 9, but the birth rate is only 5/3 = 1.7
ETA: Even when the four original inhabitants die, population has risen to 5, even assuming there are no more new children. But if the number of births per woman stays below 2 it will drop eventually.
The default absolutely should be towards letting people do what they want but the protestors are preventing this (what they want being to drive their Bugatti Veyrons across London Bridge in accordance with the law).
If the elected government mandates using cars less (and they are forcing people to give up ICEs by the day after tomorrow in relative terms) then fine. But not randoms off the street in bright orange jackets.
Etc
[A]ccording to new reports this week three separate Chinese government officials have all named scientist Ben Hu, who was in charge of gain of function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, as the first human to be infected with the new coronavirus disease."
https://twitter.com/R_H_Ebright/status/1668956327845171200?s=20
"Major development: The three scientists who fell sick with Covid-like symptoms in the Wuhan Institute of Virology have today been named as Ben Hu, Yu Ping and Yan Zhu by Public/Racket.
In 2019 Ben Hu was examining if two new coronaviruses could infect humans. His project titled:… Show more"
https://twitter.com/SharriMarkson/status/1668754118591262720?s=20
Whaddaya think PB? Maybe they just went to the wet market a fuck of a lot?
I had a lot of Socialist mates in the Labour Party hopefully i will bump into a few of them when we meet as Greens in Chesterfield next.
Sadly I cannot wish you the best of luck with the SKS Tory Party.
Sorry
https://twitter.com/HarryEnfield6/status/1549336269465030658
Breaking:
The Privileges Committee report is... big
Told it comes in at nearly 30,000 words, with extensive annexes detailing evidence
Boris Johnson's latest response will be appended to the document with a response from the committee
It's expected to drop at 9am tomorrow
apologies to Letitia Elizabeth Landon
. . .Return oh you fair lake, return,
On whose green heathlands once grew the fern;
And mountain heights of dry grey stone,
Are a fright with lichens overthrown.
Thou art too parched and bare
From climate-changed cloudless air.
Beauty once, but almost gone
A lost world once we dreamt upon;
Let thy former image with us dwell,
As we fiddle on while it goes to hell
(Sort of like when Jesus Gil, Mayor of Marbella, founded a party called the Grupo Independiente y Liberal.)
It's a big roundabout.
You do realise SKS has you as least important in his hierarchy of racism dont you (according to the bloke who he asked to investigate)
In this model the public purse gets the uplift in value that comes with planning permission & the builder gets to make their profit with the certainty that they will be able to build on the land. The LA spends (some of?) the money from selling the land on infrastructure to feed the development - roads, sewers, schools, medical facilities etc etc.
Obviously there are issues around LAs becoming dependent on building for income with this approach, but it seems better than the current system which restricts supply to the benefit of the large builders who can navigate the planning system. Also the local area sees the benefit of the infrastructure which they gain access to, which helps to blunt opposition.
And there's a point. Not all disincentives come from legislation. There are social pressures too. And social pressures on governments to allow or disallow certain things. That's where JSO come in. They're trying to drive a change they believe in that the government obviously doesn't. Now, I'm not going to judge them either way, that's for others. But I do think a similar aim of reducing ICE use is a worthwhile goal, because the noise and pollution they create aren't very nice. I like the idea of them being discouraged. That's not the same as saying block all the bridges and tax us drivers out of existence.
My untrammelled freedom to drive is someone else trammelled freedom to breath clean air, so whatever our final views, we deserve to at least consider arguments beyond drivers just being allowed to do what they like.
* I say "island", but it's pretty huge.
As far as I am concerned, this kind of intervention is precisely why government is necessary and I applaud Khan for taking a principled, politically risky, stance.
But I bet there will still be some rando nutters who will say No, it probably came from the market
It is to Colbert's eternal shame that he was so obviously uncomfortable and actually tried to shut Stewart up
Arrgh, foiled again!
St Peters (St Albans) council by-election result:
GRN: 44.7% (+8.1)
LDEM: 38.2% (-1.1)
CON: 11.1% (+1.1)
LAB: 6.0% (-8.1)
Votes cast: 1,405
Green GAIN from Liberal Democrat.
https://londonist.com/london/drink/can-you-name-all-six-tube-stations-named-after-pubs
I am afraid all I get from that piece is the usual - a change is sought by powerful global lobby groups and the requisite 'charities' (I am sure charities used to help people - you know, charity?) and third sector organisations provide the crisis window dressing, usually, and of course tragically, featuring juvenile victims, breathlessly reported by the press. I am sorry that anyone should be taken before their time, but I would require far more detail of that case and the underlying health circumstances before I got behind a vast change, that will affect hundreds more families and children negatively. Lockdown/school closures is a clear example of where we were coralled into a draconian policy that was supposed to be about child protection, but the child victims of the policy are far more numerous and their victimhood far more acute than the benefit to the supposedly vulnerable.
We were also supposed to accept open door immigration because of a horrific image of a dead baby on a beach, but the child murders and rapes of Rotherham were politely ignored because their plight did not align with a fashionable campaign or desired change in the law. I'm sorry, but we all need to be a little less naive and a little more prepared to push back on such manipulation.
NEW: Johnson calling for Sir Bernard Jenkin to resign from the Privileges Committee after not denying that he attended a lockdown breaking birthday party for his wife on 08 December 2020... with cake.
If it was off the cuff, then also pretty brave of the producers to leave it in the edit, given that the programme was recorded in advance of broadcast.
You can always take one with you.