Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
Was in Chester this weekend too seeing a friend and Knutsford yesterday, certainly plenty of history and good history displays and workshops in the cathedral
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
Cats are okay with me, because they don't threaten human life.
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
I came across for the first time today the phenomenon of responsible dog owners taking their pet's shite home by means of a poo bag tied around the fuel cap. We watched in horrified fascination as the horrible thing rattled along the motorway at 80mph, trying our best not to be behind it - but secretly trying to close enough to see who it hit when the bag inevitably split. Eventually, good sense trumped morbid curiousity and we allowed the dogshit car to speed away from us. Still. Horrible.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
Even Thatcher fails the HYUFD 'True Tory' test.
I don't think many historians would dispute that Thatcher would more likely have been a Peelite or Gladstone Liberal than Disraeli Tory had she been born in the 19th century, though she did display elements of Lord Salisbury nationalist patriotism too.
It was only the rise of Labour which brought free market liberals and Tories together to form today's Conservative Party (though Peel technically founded the modern Conservative Party he left it shortly after most of the landed gentry and much of the aristocracy and farming community opposed his proposed repeal of the Corn Laws)
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
I saw a stat the other day which said that a third of households now have dogs. And also that a lot of lockdown dogs are going rogue. Which latter is understandable given that they won't have been socialised.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
Was in Chester this weekend too seeing a friend and Knutsford yesterday, certainly plenty of history and good history displays and workshops in the cathedral
Knutsford is a pleasant town. I have got into the habit of doing my Christmas shopping there. The choice is far less overwhelming than Manchester, for a start. Anyway, well worth a visit by the curious tourist - though dripping with money nowadays. You can't afford to live there any more.
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
Cats are okay with me, because they don't threaten human life.
Almost all dogs don't threaten human life either.
Quite the contrary in fact, there's a lot of evidence that dog ownership leads to longer life, as well as a quicker recovery from illness, and better heart health, and less likely to die from either heart attacks or stress.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Not if they inherited the money like all good Tories should.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
But not on the capital gains. You know, the CAPITAL GAINS. Quite different, and VASTLY more lucrative in the SE of England in particular.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
Exeter, Brighton and Warwick ought to be on that list. St David's might be considered as part of the Pembs Coast more widely. Inverness, Aberdeen and St Andrews would all be obvious ones in Scotland.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Not if they inherited the money like all good Tories should.
And if the property was part of a portfolio let out for a profit then the Council Tax would have been paid by the tenant, not the landlord anyway, so not that either.
Be interesting news to all tenants if HYUFD thinks they should be entitled to ownership of the property they let for free, by virtue of having paid the Council Tax.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Not if they inherited the money like all good Tories should.
Indceed, and evaded paying CGT.
in the old days, one paid CTT whether on estates or otherwise.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
Cats are okay with me, because they don't threaten human life.
Almost all dogs don't threaten human life either.
Quite the contrary in fact, there's a lot of evidence that dog ownership leads to longer life, as well as a quicker recovery from illness, and better heart health, and less likely to die from either heart attacks or stress.
True. And assistance dogs are great for people with disabilities and for some poor souls their pet dog may be the only friend they have. It's a conundrum
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
A slightly different category, but I'd say Blackpool.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
Chester is primarily a town to work and live in, with some blue chip employers like M&S, MBNA and Airbus, rather than a tourist destination. I suspect it's more prosperous than York, which seems to have a significant deprivation and homelessness problem.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
It's the whining and sense of entitlement that gets me. Where's the self-reliance and self-respect of Mrs Thatcher? But I forget, she wasn't a True Tory in the 2023 sense.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
In the old days, there was no IHT. You paid CGT on what you inherited (actually, it was called Capital Transfer Tax). I found this when checking through some old family papers recently.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
Chester is primarily a town to work and live in, with some blue chip employers like M&S, MBNA and Airbus, rather than a tourist destination. I suspect it's more prosperous than York, which seems to have a significant deprivation and homelessness problem.
Point of order
Airbus is not in Chester or England
It is in Wales and manufactures all Airbus wings
Indeed my son in law recently retired from a very senior position with them having joined more than 45 years ago
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
Cats are okay with me, because they don't threaten human life.
Almost all dogs don't threaten human life either.
Quite the contrary in fact, there's a lot of evidence that dog ownership leads to longer life, as well as a quicker recovery from illness, and better heart health, and less likely to die from either heart attacks or stress.
True. And assistance dogs are great for people with disabilities and for some poor souls their pet dog may be the only friend they have. It's a conundrum
It all depends upon the breed of the dog of course. Well behaved dogs are wonderful creatures. My own dog is a cross between a Jack Russell and a Chihuahua so not only wouldn't hurt anyone, but couldn't - we got her because our youngest was only a baby when we got her and my wife investigated what are really good breeds to have around babies.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
It's the whining and sense of entitlement that gets me. Where's the self-reliance and self-respect of Mrs Thatcher? But I forget, she wasn't a True Tory in the 2023 sense.
We are absolutely on the same page on this and @HYUFD self interest is embarrassing
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
Cats are okay with me, because they don't threaten human life.
Almost all dogs don't threaten human life either.
Quite the contrary in fact, there's a lot of evidence that dog ownership leads to longer life, as well as a quicker recovery from illness, and better heart health, and less likely to die from either heart attacks or stress.
Sadly the ukraine war has been a total disaster for the west. There are no good options left.
On the other hand the Ukraine war is working out rather well for yourself, would you say? As someone is actually paying you for writing this nonsense and presumably you're not in the meat grinder yourself.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
Having just spent a week in Harrogate, I was very pleased with it.
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
Cats are okay with me, because they don't threaten human life.
Almost all dogs don't threaten human life either.
Quite the contrary in fact, there's a lot of evidence that dog ownership leads to longer life, as well as a quicker recovery from illness, and better heart health, and less likely to die from either heart attacks or stress.
Almost all isn't much good if you're the one attack by a dangerous dog.
What a ridiculous argument along the lines of those insisting upon Zero Covid, which I seem to recall from memory you didn't accept then.
You can't have zero risk in life, its about balancing risk. For a few breeds the scales of balance might tip towards saying you shouldn't have those dogs, but for almost all breeds people do have, the scales tip far the other direction.
Sadly the ukraine war has been a total disaster for the west. There are no good options left.
On the other hand the Ukraine war is working out rather well for yourself, would you say? As someone is actually paying you for writing this nonsense and presumably you're not in the meat grinder yourself.
Better than Trump's US, Bolsonaro's Brazil... Not the countries we like to compare ourselves to, are they?
We grew faster than Germany and Spain throughout the pandemic, we had fewer deaths than Italy (and about the same as Spain)
These are indeed our peer countries
That whole article by J B Murdoch on the FT is notable (and brave from the Remoaner FT). Much of the Britain-is-fucked Remoaner narrative is, it turns out, based on false statistics - which have had real negative effects as investors turn away from a country they perceive as doing particularly badly (when we are not)
Remoaners are literally talking the country down, with lies. It’s time for them to stop
Here's the thing, though.
We used to look down on Italy and Spain as second tier Euro nations. Our comparators were Germany and France. Proper, well run nations, with a solid economic base.
Perhaps have a word with your stalker and that rag he writes for.
You mean the France where law and order had broken down so badly that state visits had to be cancelled on TWO occasions this year ?
The Germany with its dependency on cheap but insecure Russian gas and cheap but polluting domestic coal ?
As for the political parties of either they're a level of dreadfulness beyond the UK.
So all countries have problems, good aspects alongside bad aspects, advantages together with disadvantages.
And the 'every other country' is overtaking the UK has been a common theme since the 1970s, probably even before then.
I've been in Turin for the last three days. Currently in Lingotto. Turin, Italy's fourth city is very lively. My only beef is the graffiti everywhere. Much brighter than the UK at present. Perhaps we need (beautifully put Dura Ace) a Fash Karen too.
Over to you Suella.
You do realise that the pejorative "Karen" is RACIST against the KAREN people of Burma?
Better than Trump's US, Bolsonaro's Brazil... Not the countries we like to compare ourselves to, are they?
We grew faster than Germany and Spain throughout the pandemic, we had fewer deaths than Italy (and about the same as Spain)
These are indeed our peer countries
That whole article by J B Murdoch on the FT is notable (and brave from the Remoaner FT). Much of the Britain-is-fucked Remoaner narrative is, it turns out, based on false statistics - which have had real negative effects as investors turn away from a country they perceive as doing particularly badly (when we are not)
Remoaners are literally talking the country down, with lies. It’s time for them to stop
Here's the thing, though.
We used to look down on Italy and Spain as second tier Euro nations. Our comparators were Germany and France. Proper, well run nations, with a solid economic base.
Perhaps have a word with your stalker and that rag he writes for.
You mean the France where law and order had broken down so badly that state visits had to be cancelled on TWO occasions this year ?
The Germany with its dependency on cheap but insecure Russian gas and cheap but polluting domestic coal ?
As for the political parties of either they're a level of dreadfulness beyond the UK.
So all countries have problems, good aspects alongside bad aspects, advantages together with disadvantages.
And the 'every other country' is overtaking the UK has been a common theme since the 1970s, probably even before then.
I've been in Turin for the last three days. Currently in Lingotto. Turin, Italy's fourth city is very lively. My only beef is the graffiti everywhere. Much brighter than the UK at present. Perhaps we need (beautifully put Dura Ace) a Fash Karen too.
Over to you Suella.
You do realise that the pejorative "Karen" is RACIST against the KAREN people of Burma?
But that is not from where the pejorative "Karen" is derived. The derivation is from a popular American name popular amongst women if a particular age.
Whereas the term may be sexist, I do not believe it to be racist.
Best case: Sunil's winding you up; other case: Sunil's very odd. I prefer to believe case 1.
There is an ethnic group living mostly, but not exclusively, in Myanmar called the Karen.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
Exeter, Brighton and Warwick ought to be on that list. St David's might be considered as part of the Pembs Coast more widely. Inverness, Aberdeen and St Andrews would all be obvious ones in Scotland.
Much as I love Scotland of the three you mention, I have only been to Inverness. Great hinterland obviously, and a nice enough town, but hardly in the same league as those English tourist cities.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
Having just spent a week in Harrogate, I was very pleased with it.
'City' is a bit unfair to Scotland - no Established cathedrals, strictly. But how about those?
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
Do you really think your rentier attitude is good for the country generally or in particular for the Conservative party ?
Unless you Conservatives stop looking upon workers as if they were serfs then you'll be spending a long time in opposition.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
Having just spent a week in Harrogate, I was very pleased with it.
'City' is a bit unfair to Scotland - no Established cathedrals, strictly. But how about those?
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
It's not that unreasonable, if you make it CGT. Abolish IHT and make it CGT payable by the recipient.
As things are, it's already possible to convert elements of IHT to recipient's CGT - deeds of apportionment or whatever they are called, for things which go up in value during probate. Or, I assume, also down in value (which would be useful in counteracting recipient's capital gains).
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
Exeter, Brighton and Warwick ought to be on that list. St David's might be considered as part of the Pembs Coast more widely. Inverness, Aberdeen and St Andrews would all be obvious ones in Scotland.
Exeter is sadly ruined; I'd add Belfast, for its amazing location and history
Winchester, Wells, Ely, Truro, Stirling must surely be on the list as small cities
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
Having just spent a week in Harrogate, I was very pleased with it.
'City' is a bit unfair to Scotland - no Established cathedrals, strictly. But how about those?
Stirling. Kirkwall. Perth. Elgin.
Oh, and Wells of course, as any fule kno.
It's not a cathedral which defines a city, it's a royal charter. There are cities without cathedrals (Leeds) and cathedrals without cities (Southwell).
Better than Trump's US, Bolsonaro's Brazil... Not the countries we like to compare ourselves to, are they?
We grew faster than Germany and Spain throughout the pandemic, we had fewer deaths than Italy (and about the same as Spain)
These are indeed our peer countries
That whole article by J B Murdoch on the FT is notable (and brave from the Remoaner FT). Much of the Britain-is-fucked Remoaner narrative is, it turns out, based on false statistics - which have had real negative effects as investors turn away from a country they perceive as doing particularly badly (when we are not)
Remoaners are literally talking the country down, with lies. It’s time for them to stop
Here's the thing, though.
We used to look down on Italy and Spain as second tier Euro nations. Our comparators were Germany and France. Proper, well run nations, with a solid economic base.
Perhaps have a word with your stalker and that rag he writes for.
You mean the France where law and order had broken down so badly that state visits had to be cancelled on TWO occasions this year ?
The Germany with its dependency on cheap but insecure Russian gas and cheap but polluting domestic coal ?
As for the political parties of either they're a level of dreadfulness beyond the UK.
So all countries have problems, good aspects alongside bad aspects, advantages together with disadvantages.
And the 'every other country' is overtaking the UK has been a common theme since the 1970s, probably even before then.
I've been in Turin for the last three days. Currently in Lingotto. Turin, Italy's fourth city is very lively. My only beef is the graffiti everywhere. Much brighter than the UK at present. Perhaps we need (beautifully put Dura Ace) a Fash Karen too.
Over to you Suella.
You do realise that the pejorative "Karen" is RACIST against the KAREN people of Burma?
Better than Trump's US, Bolsonaro's Brazil... Not the countries we like to compare ourselves to, are they?
We grew faster than Germany and Spain throughout the pandemic, we had fewer deaths than Italy (and about the same as Spain)
These are indeed our peer countries
That whole article by J B Murdoch on the FT is notable (and brave from the Remoaner FT). Much of the Britain-is-fucked Remoaner narrative is, it turns out, based on false statistics - which have had real negative effects as investors turn away from a country they perceive as doing particularly badly (when we are not)
Remoaners are literally talking the country down, with lies. It’s time for them to stop
Here's the thing, though.
We used to look down on Italy and Spain as second tier Euro nations. Our comparators were Germany and France. Proper, well run nations, with a solid economic base.
Perhaps have a word with your stalker and that rag he writes for.
You mean the France where law and order had broken down so badly that state visits had to be cancelled on TWO occasions this year ?
The Germany with its dependency on cheap but insecure Russian gas and cheap but polluting domestic coal ?
As for the political parties of either they're a level of dreadfulness beyond the UK.
So all countries have problems, good aspects alongside bad aspects, advantages together with disadvantages.
And the 'every other country' is overtaking the UK has been a common theme since the 1970s, probably even before then.
I've been in Turin for the last three days. Currently in Lingotto. Turin, Italy's fourth city is very lively. My only beef is the graffiti everywhere. Much brighter than the UK at present. Perhaps we need (beautifully put Dura Ace) a Fash Karen too.
Over to you Suella.
You do realise that the pejorative "Karen" is RACIST against the KAREN people of Burma?
But that is not from where the pejorative "Karen" is derived. The derivation is from a popular American name popular amongst women if a particular age.
Whereas the term may be sexist, I do not believe it to be racist.
Best case: Sunil's winding you up; other case: Sunil's very odd. I prefer to believe case 1.
There is an ethnic group living mostly, but not exclusively, in Myanmar called the Karen.
I don't doubt it, but you and I both know Mexicanpete was not referring to them.
If, in answer to the dog debate, I suggested Afghan's should be banned, would that be racist?
Or on the subject of body hair I said I was not keen on Brazillians?
Anyway, I now conclude the answer is case 2: you're a very odd person. Meanwhile it's Welsh rarebit for supper for me.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
Depends on the tourist. Yes, for an American who loves Heritage(tm), Bath, Oxford, York, Cambridge. But as a domestic tourist, I like Bristol, just as I like Portland in the US - it’s not really very industrial, certainly not in the league of Manchester or Leeds. Liverpool is a massive tourist draw and is pretty much sui generis.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Most people go to Zermatt to ski not to see the Matterhorn. It is entirely incidental. Just there. You can't even ski it.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Salisbury: Stonehenge
Only one tourist attraction surely rules out Salisbury.
Don't people travel from all over Russia just to see Salisbury's Cathedral too?
+1 on Stratford, that has to be the best example in England, assuming you can link all Shakespearean attractions together as one item.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
It's the whining and sense of entitlement that gets me. Where's the self-reliance and self-respect of Mrs Thatcher? But I forget, she wasn't a True Tory in the 2023 sense.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Stratford for Shakespeare
Glasto (town) for the sheer other-worldly, healing energy crystal, new-ageness of it.
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
Cats are okay with me, because they don't threaten human life.
Almost all dogs don't threaten human life either.
Quite the contrary in fact, there's a lot of evidence that dog ownership leads to longer life, as well as a quicker recovery from illness, and better heart health, and less likely to die from either heart attacks or stress.
True. And assistance dogs are great for people with disabilities and for some poor souls their pet dog may be the only friend they have. It's a conundrum
It all depends upon the breed of the dog of course. Well behaved dogs are wonderful creatures. My own dog is a cross between a Jack Russell and a Chihuahua so not only wouldn't hurt anyone, but couldn't - we got her because our youngest was only a baby when we got her and my wife investigated what are really good breeds to have around babies.
Of course some groups like PETA are completely opposed to that. Which is kind of all the more reason to support doing it.
No idea about chihuahuas but Jack Russells can turn. In particular if they feel another dog or person is in competition (for food, attention, affection, etc).
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Stratford for Shakespeare
His birthplace and the theatre, if you could literally still meet Shakespeare too I expect ticket prices would be even higher!
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
It's the whining and sense of entitlement that gets me. Where's the self-reliance and self-respect of Mrs Thatcher? But I forget, she wasn't a True Tory in the 2023 sense.
No Thatcher wasn't a true Tory in the 1823 sense
Which is why she was a good Prime Minister.
And why the true 1823 Tory party went out of business in 1834. Good riddance to that.
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Your list is really weird, anyhow
No way Taj Mahal, Uluru, the Temples of Luxor, or the Alhambra (all world class sites) are remotely equalled by the shrine at Lourdes (I've been there, it's bollocks) or Disneyword Orlando (there are multiple Disneylands) or the Roman Theatre at Orange (ditto Roman theatres, and there are multiple examples better than Orange)
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
In the old days, there was no IHT. You paid CGT on what you inherited (actually, it was called Capital Transfer Tax). I found this when checking through some old family papers recently.
Estate duty was replaced by CTT by the Labour government of 1975 and IHT replaced that in 1986. Callaghan introduced CGT in 1965
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
That is the first time I have heard that but it does seem scientifically possible
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
Cats are okay with me, because they don't threaten human life.
Almost all dogs don't threaten human life either.
Quite the contrary in fact, there's a lot of evidence that dog ownership leads to longer life, as well as a quicker recovery from illness, and better heart health, and less likely to die from either heart attacks or stress.
True. And assistance dogs are great for people with disabilities and for some poor souls their pet dog may be the only friend they have. It's a conundrum
It all depends upon the breed of the dog of course. Well behaved dogs are wonderful creatures. My own dog is a cross between a Jack Russell and a Chihuahua so not only wouldn't hurt anyone, but couldn't - we got her because our youngest was only a baby when we got her and my wife investigated what are really good breeds to have around babies.
Of course some groups like PETA are completely opposed to that. Which is kind of all the more reason to support doing it.
No idea about chihuahuas but Jack Russells can turn. In particular if they feel another dog or person is in competition (for food, attention, affection, etc).
Indeed they can, but the cross breed doesn't apparently, which is interesting.
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
Wtaf? Do you have a link?
(Consider me very dubious.)
PS The moon is already tidally locked to the Earth, of course, so what is being referred to here?
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Your list is really weird, anyhow
No way Taj Mahal, Uluru, the Temples of Luxor, or the Alhambra (all world class sites) are remotely equalled by the shrine at Lourdes (I've been there, it's bollocks) or Disneyword Orlando (there are multiple Disneylands) or the Roman Theatre at Orange (ditto Roman theatres, and there are multiple examples better than Orange)
On the subject of dangerous dogs, what about mandatory insurance?
As mentioned earlier, that would be a de facto ban for XLs as you can’t get insurance for them. Probably not a bad idea.
The reason that an simple ban won’t work is the fuckwits* who like this kind of dog will simply move to the next “completely not a violent dog for thugs” breed.
With insurance, the next breed will either not be insurable or not assessed yet. And hence unobtainable.
*various people will start whining that proper owners can make such dogs lovable pets. Yeah and responsible owners can make ownership of nuclear weapons AOK. But I my right to own plutonium is a tad restricted for some reason.
Also, DIY crossbreeding to create a new breed. Happens all the time. How much is too much bully?
Imagine trying to ban poodles. Then PC Plod sees something with curly hair. Oh no Officer, this cockapoo is absolutely not a poodle. No sir. And this? It's its daughter. No siree, not a poodle at all. And I forgot, officer - their mummy and grannyt wasn't a poodle but a Bedlington Terrier, and no way can you prove it ...
Oh do shut up. I've told you how to ban it, do it the Aussie way. On the look of the dog. And err on the side of severity if there is any doubt, so no one can own any dog that looks remotely like this
Anyway, Suella the Brave is gonna ban them, yay. First time the Tories have done something sensible for several months
What I am saying is that focussing on the breed is useless and that you need something like the Aussie way, yet the panic is all about a specific breed - or is it two? You named two earlier ...
I'll be very interested to see what Ms Braverman has in mind for legislation. Seeing as she also has to deal with all the future replacements for the XL Bully as well.
The insurance route would work best.
An encrypted, injected chip, linking to the insurance.
Easy to detect and read. No chip, dog impounded and destroyed in 30 days of no evidence of insurance provided (for cases where chip is defective)
100k fine for possessing an un-insured dog.
Insurance doesn't stop the dog attacking someone.
Many of the people with dangerous dogs would not be able to afford insurance and /or would not insure.
They wouldn't be able to afford the fine either
What do you do then? Jail the person? Put the dog down? Both?
There will still be problems, but far far fewer
Because if the dogs are banned you can’t take the dog outside, coz you will immediately be reported and your dog will be shot and you will get a fine
Result: no more Satan dogs in parks or streets, lots more happy unmauled kids and smaller non-psycho dogs etc
I can imagine neighbours might be fearful of reporting the sort of person who has a dangerous dog. And those who own them can be pretty brazen about it. I know a few people who have someone with an aggressive dog living near them and their coping strategy is to avoid the person and the dog (eg crossing the street). They don't report to police of the council dog warden because they've done that before and nothing happens. Even if the dog has attacked their dog.
Yes, but now the cops will be given the powers they need. And the coppers hate these dogs as much as anyone
And anyone can anonymously report a dog in a park, and these dogs need to be walked; the owner won't know who did it
A ban, should it happen (I wouldn't put it past this inept govt to flub it) will, I think, be effecitve enough to get the menace off our streets
The cops don't have the resources/can't be bothered to do the work they already have
Yes, anyone can report an anonymous dog in the park or the street. Do you expect the police to turn up immediately and apprehend the dog walker? Because otherwise how are they to know who the person is? It would have to be reported by someone who knows them, and where they live, which narrows things down considerably for the dog owner. Compare with drug dealers - how many of their neighbours dare report them despite them being responsible for mnay deaths?
In an ideal world insurance might work, but in the real world it will only increase the costs of owning a dog for responsible dog owners, and have little impact on getting dangerous dogs out of circulation
What a load of defeatist nonsense. A ban - with the threat of your dog being shot, if seen - means no one will walk the dogs, for fear of being spotted. These dogs will probably turn on their owners in madness (let's hope so). Anyway, end of problem
Without the demand for new dogs the breeders will stop spplying them, which mwans the breed disappears. This isn't hard. It works in Australia
Sorry to say it, but there are far too many dogs around now. Every third person seems to have one.
I think you're right, although the cost of living may result in the number of pet dogs reducing. The sheer volume of poo produced by pet dogs every day is quite phenomenal and is a big environmental problem, as well as a potential health hazard.
Cats are problematic too, in that they are a threat to birds and small mammals.
Cats are okay with me, because they don't threaten human life.
Almost all dogs don't threaten human life either.
Quite the contrary in fact, there's a lot of evidence that dog ownership leads to longer life, as well as a quicker recovery from illness, and better heart health, and less likely to die from either heart attacks or stress.
True. And assistance dogs are great for people with disabilities and for some poor souls their pet dog may be the only friend they have. It's a conundrum
It all depends upon the breed of the dog of course. Well behaved dogs are wonderful creatures. My own dog is a cross between a Jack Russell and a Chihuahua so not only wouldn't hurt anyone, but couldn't - we got her because our youngest was only a baby when we got her and my wife investigated what are really good breeds to have around babies.
Of course some groups like PETA are completely opposed to that. Which is kind of all the more reason to support doing it.
No idea about chihuahuas but Jack Russells can turn. In particular if they feel another dog or person is in competition (for food, attention, affection, etc).
A pair of Jack Russells cannot kill/savage seventy sheep in half an hour, however
Nor rip the throat out of a grown man in three minutes, then go on to attack others
Some of the vids of XL Bully attacks in America are horrendous, I shall not link
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
Though given the costs of tidal energy versus wind energy, it seems a complete white elephant now anyway, just like nuclear. Just invest in wind + batteries (esp. car batteries) at a fraction of the cost.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
It's the whining and sense of entitlement that gets me. Where's the self-reliance and self-respect of Mrs Thatcher? But I forget, she wasn't a True Tory in the 2023 sense.
No Thatcher wasn't a true Tory in the 1823 sense
Which is why she was a good Prime Minister.
And why the true 1823 Tory party went out of business in 1834. Good riddance to that.
No, Rees Mogg, Bill Cash, the Marquess of Salisbury, even Boris and Sunak sometimes would have been 19th century Tories.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
Even if Fiji lose I can see them giving Australia a torrid time
On another subject - on your tour of the English side of the border with Wales, you missed out the city I visited today: Chester. Which, it feels, is just as attractive as ever and is in rude health. I think Chester gets a bit overlooked; the instinctive reaction to it always seems to be "it's not as good as York". Which is true, but 99% of England also fails on that metric. There certainly isn't as much for the touristin Chester as in York. But there are few more pleasant cities to be in. The city walls, the rows and the riverside are all remarkable, the cathedral as fine as any; the city is awash with Roman ruins, and there are more interesting historical buildings than you can shake a stick at (I'm sure a curious visitor accompanying fewer children could have found out a bit more about this but that's all I can give you.) In common with Hereford, Shrewsbury and so on, it feels a long way west, but isn't really remote; it's only 45 minutes from Manchester and less from Liverpool, but doesn't feel like a satellite of either. Mainly, it's a very pleasant place to be. We fantasised vaguely of retiring there.
All of which makes me wonder which is the best (non-capital*) tourist city in Britain? York, Bath, Oxford, Cambridge?
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
What we don’t have in Britain is many towns and cities famous entirely for containing one globally famous bucket list tourist attraction, and not otherwise important in their own right. York minster is impressive but people visit York to see York, not just the minster. Like they visit Venice for Venice, not just St Mark’s.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra Lourdes: magic stuff Bethlehem: church of the nativity Agra: Taj Mahal Xian: Terracotta Army Zermatt: Matterhorn Luxor: temples Alice Springs: Uluru Orlando: disneyworld Orange: Roman theatre Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Most people go to Zermatt to ski not to see the Matterhorn. It is entirely incidental. Just there. You can't even ski it.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
Do you really think your rentier attitude is good for the country generally or in particular for the Conservative party ?
Unless you Conservatives stop looking upon workers as if they were serfs then you'll be spending a long time in opposition.
Well there are millions and millions of voters who own property and want their relatives to inherit it and for it to go up in value.
Osborne's IHT cut was one of the biggest factors in the Tory victories of 2010 and 2015, though regardless of electoral appeal there is no point being in government if you aren't pushing Tory principles like cutting IHT
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
And as I said, the maths checks out. The numbers he used were based on current power consumption for then, the paper I saw is based on projected global power consumption for the next 100 years hence the much lower time to catastrophe.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
Then why is IHT paid on them
As it is an inheritance tax on assets not an income tax
Yes, Stratford upon Avon is the one. I’d overlooked it despite family living round the corner.
As for my list being weird: I appreciate Lourdes isn’t on most people’s bucket list but there are some crazy (and very ill) people for whom it is indeed the trip of a lifetime.
Orange: fair point. It’s B list, like Salisbury
Orlando: I disagree. UNESCO isn’t going to list it anytime soon but for the sheer number of tourists whose biggest holiday outlay of their lives is a trip there, for a small selection of theme parks dominated by the big Disneyworld, it surely more than qualifies. Certainly more than the Surrey village of Chessington, where I spent a hot and queuey day today that reaffirmed I’ll never go willingly to Orlando.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
It's the whining and sense of entitlement that gets me. Where's the self-reliance and self-respect of Mrs Thatcher? But I forget, she wasn't a True Tory in the 2023 sense.
No Thatcher wasn't a true Tory in the 1823 sense
Which is why she was a good Prime Minister.
And why the true 1823 Tory party went out of business in 1834. Good riddance to that.
No, Rees Mogg, Bill Cash, the Marquess of Salisbury, even Boris and Sunak sometimes would have been 19th century Tories.
Yes, they would have been, but that's not the party they're in so perhaps those entryists should be kicked out and form a real "true Tory" party. And it is also why Mogg and Cash* are regarded as eccentrics and weirdos, the Marquess of Salisbury is not even worth mentioning, and Sunak is going to deliver the Tories to a well deserved period of Opposition.
Boris isn't an 1820s Tory by any stretch of the definition. Boris is interested in Boris, not obsolete 19th century philosophies.
* Actually to be fair to Cash, as eccentric and weird as he can be, he's not as bad as that. Mogg is, yes.
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
Wtaf? Do you have a link?
(Consider me very dubious.)
The relative scales of the energy involved are separated by a number of orders of magnitude….
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
Then why is IHT paid on them
As it is an inheritance tax on assets not an income tax
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
Wtaf? Do you have a link?
(Consider me very dubious.)
PS The moon is already tidally locked to the Earth, of course, so what is being referred to here?
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
Though given the costs of tidal energy versus wind energy, it seems a complete white elephant now anyway, just like nuclear. Just invest in wind + batteries (esp. car batteries) at a fraction of the cost.
Yes well, this person is attempting to have tidal labelled as non-renewable alongside fossil fuels. Having read that paper on Friday I'm minded to agree and any billions that are being spent on tidal should be diverted to nuclear.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
I struggle with your justification for your position. Consider the following. My sister in law and husband are not high earners but bought a flat many decades ago in SW London to live in, upgraded to a terraced house and since now down sized to a flat again and will soon move out of SW London. The capital gains they have made on their homes exceed any income they have made in their entire lives and they will live on that for the rest of their lives and not a penny of tax has been paid on it.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
Then why is IHT paid on them
As it is an inheritance tax on assets not an income tax
"Terrifying moment 'XL Bully' dog mauls 11-year-old girl in the street before crazed animal chases and attacks two men who tried to wrestle the youngster free: Suella Braverman commissions 'urgent advice' on banning the 'lethal' breed The nightmare unfolded in Bordesley Green, Birmingham, yesterday afternoon"
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
Wtaf? Do you have a link?
(Consider me very dubious.)
PS The moon is already tidally locked to the Earth, of course, so what is being referred to here?
Likewise. Makes no sense on first glance.
Yes it does, there is a net energy transfer already which is causing a very tiny slowdown in our orbital speed and that's just from natural tidal forces that create friction. Man made friction would be a few orders of magnitude higher than natural tidal friction so the net energy transfer from the moon's orbit gets a lot higher.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
It's the whining and sense of entitlement that gets me. Where's the self-reliance and self-respect of Mrs Thatcher? But I forget, she wasn't a True Tory in the 2023 sense.
No Thatcher wasn't a true Tory in the 1823 sense
Which is why she was a good Prime Minister.
And why the true 1823 Tory party went out of business in 1834. Good riddance to that.
No, Rees Mogg, Bill Cash, the Marquess of Salisbury, even Boris and Sunak sometimes would have been 19th century Tories.
Yes, they would have been, but that's not the party they're in so perhaps those entryists should be kicked out and form a real "true Tory" party. And it is also why Mogg and Cash* are regarded as eccentrics and weirdos, the Marquess of Salisbury is not even worth mentioning, and Sunak is going to deliver the Tories to a well deserved period of Opposition.
Boris isn't an 1820s Tory by any stretch of the definition. Boris is interested in Boris, not obsolete 19th century philosophies.
* Actually to be fair to Cash, as eccentric and weird as he can be, he's not as bad as that. Mogg is, yes.
Yes it is the party they are in, the original Tory Party is still there, it just added on some free market liberals.
Indeed the impact of Brexit eg leaving the single market free trade area and restricting immigration has seen the electoral map shift in a more late 19th century direction. Conservatives strongest in rural areas and patriotic working class areas and Liberals making gains in commuter belt and the cities Labour largely (largely Liberal in the 19th century)
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
Then why is IHT paid on them
As it is an inheritance tax on assets not an income tax
Just as an aside, I saw a pretty alarming bit of research on Friday calling for a global moratorium on tidal energy. It was quite compelling and essentially it outlined that tidal energy isn't renewable and using it at scale would be catastrophically bad. If we used tidal to power just 5% of global energy needs the resulting slowdown in our orbital speed would mean our orbit becomes tidally locked to the moon within 50-60 years, that's 27.8 current days per rotation.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
Wtaf? Do you have a link?
(Consider me very dubious.)
PS The moon is already tidally locked to the Earth, of course, so what is being referred to here?
Likewise. Makes no sense on first glance.
Yes it does, there is a net energy transfer already which is causing a very tiny slowdown in our orbital speed and that's just from natural tidal forces that create friction. Man made friction would be a few orders of magnitude higher than natural tidal friction so the net energy transfer from the moon's orbit gets a lot higher.
The principle makes sense, the question would be the orders of magnitude and the maths. It could either be a figurative drop in the ocean, or it could be catastrophic.
I wouldn't want to judge the maths either way personally, but it is certainly something that perhaps should be looked into.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
It's the whining and sense of entitlement that gets me. Where's the self-reliance and self-respect of Mrs Thatcher? But I forget, she wasn't a True Tory in the 2023 sense.
No Thatcher wasn't a true Tory in the 1823 sense
Which is why she was a good Prime Minister.
And why the true 1823 Tory party went out of business in 1834. Good riddance to that.
No, Rees Mogg, Bill Cash, the Marquess of Salisbury, even Boris and Sunak sometimes would have been 19th century Tories.
Yes, they would have been, but that's not the party they're in so perhaps those entryists should be kicked out and form a real "true Tory" party. And it is also why Mogg and Cash* are regarded as eccentrics and weirdos, the Marquess of Salisbury is not even worth mentioning, and Sunak is going to deliver the Tories to a well deserved period of Opposition.
Boris isn't an 1820s Tory by any stretch of the definition. Boris is interested in Boris, not obsolete 19th century philosophies.
* Actually to be fair to Cash, as eccentric and weird as he can be, he's not as bad as that. Mogg is, yes.
Yes it is the party they are in, the original Tory Party is still there, it just added on some free market liberals.
Indeed the impact of Brexit eg leaving the single market free trade area and restricting immigration has seen the electoral map shift in a more late 19th century direction. Conservatives strongest in rural areas and patriotic working class areas and Liberals making gains in commuter belt
No, the original Tory Party died.
Peel's Conservative Party killed it. Good riddance, no flowers.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
I struggle with your justification for your position. Consider the following. My sister in law and husband are not high earners but bought a flat many decades ago in SW London to live in, upgraded to a terraced house and since now down sized to a flat again and will soon move out of SW London. The capital gains they have made on their homes exceed any income they have made in their entire lives and they will live on that for the rest of their lives and not a penny of tax has been paid on it.
Well good for them, they invested wisely in a sensible asset. That is why I am a Tory and you are a Liberal.
Though they will of course have paid increased council tax on it
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
I struggle with your justification for your position. Consider the following. My sister in law and husband are not high earners but bought a flat many decades ago in SW London to live in, upgraded to a terraced house and since now down sized to a flat again and will soon move out of SW London. The capital gains they have made on their homes exceed any income they have made in their entire lives and they will live on that for the rest of their lives and not a penny of tax has been paid on it.
Well good for them, they invested wisely in a sensible asset. That is why I am a Tory and you are a Liberal.
Though they will of course have paid increased council tax on it
Council tax at the higher end of the scale is never very proportional to value. So that is an absolutely pathetic excuse.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
I struggle with your justification for your position. Consider the following. My sister in law and husband are not high earners but bought a flat many decades ago in SW London to live in, upgraded to a terraced house and since now down sized to a flat again and will soon move out of SW London. The capital gains they have made on their homes exceed any income they have made in their entire lives and they will live on that for the rest of their lives and not a penny of tax has been paid on it.
Well good for them, they invested wisely in a sensible asset. That is why I am a Tory and you are a Liberal.
Though they will of course have paid increased council tax on it
Many who inherit a property will inherit property that their parents tenants will have paid Council Tax on, not their parents.
So should the tenants get the property tax free instead of the recipient in your eyes, if that's the killer tax that's relevant?
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
It's the whining and sense of entitlement that gets me. Where's the self-reliance and self-respect of Mrs Thatcher? But I forget, she wasn't a True Tory in the 2023 sense.
No Thatcher wasn't a true Tory in the 1823 sense
Which is why she was a good Prime Minister.
And why the true 1823 Tory party went out of business in 1834. Good riddance to that.
No, Rees Mogg, Bill Cash, the Marquess of Salisbury, even Boris and Sunak sometimes would have been 19th century Tories.
Yes, they would have been, but that's not the party they're in so perhaps those entryists should be kicked out and form a real "true Tory" party. And it is also why Mogg and Cash* are regarded as eccentrics and weirdos, the Marquess of Salisbury is not even worth mentioning, and Sunak is going to deliver the Tories to a well deserved period of Opposition.
Boris isn't an 1820s Tory by any stretch of the definition. Boris is interested in Boris, not obsolete 19th century philosophies.
* Actually to be fair to Cash, as eccentric and weird as he can be, he's not as bad as that. Mogg is, yes.
Yes it is the party they are in, the original Tory Party is still there, it just added on some free market liberals.
Indeed the impact of Brexit eg leaving the single market free trade area and restricting immigration has seen the electoral map shift in a more late 19th century direction. Conservatives strongest in rural areas and patriotic working class areas and Liberals making gains in commuter belt
No, the original Tory Party died.
Peel's Conservative Party killed it. Good riddance, no flowers.
Nope, Peel left the Conservative Party he himself created to form a Peelite faction which ultimately merged with the Whigs to form the Liberal Party.
Just as the franchise expanded and faced with the threat of a rising Labour party many of those free market Liberals joined the Conservatives to form today's Conservative Party in the early 20th century.
What would be the effect of removing national insurance on employment income and putting it on non-employment income ?
I suppose you could do it on a gradual basis by decreasing the first and increasing the second by 1% a year until they were level.
Obviously the rentiers and oldies would hate it but part of the reason for introducing it would be to transfer wealth to workers and the young.
Absolutely not. The whole reason national insurance was created in the first place was so workers would contribute for insurance and benefits if unemployed and that expanded to contributions to fund state pensions and also some healthcare.
National insurance should be hypothecated and return to those aims. The inheritance tax threshold should be increased to £2 million instead so older people can ultimately pass on more of their assets to their children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces
Why shouldn't non-workers contribute to those things ?
And given that only about 5% of estates pay inheritance tax your idea would be a tax cut on unearned income for the very rich.
Is this really your view as to what the Conservative party should be for ?
They did, they paid in national insurance when they were working. Now most estates in the south especially are above the IHT threshold. Absolutely the Conservative party should be about preserving wealth and inheritance in the family, that is what Toryism has always been about, even before free market liberals joined it to keep out Labour
"preserving wealth and inheritance in the family" = not paying their fair share of taxes, especially on massive capital gains orchestrated by the "Conservative" Party. Which used to be one of hard work and self-respect. Now, no longer.
They already paid tax on that estate and income and assets their working life.
The Tory party has always been a party which has supported inherited wealth, indeed even Thatcher would arguably have been a Gladstone free market Liberal rather than a Tory in the 19th century. Today's Conservative Party does indeed support hard work and the free market on the whole (certainly compared to Labour) but those are add ons from free market liberals, inheritance is more a cornerstone of Toryism
THEY DID NOT PAY TAX ON THAT INCOME FROM MASSIVE CAPITAL GAINS.
Look at how estates are de facto immune from CGT.
CGT allowance when you are alive - 6k, 3K next year.
Dead, effectively 500k for many.
They paid council tax on it, stamp duty when they bought it and income tax on the income which bought it and paid for the mortgage
Interesting you are arguing they paid income tax on the income which bought it, when you want 2 million handed down tax free to you to buy a property
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Forget allowances, inheritance tax should be abolished altogether.
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
I have no issue of applying income tax to estates though I doubt any politician is brave enough to propose it
Estates are wealth and assets not income, unless let out and you get rent from them
I struggle with your justification for your position. Consider the following. My sister in law and husband are not high earners but bought a flat many decades ago in SW London to live in, upgraded to a terraced house and since now down sized to a flat again and will soon move out of SW London. The capital gains they have made on their homes exceed any income they have made in their entire lives and they will live on that for the rest of their lives and not a penny of tax has been paid on it.
Well good for them, they invested wisely in a sensible asset. That is why I am a Tory and you are a Liberal.
Though they will of course have paid increased council tax on it
Many who inherit a property will inherit property that their parents tenants will have paid Council Tax on, not their parents.
So should the tenants get the property tax free instead of the recipient in your eyes, if that's the killer tax that's relevant?
This is getting to sound like "my hamster ate my homework" level of excuse from HYUFD.
Comments
Eventually, good sense trumped morbid curiousity and we allowed the dogshit car to speed away from us.
Still. Horrible.
It was only the rise of Labour which brought free market liberals and Tories together to form today's Conservative Party (though Peel technically founded the modern Conservative Party he left it shortly after most of the landed gentry and much of the aristocracy and farming community opposed his proposed repeal of the Corn Laws)
I'd plump for Bath, Oxford, York and Cambridge in that order. Then you've got Chester, Canterbury, Lincoln, Salisbury, Shrewsbury, Durham, Norwich, Windsor and a whole host of also-rans.
My list is all England, what am I missing from the other nations?
(*I'd suggest London and Edinburgh are in a different league, and I am excluding the big commercial industrial cities, Manchester, Bristol, Leeds, Newcastle, etc. though they do get a fair few tourists.)
Quite the contrary in fact, there's a lot of evidence that dog ownership leads to longer life, as well as a quicker recovery from illness, and better heart health, and less likely to die from either heart attacks or stress.
https://www.heart.org/en/healthy-living/healthy-bond-for-life-pets/do-dog-owners-live-longer
Be interesting news to all tenants if HYUFD thinks they should be entitled to ownership of the property they let for free, by virtue of having paid the Council Tax.
in the old days, one paid CTT whether on estates or otherwise.
The present allowances are more than generous and I do not support increasing them, just as I do not support the triple lock
Inheritance should just be liable to income tax on the entire inheritance instead. Which should include National Insurance as should all incomes, not just salaried ones.
Airbus is not in Chester or England
It is in Wales and manufactures all Airbus wings
Indeed my son in law recently retired from a very senior position with them having joined more than 45 years ago
Therapy dogs can work for more than just a few people with disabilities, its an interesting thing some schools have started doing is getting dogs for the school - which where its been trialled has done wonders in improving school behaviour and cutting truancy: https://schoolsweek.co.uk/paws-for-thought-why-an-academy-trust-spent-12k-on-dogs-to-tackle-pupil-anxiety/
Of course some groups like PETA are completely opposed to that. Which is kind of all the more reason to support doing it.
You can't have zero risk in life, its about balancing risk. For a few breeds the scales of balance might tip towards saying you shouldn't have those dogs, but for almost all breeds people do have, the scales tip far the other direction.
The box will be though, so that's a conundrum if that counts.
Stirling. Kirkwall. Perth. Elgin.
Oh, and Wells of course, as any fule kno.
Compare with
Granada: Alhambra
Lourdes: magic stuff
Bethlehem: church of the nativity
Agra: Taj Mahal
Xian: Terracotta Army
Zermatt: Matterhorn
Luxor: temples
Alice Springs: Uluru
Orlando: disneyworld
Orange: Roman theatre
Etc
Actually I thought of a couple, but they are B list world tourist attractions: Windsor for the castle, Bicester for the outlet village, Hay and Glastonbury for the festivals.
Unless you Conservatives stop looking upon workers as if they were serfs then you'll be spending a long time in opposition.
As things are, it's already possible to convert elements of IHT to recipient's CGT - deeds of apportionment or whatever they are called, for things which go up in value during probate. Or, I assume, also down in value (which would be useful in counteracting recipient's capital gains).
Winchester, Wells, Ely, Truro, Stirling must surely be on the list as small cities
Former hooker was caught up in the chaotic scenes outside Stade de Marseille ahead of England's opening match of the Rugby World Cup
Brian Moore"
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/rugby-union/2023/09/10/organisation-shambolic-england-v-argentina-rugby-world-cup
Stratford: Shakespeare
Newcastle: Hadrian's Wall
If, in answer to the dog debate, I suggested Afghan's should be banned, would that be racist?
Or on the subject of body hair I said I was not keen on Brazillians?
Anyway, I now conclude the answer is case 2: you're a very odd person. Meanwhile it's Welsh rarebit for supper for me.
Best game of the tournament so far! Augurs well
Don't people travel from all over Russia just to see Salisbury's Cathedral too?
+1 on Stratford, that has to be the best example in England, assuming you can link all Shakespearean attractions together as one item.
I've requested more information for the coming week but I took a cursory look at the maths on Friday and it definitely checks out.
And why the true 1823 Tory party went out of business in 1834. Good riddance to that.
No way Taj Mahal, Uluru, the Temples of Luxor, or the Alhambra (all world class sites) are remotely equalled by the shrine at Lourdes (I've been there, it's bollocks) or Disneyword Orlando (there are multiple Disneylands) or the Roman Theatre at Orange (ditto Roman theatres, and there are multiple examples better than Orange)
Very popular with Russian tourists, I believe.
(Consider me very dubious.)
PS The moon is already tidally locked to the Earth, of course, so what is being referred to here?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/tennis/62999885
Nor rip the throat out of a grown man in three minutes, then go on to attack others
Some of the vids of XL Bully attacks in America are horrendous, I shall not link
Its an interesting concept.
Though given the costs of tidal energy versus wind energy, it seems a complete white elephant now anyway, just like nuclear. Just invest in wind + batteries (esp. car batteries) at a fraction of the cost.
Osborne's IHT cut was one of the biggest factors in the Tory victories of 2010 and 2015, though regardless of electoral appeal there is no point being in government if you aren't pushing Tory principles like cutting IHT
And as I said, the maths checks out. The numbers he used were based on current power consumption for then, the paper I saw is based on projected global power consumption for the next 100 years hence the much lower time to catastrophe.
As for my list being weird: I appreciate Lourdes isn’t on most people’s bucket list but there are some crazy (and very ill) people for whom it is indeed the trip of a lifetime.
Orange: fair point. It’s B list, like Salisbury
Orlando: I disagree. UNESCO isn’t going to list it anytime soon but for the sheer number of tourists whose biggest holiday outlay of their lives is a trip there, for a small selection of theme parks dominated by the big Disneyworld, it surely more than qualifies. Certainly more than the Surrey village of Chessington, where I spent a hot and queuey day today that reaffirmed I’ll never go willingly to Orlando.
Boris isn't an 1820s Tory by any stretch of the definition. Boris is interested in Boris, not obsolete 19th century philosophies.
* Actually to be fair to Cash, as eccentric and weird as he can be, he's not as bad as that. Mogg is, yes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2023_New_Zealand_general_election
The nightmare unfolded in Bordesley Green, Birmingham, yesterday afternoon"
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12501641/Terrifying-moment-XL-Bully-dog-mauls-11-year-old-girl-street-crazed-animal-chases-attacks-two-men-tried-wrestle-youngster-free-jaws.html
Indeed the impact of Brexit eg leaving the single market free trade area and restricting immigration has seen the electoral map shift in a more late 19th century direction. Conservatives strongest in rural areas and patriotic working class areas and Liberals making gains in commuter belt and the cities Labour largely (largely Liberal in the 19th century)
I wouldn't want to judge the maths either way personally, but it is certainly something that perhaps should be looked into.
Peel's Conservative Party killed it. Good riddance, no flowers.
Though they will of course have paid increased council tax on it
So should the tenants get the property tax free instead of the recipient in your eyes, if that's the killer tax that's relevant?
Just as the franchise expanded and faced with the threat of a rising Labour party many of those free market Liberals joined the Conservatives to form today's Conservative Party in the early 20th century.