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How Sunak’s speech is being covered – politicalbetting.com

SystemSystem Posts: 12,114
edited October 2023 in General
imageHow Sunak’s speech is being covered – politicalbetting.com

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  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,163
    First.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,163

    Lilian Greenwood
    @LilianGreenwood
    ·
    3h
    YCMIU - according to the Tory Transport Secretary’s new fairytale published this afternoon, there’s “the potential to extend the Nottingham Tram system to serve …Clifton South”. (Clifton South opened more than 8 years ago). Do they even know where the East Midlands is?
  • The Star has got the scoop yet again.
  • glwglw Posts: 9,855


    Lilian Greenwood
    @LilianGreenwood
    ·
    3h
    YCMIU - according to the Tory Transport Secretary’s new fairytale published this afternoon, there’s “the potential to extend the Nottingham Tram system to serve …Clifton South”. (Clifton South opened more than 8 years ago). Do they even know where the East Midlands is?

    Forget the fag packet, the plan must have been dreamt up on the back of a stamp.
  • Eabhal said:

    One year to a GE and Sunak has got the country focussed on railway lines.

    Taking a step back from the fire and fury tonight: is that really a very good re-election launch strategy?

    As disgusted as I am, cynically it could be.

    Rail just isn't that important outside of London, which is why HS2 was only ever a Londoners blueprint for what Levelling Up should mean.

    If the Opposition overreacts to this then it could backfire, which is probably why Starmer is wisely keeping his cards close to his chest currently.

    If Sunak wanted to be really cynical, he should slash fuel duty before the election. Would help him make his inflation target too.
    This is your blind spot for all things transport.

    The reason it isn't important is because it isn't available. That's what HS2 was aiming to fix.

    The reason you have high levels of driving in the north-west is because you have the highest density of roads anywhere in the country.

    So what you're saying is we have high levels of driving because we have the best density of roads anywhere in the country?

    Great. And your problem with that is?

    So if other areas had better road density, they could cope with more driving too. And since 95% of freight mileage comes on the roads, and 90% of passenger mileage comes on the roads, then any extra driving would be GDP growth.

    Just because our road situation is better than elsewhere, doesn't mean its worse than it should be. Had we continued to invest in our roads at the same rate as we had in the 60s then we'd be much better off now and our GDP/capita would have continued to grow just as it did in the 60s and 70s.

    You could literally double all rail capacity and that would be a miniscule boost in freight capacity nationwide, but if you double road capacity then since 95% of transport comes on roads that takes you to 190% capacity.

    Its almost as if investment in infrastructure works, seems like you're coming around.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,675
    @faisalislam

    The net result of this, they say, is that they west coast rail line itself will have to be upgraded, but that can only be achieved by shutting it at vast expense/ traveller hassle in a few years’ time.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,006
    edited October 2023
    "Tom Forth reposted
    Jeremy Hunt
    @Jeremy_Hunt

    HS2 is absolutely vital. Totally agree w
    @andy4wm
    . Post Brexit we must be AMBITIOUS for our country and hungry for our economy. What signal would it send if we cancelled our highest profile infrastructure project and weakened our commitment to share prosperity around the country?
    2:16 PM · May 20, 2019"

    https://twitter.com/Jeremy_Hunt/status/1130462314304552960
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,163
    glw said:


    Lilian Greenwood
    @LilianGreenwood
    ·
    3h
    YCMIU - according to the Tory Transport Secretary’s new fairytale published this afternoon, there’s “the potential to extend the Nottingham Tram system to serve …Clifton South”. (Clifton South opened more than 8 years ago). Do they even know where the East Midlands is?

    Forget the fag packet, the plan must have been dreamt up on the back of a stamp.
    A "brave", "bold" "end of consensus" long term decision that was clearly done overnight at conference with some teenage scribblers.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,307
    Great show for the Daily Star in the header. Twice the size of any other front page and no reference to the Tory conference.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,307


    Lilian Greenwood
    @LilianGreenwood
    ·
    3h
    YCMIU - according to the Tory Transport Secretary’s new fairytale published this afternoon, there’s “the potential to extend the Nottingham Tram system to serve …Clifton South”. (Clifton South opened more than 8 years ago). Do they even know where the East Midlands is?

    Sunak: “Today, Conference, I will repeal the ban on the Nottingham tram serving Clifton South.”
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,163
    Scott_xP said:

    @faisalislam

    The net result of this, they say, is that they west coast rail line itself will have to be upgraded, but that can only be achieved by shutting it at vast expense/ traveller hassle in a few years’ time.

    Almost as if there was actually a reason to build HS2 after all.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,163

    Great show for the Daily Star in the header. Twice the size of any other front page and no reference to the Tory conference.

    Or maybe there is?
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,163

    (((Dan Hodges)))
    @DPJHodges
    ·
    18m
    If Boris Johnson, David Cameron and Liz Truss all think Rishi Sunak is pursuing the wrong strategy, and Rishi Sunak thinks Boris Johnson, David Cameron and Liz Truss were pursuing the wrong strategy, what are the British people meant to think…
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,307
    I genuinely have no idea what Sunak hoped to gain from this speech today. What was his goal? It makes no sense, on any level.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,307
    edited October 2023

    Great show for the Daily Star in the header. Twice the size of any other front page and no reference to the Tory conference.

    Or maybe there is?
    Ah, yes. I see it now.
  • carnforthcarnforth Posts: 4,470

    I genuinely have no idea what Sunak hoped to gain from this speech today. What was his goal? It makes no sense, on any level.

    Perhaps, and I speak unfathomably charitably, there is some jam to come after this boil is lanced.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,163

    I genuinely have no idea what Sunak hoped to gain from this speech today. What was his goal? It makes no sense, on any level.

    I am change and change is what you all want.

  • Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,163
    George Eaton
    @georgeeaton
    Tory conference showed what a significant media player GB News has become in just two years. It will be even more influential in opposition.
  • carnforthcarnforth Posts: 4,470

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    Welcome to PB. Hyperbole.
  • carnforthcarnforth Posts: 4,470

    George Eaton
    @georgeeaton
    Tory conference showed what a significant media player GB News has become in just two years. It will be even more influential in opposition.

    I have never watched GB news - I don't watch TV news of any stripe. But it is doing surprisingly well. Not well enough to turn a profit though....
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 70,217
    Give it a couple of days for the press to work out the extent of Sunak's financial sleight of hand.
    This is like the dodgiest iof 'clever' budgets. It won't withstand scrutiny.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 51,179

    I genuinely have no idea what Sunak hoped to gain from this speech today. What was his goal? It makes no sense, on any level.

    If he is being advised by Dominic Cummings then he's probably hoping that it will goad the opposition into taking a position that makes them more vulnerable.
  • George Eaton
    @georgeeaton
    Tory conference showed what a significant media player GB News has become in just two years. It will be even more influential in opposition.

    Lol they have just lost 3 of their main presenters. Lozza Fox was arrested today.
    https://x.com/CaliforniaFrizz/status/1709512739582816604?s=20
  • Then theres this from Calvin Robinson.

    How long can a station keep calling itself "the home of free speech" when it continues to engage in cancel culture? I supported my friends/colleagues and will continue to do so. That should not be a fireable offence. GB News is controlled opposition.

    https://x.com/calvinrobinson/status/1709584551926804768?s=20
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 70,217
    Another risible piece of Musk crippling his own website.

    Twitter/X has officially removed article headlines on links shared to the platform, now just displaying the image and website.
    https://twitter.com/PopBase/status/1709655415850746242

    For now it's still usable, but steadily becoming less so.
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 8,362

    Eabhal said:

    One year to a GE and Sunak has got the country focussed on railway lines.

    Taking a step back from the fire and fury tonight: is that really a very good re-election launch strategy?

    As disgusted as I am, cynically it could be.

    Rail just isn't that important outside of London, which is why HS2 was only ever a Londoners blueprint for what Levelling Up should mean.

    If the Opposition overreacts to this then it could backfire, which is probably why Starmer is wisely keeping his cards close to his chest currently.

    If Sunak wanted to be really cynical, he should slash fuel duty before the election. Would help him make his inflation target too.
    This is your blind spot for all things transport.

    The reason it isn't important is because it isn't available. That's what HS2 was aiming to fix.

    The reason you have high levels of driving in the north-west is because you have the highest density of roads anywhere in the country.

    So what you're saying is we have high levels of driving because we have the best density of roads anywhere in the country?

    Great. And your problem with that is?

    So if other areas had better road density, they could cope with more driving too. And since 95% of freight mileage comes on the roads, and 90% of passenger mileage comes on the roads, then any extra driving would be GDP growth.

    Just because our road situation is better than elsewhere, doesn't mean its worse than it should be. Had we continued to invest in our roads at the same rate as we had in the 60s then we'd be much better off now and our GDP/capita would have continued to grow just as it did in the 60s and 70s.

    You could literally double all rail capacity and that would be a miniscule boost in freight capacity nationwide, but if you double road capacity then since 95% of transport comes on roads that takes you to 190% capacity.

    Its almost as if investment in infrastructure works, seems like you're coming around.
    High road coverage, low productivity. Thought you were interested in levelling up, not down?

    (Doubling rail coverage from a low base is not the same as doubling road coverage)
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 121,974

    Then theres this from Calvin Robinson.

    How long can a station keep calling itself "the home of free speech" when it continues to engage in cancel culture? I supported my friends/colleagues and will continue to do so. That should not be a fireable offence. GB News is controlled opposition.

    https://x.com/calvinrobinson/status/1709584551926804768?s=20

    He is also a Deacon at Christ Church Harlesden in the Free Church of England

    https://web.archive.org/web/20220703142101/https://fcofe.org.uk/2022/06/26/calvin-robinson-was-ordained-to-the-diaconate/
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,347
    edited October 2023
    carnforth said:

    George Eaton
    @georgeeaton
    Tory conference showed what a significant media player GB News has become in just two years. It will be even more influential in opposition.

    I have never watched GB news - I don't watch TV news of any stripe. But it is doing surprisingly well. Not well enough to turn a profit though....
    Its a very strange channel...a mix of long time industry professionals who have been hired from the likes of Sky News with equal measure crackpots.

    I don't understand the business plan at all. Live TV is expensive and you will always have the OFCOM issue and I don't think there is much demand for one minute having a Colin Brazier or Alister Stewart types, next the mad bloke of Coast.

    Nobody gets big viewership or has made money out of tv news in the UK and the use of "shock-jock" approaches like having Farage on has a limited market and shelf life (he was similarly success on LBC, but its never Tucker Carlson popular).

    Compare UnHerd which is funded by the same people, you can see how that can work out businesswise.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,307
    How is it possible to be as into roads as Uncle Barty?
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 121,974

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    5 years ago you could have said 'Labour are finished now. A new hard left party will take their place and even if Labour survive they will be the hard left party.'

    The 2 main parties have always moved between their centrist and more extreme ideological wings and back
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 8,362

    How is it possible to be as into roads as Uncle Barty?

    Environment. He lives in a low density housing estate in an area with some of the highest car commuting and road density in the country.
  • .
    Eabhal said:

    Eabhal said:

    One year to a GE and Sunak has got the country focussed on railway lines.

    Taking a step back from the fire and fury tonight: is that really a very good re-election launch strategy?

    As disgusted as I am, cynically it could be.

    Rail just isn't that important outside of London, which is why HS2 was only ever a Londoners blueprint for what Levelling Up should mean.

    If the Opposition overreacts to this then it could backfire, which is probably why Starmer is wisely keeping his cards close to his chest currently.

    If Sunak wanted to be really cynical, he should slash fuel duty before the election. Would help him make his inflation target too.
    This is your blind spot for all things transport.

    The reason it isn't important is because it isn't available. That's what HS2 was aiming to fix.

    The reason you have high levels of driving in the north-west is because you have the highest density of roads anywhere in the country.

    So what you're saying is we have high levels of driving because we have the best density of roads anywhere in the country?

    Great. And your problem with that is?

    So if other areas had better road density, they could cope with more driving too. And since 95% of freight mileage comes on the roads, and 90% of passenger mileage comes on the roads, then any extra driving would be GDP growth.

    Just because our road situation is better than elsewhere, doesn't mean its worse than it should be. Had we continued to invest in our roads at the same rate as we had in the 60s then we'd be much better off now and our GDP/capita would have continued to grow just as it did in the 60s and 70s.

    You could literally double all rail capacity and that would be a miniscule boost in freight capacity nationwide, but if you double road capacity then since 95% of transport comes on roads that takes you to 190% capacity.

    Its almost as if investment in infrastructure works, seems like you're coming around.
    High road coverage, low productivity. Thought you were interested in levelling up, not down?

    (Doubling rail coverage from a low base is not the same as doubling road coverage)
    There's no inverse relationship between high productivity including high home ownership and road coverage.

    Your argument is as illogical as your contention that just because something is working doesn't mean we don't need more of it.

    By your logic London already had rail so has no need for Crossrail.
  • BartholomewRobertsBartholomewRoberts Posts: 21,699
    edited October 2023
    Eabhal said:

    How is it possible to be as into roads as Uncle Barty?

    Environment. He lives in a low density housing estate in an area with some of the highest car commuting and road density in the country.
    It's fantastic.

    Housing is affordable (relatively) and private transport (also relatively) is too. Win/win.

    Oh and it's not just my environment. 95% of nationwide freight mileage, 90% of nationwide passenger mileage and 75% of commuters everywhere except London are all by driving too. The remainder of commuters mostly walk.

    If only we had some investment too. Unfortunately the train obsessives who think they're normal and I'm the odd one out run the country.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 51,179
    edited October 2023
    Martina Navratilova is engaging in Tory party conference discourse.

    https://x.com/martina/status/1709653771788091516

    “Owen [Jones] getting schooled, so to speak.”
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 8,362

    .

    Eabhal said:

    Eabhal said:

    One year to a GE and Sunak has got the country focussed on railway lines.

    Taking a step back from the fire and fury tonight: is that really a very good re-election launch strategy?

    As disgusted as I am, cynically it could be.

    Rail just isn't that important outside of London, which is why HS2 was only ever a Londoners blueprint for what Levelling Up should mean.

    If the Opposition overreacts to this then it could backfire, which is probably why Starmer is wisely keeping his cards close to his chest currently.

    If Sunak wanted to be really cynical, he should slash fuel duty before the election. Would help him make his inflation target too.
    This is your blind spot for all things transport.

    The reason it isn't important is because it isn't available. That's what HS2 was aiming to fix.

    The reason you have high levels of driving in the north-west is because you have the highest density of roads anywhere in the country.

    So what you're saying is we have high levels of driving because we have the best density of roads anywhere in the country?

    Great. And your problem with that is?

    So if other areas had better road density, they could cope with more driving too. And since 95% of freight mileage comes on the roads, and 90% of passenger mileage comes on the roads, then any extra driving would be GDP growth.

    Just because our road situation is better than elsewhere, doesn't mean its worse than it should be. Had we continued to invest in our roads at the same rate as we had in the 60s then we'd be much better off now and our GDP/capita would have continued to grow just as it did in the 60s and 70s.

    You could literally double all rail capacity and that would be a miniscule boost in freight capacity nationwide, but if you double road capacity then since 95% of transport comes on roads that takes you to 190% capacity.

    Its almost as if investment in infrastructure works, seems like you're coming around.
    High road coverage, low productivity. Thought you were interested in levelling up, not down?

    (Doubling rail coverage from a low base is not the same as doubling road coverage)
    There's no inverse relationship between high productivity including high home ownership and road coverage.

    Your argument is as illogical as your contention that just because something is working doesn't mean we don't need more of it.

    By your logic London already had rail so has no need for Crossrail.
    Given London has high levels of productivity and relatively few roads per person, seems a safe bet to invest in public transport rather than roads.

    But I actually agree - I think public transport is simply an efficient way to provide infrastructure in high density areas. The real driver of those productivity levels is the melting pot of lots of people interacting with each other.

    Areas of the north with higher density are, I assume, the areas with the higher productivity. But those areas are likely constrained by a lack of decent public transport. I'll test this later.
  • BartholomewRobertsBartholomewRoberts Posts: 21,699
    edited October 2023
    Eabhal said:

    .

    Eabhal said:

    Eabhal said:

    One year to a GE and Sunak has got the country focussed on railway lines.

    Taking a step back from the fire and fury tonight: is that really a very good re-election launch strategy?

    As disgusted as I am, cynically it could be.

    Rail just isn't that important outside of London, which is why HS2 was only ever a Londoners blueprint for what Levelling Up should mean.

    If the Opposition overreacts to this then it could backfire, which is probably why Starmer is wisely keeping his cards close to his chest currently.

    If Sunak wanted to be really cynical, he should slash fuel duty before the election. Would help him make his inflation target too.
    This is your blind spot for all things transport.

    The reason it isn't important is because it isn't available. That's what HS2 was aiming to fix.

    The reason you have high levels of driving in the north-west is because you have the highest density of roads anywhere in the country.

    So what you're saying is we have high levels of driving because we have the best density of roads anywhere in the country?

    Great. And your problem with that is?

    So if other areas had better road density, they could cope with more driving too. And since 95% of freight mileage comes on the roads, and 90% of passenger mileage comes on the roads, then any extra driving would be GDP growth.

    Just because our road situation is better than elsewhere, doesn't mean its worse than it should be. Had we continued to invest in our roads at the same rate as we had in the 60s then we'd be much better off now and our GDP/capita would have continued to grow just as it did in the 60s and 70s.

    You could literally double all rail capacity and that would be a miniscule boost in freight capacity nationwide, but if you double road capacity then since 95% of transport comes on roads that takes you to 190% capacity.

    Its almost as if investment in infrastructure works, seems like you're coming around.
    High road coverage, low productivity. Thought you were interested in levelling up, not down?

    (Doubling rail coverage from a low base is not the same as doubling road coverage)
    There's no inverse relationship between high productivity including high home ownership and road coverage.

    Your argument is as illogical as your contention that just because something is working doesn't mean we don't need more of it.

    By your logic London already had rail so has no need for Crossrail.
    Given London has high levels of productivity and relatively few roads per person, seems a safe bet to invest in public transport rather than roads.

    But I actually agree - I think public transport is simply an efficient way to provide infrastructure in high density areas. The real driver of those productivity levels is the melting pot of lots of people interacting with each other.

    Areas of the north with higher density are, I assume, the areas with the higher productivity. But those areas are likely constrained by a lack of decent public transport. I'll test this later.
    London is absolutely shit with extremely expensive houses, rent, cramming 21 people to live in 2 bedroom apartments and is the only part of the country were less than half can afford their own home.

    Yes getting 21 serfs to live in a 2 bed apartment may be productive but it's a form of productivity I have no interest in thank you very much.

    Bear in mind home ownership and affordability is more important in your data analysis than "productivity".

    Also try analysing productivity growth per year versus new motorway mileage over past 65 years.
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 8,362
    edited October 2023

    Eabhal said:

    .

    Eabhal said:

    Eabhal said:

    One year to a GE and Sunak has got the country focussed on railway lines.

    Taking a step back from the fire and fury tonight: is that really a very good re-election launch strategy?

    As disgusted as I am, cynically it could be.

    Rail just isn't that important outside of London, which is why HS2 was only ever a Londoners blueprint for what Levelling Up should mean.

    If the Opposition overreacts to this then it could backfire, which is probably why Starmer is wisely keeping his cards close to his chest currently.

    If Sunak wanted to be really cynical, he should slash fuel duty before the election. Would help him make his inflation target too.
    This is your blind spot for all things transport.

    The reason it isn't important is because it isn't available. That's what HS2 was aiming to fix.

    The reason you have high levels of driving in the north-west is because you have the highest density of roads anywhere in the country.

    So what you're saying is we have high levels of driving because we have the best density of roads anywhere in the country?

    Great. And your problem with that is?

    So if other areas had better road density, they could cope with more driving too. And since 95% of freight mileage comes on the roads, and 90% of passenger mileage comes on the roads, then any extra driving would be GDP growth.

    Just because our road situation is better than elsewhere, doesn't mean its worse than it should be. Had we continued to invest in our roads at the same rate as we had in the 60s then we'd be much better off now and our GDP/capita would have continued to grow just as it did in the 60s and 70s.

    You could literally double all rail capacity and that would be a miniscule boost in freight capacity nationwide, but if you double road capacity then since 95% of transport comes on roads that takes you to 190% capacity.

    Its almost as if investment in infrastructure works, seems like you're coming around.
    High road coverage, low productivity. Thought you were interested in levelling up, not down?

    (Doubling rail coverage from a low base is not the same as doubling road coverage)
    There's no inverse relationship between high productivity including high home ownership and road coverage.

    Your argument is as illogical as your contention that just because something is working doesn't mean we don't need more of it.

    By your logic London already had rail so has no need for Crossrail.
    Given London has high levels of productivity and relatively few roads per person, seems a safe bet to invest in public transport rather than roads.

    But I actually agree - I think public transport is simply an efficient way to provide infrastructure in high density areas. The real driver of those productivity levels is the melting pot of lots of people interacting with each other.

    Areas of the north with higher density are, I assume, the areas with the higher productivity. But those areas are likely constrained by a lack of decent public transport. I'll test this later.
    London is absolutely shit with extremely expensive houses, rent, cramming 21 people to live in 2 bedroom apartments and is the only part of the country were less than half can afford their own home.

    Yes getting 21 serfs to live in a 2 bed apartment may be productive but it's a form of productivity I have no interest in thank you very much.

    Bear in mind home ownership and affordability is more important in your data analysis than "productivity".

    Also try analysing productivity growth per year versus new motorway mileage over past 65 years.
    That's what happens when an area is successful. People want to invest in those areas, which drives housing demand. Compare to Greenock, or Middlesbrough.

    If you're not interested in economic growth in the north, that's fine. But you'd have the same problem in Warrington if it suddenly became attractive for investment.
  • BartholomewRobertsBartholomewRoberts Posts: 21,699
    edited October 2023
    If you mean private sector investment as opposed to government investment there's been plenty in local towns across the NW. That's why we have full employment and people better able to afford their own home.

    The reason houses are more affordable here isn't a lack of growth, it's because housing growth has kept up with population growth as we aren't as catastrophically overcrowded.

    I'm not interested in piling people into failed slums. If we wanted that, may as well live in Bangalore.

    But since you care about productivity let's look at productivity. Productivity growth has been appalling this century which is directly correlated and causatively related to the fact that we stopped investing in roads.

    Since 2001 our population has grown by almost 25% but there's been no significant productivity growth. Why if density causes growth has our increasing densification led to less productivity than ever before?

    Because density doesn't cause productivity. Look nationally overtime. When were our years of high productivity growth and where we building roads in the years up to it?
  • BartholomewRobertsBartholomewRoberts Posts: 21,699
    edited October 2023
    3 charts to comprehensively prove once and for all that I am right and Eabhal is wrong.

    Chart over time national productivity, national population density, and national road usage. Lets see which is related or correlated.

    image
    Figure 1: UK productivity - what do we notice? A complete flatline in recent years, utterly unprecedented in fact. The unprecedented flatline continues past 2018.

    image
    Figure 2: UK population density - what do we notice? A major increase in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 2 related?
    A: No, they're inversely correlated in fact. Productivity was growing faster when our density was stable and has collapsed while our density has been rising.

    How does that make sense? Could it be due to figure 3?
    image
    Figure 3: UK road usage - what do we notice? A major flatline in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 3 related?
    A: Yes.

    The UK stopped investing in roads last century. Our population density has shot up this century, our population grown nearly a quarter, but our roads have not kept up and we've not been building them. As a result our vehicle usage has stalled, leading to productivity stalling, since as we all know 95% of freight and 90% of passenger mileage is by the road, so no extra road activity = no extra productivity.

    Case comprehensively closed and proven. If you want productivity, build some roads. We're overdue decades of investment.
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677
    This wall of graphs is like crazy, hazy Panny Demz summer of 2020.

    Who can forget the almost crystalline anticipation of waiting for the week's West Midlands mortality figures and the subsequent boldly stated assertions of clueless arseholes?
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,006
    edited October 2023
    "Asia | The Cricket World Cup
    Narendra Modi has seized and politicised Indian cricket
    India’s behaviour in cricket offers a sobering lesson in Indian power

    The six-week-long cricket World Cup, which will see the world’s ten strongest national sides compete in the one-day format of the game, may be the richest, most watched and most overtly politicised ever held. More than 712m Indians are expected to tune in, especially if their team does well, as is predicted. Indian companies are vying for eyeballs, with unicorns such as Upstox, a fintech firm, and Dream11, a gaming one, joining old stagers such as mrf Tyres among the event’s 18 official sponsors."

    https://www.economist.com/asia/2023/10/04/narendra-modi-has-seized-and-politicised-indian-cricket
  • FishingFishing Posts: 4,921
    edited October 2023


    (((Dan Hodges)))
    @DPJHodges
    ·
    18m
    If Boris Johnson, David Cameron and Liz Truss all think Rishi Sunak is pursuing the wrong strategy, and Rishi Sunak thinks Boris Johnson, David Cameron and Liz Truss were pursuing the wrong strategy, what are the British people meant to think…

    That with high debt and rising interest rates the age of spraying money around on extravagant vanity projects with lousy cost-benefit ratios like HS2 or net zero crap is over?
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 77,769
    Scott_xP said:

    @faisalislam

    The net result of this, they say, is that they west coast rail line itself will have to be upgraded, but that can only be achieved by shutting it at vast expense/ traveller hassle in a few years’ time.

    I used the trains reasonably frequently from Coventry in the early 2000s. I remember all sorts of disruption tbh
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,139
    Fishing said:


    (((Dan Hodges)))
    @DPJHodges
    ·
    18m
    If Boris Johnson, David Cameron and Liz Truss all think Rishi Sunak is pursuing the wrong strategy, and Rishi Sunak thinks Boris Johnson, David Cameron and Liz Truss were pursuing the wrong strategy, what are the British people meant to think…

    That with high debt and rising interest rates the age of spraying money around on extravagant vanity projects with lousy cost-benefit ratios like HS2 or net zero crap is over?
    They're still building the most expensive part of HS2.
    This government are still going for the 'net zero crap', albeit a little slower.

    Aside from that, well done!
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,139
    edited October 2023

    3 charts to comprehensively prove once and for all that I am right and Eabhal is wrong.

    Chart over time national productivity, national population density, and national road usage. Lets see which is related or correlated.

    (Snip)
    Figure 1: UK productivity - what do we notice? A complete flatline in recent years, utterly unprecedented in fact. The unprecedented flatline continues past 2018.

    (Snip)

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 2 related?
    A: No, they're inversely correlated in fact. Productivity was growing faster when our density was stable and has collapsed while our density has been rising.

    How does that make sense? Could it be due to figure 3?
    (Snip)
    Figure 3: UK road usage - what do we notice? A major flatline in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 3 related?
    A: Yes.

    The UK stopped investing in roads last century. Our population density has shot up this century, our population grown nearly a quarter, but our roads have not kept up and we've not been building them. As a result our vehicle usage has stalled, leading to productivity stalling, since as we all know 95% of freight and 90% of passenger mileage is by the road, so no extra road activity = no extra productivity.

    Case comprehensively closed and proven. If you want productivity, build some roads. We're overdue decades of investment.

    "The UK stopped investing in roads last century. "

    Wow. I must have been driving across fields when I imagined driving along the A14 past Huntingdon on Monday. And I must have imagined all the preparatory works for the A428 Caxton Gibbett to Black Cat upgrade.
  • ChrisChris Posts: 11,705
    Nigelb said:

    Give it a couple of days for the press to work out the extent of Sunak's financial sleight of hand.
    This is like the dodgiest iof 'clever' budgets. It won't withstand scrutiny.

    I wonder if anyone will be able to get to the bottom of whether a decision had secretly been made to cancel the project before those £300m of contracts were handed out. If so, I wish Sunak could be surcharged. Though he or his in-laws could presumably afford it.
  • ChrisChris Posts: 11,705
    I hadn't realised that one of Sunak's big ideas - the smoking ban - isn't even going to be whipped by the Tories (according to the BBC this morning). One wonders whether it has been agreed - or even discussed - by the Cabinet.
  • HeathenerHeathener Posts: 7,083
    edited October 2023
    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    The whole landscape of this country will look and feel very different after the next General Election.

    It remains to be seen how successful GB News will be, and most of the reactionary right, when they are disconnected from power - and an awfully long way from it both politically and temporally.

    I suspect Lawrence Fox will be a harbinger. They will become more and more strident, out of touch and, well, dotty.
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 8,362

    .

    Eabhal said:

    Eabhal said:

    One year to a GE and Sunak has got the country focussed on railway lines.

    Taking a step back from the fire and fury tonight: is that really a very good re-election launch strategy?

    As disgusted as I am, cynically it could be.

    Rail just isn't that important outside of London, which is why HS2 was only ever a Londoners blueprint for what Levelling Up should mean.

    If the Opposition overreacts to this then it could backfire, which is probably why Starmer is wisely keeping his cards close to his chest currently.

    If Sunak wanted to be really cynical, he should slash fuel duty before the election. Would help him make his inflation target too.
    This is your blind spot for all things transport.

    The reason it isn't important is because it isn't available. That's what HS2 was aiming to fix.

    The reason you have high levels of driving in the north-west is because you have the highest density of roads anywhere in the country.

    So what you're saying is we have high levels of driving because we have the best density of roads anywhere in the country?

    Great. And your problem with that is?

    So if other areas had better road density, they could cope with more driving too. And since 95% of freight mileage comes on the roads, and 90% of passenger mileage comes on the roads, then any extra driving would be GDP growth.

    Just because our road situation is better than elsewhere, doesn't mean its worse than it should be. Had we continued to invest in our roads at the same rate as we had in the 60s then we'd be much better off now and our GDP/capita would have continued to grow just as it did in the 60s and 70s.

    You could literally double all rail capacity and that would be a miniscule boost in freight capacity nationwide, but if you double road capacity then since 95% of transport comes on roads that takes you to 190% capacity.

    Its almost as if investment in infrastructure works, seems like you're coming around.
    High road coverage, low productivity. Thought you were interested in levelling up, not down?

    (Doubling rail coverage from a low base is not the same as doubling road coverage)
    There's no inverse relationship between high productivity including high home ownership and road coverage.

    Your argument is as illogical as your contention that just because something is working doesn't mean we don't need more of it.

    By your logic London already had rail so has no need for Crossrail.
    Given London has high levels of productivity and relatively few roads per person, seems a safe bet to invest in public transport rather than roads.

    But I actually agree - I think levels of public transport

    3 charts to comprehensively prove once and for all that I am right and Eabhal is wrong.

    Chart over time national productivity, national population density, and national road usage. Lets see which is related or correlated.

    image
    Figure 1: UK productivity - what do we notice? A complete flatline in recent years, utterly unprecedented in fact. The unprecedented flatline continues past 2018.

    image
    Figure 2: UK population density - what do we notice? A major increase in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 2 related?
    A: No, they're inversely correlated in fact. Productivity was growing faster when our density was stable and has collapsed while our density has been rising.

    How does that make sense? Could it be due to figure 3?
    image
    Figure 3: UK road usage - what do we notice? A major flatline in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 3 related?
    A: Yes.

    The UK stopped investing in roads last century. Our population density has shot up this century, our population grown nearly a quarter, but our roads have not kept up and we've not been building them. As a result our vehicle usage has stalled, leading to productivity stalling, since as we all know 95% of freight and 90% of passenger mileage is by the road, so no extra road activity = no extra productivity.

    Case comprehensively closed and proven. If you want productivity, build some roads. We're overdue decades of investment.

    Have you sent your analysis to the OECD? Nobel prize I reckon. It was roads all along.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,872
    Chris said:

    I hadn't realised that one of Sunak's big ideas - the smoking ban - isn't even going to be whipped by the Tories (according to the BBC this morning). One wonders whether it has been agreed - or even discussed - by the Cabinet.

    It all got a bit Pitt the Even Younger:


  • HeathenerHeathener Posts: 7,083
    edited October 2023
    HYUFD said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    5 years ago you could have said 'Labour are finished now. A new hard left party will take their place and even if Labour survive they will be the hard left party.'

    The 2 main parties have always moved between their centrist and more extreme ideological wings and back
    Morning HY,

    I now think more strongly that it will take a minimum of 2 GE defeats before they are even vying for power. Why so? Because all the evidence suggests they will have one more lurch to the right, where they will never win power and where they will look increasingly out of touch. This country will move on and will look and feel very different.

    When people look back on the last 13 (14) years it will be tainted by the horrors of the past 4 years, not all of their own making of course, but that's how bad luck sometimes goes.

    The Conservatives may well be out of power for a generation. But, yes, they will come back. Why? Because people like to have money and there will always be a place for a centre-right party of aspiration.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,872
    Growth requires people, infrastructure, investment, new businesses and housing.

    I think the trouble is that a lot of people in this country don't want any growth whatsoever but expect to be paid to be kept in clover regardless.

    That's where it's breaking down.
  • eristdooferistdoof Posts: 5,056

    3 charts to comprehensively prove once and for all that I am right and Eabhal is wrong.

    Chart over time national productivity, national population density, and national road usage. Lets see which is related or correlated.

    image
    Figure 1: UK productivity - what do we notice? A complete flatline in recent years, utterly unprecedented in fact. The unprecedented flatline continues past 2018.

    image
    Figure 2: UK population density - what do we notice? A major increase in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 2 related?
    A: No, they're inversely correlated in fact. Productivity was growing faster when our density was stable and has collapsed while our density has been rising.

    How does that make sense? Could it be due to figure 3?
    image
    Figure 3: UK road usage - what do we notice? A major flatline in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 3 related?
    A: Yes.

    The UK stopped investing in roads last century. Our population density has shot up this century, our population grown nearly a quarter, but our roads have not kept up and we've not been building them. As a result our vehicle usage has stalled, leading to productivity stalling, since as we all know 95% of freight and 90% of passenger mileage is by the road, so no extra road activity = no extra productivity.

    Case comprehensively closed and proven. If you want productivity, build some roads. We're overdue decades of investment.

    This is the kind of article I could give to undergraduate statistics students with the task 'Find all the abuses of statistics in this article'.


  • HeathenerHeathener Posts: 7,083
    eristdoof said:

    3 charts to comprehensively prove once and for all that I am right and Eabhal is wrong.

    Chart over time national productivity, national population density, and national road usage. Lets see which is related or correlated.

    image
    Figure 1: UK productivity - what do we notice? A complete flatline in recent years, utterly unprecedented in fact. The unprecedented flatline continues past 2018.

    image
    Figure 2: UK population density - what do we notice? A major increase in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 2 related?
    A: No, they're inversely correlated in fact. Productivity was growing faster when our density was stable and has collapsed while our density has been rising.

    How does that make sense? Could it be due to figure 3?
    image
    Figure 3: UK road usage - what do we notice? A major flatline in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 3 related?
    A: Yes.

    The UK stopped investing in roads last century. Our population density has shot up this century, our population grown nearly a quarter, but our roads have not kept up and we've not been building them. As a result our vehicle usage has stalled, leading to productivity stalling, since as we all know 95% of freight and 90% of passenger mileage is by the road, so no extra road activity = no extra productivity.

    Case comprehensively closed and proven. If you want productivity, build some roads. We're overdue decades of investment.

    This is the kind of article I could give to undergraduate statistics students with the task 'Find all the abuses of statistics in this article'.


    Was thinking the same. Reminds me of that meme circulating a couple of years ago which statistically proved that Joe Root's poor batting form was down to the reintroduction of wild boar in Kent.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,028
    Heathener said:

    eristdoof said:

    3 charts to comprehensively prove once and for all that I am right and Eabhal is wrong.

    Chart over time national productivity, national population density, and national road usage. Lets see which is related or correlated.

    image
    Figure 1: UK productivity - what do we notice? A complete flatline in recent years, utterly unprecedented in fact. The unprecedented flatline continues past 2018.

    image
    Figure 2: UK population density - what do we notice? A major increase in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 2 related?
    A: No, they're inversely correlated in fact. Productivity was growing faster when our density was stable and has collapsed while our density has been rising.

    How does that make sense? Could it be due to figure 3?
    image
    Figure 3: UK road usage - what do we notice? A major flatline in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 3 related?
    A: Yes.

    The UK stopped investing in roads last century. Our population density has shot up this century, our population grown nearly a quarter, but our roads have not kept up and we've not been building them. As a result our vehicle usage has stalled, leading to productivity stalling, since as we all know 95% of freight and 90% of passenger mileage is by the road, so no extra road activity = no extra productivity.

    Case comprehensively closed and proven. If you want productivity, build some roads. We're overdue decades of investment.

    This is the kind of article I could give to undergraduate statistics students with the task 'Find all the abuses of statistics in this article'.


    Was thinking the same. Reminds me of that meme circulating a couple of years ago which statistically proved that Joe Root's poor batting form was down to the reintroduction of wild boar in Kent.
    That's not a very polite way to refer to Zak Crawley.
  • HeathenerHeathener Posts: 7,083
    ydoethur said:

    Heathener said:

    eristdoof said:

    3 charts to comprehensively prove once and for all that I am right and Eabhal is wrong.

    Chart over time national productivity, national population density, and national road usage. Lets see which is related or correlated.

    image
    Figure 1: UK productivity - what do we notice? A complete flatline in recent years, utterly unprecedented in fact. The unprecedented flatline continues past 2018.

    image
    Figure 2: UK population density - what do we notice? A major increase in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 2 related?
    A: No, they're inversely correlated in fact. Productivity was growing faster when our density was stable and has collapsed while our density has been rising.

    How does that make sense? Could it be due to figure 3?
    image
    Figure 3: UK road usage - what do we notice? A major flatline in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 3 related?
    A: Yes.

    The UK stopped investing in roads last century. Our population density has shot up this century, our population grown nearly a quarter, but our roads have not kept up and we've not been building them. As a result our vehicle usage has stalled, leading to productivity stalling, since as we all know 95% of freight and 90% of passenger mileage is by the road, so no extra road activity = no extra productivity.

    Case comprehensively closed and proven. If you want productivity, build some roads. We're overdue decades of investment.

    This is the kind of article I could give to undergraduate statistics students with the task 'Find all the abuses of statistics in this article'.


    Was thinking the same. Reminds me of that meme circulating a couple of years ago which statistically proved that Joe Root's poor batting form was down to the reintroduction of wild boar in Kent.
    That's not a very polite way to refer to Zak Crawley.
    :smiley:

    very good!
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,100
    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    Hard right. The Tories are hardly hard right. Or even a UKIP tribute act. If they were there wouldn’t be the smoking ban or nanny state policies, there wouldn’t be taxes at the rate they are and net inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is now, it may be as high as a million this year, and the small boats would have been sorted.

    I have seen this claim, usually from centrist dad types on twitter trying to score politics points, but I cannot see how it stands up to scrutiny.
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,100

    Growth requires people, infrastructure, investment, new businesses and housing.

    I think the trouble is that a lot of people in this country don't want any growth whatsoever but expect to be paid to be kept in clover regardless.

    That's where it's breaking down.

    The Tories embracing the de growth movement.
  • HeathenerHeathener Posts: 7,083
    edited October 2023
    So what's the latest pb thinking on timing of the GE? Shame we can't have a poll:

    1. Spring 2024

    2. Autumn 2024

    3. January 2025


    The question isn't what you'd like but what you think.

    2,1, 3 for me but I wouldn't discount 3, much as I hate the idea.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,028
    Taz said:

    Growth requires people, infrastructure, investment, new businesses and housing.

    I think the trouble is that a lot of people in this country don't want any growth whatsoever but expect to be paid to be kept in clover regardless.

    That's where it's breaking down.

    The Tories embracing the de growth movement.
    They're embracing Cummings, which is worse.

    Although if he aims for 'de growth' given his record we'll probably have a 10% uplift in GDP.
  • Growth requires people, infrastructure, investment, new businesses and housing.

    I think the trouble is that a lot of people in this country don't want any growth whatsoever but expect to be paid to be kept in clover regardless.

    That's where it's breaking down.

    Works fine for the gerontocracy. Works fine for a political party with a massive client vote it protects.
  • HeathenerHeathener Posts: 7,083
    edited October 2023
    Taz said:

    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    Hard right. The Tories are hardly hard right. Or even a UKIP tribute act. If they were there wouldn’t be the smoking ban or nanny state policies, there wouldn’t be taxes at the rate they are and net inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is now, it may be as high as a million this year, and the small boats would have been sorted.

    I have seen this claim, usually from centrist dad types on twitter trying to score politics points, but I cannot see how it stands up to scrutiny.
    Isn't this just part of their problem though? They are politically all over the place. Some of their policies are, as you quite rightly point out, anti-freedom. I mean in my view, bizarrely so.

    Perhaps it's a general problem with the right. I mean if you truly believe in freedom you don't go telling people they can't express gender however they like. Or ban smoking. etc. etc.

    Ontologically the right is in a mess.

    (The same thing happened with the hard left a few years ago and regularly surfaces)
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,100
    Heathener said:

    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    The whole landscape of this country will look and feel very different after the next General Election.

    It remains to be seen how successful GB News will be, and most of the reactionary right, when they are disconnected from power - and an awfully long way from it both politically and temporally.

    I suspect Lawrence Fox will be a harbinger. They will become more and more strident, out of touch and, well, dotty.
    The Laurence Fox GB news issue will be a defining moment in the news channel I suspect. It will be the beginning of a move towards the end of the less sane elements they have on screen. Coast man will go too I expect. It will still be right of centre, but then many mainstream outlets are left of centre, but far less conspiracy theory.

    GB News seems to be successful among its peers but it doesn’t make money, neither does SKY News, and it is hard to see how it will.

    I do agree with your initial sentence. No way back for the useless Tories now. We will be Starmers people in around 12 months and he will have a working majority.
  • Taz said:

    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    Hard right. The Tories are hardly hard right. Or even a UKIP tribute act. If they were there wouldn’t be the smoking ban or nanny state policies, there wouldn’t be taxes at the rate they are and net inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is now, it may be as high as a million this year, and the small boats would have been sorted.

    I have seen this claim, usually from centrist dad types on twitter trying to score politics points, but I cannot see how it stands up to scrutiny.
    The Tories aren't hard right but cabinet ministers do flirt with them nowadays in way that would have been unthinkable for most of my lifetime. GB News seems very keen on the "conspiracy right" as a core audience which often overlaps and provides a gateway to the hard right.
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,100
    Heathener said:

    Taz said:

    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    Hard right. The Tories are hardly hard right. Or even a UKIP tribute act. If they were there wouldn’t be the smoking ban or nanny state policies, there wouldn’t be taxes at the rate they are and net inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is now, it may be as high as a million this year, and the small boats would have been sorted.

    I have seen this claim, usually from centrist dad types on twitter trying to score politics points, but I cannot see how it stands up to scrutiny.
    Isn't this just part of their problem though? They are politically all over the place. Some of their policies are, as you quite rightly point out, anti-freedom. I mean in my view, bizarrely so.

    Perhaps it's a general problem with the right. I mean if you truly believe in freedom you don't go telling people they can't express gender however they like. Or ban smoking. etc. etc.

    Ontologically the right is in a mess.

    (The same thing happened with the hard left a few years ago and regularly surfaces)
    Yes, I agree. They are all over the place. The announcements this week have been all over the place and seem to have been plucked out of the air at random. It’s all a mess.

    They certainly aren’t ‘pro freedom’ like the Trump GOP.

    Starmer is playing it right. The Tories are making error after a error. He is letting the get on with it.
  • 3 charts to comprehensively prove once and for all that I am right and Eabhal is wrong.

    Chart over time national productivity, national population density, and national road usage. Lets see which is related or correlated.

    (Snip)
    Figure 1: UK productivity - what do we notice? A complete flatline in recent years, utterly unprecedented in fact. The unprecedented flatline continues past 2018.

    (Snip)

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 2 related?
    A: No, they're inversely correlated in fact. Productivity was growing faster when our density was stable and has collapsed while our density has been rising.

    How does that make sense? Could it be due to figure 3?
    (Snip)
    Figure 3: UK road usage - what do we notice? A major flatline in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 3 related?
    A: Yes.

    The UK stopped investing in roads last century. Our population density has shot up this century, our population grown nearly a quarter, but our roads have not kept up and we've not been building them. As a result our vehicle usage has stalled, leading to productivity stalling, since as we all know 95% of freight and 90% of passenger mileage is by the road, so no extra road activity = no extra productivity.

    Case comprehensively closed and proven. If you want productivity, build some roads. We're overdue decades of investment.

    "The UK stopped investing in roads last century. "

    Wow. I must have been driving across fields when I imagined driving along the A14 past Huntingdon on Monday. And I must have imagined all the preparatory works for the A428 Caxton Gibbett to Black Cat upgrade.
    Yes if you think that there has been a significant investment in roads this century then you've imagined it.

    Trends over time
    In 2021, there were 247,800 miles of road in Great Britain. This was 2,800 more miles than a decade earlier in 2011 (a 1.1% increase), and 4,900 more miles than in 2001 (a 2.0% increase).

    Most of this change seen over the last 20 years was due to an increase in minor roads. There were 4,200 more miles of minor road in Great Britain in 2021 than in 2001 (a 1.9% increase), almost entirely driven by an increase in ‘C’ and ‘U’ roads.


    In 20 years there's been a 2% increase in roads, almost entirely made up from minor roads.

    In the meantime there's been a 14% increase in our population.

    So proportionately our roads have gone backwards not forwards per capita.

    Compare instead with last century, when we had productivity growth from investment in infrastructure.
  • GIN1138GIN1138 Posts: 22,121
    edited October 2023
    Heathener said:

    So what's the latest pb thinking on timing of the GE? Shame we can't have a poll:

    1. Spring 2024

    2. Autumn 2024

    3. January 2025


    The question isn't what you'd like but what you think.

    2,1, 3 for me but I wouldn't discount 3, much as I hate the idea.


    Autumn 2024. I'll even go for a date - 24th October 2024 - Gives Rishi exactly two years to the day as PM.

    Oh, and good morning PB!
  • Growth requires people, infrastructure, investment, new businesses and housing.

    I think the trouble is that a lot of people in this country don't want any growth whatsoever but expect to be paid to be kept in clover regardless.

    That's where it's breaking down.

    Or, being slightly more charitable...

    It's not so much that people don't want economic growth...

    .... It's just that they don't see why they should be inconvenienced is any way at all to enable it. And the wiring between those new houses, or that tram line, or those immigrants, and growth is sometimes complex and counterintuitive enough that it can be plausibly denied.

    Works fine for the gerontocracy. Works fine for a political party with a massive client vote it protects.

    "It will see me out" is what people on the way out tend to say (my father said it a lot). It's not a good attitude when it grips a country.

  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 27,994
    edited October 2023
    ...

    Growth requires people, infrastructure, investment, new businesses and housing.

    I think the trouble is that a lot of people in this country don't want any growth whatsoever but expect to be paid to be kept in clover regardless.

    That's where it's breaking down.

    But the Liz Truss model of repeating the word "growth" over and over again doesn't generate growth.

    I suspect Sunak's "growth" model is not dissimilar from Truss's trickle down programme. No speculate to accumulate notion from Rishi. As a hedge fund manager he knows how to grow money from failure. Canning HS2 creates an accounting sleight of hand, which the media have already moronically latched onto, of a £36b "windfall". An invisible Brucie-bonus, Rishi has twigged he can use for pre-election top down tax cuts.

    Yesterday was a spectacularly sad culmination of a profoundly sad conference week. The speech was a seminal moment in Britain's decline.

    Anyway back to those Labour/Lib Dem/ SNP small boat failures and the war on tofu eating wokerati liberal elites. That should generate us some growth.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,872

    Growth requires people, infrastructure, investment, new businesses and housing.

    I think the trouble is that a lot of people in this country don't want any growth whatsoever but expect to be paid to be kept in clover regardless.

    That's where it's breaking down.

    Or, being slightly more charitable...

    It's not so much that people don't want economic growth...

    .... It's just that they don't see why they should be inconvenienced is any way at all to enable it. And the wiring between those new houses, or that tram line, or those immigrants, and growth is sometimes complex and counterintuitive enough that it can be plausibly denied.

    Yes, that's a better way to put it.

    I think fundamentally (and Starmer is just as bad here) there's an absence of leadership in this country.

    Leadership means saying unpopular things and tackled the criticism and flak head-on, respectfully I might add, because you're trying to take people somewhere different. The point is that you will grudging respect and some new support along the way, and then much more of the country gets behind you - just a question of when.

    I'd like to see more political leaders with courage and doing the right thing for the whole country. What we have instead is abdication of responsibility, cowardice and followership and loud-mouth performing on social media.
  • ChrisChris Posts: 11,705
    Taz said:

    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    Hard right. The Tories are hardly hard right. Or even a UKIP tribute act. If they were there wouldn’t be the smoking ban or nanny state policies, there wouldn’t be taxes at the rate they are and net inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is now, it may be as high as a million this year, and the small boats would have been sorted.

    I have seen this claim, usually from centrist dad types on twitter trying to score politics points, but I cannot see how it stands up to scrutiny.
    If Sunak wants to attract RefUK supporters, the smoking ban looks like a pretty big blunder. If it's correct that it's not going to be whipped, that must be because Sunak realises that the Right won't support it. Yet Labour is going to support it on the basis that they won't play politics with health. So people who support it will see Labour in support and the Tories divided. And people who oppose it will see the Tory leader in favour of it. and the rest divided. Not the cleverest political manoeuvre.
  • GIN1138 said:

    Heathener said:

    So what's the latest pb thinking on timing of the GE? Shame we can't have a poll:

    1. Spring 2024

    2. Autumn 2024

    3. January 2025


    The question isn't what you'd like but what you think.

    2,1, 3 for me but I wouldn't discount 3, much as I hate the idea.


    Autumn 2024. I'll even go for a date - 24th October 2024 - Gives Rishi exactly two years to the day as PM.

    Oh, and good morning PB!
    The argument against is...

    Suppose we get to September 2024 and the polls have swung back a bit, but still pointing to a bad Conservative defeat. Won't the temptation be to cling on just a little bit longer in the hope that something turns up?

    Yes, the government going to the polls in Nov/Dec/Jan would be mad, but that's not an argument against them doing it. And it would fit the "uncomprehending Johnson cosplay" that Rishi S seems to be toying with.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,557
    At the Knappers Gazette, we believe in balance, so I just want to point out that it has now been raining in the Maldives, for four days; almost without cease

    The scuba diving remains sensational, not least coz it gets you out of the dreadful, dreary rain


  • eristdoof said:

    3 charts to comprehensively prove once and for all that I am right and Eabhal is wrong.

    Chart over time national productivity, national population density, and national road usage. Lets see which is related or correlated.

    image
    Figure 1: UK productivity - what do we notice? A complete flatline in recent years, utterly unprecedented in fact. The unprecedented flatline continues past 2018.

    image
    Figure 2: UK population density - what do we notice? A major increase in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 2 related?
    A: No, they're inversely correlated in fact. Productivity was growing faster when our density was stable and has collapsed while our density has been rising.

    How does that make sense? Could it be due to figure 3?
    image
    Figure 3: UK road usage - what do we notice? A major flatline in recent years.

    Q: Are figure 1 and figure 3 related?
    A: Yes.

    The UK stopped investing in roads last century. Our population density has shot up this century, our population grown nearly a quarter, but our roads have not kept up and we've not been building them. As a result our vehicle usage has stalled, leading to productivity stalling, since as we all know 95% of freight and 90% of passenger mileage is by the road, so no extra road activity = no extra productivity.

    Case comprehensively closed and proven. If you want productivity, build some roads. We're overdue decades of investment.

    This is the kind of article I could give to undergraduate statistics students with the task 'Find all the abuses of statistics in this article'.


    Other than the fact that correlation does not equal causation (something I've said repeatedly to Eabhal myself) what kind of abuses do you think?

    It's neither novel nor alien not illogical to believe that our critical transport infrastructure is key to economic growth and development.

    Hence why we built the infrastructure which unlocked economic growth in the past. Hence why others around the planet are investing in their infrastructure too.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,872
    In fact, @Stuartinromford , HS2 is a great example of that too because all those ridiculous long tunnels, green cut & cover tunnels, cuttings and noise barriers massively jacked up the cost for Phase 1 and set a precedent for the rest of the route too. It will also make it a very boring ride for the user - one of the pleasures of train travel being to admire the views and majesty out the window.

    Again, a lack of political courage in telling people they'll have to accept it - and it will become part of the landscape in time - and it's not as if doing all that won it any extra fans anyway.

    Ultimately, it was part of its undoing.
  • Growth requires people, infrastructure, investment, new businesses and housing.

    I think the trouble is that a lot of people in this country don't want any growth whatsoever but expect to be paid to be kept in clover regardless.

    That's where it's breaking down.

    Or, being slightly more charitable...

    It's not so much that people don't want economic growth...

    .... It's just that they don't see why they should be inconvenienced is any way at all to enable it. And the wiring between those new houses, or that tram line, or those immigrants, and growth is sometimes complex and counterintuitive enough that it can be plausibly denied.

    Yes, that's a better way to put it.

    I think fundamentally (and Starmer is just as bad here) there's an absence of leadership in this country.

    Leadership means saying unpopular things and tackled the criticism and flak head-on, respectfully I might add, because you're trying to take people somewhere different. The point is that you will grudging respect and some new support along the way, and then much more of the country gets behind you - just a question of when.

    I'd like to see more political leaders with courage and doing the right thing for the whole country. What we have instead is abdication of responsibility, cowardice and followership and loud-mouth performing on social media.
    There were a few around, Ken Clarke and Rory the ex-Tory top of my list but got sent into permanent exile over Brexit and Boris. The way the system is set up and the way they were treated shall ensure we don't see many more of their type for a long time to come.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 35,675
    Scottish Labour is on the brink of a “seismic” win in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election with insiders predicting a swing of more than 10 per cent from the SNP.

    Anas Sarwar, the party’s leader in Scotland, said the result has the potential to become “a launchpad” for Labour’s Westminster election campaign next year.

    The scale of any victory would be seen as a key pointer to the party’s fortunes next year, with predictions of a win on a swing of more than 10 per cent, though on a relatively low turnout.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/anas-sarwar-confident-of-seismic-result-in-by-election-6xvmp9zpx
  • RogerRoger Posts: 19,826
    It looks like Starmer starts his conference with at least a dozen open goals.
  • Nigelb said:

    .

    Chris said:

    I hadn't realised that one of Sunak's big ideas - the smoking ban - isn't even going to be whipped by the Tories (according to the BBC this morning). One wonders whether it has been agreed - or even discussed - by the Cabinet.

    I believe Labour have said they'll support it, though.

    It's the Education policy which is most absurd in this respect. Putting forward, without consultation of any kind, a year before an election, a fundamental reform which will take a decade to come about, is simply absurd.

    Sunak appears to believe he was elected with some massive mandate to mess around with the country at his whim. He needs to recognise he's a fag end* PM who's almost certain to be ejected by an electorate which is wholly disillusioned with both him and his party.

    *Possibly his only legacy.
    Both need wider debate, maybe even a Royal Commission especially for the smoking ban. We don't need PMs who think they are both the Oracle and all powerful, especially the ones who are actually weak and under threat.
  • eekeek Posts: 27,939

    In fact, @Stuartinromford , HS2 is a great example of that too because all those ridiculous long tunnels, green cut & cover tunnels, cuttings and noise barriers massively jacked up the cost for Phase 1 and set a precedent for the rest of the route too. It will also make it a very boring ride for the user - one of the pleasures of train travel being to admire the views and majesty out the window.

    Again, a lack of political courage in telling people they'll have to accept it - and it will become part of the landscape in time - and it's not as if doing all that won it any extra fans anyway.

    Ultimately, it was part of its undoing.

    The irony is that the reason people in the Chilterns campaigned against HS2 was because of the disruption it would course.

    The tunnels haven't actually removed any disruption instead it's ended up with massive air vents being built at multiple locations so the air can be managed...

    When I say that an actual train track would be prettier and would have been less disruptive many people agree...
  • HeathenerHeathener Posts: 7,083

    In fact, @Stuartinromford , HS2

    [...]

    Ultimately, it was part of its undoing.

    Not really followed all this closely as I've had a wonderful sabbatical from News, but I'm not sure that HS2 is over. Surely in due course it will come back and be completed properly, thus ensuring that people will have another permanent reminder of the shambles under the current party.

    I seem to recall the channel tunnel went through various stages of cancellation.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 33,284
    Leon said:

    At the Knappers Gazette, we believe in balance, so I just want to point out that it has now been raining in the Maldives, for four days; almost without cease

    The scuba diving remains sensational, not least coz it gets you out of the dreadful, dreary rain


    Windsor Davies applies,I suggest:
    Oh dear, how sad. Never mind!

    And Good Morning to everyone!
  • Growth requires people, infrastructure, investment, new businesses and housing.

    I think the trouble is that a lot of people in this country don't want any growth whatsoever but expect to be paid to be kept in clover regardless.

    That's where it's breaking down.

    Or, being slightly more charitable...

    It's not so much that people don't want economic growth...

    .... It's just that they don't see why they should be inconvenienced is any way at all to enable it. And the wiring between those new houses, or that tram line, or those immigrants, and growth is sometimes complex and counterintuitive enough that it can be plausibly denied.

    Works fine for the gerontocracy. Works fine for a political party with a massive client vote it protects.

    "It will see me out" is what people on the way out tend to say (my father said it a lot). It's not a good attitude when it grips a country.

    The problem is for the past decades those things haven't led to productivity growth or wage growth because neither infrastructure not housing has kept up with population growth.

    It's great to have more people but for them to be productive and have good living standards they need homes and infrastructure.

    Unfortunately NIMBYism and an anti-investment agenda (often cloaked under the cloth of false environmental concerns) have both stood in the way of either productivity or wage growth.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 10,640
    Heathener said:

    Taz said:

    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    Hard right. The Tories are hardly hard right. Or even a UKIP tribute act. If they were there wouldn’t be the smoking ban or nanny state policies, there wouldn’t be taxes at the rate they are and net inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is now, it may be as high as a million this year, and the small boats would have been sorted.

    I have seen this claim, usually from centrist dad types on twitter trying to score politics points, but I cannot see how it stands up to scrutiny.
    Isn't this just part of their problem though? They are politically all over the place. Some of their policies are, as you quite rightly point out, anti-freedom. I mean in my view, bizarrely so.

    Perhaps it's a general problem with the right. I mean if you truly believe in freedom you don't go telling people they can't express gender however they like. Or ban smoking. etc. etc.

    Ontologically the right is in a mess.

    (The same thing happened with the hard left a few years ago and regularly surfaces)
    Smoking is very anti-freedom. Nicotine is exceedingly addictive. It is as and possibly more addictive than heroin or cocaine. Once someone is hooked by smoking, they lose their freedom to a biochemical imbalance caused in the brain. Constantly craving the next cigarette is not freedom.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 59,872
    Scott_xP said:

    Scottish Labour is on the brink of a “seismic” win in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election with insiders predicting a swing of more than 10 per cent from the SNP.

    Anas Sarwar, the party’s leader in Scotland, said the result has the potential to become “a launchpad” for Labour’s Westminster election campaign next year.

    The scale of any victory would be seen as a key pointer to the party’s fortunes next year, with predictions of a win on a swing of more than 10 per cent, though on a relatively low turnout.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/anas-sarwar-confident-of-seismic-result-in-by-election-6xvmp9zpx

    Argh, bollocks. Laid down a chunk of cash on the SNP there.
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,100
    edited October 2023

    Heathener said:

    Taz said:

    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    Hard right. The Tories are hardly hard right. Or even a UKIP tribute act. If they were there wouldn’t be the smoking ban or nanny state policies, there wouldn’t be taxes at the rate they are and net inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is now, it may be as high as a million this year, and the small boats would have been sorted.

    I have seen this claim, usually from centrist dad types on twitter trying to score politics points, but I cannot see how it stands up to scrutiny.
    Isn't this just part of their problem though? They are politically all over the place. Some of their policies are, as you quite rightly point out, anti-freedom. I mean in my view, bizarrely so.

    Perhaps it's a general problem with the right. I mean if you truly believe in freedom you don't go telling people they can't express gender however they like. Or ban smoking. etc. etc.

    Ontologically the right is in a mess.

    (The same thing happened with the hard left a few years ago and regularly surfaces)
    Smoking is very anti-freedom. Nicotine is exceedingly addictive. It is as and possibly more addictive than heroin or cocaine. Once someone is hooked by smoking, they lose their freedom to a biochemical imbalance caused in the brain. Constantly craving the next cigarette is not freedom.
    "Possibly" meaning no one knows

    It is amazing how something as illiberal as this ban is portrayed as being a "freedom" measure. People start smoking and clearly they lose their own free will. Even though many many people have stopped quite easily.
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,100
    Scott_xP said:

    Scottish Labour is on the brink of a “seismic” win in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election with insiders predicting a swing of more than 10 per cent from the SNP.

    Anas Sarwar, the party’s leader in Scotland, said the result has the potential to become “a launchpad” for Labour’s Westminster election campaign next year.

    The scale of any victory would be seen as a key pointer to the party’s fortunes next year, with predictions of a win on a swing of more than 10 per cent, though on a relatively low turnout.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/anas-sarwar-confident-of-seismic-result-in-by-election-6xvmp9zpx

    Winning Here
  • Heathener said:

    In fact, @Stuartinromford , HS2

    [...]

    Ultimately, it was part of its undoing.

    Not really followed all this closely as I've had a wonderful sabbatical from News, but I'm not sure that HS2 is over. Surely in due course it will come back and be completed properly, thus ensuring that people will have another permanent reminder of the shambles under the current party.

    I seem to recall the channel tunnel went through various stages of cancellation.
    Great opportunity for the elite (the true elite, not young renters who like a bit of avocado but have the temerity to have a degree and live in a city) to buy up the property the government had to overpay for and is now selling off cheap with the expectation that Labour will overpay for it in the not too distant future.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,139
    Heathener said:

    In fact, @Stuartinromford , HS2

    [...]

    Ultimately, it was part of its undoing.

    Not really followed all this closely as I've had a wonderful sabbatical from News, but I'm not sure that HS2 is over. Surely in due course it will come back and be completed properly, thus ensuring that people will have another permanent reminder of the shambles under the current party.

    I seem to recall the channel tunnel went through various stages of cancellation.
    Cancelled twice; in 1883 and once after some serious work had been done in 1975. And a Labour government cancelled that...

    I don't think Thatcher/Mitterand's tunnel was ever in serious risk of being cancelled? And the high-speed link, though started late, was also not cancelled.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 10,640

    Nigelb said:

    .

    Chris said:

    I hadn't realised that one of Sunak's big ideas - the smoking ban - isn't even going to be whipped by the Tories (according to the BBC this morning). One wonders whether it has been agreed - or even discussed - by the Cabinet.

    I believe Labour have said they'll support it, though.

    It's the Education policy which is most absurd in this respect. Putting forward, without consultation of any kind, a year before an election, a fundamental reform which will take a decade to come about, is simply absurd.

    Sunak appears to believe he was elected with some massive mandate to mess around with the country at his whim. He needs to recognise he's a fag end* PM who's almost certain to be ejected by an electorate which is wholly disillusioned with both him and his party.

    *Possibly his only legacy.
    Both need wider debate, maybe even a Royal Commission especially for the smoking ban. We don't need PMs who think they are both the Oracle and all powerful, especially the ones who are actually weak and under threat.
    Why do we need a Royal Commission on the smoking ban? We’ve known the ills of smoking for decades. We’ve known the effects of different approaches to reduce smoking for decades. Let’s make a decision.
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,100
    GIN1138 said:

    Heathener said:

    So what's the latest pb thinking on timing of the GE? Shame we can't have a poll:

    1. Spring 2024

    2. Autumn 2024

    3. January 2025


    The question isn't what you'd like but what you think.

    2,1, 3 for me but I wouldn't discount 3, much as I hate the idea.


    Autumn 2024. I'll even go for a date - 24th October 2024 - Gives Rishi exactly two years to the day as PM.

    Oh, and good morning PB!
    Morning GIn

    Autumn 2024 I think as well
  • bigjohnowlsbigjohnowls Posts: 22,625
    It's time for change and we are shit
  • TazTaz Posts: 14,100
    edited October 2023

    Taz said:

    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    Hard right. The Tories are hardly hard right. Or even a UKIP tribute act. If they were there wouldn’t be the smoking ban or nanny state policies, there wouldn’t be taxes at the rate they are and net inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is now, it may be as high as a million this year, and the small boats would have been sorted.

    I have seen this claim, usually from centrist dad types on twitter trying to score politics points, but I cannot see how it stands up to scrutiny.
    The Tories aren't hard right but cabinet ministers do flirt with them nowadays in way that would have been unthinkable for most of my lifetime. GB News seems very keen on the "conspiracy right" as a core audience which often overlaps and provides a gateway to the hard right.
    I do not watch GB News but I think if it wants to be taken seriously it needs to ditch the conspiracy right.

    It has started. But really needs to purge a few loons still. There is a place for a right of centre news channel which is a little more mainstream and less "WEF are controlling us all, use only cash" types.

    Mind you the more I see of the Guardian these days it is like a left wing, print, version of GB News. Or at least what GB News seems to be from social media as I don't watch it.
  • BarnesianBarnesian Posts: 8,514
    HYUFD said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    5 years ago you could have said 'Labour are finished now. A new hard left party will take their place and even if Labour survive they will be the hard left party.'

    The 2 main parties have always moved between their centrist and more extreme ideological wings and back
    But the Tories need a new centrist leader elected by their hard right membership. How is that going to work?

    I suppose it could work if Tory MPs only give two centrist candidates to the membership to choose from. Mordaunt and Barclay?
  • Nigelb said:

    .

    Chris said:

    I hadn't realised that one of Sunak's big ideas - the smoking ban - isn't even going to be whipped by the Tories (according to the BBC this morning). One wonders whether it has been agreed - or even discussed - by the Cabinet.

    I believe Labour have said they'll support it, though.

    It's the Education policy which is most absurd in this respect. Putting forward, without consultation of any kind, a year before an election, a fundamental reform which will take a decade to come about, is simply absurd.

    Sunak appears to believe he was elected with some massive mandate to mess around with the country at his whim. He needs to recognise he's a fag end* PM who's almost certain to be ejected by an electorate which is wholly disillusioned with both him and his party.

    *Possibly his only legacy.
    Both need wider debate, maybe even a Royal Commission especially for the smoking ban. We don't need PMs who think they are both the Oracle and all powerful, especially the ones who are actually weak and under threat.
    Why do we need a Royal Commission on the smoking ban? We’ve known the ills of smoking for decades. We’ve known the effects of different approaches to reduce smoking for decades. Let’s make a decision.
    Prohibition on drugs hasn't exactly worked out brilliantly or without its own side effects? I am probably in favour, but those pretending this is a slam dunk because smoking is bad are being very naive.

    And major changes generally that impact generations to come should not be rabbits out of the hat at a PMs whim making a quick decision, but be informed decisions after a proper debate and attempts to build consensus where possible.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 10,640
    Taz said:

    Heathener said:

    Taz said:

    Cicero said:

    Tories are finished now. A new hard right party will take their place and even if the tories survive they will be the hard right party.

    KGB News and the Conservatives have become Fox news and Trump GOP tribute acts respectively. It remains to be seen if there is a market for the hard right in the UK when the originals in the US seem to be in intellectual and financial meltdown.

    I think the general sarcasm in the UK may prove a considerable defence against these humourless extremists.
    Hard right. The Tories are hardly hard right. Or even a UKIP tribute act. If they were there wouldn’t be the smoking ban or nanny state policies, there wouldn’t be taxes at the rate they are and net inward migration wouldn’t be as high as it is now, it may be as high as a million this year, and the small boats would have been sorted.

    I have seen this claim, usually from centrist dad types on twitter trying to score politics points, but I cannot see how it stands up to scrutiny.
    Isn't this just part of their problem though? They are politically all over the place. Some of their policies are, as you quite rightly point out, anti-freedom. I mean in my view, bizarrely so.

    Perhaps it's a general problem with the right. I mean if you truly believe in freedom you don't go telling people they can't express gender however they like. Or ban smoking. etc. etc.

    Ontologically the right is in a mess.

    (The same thing happened with the hard left a few years ago and regularly surfaces)
    Smoking is very anti-freedom. Nicotine is exceedingly addictive. It is as and possibly more addictive than heroin or cocaine. Once someone is hooked by smoking, they lose their freedom to a biochemical imbalance caused in the brain. Constantly craving the next cigarette is not freedom.
    "Possibly" meaning no one knows

    It is amazing how something as illiberal as this ban is portrayed as being a "freedom" measure. People start smoking and clearly they lose their own free will. Even though many many people have stopped quite easily.
    “Possibly” meaning that addictiveness is hard to define and is partly socially determined rather than purely being about neurochemistry. We do know. Nicotine is one of the most researched drugs ever.

    People vary: some find it easier to give up than others. Others don’t. The majority of all smokers have tried to quit and failed. The majority of all smokers want to quit. If most people doing something don’t want to be doing it, it’s not much of a freedom!
This discussion has been closed.