The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
What does it mean to be trans if not to have a gender identity that conflicts with your biological sex?
Interestingly, the use of the phrase "pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes" implies that pupils will be allowed to not comply with sex sterotypes. So has this legalised childhood crossdressing?
(ducks)
Are girls still banned from wearing trousers in some schools? Might solve that problem at least.
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
What does it mean to be trans if not to have a gender identity that conflicts with your biological sex?
Interestingly, the use of the phrase "pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes" implies that pupils will be allowed to not comply with sex sterotypes. So has this legalised childhood crossdressing?
(ducks)
"You are charged under Section 34.5C of the Stereotypes Act. To wit, being a Goth with blond eyebrows. How do you plead?"
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
The government will fail to meet its targets on heat pump rollout. The promised lifting of a ban on new onshore windfarms has not gone far enough. Massive investment is needed in the electricity grid. There is no proper plan for rail in the north and Midlands now that the northern leg of HS2 has been cancelled, severely inhibiting economic growth in those regions. Water bills will need to go up to fix the sewage crisis, and more reservoirs are needed to avoid drought, while water companies have done too little to staunch leaks. The UK lacks a coherent strategy on flooding, with more than 900,000 properties at risk of river or sea flooding and 910,000 at risk of surface water flooding. Good progress has been made on the rollout of gigabit broadband around the country.
Armitt called for this government, and the next, to act swiftly. “It’s not too late to catch up in many of the areas we’ve highlighted, if the goals are matched with policies of sufficient scale. But the window is closing,” he said.
“Ducking big decisions over the next 12 months will put the major goals of net zero, regional economic growth, and environmental protection in jeopardy,” he warned.
Greater investment was needed in public transport, the NIC found. Uniquely in Europe, the UK’s second and third cities showed lower economic productivity than the national average, largely because of poor transport links, the review found.
The axing of the next phases of the HS2 high-speed rail project left a “critical gap” in rail connectivity between the Midlands and the north, with northern cities likely to “remain poorly served” without further investment.
Given long-term growth in demand “a do-nothing scenario north of the proposed connection of HS2 and the west coast mainline at Handsacre is not sustainable”, the report found.
The target of rolling out 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 to reach 7m homes by 2035 was way off track, the report found, while putting off a decision on hydrogen for home heating until 2026 had created uncertainty.
The next government should end new connections to Britain’s gas network from 2025, and ban the sale of new gas boilers for homes and fossil fuel heating in large commercial buildings by 2035, according to the report. It also called on the government to rule out subsidies for hydrogen heating...
The two highlighted items in particular are just economic stupidity from the government. I don't think there's any reasonable grounds to argue about that.
Holy Moly, are they really thinking of piping hydrogen to homes? That is the stupidest fucking decision in history. Any minister stupid enough to authorise that should be shot. We need to stop being governed by morons.
The current plan is to mix 15% hydrogen in with the natural gas, isn't it? So the same partial pressure of hydrogen as in the old town gas mix...
Perfectly safe, just a slightly lower heating value.
...and a much higher hydrogen leakage value. Which then explodes.
Reasons for not using hydrogen are:
Hydrogen is just greenwashed coal: it takes more energy to produce than it releases.
It leaks like a bastard.
It is worse than all the other alternatives.
So it's expensive to make, impossible to store, dangerous to transport and pointless. It has a large red flashing sign over it saying "THIS IS A MASSIVE ERROR". It is Blackadder levels of wrong. It's not just wrong it's stupidly wrong. I could do a Baldrick impersonation whilst saying "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong..." but I think my view is clear at this point.
You need it to get to a certain concentration for it to explode, though, surely? And with it being so leaky that's going to be hard to achieve - no-one encloses their boiler that well.
But I don't disagree that domestic hydrogen's a dead end given the continuing development of heat pumps - as you say, there's still no economic source for the volume needed.
It'd be better to just set a date now for switching off gas altogether rather than stringing it out with the promise of a hydrogen transition that will probably never happen.
I would like to see the writeup for "the environment is so leaky that leaking hydrogen is no biggy". As in legally-responsible-for-the-result writeup and signature.
I mean, we used town gas for however long that lasted, and that was 50% hydrogen...
Yes, sure, there'll be some unsuitable materials used in the 80s before anyone began to think of hydrogen compatibility, and we would need a plan to replace those. But that's mainly an issue in the distribution network rather than in the home, and that can be solved by re-lining the pipes where necessary.
And since more than 95% of the deaths from gas come from CO poisoning, a pure hydrogen network would likely work out as being safer than natural gas.
But I don't see it winning out against electricity, and think the real danger is that certain sectors of industry will try to keep us throwing money at it in an effort to keep the possibility of domestic hydrogen alive. We ought to make a decision rather than dithering.
(I do agree that a 'a few more explosions but far fewer poisonings!' is hardly a great safety case. But that's an argument against all domestic gas, not just against hydrogen)
Hydrogen embrittlement was largely discovered through town gas - pipes you could collapse by rapping on them with your knuckle.
You can't reline domestic pipes - between embrittlement and leaks, you'd have to redo all the pipework between the street and boiler. Even the solder used to join metal has to be the right kind. Hydrogen can leak *through* solid materials.
Gas explosions have dropped massively since the town gas days - the question is whether this was partly due to no hydrogen in the mix. It probably was.
From a good thread on the Rotterdam hydrogen summit:
Mobility and heating definitely have a muted presence, with a lot more focus on ammonia, eSAF, P2X, and large scale industrial facilities.
Hydrogen will definitely have its place in a renewable economy - but the cost timeline on the production of green hydrogen, and the likely massive cost of upgrading national gas networks (and domestic pipework), make planning to use it to replace gas in domestic heating completely nuts.
As an industrial feedstock, from electrolysis using zero marginal cost renewables which go beyond what's needed to charge whatever battery storage demand is out there from hour to hour, bulk generation of green hydrogen will at some point make quite a lot of sense economically.
Creating hydrogen for steel production, actually makes some sense.
The cycle of electricity -> hydrogen -> compress/cool -> store -> uncompress -> electricity is so inefficient that hydrogen power storage is unlikely to make sense. Nearly every other method is cheaper and better. Remember you have significant loses per day - several percent.
Also ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen as an aviation fuel (though not without issues).
A jet turbine will burn pretty much anything combustible with only minor modification.
They will, just not for very long unless specifically designed for an alternate fuel. Jet A-1 is blended to have excellent lubricating properties as it's otherwise very difficult to lubricate the HP fuel pumps at the very high fuel pressures that jet engines run. It was 2,200psi in the Sea Harrier! So you could run it on turps but the fuel pumps and other ancillaries would wear quickly in the best case or melt in the worse.
This especially applies to aircraft with fueldraulic actuated systems (F-35, Su-30/35 and probably some civvie shit I don't know about) where pressures are 3,000+ psi.
The gas turbine OEMs are developing machines to run on hydrogen and/or ammonia.
Ammonia is a handy transportation vector for hydrogen, especially if it is going a long way by ship (e.g. Australia to Japan/Korea, Middle East to Europe), and if you can burn it directly and avoid the faff of cracking it back to hydrogen, happy days.
And before people start flapping about the risks associated with ammonia (which I agree should not be underestimated), there used to be daily train loads of the stuff running between Teesside and Grangemouth, back in the day. I remember on one occasion the Class 40 on the train struggling on greasy rails through platform 8 (now 2) at Newcastle Central, and giving maximum thrash under the station roof to keep the train moving.
But I don't want the domestic gas supply converted to ammonia, before someone asks!
The tankage for enough ammonia to run an airport of planes flying from Heathrow, say, would be a fairly serious risk to West London, if breached.
An airliner running on ammonia would make a fairly serious chemical weapon.
I think aviation is more likely to go with "SAF", essentially Jet-A1 made from biomass, and pretend that the CO2 is not coming out of their engines. Proponents of SAF like to use terms like "ultra-clean drop-in fuel".
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
What does it mean to be trans if not to have a gender identity that conflicts with your biological sex?
Interestingly, the use of the phrase "pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes" implies that pupils will be allowed to not comply with sex sterotypes. So has this legalised childhood crossdressing?
(ducks)
"You are charged under Section 34.5C of the Stereotypes Act. To wit, being a Goth with blond eyebrows. How do you plead?"
"Not guilty, and I call the witness Siouxsie Sioux in my defence."
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
Aged 11 we were herded into the hall at primary school to watch a large black and white TV for a handful of Fridays. As the Grampian TV jingle started (I was in ATVland) a half an hour show called "Living and Growing" started. What did I learn? Girls have long hair and boys have short hair. I am yet to have any further formal reproduction lessons outside of Biology lessons I was an only child so am still waiting to learn about the birds and the bees.
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
I can't remember. Did Section Wotsit simply say not to teach the bairns about gayness in an approving manner, or did it say to keep completely silent?
It said not to teach it as a pretended family relationship.
Checked. Just said [edit] local authorities and their schools shouldn't teach approvingly/promote homosexuality full stop. Nothing about specifically family relationships, but as a whole.
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
Aged 11 we were herded into the hall at primary school to watch a large black and white TV for a handful of Fridays. As the Grampian TV jingle started (I was in ATVland) a half an hour show called "Living and Growing" started. What did I learn? Girls have long hair and boys have short hair. I am yet to have any further formal reproduction lessons outside of Biology lessons I was an only child so am still waiting to learn about the birds and the bees.
Maybe your school censored some of the episodes. I watched Living and Growing too and it covered the whole business!
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
Aged 11 we were herded into the hall at primary school to watch a large black and white TV for a handful of Fridays. As the Grampian TV jingle started (I was in ATVland) a half an hour show called "Living and Growing" started. What did I learn? Girls have long hair and boys have short hair. I am yet to have any further formal reproduction lessons outside of Biology lessons I was an only child so am still waiting to learn about the birds and the bees.
Maybe your school censored some of the episodes. I watched Living and Growing too and it covered the whole business!
To be fair It was the vox pop children differentiating gender by hair length. It might have been lack of interest on my part at the time. I was fixated on the old fellow (and he was old) saying "babies" in a lowland brogue
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
Aged 11 we were herded into the hall at primary school to watch a large black and white TV for a handful of Fridays. As the Grampian TV jingle started (I was in ATVland) a half an hour show called "Living and Growing" started. What did I learn? Girls have long hair and boys have short hair. I am yet to have any further formal reproduction lessons outside of Biology lessons I was an only child so am still waiting to learn about the birds and the bees.
Maybe your school censored some of the episodes. I watched Living and Growing too and it covered the whole business!
My only memory of sex education at primary school was a teacher telling us that you could have a wet dream as a result of something exciting but non sexual like scoring a goal in football. This caused much hilarity in the next PE lesson.
16.9% in perfect conditions in one seat, 5.9% capital wide on the list, almost no recognisable names, no local organisation, reliant on loans and donations from Tice. They'll do well to break 5% nationwide at a GE with or without the spiv
I think that Reform are very unlikely to do well at the GE. In Bootle, a huge number of people hate the Labour party, and say they're going to vote for someone else, except on GE day itself when they mysteriously vote Labour after all.
I view Reform as a successor to UKIP.
In 2015, I would view that as the high water mark for UKIP. They had: 1) A unique USP in leaving the EU. 2) Excepting the Conservative party, no other party would even talk about it. 3) They'd won two decent by-elections and had two MPs (one decent in Carswell). 4) Farage was at the top of his game. 5) Crucially, the party wasn't just seen as a one man party. Farage sure, but you had Nuttall, Suzanne Evans, Diane James and both Carswell and Reckless.
They managed 13% and 1 MP.
I don't think Reform will get much more than half that. None of the ideal circumstances that hit UKIP in 2015 are likely to be present for Reform, and absent Farage and Tice I can't think of a single other politician in Reform (I've even forgotten about 30p Lee, as should we all).
There are two different criteria when talking about Reform.
Will Reform do well in terms of their own electoral success? The answer to this tends towards no. They're not going to get many MPs elected, if any.
Will people voting for Reform have an impact on the election results? The answer to this tends towards yes. 6% voting Reform UK instead of the Tories will not elect a Reform UK MP, but it will elect a whole bunch of Labour and LibDem MPs by depressing the Tory vote.
Not all 6% voting reform will vote for the Tories if reform isn’t on the ballot, I think you are taking 2019 (get Brexit done logic) to a very different situation.
It’s perfectly plausible that only half that vote votes Tory (so adding 3% to their share) while Labour get 1.5% and the rest simply disappears to other candidates.
So reality is Reform are only going to make an impact on the tightest of tight races and I don’t see many of those
6% 'all Tories' would perhaps turn over 30 or 40 seats If its 3.5% Tory, 1% Labour, 1.5% others or NV, maybe 10 or so (based on tightest marginals last time and not including any BXP vote)
If your ideal vote is reform why would you ever want to vote for Rishi and co? I simply don’t get the logic and it’s not just me the few Reform minded voters I know are way more likely to not bother voting than voting Tory
I think that this is the gap between people who will end up voting Reform, and those who tick Reform in online opinion polls. I think there's quite a strong "protest vote" element in the latter, and those are voters who are in play.
Very much the problem Labour will (and have in the locals) have in turning 'I'm not happy' into the large opinion poll %s. I see Labour getting high 30s in the GE maybe 40
Except that Labour's relative under performance in the locals is normal when they are high in the national polls, as we saw in 1996 and 1997. There seems to be a point where high national VI doesn't translate into more votes for Labour councillors.
Their 1996 local election performance matched their 1997 GE performance, both underperforming their VI
Indeed yet in 1996 New Labour got 43%, ie the same as they got in the 1997 GE. In 2009 Cameron's Tories got 38% ie actually slightly more than the 36% they got at GE 2010.
So Starmer must be somewhat concerned Labour only got 35% NEV at this year's local elections as the precedent of the last 2 general elections we changed government is the winning opposition party ended up with a GE voteshare no higher or even lower than they got at the previous locals.
The government will fail to meet its targets on heat pump rollout. The promised lifting of a ban on new onshore windfarms has not gone far enough. Massive investment is needed in the electricity grid. There is no proper plan for rail in the north and Midlands now that the northern leg of HS2 has been cancelled, severely inhibiting economic growth in those regions. Water bills will need to go up to fix the sewage crisis, and more reservoirs are needed to avoid drought, while water companies have done too little to staunch leaks. The UK lacks a coherent strategy on flooding, with more than 900,000 properties at risk of river or sea flooding and 910,000 at risk of surface water flooding. Good progress has been made on the rollout of gigabit broadband around the country.
Armitt called for this government, and the next, to act swiftly. “It’s not too late to catch up in many of the areas we’ve highlighted, if the goals are matched with policies of sufficient scale. But the window is closing,” he said.
“Ducking big decisions over the next 12 months will put the major goals of net zero, regional economic growth, and environmental protection in jeopardy,” he warned.
Greater investment was needed in public transport, the NIC found. Uniquely in Europe, the UK’s second and third cities showed lower economic productivity than the national average, largely because of poor transport links, the review found.
The axing of the next phases of the HS2 high-speed rail project left a “critical gap” in rail connectivity between the Midlands and the north, with northern cities likely to “remain poorly served” without further investment.
Given long-term growth in demand “a do-nothing scenario north of the proposed connection of HS2 and the west coast mainline at Handsacre is not sustainable”, the report found.
The target of rolling out 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 to reach 7m homes by 2035 was way off track, the report found, while putting off a decision on hydrogen for home heating until 2026 had created uncertainty.
The next government should end new connections to Britain’s gas network from 2025, and ban the sale of new gas boilers for homes and fossil fuel heating in large commercial buildings by 2035, according to the report. It also called on the government to rule out subsidies for hydrogen heating...
The two highlighted items in particular are just economic stupidity from the government. I don't think there's any reasonable grounds to argue about that.
Holy Moly, are they really thinking of piping hydrogen to homes? That is the stupidest fucking decision in history. Any minister stupid enough to authorise that should be shot. We need to stop being governed by morons.
The current plan is to mix 15% hydrogen in with the natural gas, isn't it? So the same partial pressure of hydrogen as in the old town gas mix...
Perfectly safe, just a slightly lower heating value.
...and a much higher hydrogen leakage value. Which then explodes.
Reasons for not using hydrogen are:
Hydrogen is just greenwashed coal: it takes more energy to produce than it releases.
It leaks like a bastard.
It is worse than all the other alternatives.
So it's expensive to make, impossible to store, dangerous to transport and pointless. It has a large red flashing sign over it saying "THIS IS A MASSIVE ERROR". It is Blackadder levels of wrong. It's not just wrong it's stupidly wrong. I could do a Baldrick impersonation whilst saying "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong..." but I think my view is clear at this point.
You need it to get to a certain concentration for it to explode, though, surely? And with it being so leaky that's going to be hard to achieve - no-one encloses their boiler that well.
But I don't disagree that domestic hydrogen's a dead end given the continuing development of heat pumps - as you say, there's still no economic source for the volume needed.
It'd be better to just set a date now for switching off gas altogether rather than stringing it out with the promise of a hydrogen transition that will probably never happen.
I would like to see the writeup for "the environment is so leaky that leaking hydrogen is no biggy". As in legally-responsible-for-the-result writeup and signature.
I mean, we used town gas for however long that lasted, and that was 50% hydrogen...
Yes, sure, there'll be some unsuitable materials used in the 80s before anyone began to think of hydrogen compatibility, and we would need a plan to replace those. But that's mainly an issue in the distribution network rather than in the home, and that can be solved by re-lining the pipes where necessary.
And since more than 95% of the deaths from gas come from CO poisoning, a pure hydrogen network would likely work out as being safer than natural gas.
But I don't see it winning out against electricity, and think the real danger is that certain sectors of industry will try to keep us throwing money at it in an effort to keep the possibility of domestic hydrogen alive. We ought to make a decision rather than dithering.
(I do agree that a 'a few more explosions but far fewer poisonings!' is hardly a great safety case. But that's an argument against all domestic gas, not just against hydrogen)
Hydrogen embrittlement was largely discovered through town gas - pipes you could collapse by rapping on them with your knuckle.
You can't reline domestic pipes - between embrittlement and leaks, you'd have to redo all the pipework between the street and boiler. Even the solder used to join metal has to be the right kind. Hydrogen can leak *through* solid materials.
Gas explosions have dropped massively since the town gas days - the question is whether this was partly due to no hydrogen in the mix. It probably was.
From a good thread on the Rotterdam hydrogen summit:
Mobility and heating definitely have a muted presence, with a lot more focus on ammonia, eSAF, P2X, and large scale industrial facilities.
Hydrogen will definitely have its place in a renewable economy - but the cost timeline on the production of green hydrogen, and the likely massive cost of upgrading national gas networks (and domestic pipework), make planning to use it to replace gas in domestic heating completely nuts.
As an industrial feedstock, from electrolysis using zero marginal cost renewables which go beyond what's needed to charge whatever battery storage demand is out there from hour to hour, bulk generation of green hydrogen will at some point make quite a lot of sense economically.
Creating hydrogen for steel production, actually makes some sense.
The cycle of electricity -> hydrogen -> compress/cool -> store -> uncompress -> electricity is so inefficient that hydrogen power storage is unlikely to make sense. Nearly every other method is cheaper and better. Remember you have significant loses per day - several percent.
Also ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen as an aviation fuel (though not without issues).
A jet turbine will burn pretty much anything combustible with only minor modification.
They will, just not for very long unless specifically designed for an alternate fuel. Jet A-1 is blended to have excellent lubricating properties as it's otherwise very difficult to lubricate the HP fuel pumps at the very high fuel pressures that jet engines run. It was 2,200psi in the Sea Harrier! So you could run it on turps but the fuel pumps and other ancillaries would wear quickly in the best case or melt in the worse.
This especially applies to aircraft with fueldraulic actuated systems (F-35, Su-30/35 and probably some civvie shit I don't know about) where pressures are 3,000+ psi.
The gas turbine OEMs are developing machines to run on hydrogen and/or ammonia.
Ammonia is a handy transportation vector for hydrogen, especially if it is going a long way by ship (e.g. Australia to Japan/Korea, Middle East to Europe), and if you can burn it directly and avoid the faff of cracking it back to hydrogen, happy days.
And before people start flapping about the risks associated with ammonia (which I agree should not be underestimated), there used to be daily train loads of the stuff running between Teesside and Grangemouth, back in the day. I remember on one occasion the Class 40 on the train struggling on greasy rails through platform 8 (now 2) at Newcastle Central, and giving maximum thrash under the station roof to keep the train moving.
But I don't want the domestic gas supply converted to ammonia, before someone asks!
The tankage for enough ammonia to run an airport of planes flying from Heathrow, say, would be a fairly serious risk to West London, if breached.
An airliner running on ammonia would make a fairly serious chemical weapon.
I think aviation is more likely to go with "SAF", essentially Jet-A1 made from biomass, and pretend that the CO2 is not coming out of their engines. Proponents of SAF like to use terms like "ultra-clean drop-in fuel".
O/T but interesting piece on how it's possible to build cycle paths cheaply if one knows how to use the planning system and has lots of free labour (especially for @MattW ):
Obvious issues about it really only working out in the sticks rather than the urban jungle, but Shepton M is not that small a place.
And the emphasis of the article is on cycling (despite the notice in onw photo!).
Interesting. There is an awful lot of difficulty with landowners, including Network Rail who sit on land that would be perfect for cycle lanes (and indeed trams), even when there is plenty of funding available.
There is also a tension with the provision of off-road cycle networks in lieu of ones alongside roads. Women, in particular, do not like cycling along them in the dark, and the one factor that has a discernible effect on cycling rates is hours of daylight (often wrongly ascribed to the weather). Thus, adding good lighting is essential but massively increases costs and maintenance.
"including Network Rail who sit on land that would be perfect for cycle lanes"
Do you have examples? I can understand BRB (Residuals) / HA Historical Railways Estate having such land, but what are the NR examples?
Tracks alongside exiting railway lines are frequently used for access by workers, and probably would not be either safe or accessible to the public.
My personal example is a closed freight line in Edinburgh. It's been in the council's plan for cycling for at least 6 years but apparently Network Rail are yet to provide a price for the purchase (and they have form for these kind of delays elsewhere, I'm told).
If it takes that long to provide a quote for a disused stretch of land for a cycle lane in the middle of the capital, you start to understand why nuclear energy takes such a long time!
Thanks. Do you know its name, and if it is actually officially closed, as opposed to mothballed?
If the latter; we are now in a slow trend of mothballed lines being reopened - especially in Scotland. If a mothballed line becomes a cycle path, there's f;all chance of it being turned back into a railway.
Edit: I see this question's already been answered, thanks.
The track is still there, at least on Google air. I'm in two minds about its conversion. It used ot be a very useful branch line taking rubbish out to the cement works at Dunbar for incineration. Still potential for industrial purposes as it runs through a very mixed area with quite a bit of industry though admittedly not as much as there used to be.
That's actually an important and difficult question - and raises tough balances, especially in certain 'not car' travel groups which have historic biases (eg the one that used to be called Transport 2000 which was set up by iirc bus companies back in the 1990s) .
For example there was a proposal to turn the Monsal Trail in Derbyshire, which is walking / cycling multiuser path which has 300k+ users every year, into a railway.
Similarly the Roseburn Path in Edinburgh is a railway repurposed as a walking / cycling route, which is now well enough established that Edinburgh has designed its active travel provision around its existence.
Yet there were recent proposals by the Council to turn it into a tram line extension, which would degrade the quality of service of what is now a key link in the Edinburgh active travel network.
Neither strategic nor joined-up. These need to be protected from politicians thinking short-term.
One of the things I want is for these all to be dedicated as Public Rights of Way, by statute - at least in England / Wales. Afaics it is never done, and when it is something like a Planning Condition (eg Summerleaze Bridge, Windsor) it is forgotten about.
I'd instinctively give the tramway priority - but insist on a pathway next to it.
When I lived in Edinburgh I was very close to the Roseburn path and used it frequently. It's not wide enough to have both a tramway and a cycle path, and the geography (some of it is in deep cuttings, there are many bridges of a certain size, etc) means that it isn't possible to widen it to take both.
The idea of putting the tramway there is purely to take space away from cyclists, rather than to have cars sharing with trams (as happens in dozens of European cities).
If it happens it will be a disaster for cycling in Edinburgh as it will force cyclists onto major arterial roads, probably resulting in lots of people just giving up on cycling.
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
Aged 11 we were herded into the hall at primary school to watch a large black and white TV for a handful of Fridays. As the Grampian TV jingle started (I was in ATVland) a half an hour show called "Living and Growing" started. What did I learn? Girls have long hair and boys have short hair. I am yet to have any further formal reproduction lessons outside of Biology lessons I was an only child so am still waiting to learn about the birds and the bees.
just been through Starmers 6 priorities for a Labour government.
Where did housing go ?
Into the Tories list of things to go ham on if they've any sense.
Well yes the other 6 point werent exactly earth movers.
1. Financial stability ie keep doing what Hunt is doing 2. NHS waiting lists - well good luck - Wes Streeting better mean what he says about reform 3. Border security - only time will tell 4. British Energy - good idea but youve given it to Ed Miliband the nations #1 dork 5. Antisocial behaviour - heard it all before, will plods actually be told to be pursue criminals 6. More teachers -why ? Class rolls are falling and schools will close.
Big issues like housing quietly dropped, HoL left as it is, public services unreformed.
just been through Starmers 6 priorities for a Labour government.
Where did housing go ?
The housing pledge is now homeless
He needs to keep back housing for the 49th reboot next week.
It is quite worrying as Rishi is having some really positive feedback for his well received speech on Monday, the "gangbusters" economic picture and one of his better PMQs performances yesterday.
just been through Starmers 6 priorities for a Labour government.
Where did housing go ?
Into the Tories list of things to go ham on if they've any sense.
Well yes the other 6 point werent exactly earth movers.
1. Financial stability ie keep doing what Hunt is doing 2. NHS waiting lists - well good luck - Wes Streeting better mean what he says about reform 3. Border security - only time will tell 4. British Energy - good idea but youve given it to Ed Miliband the nations #1 dork 5. Antisocial behaviour - heard it all before, will plods actually be told to be pursue criminals 6. More teachers -why ? Class rolls are falling and schools will close.
Big issues like housing quietly dropped, HoL left as it is, public services unreformed.
Welcome to the post-Covid consensus. Like the post-war consensus but without ration books (for the time being).
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
I can't remember. Did Section Wotsit simply say not to teach the bairns about gayness in an approving manner, or did it say to keep completely silent?
Local Government Act 1988, Section 28 28 Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1)The following section shall be inserted after section 2 of the Local Government Act 1986 (prohibition of political publicity)—
"...Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1) A local authority shall not— (a) intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality; (b) promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship. (2) Nothing in subsection (1) above shall be taken to prohibit the doing of anything for the purpose of treating or preventing the spread of disease...
just been through Starmers 6 priorities for a Labour government.
Where did housing go ?
He's a NIMFTY - Not In My First Term.
Or my second term, or my third term either. None of the donor class want to see house prices fall appreciably.
I suspect leasehold reform will be similarly hobbled. I hope Labour will be better than the Conservatives have been on this, but the property developer/manager lobby is well funded and well established. Of course it is, they don't want the gravy train to stop.
And of course leaseholders are paying for the developers to lobby against us through our own service charges...
She's certainly had a varied and (reasonably) successful career, but I do wonder if she might not enjoy the limelight a bit too much for this sort of role...
just been through Starmers 6 priorities for a Labour government.
Where did housing go ?
The housing pledge is now homeless
He needs to keep back housing for the 49th reboot next week.
It is quite worrying as Rishi is having some really positive feedback for his well received speech on Monday, the "gangbusters" economic picture and one of his better PMQs performances yesterday.
What are you worrying about? You think that the Tories are going to win the next election with a majority of 20 anyway. It's a niche view, I hope you're wrong, and to me there's little evidence to me that Sunak is getting positive feedback outside the DE/DM/DT usual suspects whose print circulation (people tend to skip politics on MailOnline for the SideBar of Shame) is collapsing. The BBC's political editor, not known for being particularly Labour friendly, posted this yesterday -
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
One of the main points of the Cass review is clinicians do not know which kids are "trans' - and thats why going through puberty is a useful way for them to work it out for themselves. Meanwhile multiple other issues are ignored because "trans" is the only thing being treated.
Do you know which kids are trans?
The text explicitly says Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment,
So in what way is it "denying the existence of trans people"?
The guidance sets out the law as it is - if you wan't to campaign for lowering the age of gender reassignment from 18, feel free - but thats what the law says today.
Aren't you misapplying Cass - on medicine - to teaching in schools? Note that what is being proposed isn't about just talking to kids who may be trans; it may be to friends and other classmates. Essentially: trans people don't exist.
Yet they do.
Say one kid in school thinks they may be trans, and is getting bullied because of it; or even because one of their parents is trans. The root cause of the bullying would not be able to be addressed - because the very idea someone can feel their gender is wrong - or have issued with gender - is verboten. And the fact it's verboten will make it seem odd; disturbing. Worthy of being bullied about.
And then you morph this into some sh*t about lowering the age of gender reassignment.
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
Aged 11 we were herded into the hall at primary school to watch a large black and white TV for a handful of Fridays. As the Grampian TV jingle started (I was in ATVland) a half an hour show called "Living and Growing" started. What did I learn? Girls have long hair and boys have short hair. I am yet to have any further formal reproduction lessons outside of Biology lessons I was an only child so am still waiting to learn about the birds and the bees.
Apart from promoting some views which are at best, contested, I found it confusing as heck.....
I didn't get past the second minute. I don't disagree, it is a totally unnecessary enterprise to be pitched at eleven year olds. Mind, I still can't get exercised like you do.
These kind of stories polarise opinion. Some would expect a lot of this kind of thing goes on. Some would say its rare, and we get selection bias (we are aware of these cases BECAUSE they get caught). Id be interested to see how this opinion split between left and right and Labour vs Tory.
Isn’t it reckoned that there’s £5.5bn of benefits fraud annually. That suggests that there’s a fair amount of it occurring.
Chase down a handful of Tory crooks and you would recover that amount easily rather than chasing hundreds of thousands and spending more than you recover.
just been through Starmers 6 priorities for a Labour government.
Where did housing go ?
The housing pledge is now homeless
He needs to keep back housing for the 49th reboot next week.
It is quite worrying as Rishi is having some really positive feedback for his well received speech on Monday, the "gangbusters" economic picture and one of his better PMQs performances yesterday.
What are you worrying about? You think that the Tories are going to win the next election with a majority of 20 anyway. It's a niche view, I hope you're wrong, and to me there's little evidence to me that Sunak is getting positive feedback outside the DE/DM/DT usual suspects whose print circulation (people tend to skip politics on MailOnline for the SideBar of Shame) is collapsing. The BBC's political editor, not known for being particularly Labour friendly, posted this yesterday -
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
One of the main points of the Cass review is clinicians do not know which kids are "trans' - and thats why going through puberty is a useful way for them to work it out for themselves. Meanwhile multiple other issues are ignored because "trans" is the only thing being treated.
Do you know which kids are trans?
The text explicitly says Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment,
So in what way is it "denying the existence of trans people"?
The guidance sets out the law as it is - if you wan't to campaign for lowering the age of gender reassignment from 18, feel free - but thats what the law says today.
Aren't you misapplying Cass - on medicine - to teaching in schools? Note that what is being proposed isn't about just talking to kids who may be trans; it may be to friends and other classmates. Essentially: trans people don't exist.
Yet they do.
Say one kid in school thinks they may be trans, and is getting bullied because of it; or even because one of their parents is trans. The root cause of the bullying would not be able to be addressed - because the very idea someone can feel their gender is wrong - or have issued with gender - is verboten. And the fact it's verboten will make it seem odd; disturbing. Worthy of being bullied about.
And then you morph this into some sh*t about lowering the age of gender reassignment.
She's certainly had a varied and (reasonably) successful career, but I do wonder if she might not enjoy the limelight a bit too much for this sort of role...
It would be the sort of appointment that would signal the definitive death of the old idea of a neutral civil service that would carry on serving a new government as impartially as it served an old one.
I know people will say that this idea had already died, pointing to changes under either Boris Johnson, or Tony Blair, depending on their politics, but I think it's still possible for Starmer to re-establish the old culture, if he wanted to. But that wouldn't be the way to do it.
I really don't think it's a good change to have a politicised civil service where a new government sees a massive turnover in senior civil service appointments. It looks like that's the way Britain is inexorably heading. I know people are cynical about the civil service, and it was never perfect, but a politicised civil service is worse.
O/T but interesting piece on how it's possible to build cycle paths cheaply if one knows how to use the planning system and has lots of free labour (especially for @MattW ):
Obvious issues about it really only working out in the sticks rather than the urban jungle, but Shepton M is not that small a place.
And the emphasis of the article is on cycling (despite the notice in onw photo!).
Interesting. There is an awful lot of difficulty with landowners, including Network Rail who sit on land that would be perfect for cycle lanes (and indeed trams), even when there is plenty of funding available.
There is also a tension with the provision of off-road cycle networks in lieu of ones alongside roads. Women, in particular, do not like cycling along them in the dark, and the one factor that has a discernible effect on cycling rates is hours of daylight (often wrongly ascribed to the weather). Thus, adding good lighting is essential but massively increases costs and maintenance.
"including Network Rail who sit on land that would be perfect for cycle lanes"
Do you have examples? I can understand BRB (Residuals) / HA Historical Railways Estate having such land, but what are the NR examples?
Tracks alongside exiting railway lines are frequently used for access by workers, and probably would not be either safe or accessible to the public.
My personal example is a closed freight line in Edinburgh. It's been in the council's plan for cycling for at least 6 years but apparently Network Rail are yet to provide a price for the purchase (and they have form for these kind of delays elsewhere, I'm told).
If it takes that long to provide a quote for a disused stretch of land for a cycle lane in the middle of the capital, you start to understand why nuclear energy takes such a long time!
Thanks. Do you know its name, and if it is actually officially closed, as opposed to mothballed?
If the latter; we are now in a slow trend of mothballed lines being reopened - especially in Scotland. If a mothballed line becomes a cycle path, there's f;all chance of it being turned back into a railway.
Edit: I see this question's already been answered, thanks.
The track is still there, at least on Google air. I'm in two minds about its conversion. It used ot be a very useful branch line taking rubbish out to the cement works at Dunbar for incineration. Still potential for industrial purposes as it runs through a very mixed area with quite a bit of industry though admittedly not as much as there used to be.
That's actually an important and difficult question - and raises tough balances, especially in certain 'not car' travel groups which have historic biases (eg the one that used to be called Transport 2000 which was set up by iirc bus companies back in the 1990s) .
For example there was a proposal to turn the Monsal Trail in Derbyshire, which is walking / cycling multiuser path which has 300k+ users every year, into a railway.
Similarly the Roseburn Path in Edinburgh is a railway repurposed as a walking / cycling route, which is now well enough established that Edinburgh has designed its active travel provision around its existence.
Yet there were recent proposals by the Council to turn it into a tram line extension, which would degrade the quality of service of what is now a key link in the Edinburgh active travel network.
Neither strategic nor joined-up. These need to be protected from politicians thinking short-term.
One of the things I want is for these all to be dedicated as Public Rights of Way, by statute - at least in England / Wales. Afaics it is never done, and when it is something like a Planning Condition (eg Summerleaze Bridge, Windsor) it is forgotten about.
I'd instinctively give the tramway priority - but insist on a pathway next to it.
When I lived in Edinburgh I was very close to the Roseburn path and used it frequently. It's not wide enough to have both a tramway and a cycle path, and the geography (some of it is in deep cuttings, there are many bridges of a certain size, etc) means that it isn't possible to widen it to take both.
The idea of putting the tramway there is purely to take space away from cyclists, rather than to have cars sharing with trams (as happens in dozens of European cities).
If it happens it will be a disaster for cycling in Edinburgh as it will force cyclists onto major arterial roads, probably resulting in lots of people just giving up on cycling.
These kind of stories polarise opinion. Some would expect a lot of this kind of thing goes on. Some would say its rare, and we get selection bias (we are aware of these cases BECAUSE they get caught). Id be interested to see how this opinion split between left and right and Labour vs Tory.
Isn’t it reckoned that there’s £5.5bn of benefits fraud annually. That suggests that there’s a fair amount of it occurring.
Chase down a handful of Tory crooks and you would recover that amount easily rather than chasing hundreds of thousands and spending more than you recover.
Sickness benefit fraudsters don't donate to the Conservative Party. Fast track PPE billionaires do. Who would you chase down if you were the Tories?
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
I know you and I are both good parents, who will try to guide our kids the best we can; occasionally making mistakes, but generally doing a good job. If our kids ask us questions about anything, we will try to give answer we think are suitable for their age and development.
The problem is, not all parents are like us. Many kids have parents who do not do the best for their kids, or even try to pass negative traits and habits onto their kids - racism, sexism, ageism etc. These kids may get some information from friends, or t'internet; but that could be plainly wrong, misguided or gappy - and have parents who will not put them right.
For this reason, schools need to be there to fill in the gaps; to give a view that might conflict with what children have learnt through unofficial sources. Therefore schools need to teach kids these things, even if it embarrasses almost everyone involved, perhaps including the teacher.
Then we get the thorny question of what age is correct for each topic...
The government will fail to meet its targets on heat pump rollout. The promised lifting of a ban on new onshore windfarms has not gone far enough. Massive investment is needed in the electricity grid. There is no proper plan for rail in the north and Midlands now that the northern leg of HS2 has been cancelled, severely inhibiting economic growth in those regions. Water bills will need to go up to fix the sewage crisis, and more reservoirs are needed to avoid drought, while water companies have done too little to staunch leaks. The UK lacks a coherent strategy on flooding, with more than 900,000 properties at risk of river or sea flooding and 910,000 at risk of surface water flooding. Good progress has been made on the rollout of gigabit broadband around the country.
Armitt called for this government, and the next, to act swiftly. “It’s not too late to catch up in many of the areas we’ve highlighted, if the goals are matched with policies of sufficient scale. But the window is closing,” he said.
“Ducking big decisions over the next 12 months will put the major goals of net zero, regional economic growth, and environmental protection in jeopardy,” he warned.
Greater investment was needed in public transport, the NIC found. Uniquely in Europe, the UK’s second and third cities showed lower economic productivity than the national average, largely because of poor transport links, the review found.
The axing of the next phases of the HS2 high-speed rail project left a “critical gap” in rail connectivity between the Midlands and the north, with northern cities likely to “remain poorly served” without further investment.
Given long-term growth in demand “a do-nothing scenario north of the proposed connection of HS2 and the west coast mainline at Handsacre is not sustainable”, the report found.
The target of rolling out 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 to reach 7m homes by 2035 was way off track, the report found, while putting off a decision on hydrogen for home heating until 2026 had created uncertainty.
The next government should end new connections to Britain’s gas network from 2025, and ban the sale of new gas boilers for homes and fossil fuel heating in large commercial buildings by 2035, according to the report. It also called on the government to rule out subsidies for hydrogen heating...
The two highlighted items in particular are just economic stupidity from the government. I don't think there's any reasonable grounds to argue about that.
Holy Moly, are they really thinking of piping hydrogen to homes? That is the stupidest fucking decision in history. Any minister stupid enough to authorise that should be shot. We need to stop being governed by morons.
The current plan is to mix 15% hydrogen in with the natural gas, isn't it? So the same partial pressure of hydrogen as in the old town gas mix...
Perfectly safe, just a slightly lower heating value.
...and a much higher hydrogen leakage value. Which then explodes.
Reasons for not using hydrogen are:
Hydrogen is just greenwashed coal: it takes more energy to produce than it releases.
It leaks like a bastard.
It is worse than all the other alternatives.
So it's expensive to make, impossible to store, dangerous to transport and pointless. It has a large red flashing sign over it saying "THIS IS A MASSIVE ERROR". It is Blackadder levels of wrong. It's not just wrong it's stupidly wrong. I could do a Baldrick impersonation whilst saying "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong..." but I think my view is clear at this point.
You need it to get to a certain concentration for it to explode, though, surely? And with it being so leaky that's going to be hard to achieve - no-one encloses their boiler that well.
But I don't disagree that domestic hydrogen's a dead end given the continuing development of heat pumps - as you say, there's still no economic source for the volume needed.
It'd be better to just set a date now for switching off gas altogether rather than stringing it out with the promise of a hydrogen transition that will probably never happen.
I would like to see the writeup for "the environment is so leaky that leaking hydrogen is no biggy". As in legally-responsible-for-the-result writeup and signature.
I mean, we used town gas for however long that lasted, and that was 50% hydrogen...
Yes, sure, there'll be some unsuitable materials used in the 80s before anyone began to think of hydrogen compatibility, and we would need a plan to replace those. But that's mainly an issue in the distribution network rather than in the home, and that can be solved by re-lining the pipes where necessary.
And since more than 95% of the deaths from gas come from CO poisoning, a pure hydrogen network would likely work out as being safer than natural gas.
But I don't see it winning out against electricity, and think the real danger is that certain sectors of industry will try to keep us throwing money at it in an effort to keep the possibility of domestic hydrogen alive. We ought to make a decision rather than dithering.
(I do agree that a 'a few more explosions but far fewer poisonings!' is hardly a great safety case. But that's an argument against all domestic gas, not just against hydrogen)
Hydrogen embrittlement was largely discovered through town gas - pipes you could collapse by rapping on them with your knuckle.
You can't reline domestic pipes - between embrittlement and leaks, you'd have to redo all the pipework between the street and boiler. Even the solder used to join metal has to be the right kind. Hydrogen can leak *through* solid materials.
Gas explosions have dropped massively since the town gas days - the question is whether this was partly due to no hydrogen in the mix. It probably was.
From a good thread on the Rotterdam hydrogen summit:
Mobility and heating definitely have a muted presence, with a lot more focus on ammonia, eSAF, P2X, and large scale industrial facilities.
Hydrogen will definitely have its place in a renewable economy - but the cost timeline on the production of green hydrogen, and the likely massive cost of upgrading national gas networks (and domestic pipework), make planning to use it to replace gas in domestic heating completely nuts.
As an industrial feedstock, from electrolysis using zero marginal cost renewables which go beyond what's needed to charge whatever battery storage demand is out there from hour to hour, bulk generation of green hydrogen will at some point make quite a lot of sense economically.
Creating hydrogen for steel production, actually makes some sense.
The cycle of electricity -> hydrogen -> compress/cool -> store -> uncompress -> electricity is so inefficient that hydrogen power storage is unlikely to make sense. Nearly every other method is cheaper and better. Remember you have significant loses per day - several percent.
Also ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen as an aviation fuel (though not without issues).
A jet turbine will burn pretty much anything combustible with only minor modification.
They will, just not for very long unless specifically designed for an alternate fuel. Jet A-1 is blended to have excellent lubricating properties as it's otherwise very difficult to lubricate the HP fuel pumps at the very high fuel pressures that jet engines run. It was 2,200psi in the Sea Harrier! So you could run it on turps but the fuel pumps and other ancillaries would wear quickly in the best case or melt in the worse.
This especially applies to aircraft with fueldraulic actuated systems (F-35, Su-30/35 and probably some civvie shit I don't know about) where pressures are 3,000+ psi.
The gas turbine OEMs are developing machines to run on hydrogen and/or ammonia.
Ammonia is a handy transportation vector for hydrogen, especially if it is going a long way by ship (e.g. Australia to Japan/Korea, Middle East to Europe), and if you can burn it directly and avoid the faff of cracking it back to hydrogen, happy days.
And before people start flapping about the risks associated with ammonia (which I agree should not be underestimated), there used to be daily train loads of the stuff running between Teesside and Grangemouth, back in the day. I remember on one occasion the Class 40 on the train struggling on greasy rails through platform 8 (now 2) at Newcastle Central, and giving maximum thrash under the station roof to keep the train moving.
But I don't want the domestic gas supply converted to ammonia, before someone asks!
The tankage for enough ammonia to run an airport of planes flying from Heathrow, say, would be a fairly serious risk to West London, if breached.
An airliner running on ammonia would make a fairly serious chemical weapon.
I think aviation is more likely to go with "SAF", essentially Jet-A1 made from biomass, and pretend that the CO2 is not coming out of their engines. Proponents of SAF like to use terms like "ultra-clean drop-in fuel".
All the studies, going back decades, for alternatives to jet fuel have concluded that synthetic jet fuel is the best answer.
Or just use regular Jet fuel and offset the emissions with BECCS, tree planting, or similar.
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
I know you and I are both good parents, who will try to guide our kids the best we can; occasionally making mistakes, but generally doing a good job. If our kids ask us questions about anything, we will try to give answer we think are suitable for their age and development.
The problem is, not all parents are like us. Many kids have parents who do not do the best for their kids, or even try to pass negative traits and habits onto their kids - racism, sexism, ageism etc. These kids may get some information from friends, or t'internet; but that could be plainly wrong, misguided or gappy - and have parents who will not put them right.
For this reason, schools need to be there to fill in the gaps; to give a view that might conflict with what children have learnt through unofficial sources. Therefore schools need to teach kids these things, even if it embarrasses almost everyone involved, perhaps including the teacher.
Then we get the thorny question of what age is correct for each topic...
On this topic, as with many others, I am a firm traditionalist.
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
I can't remember. Did Section Wotsit simply say not to teach the bairns about gayness in an approving manner, or did it say to keep completely silent?
Local Government Act 1988, Section 28 28 Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1)The following section shall be inserted after section 2 of the Local Government Act 1986 (prohibition of political publicity)—
"...Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1) A local authority shall not— (a) intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality; (b) promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship. (2) Nothing in subsection (1) above shall be taken to prohibit the doing of anything for the purpose of treating or preventing the spread of disease...
Interesting, thanks. (b) is otiose - obviously aimed as a barb to keep the anti-gays happy. And (2) is in its way just as maliciously redundant.
Though what I hadn't realised was that it was absolutely OK for Sir or Miss to give an approving picture of homosexuality if one taught at Fettes or Roedean!
She's certainly had a varied and (reasonably) successful career, but I do wonder if she might not enjoy the limelight a bit too much for this sort of role...
It would be the sort of appointment that would signal the definitive death of the old idea of a neutral civil service that would carry on serving a new government as impartially as it served an old one.
I know people will say that this idea had already died, pointing to changes under either Boris Johnson, or Tony Blair, depending on their politics, but I think it's still possible for Starmer to re-establish the old culture, if he wanted to. But that wouldn't be the way to do it.
I really don't think it's a good change to have a politicised civil service where a new government sees a massive turnover in senior civil service appointments. It looks like that's the way Britain is inexorably heading. I know people are cynical about the civil service, and it was never perfect, but a politicised civil service is worse.
The civil service have politicised themselves, that’s the problem. Too many of the current senior CS see their job as thwarting government policy, as if Yes, Minister was a documentary.
I expect Starmer to have a much easier time than Sunak, Truss, and especially Johnson had.
This was an interesting piece on the linkage between re-wilding and climate change. I don't know abut the figures they claim, but the reasoning seems plausible.
"Bison influence grassland and forest ecosystems by grazing grasslands evenly, recycling nutrients to fertilise the soil and all of its life, dispersing seeds to enrich the ecosystem, and compacting the soil to prevent stored carbon from being released. These creatures evolved for millions of years with grassland and forest ecosystems, and their removal, especially where grasslands have been ploughed up, has led to the release of vast amounts of carbon..." So reverting the land to grazing by sheep would presumably have the claimed effect but without the rewilding fairydust sugar sprinkles?
Also bison are bovids and therefore methane farters
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
One of the main points of the Cass review is clinicians do not know which kids are "trans' - and thats why going through puberty is a useful way for them to work it out for themselves. Meanwhile multiple other issues are ignored because "trans" is the only thing being treated.
Do you know which kids are trans?
The text explicitly says Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment,
So in what way is it "denying the existence of trans people"?
The guidance sets out the law as it is - if you wan't to campaign for lowering the age of gender reassignment from 18, feel free - but thats what the law says today.
This is harder to understand than applied mathematics.
just been through Starmers 6 priorities for a Labour government.
Where did housing go ?
The housing pledge is now homeless
He needs to keep back housing for the 49th reboot next week.
It is quite worrying as Rishi is having some really positive feedback for his well received speech on Monday, the "gangbusters" economic picture and one of his better PMQs performances yesterday.
What are you worrying about? You think that the Tories are going to win the next election with a majority of 20 anyway. It's a niche view, I hope you're wrong, and to me there's little evidence to me that Sunak is getting positive feedback outside the DE/DM/DT usual suspects whose print circulation (people tend to skip politics on MailOnline for the SideBar of Shame) is collapsing. The BBC's political editor, not known for being particularly Labour friendly, posted this yesterday -
I'm starting to think you might, just might, be hedging your disappointment by ramping the Tories.
Kuenssberg is just shilling for a Boris redux.
Maybe, but equally I've not seen much positive coverage, beyond the usual suspects, regarding Monday's speech, or yesterday's PMQs. I mean the 2 remaining Express readers were probably given to believe it was a new Gettysburg Address but other than that...
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
I know you and I are both good parents, who will try to guide our kids the best we can; occasionally making mistakes, but generally doing a good job. If our kids ask us questions about anything, we will try to give answer we think are suitable for their age and development.
The problem is, not all parents are like us. Many kids have parents who do not do the best for their kids, or even try to pass negative traits and habits onto their kids - racism, sexism, ageism etc. These kids may get some information from friends, or t'internet; but that could be plainly wrong, misguided or gappy - and have parents who will not put them right.
For this reason, schools need to be there to fill in the gaps; to give a view that might conflict with what children have learnt through unofficial sources. Therefore schools need to teach kids these things, even if it embarrasses almost everyone involved, perhaps including the teacher.
Then we get the thorny question of what age is correct for each topic...
Absolutely. And then the poor teachers and schools get blamed.
But only if they are council schools, if the Section 28 precedent is to be followed.
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
I can't remember. Did Section Wotsit simply say not to teach the bairns about gayness in an approving manner, or did it say to keep completely silent?
Local Government Act 1988, Section 28 28 Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1)The following section shall be inserted after section 2 of the Local Government Act 1986 (prohibition of political publicity)—
"...Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1) A local authority shall not— (a) intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality; (b) promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship. (2) Nothing in subsection (1) above shall be taken to prohibit the doing of anything for the purpose of treating or preventing the spread of disease...
Incidentally, in case you get confused by the notation, it was section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988 that inserted section 2A into the Local Government Act 1986. The prohibition text is usually referred to "section 28" as a shorthand, although it could with equal validity be called "section 2A". Earlier versions referred to "section 28" as "clause 28" due to an earlier draft.
She's certainly had a varied and (reasonably) successful career, but I do wonder if she might not enjoy the limelight a bit too much for this sort of role...
She's been a disaster at John Lewis, and besides which Labour are a long way from Government. They haven't won this 1992- style GE yet.
The government will fail to meet its targets on heat pump rollout. The promised lifting of a ban on new onshore windfarms has not gone far enough. Massive investment is needed in the electricity grid. There is no proper plan for rail in the north and Midlands now that the northern leg of HS2 has been cancelled, severely inhibiting economic growth in those regions. Water bills will need to go up to fix the sewage crisis, and more reservoirs are needed to avoid drought, while water companies have done too little to staunch leaks. The UK lacks a coherent strategy on flooding, with more than 900,000 properties at risk of river or sea flooding and 910,000 at risk of surface water flooding. Good progress has been made on the rollout of gigabit broadband around the country.
Armitt called for this government, and the next, to act swiftly. “It’s not too late to catch up in many of the areas we’ve highlighted, if the goals are matched with policies of sufficient scale. But the window is closing,” he said.
“Ducking big decisions over the next 12 months will put the major goals of net zero, regional economic growth, and environmental protection in jeopardy,” he warned.
Greater investment was needed in public transport, the NIC found. Uniquely in Europe, the UK’s second and third cities showed lower economic productivity than the national average, largely because of poor transport links, the review found.
The axing of the next phases of the HS2 high-speed rail project left a “critical gap” in rail connectivity between the Midlands and the north, with northern cities likely to “remain poorly served” without further investment.
Given long-term growth in demand “a do-nothing scenario north of the proposed connection of HS2 and the west coast mainline at Handsacre is not sustainable”, the report found.
The target of rolling out 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 to reach 7m homes by 2035 was way off track, the report found, while putting off a decision on hydrogen for home heating until 2026 had created uncertainty.
The next government should end new connections to Britain’s gas network from 2025, and ban the sale of new gas boilers for homes and fossil fuel heating in large commercial buildings by 2035, according to the report. It also called on the government to rule out subsidies for hydrogen heating...
The two highlighted items in particular are just economic stupidity from the government. I don't think there's any reasonable grounds to argue about that.
Holy Moly, are they really thinking of piping hydrogen to homes? That is the stupidest fucking decision in history. Any minister stupid enough to authorise that should be shot. We need to stop being governed by morons.
The current plan is to mix 15% hydrogen in with the natural gas, isn't it? So the same partial pressure of hydrogen as in the old town gas mix...
Perfectly safe, just a slightly lower heating value.
...and a much higher hydrogen leakage value. Which then explodes.
Reasons for not using hydrogen are:
Hydrogen is just greenwashed coal: it takes more energy to produce than it releases.
It leaks like a bastard.
It is worse than all the other alternatives.
So it's expensive to make, impossible to store, dangerous to transport and pointless. It has a large red flashing sign over it saying "THIS IS A MASSIVE ERROR". It is Blackadder levels of wrong. It's not just wrong it's stupidly wrong. I could do a Baldrick impersonation whilst saying "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong..." but I think my view is clear at this point.
You need it to get to a certain concentration for it to explode, though, surely? And with it being so leaky that's going to be hard to achieve - no-one encloses their boiler that well.
But I don't disagree that domestic hydrogen's a dead end given the continuing development of heat pumps - as you say, there's still no economic source for the volume needed.
It'd be better to just set a date now for switching off gas altogether rather than stringing it out with the promise of a hydrogen transition that will probably never happen.
I would like to see the writeup for "the environment is so leaky that leaking hydrogen is no biggy". As in legally-responsible-for-the-result writeup and signature.
I mean, we used town gas for however long that lasted, and that was 50% hydrogen...
Yes, sure, there'll be some unsuitable materials used in the 80s before anyone began to think of hydrogen compatibility, and we would need a plan to replace those. But that's mainly an issue in the distribution network rather than in the home, and that can be solved by re-lining the pipes where necessary.
And since more than 95% of the deaths from gas come from CO poisoning, a pure hydrogen network would likely work out as being safer than natural gas.
But I don't see it winning out against electricity, and think the real danger is that certain sectors of industry will try to keep us throwing money at it in an effort to keep the possibility of domestic hydrogen alive. We ought to make a decision rather than dithering.
(I do agree that a 'a few more explosions but far fewer poisonings!' is hardly a great safety case. But that's an argument against all domestic gas, not just against hydrogen)
Hydrogen embrittlement was largely discovered through town gas - pipes you could collapse by rapping on them with your knuckle.
You can't reline domestic pipes - between embrittlement and leaks, you'd have to redo all the pipework between the street and boiler. Even the solder used to join metal has to be the right kind. Hydrogen can leak *through* solid materials.
Gas explosions have dropped massively since the town gas days - the question is whether this was partly due to no hydrogen in the mix. It probably was.
From a good thread on the Rotterdam hydrogen summit:
Mobility and heating definitely have a muted presence, with a lot more focus on ammonia, eSAF, P2X, and large scale industrial facilities.
Hydrogen will definitely have its place in a renewable economy - but the cost timeline on the production of green hydrogen, and the likely massive cost of upgrading national gas networks (and domestic pipework), make planning to use it to replace gas in domestic heating completely nuts.
As an industrial feedstock, from electrolysis using zero marginal cost renewables which go beyond what's needed to charge whatever battery storage demand is out there from hour to hour, bulk generation of green hydrogen will at some point make quite a lot of sense economically.
Creating hydrogen for steel production, actually makes some sense.
The cycle of electricity -> hydrogen -> compress/cool -> store -> uncompress -> electricity is so inefficient that hydrogen power storage is unlikely to make sense. Nearly every other method is cheaper and better. Remember you have significant loses per day - several percent.
Also ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen as an aviation fuel (though not without issues).
A jet turbine will burn pretty much anything combustible with only minor modification.
They will, just not for very long unless specifically designed for an alternate fuel. Jet A-1 is blended to have excellent lubricating properties as it's otherwise very difficult to lubricate the HP fuel pumps at the very high fuel pressures that jet engines run. It was 2,200psi in the Sea Harrier! So you could run it on turps but the fuel pumps and other ancillaries would wear quickly in the best case or melt in the worse.
This especially applies to aircraft with fueldraulic actuated systems (F-35, Su-30/35 and probably some civvie shit I don't know about) where pressures are 3,000+ psi.
The gas turbine OEMs are developing machines to run on hydrogen and/or ammonia.
Ammonia is a handy transportation vector for hydrogen, especially if it is going a long way by ship (e.g. Australia to Japan/Korea, Middle East to Europe), and if you can burn it directly and avoid the faff of cracking it back to hydrogen, happy days.
And before people start flapping about the risks associated with ammonia (which I agree should not be underestimated), there used to be daily train loads of the stuff running between Teesside and Grangemouth, back in the day. I remember on one occasion the Class 40 on the train struggling on greasy rails through platform 8 (now 2) at Newcastle Central, and giving maximum thrash under the station roof to keep the train moving.
But I don't want the domestic gas supply converted to ammonia, before someone asks!
The tankage for enough ammonia to run an airport of planes flying from Heathrow, say, would be a fairly serious risk to West London, if breached.
An airliner running on ammonia would make a fairly serious chemical weapon.
I think aviation is more likely to go with "SAF", essentially Jet-A1 made from biomass, and pretend that the CO2 is not coming out of their engines. Proponents of SAF like to use terms like "ultra-clean drop-in fuel".
just been through Starmers 6 priorities for a Labour government.
Where did housing go ?
The housing pledge is now homeless
He needs to keep back housing for the 49th reboot next week.
It is quite worrying as Rishi is having some really positive feedback for his well received speech on Monday, the "gangbusters" economic picture and one of his better PMQs performances yesterday.
What are you worrying about? You think that the Tories are going to win the next election with a majority of 20 anyway. It's a niche view, I hope you're wrong, and to me there's little evidence to me that Sunak is getting positive feedback outside the DE/DM/DT usual suspects whose print circulation (people tend to skip politics on MailOnline for the SideBar of Shame) is collapsing. The BBC's political editor, not known for being particularly Labour friendly, posted this yesterday -
I'm starting to think you might, just might, be hedging your disappointment by ramping the Tories.
Kuenssberg is just shilling for a Boris redux.
Maybe, but equally I've not seen much positive coverage, beyond the usual suspects, regarding Monday's speech, or yesterday's PMQs. I mean the 2 remaining Express readers were probably given to believe it was a new Gettysburg Address but other than that...
Even The Telegraph's PolEd reckons that SKS today was better than Sunak on Monday:
"This Labour pledge card launch feels like a mini party conference. Key shad cab ministers speaking. Endorsements. Big stage festooned with slogans. Very different feel to Rishi Sunak’s think tank campaign framing speech on Monday." https://twitter.com/benrileysmith/status/1791038202607771772
Yes, Momentum don't like it but most of the other usual suspects on the left sound mildly encouraged. I'm not sure where the view that Sunak's speech was better-received than Starmer's is coming from...
She's certainly had a varied and (reasonably) successful career, but I do wonder if she might not enjoy the limelight a bit too much for this sort of role...
The woman who totally f******-up one of the UK’s most famous brands?
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
I can't remember. Did Section Wotsit simply say not to teach the bairns about gayness in an approving manner, or did it say to keep completely silent?
Local Government Act 1988, Section 28 28 Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1)The following section shall be inserted after section 2 of the Local Government Act 1986 (prohibition of political publicity)—
"...Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1) A local authority shall not— (a) intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality; (b) promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship. (2) Nothing in subsection (1) above shall be taken to prohibit the doing of anything for the purpose of treating or preventing the spread of disease...
Interesting, thanks. (b) is otiose - obviously aimed as a barb to keep the anti-gays happy. And (2) is in its way just as maliciously redundant.
Though what I hadn't realised was that it was absolutely OK for Sir or Miss to give an approving picture of homosexuality if one taught at Fettes or Roedean!
It's almost like somebody wrote an article about how social issues are resolved in the United Kingdom in a tripartite settlement where the rich can do as they please, the middle class can muddle along but at cost, and the working class get nothing or a placebo.
The government will fail to meet its targets on heat pump rollout. The promised lifting of a ban on new onshore windfarms has not gone far enough. Massive investment is needed in the electricity grid. There is no proper plan for rail in the north and Midlands now that the northern leg of HS2 has been cancelled, severely inhibiting economic growth in those regions. Water bills will need to go up to fix the sewage crisis, and more reservoirs are needed to avoid drought, while water companies have done too little to staunch leaks. The UK lacks a coherent strategy on flooding, with more than 900,000 properties at risk of river or sea flooding and 910,000 at risk of surface water flooding. Good progress has been made on the rollout of gigabit broadband around the country.
Armitt called for this government, and the next, to act swiftly. “It’s not too late to catch up in many of the areas we’ve highlighted, if the goals are matched with policies of sufficient scale. But the window is closing,” he said.
“Ducking big decisions over the next 12 months will put the major goals of net zero, regional economic growth, and environmental protection in jeopardy,” he warned.
Greater investment was needed in public transport, the NIC found. Uniquely in Europe, the UK’s second and third cities showed lower economic productivity than the national average, largely because of poor transport links, the review found.
The axing of the next phases of the HS2 high-speed rail project left a “critical gap” in rail connectivity between the Midlands and the north, with northern cities likely to “remain poorly served” without further investment.
Given long-term growth in demand “a do-nothing scenario north of the proposed connection of HS2 and the west coast mainline at Handsacre is not sustainable”, the report found.
The target of rolling out 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 to reach 7m homes by 2035 was way off track, the report found, while putting off a decision on hydrogen for home heating until 2026 had created uncertainty.
The next government should end new connections to Britain’s gas network from 2025, and ban the sale of new gas boilers for homes and fossil fuel heating in large commercial buildings by 2035, according to the report. It also called on the government to rule out subsidies for hydrogen heating...
The two highlighted items in particular are just economic stupidity from the government. I don't think there's any reasonable grounds to argue about that.
Holy Moly, are they really thinking of piping hydrogen to homes? That is the stupidest fucking decision in history. Any minister stupid enough to authorise that should be shot. We need to stop being governed by morons.
The current plan is to mix 15% hydrogen in with the natural gas, isn't it? So the same partial pressure of hydrogen as in the old town gas mix...
Perfectly safe, just a slightly lower heating value.
...and a much higher hydrogen leakage value. Which then explodes.
Reasons for not using hydrogen are:
Hydrogen is just greenwashed coal: it takes more energy to produce than it releases.
It leaks like a bastard.
It is worse than all the other alternatives.
So it's expensive to make, impossible to store, dangerous to transport and pointless. It has a large red flashing sign over it saying "THIS IS A MASSIVE ERROR". It is Blackadder levels of wrong. It's not just wrong it's stupidly wrong. I could do a Baldrick impersonation whilst saying "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong..." but I think my view is clear at this point.
You need it to get to a certain concentration for it to explode, though, surely? And with it being so leaky that's going to be hard to achieve - no-one encloses their boiler that well.
But I don't disagree that domestic hydrogen's a dead end given the continuing development of heat pumps - as you say, there's still no economic source for the volume needed.
It'd be better to just set a date now for switching off gas altogether rather than stringing it out with the promise of a hydrogen transition that will probably never happen.
I would like to see the writeup for "the environment is so leaky that leaking hydrogen is no biggy". As in legally-responsible-for-the-result writeup and signature.
I mean, we used town gas for however long that lasted, and that was 50% hydrogen...
Yes, sure, there'll be some unsuitable materials used in the 80s before anyone began to think of hydrogen compatibility, and we would need a plan to replace those. But that's mainly an issue in the distribution network rather than in the home, and that can be solved by re-lining the pipes where necessary.
And since more than 95% of the deaths from gas come from CO poisoning, a pure hydrogen network would likely work out as being safer than natural gas.
But I don't see it winning out against electricity, and think the real danger is that certain sectors of industry will try to keep us throwing money at it in an effort to keep the possibility of domestic hydrogen alive. We ought to make a decision rather than dithering.
(I do agree that a 'a few more explosions but far fewer poisonings!' is hardly a great safety case. But that's an argument against all domestic gas, not just against hydrogen)
Hydrogen embrittlement was largely discovered through town gas - pipes you could collapse by rapping on them with your knuckle.
You can't reline domestic pipes - between embrittlement and leaks, you'd have to redo all the pipework between the street and boiler. Even the solder used to join metal has to be the right kind. Hydrogen can leak *through* solid materials.
Gas explosions have dropped massively since the town gas days - the question is whether this was partly due to no hydrogen in the mix. It probably was.
From a good thread on the Rotterdam hydrogen summit:
Mobility and heating definitely have a muted presence, with a lot more focus on ammonia, eSAF, P2X, and large scale industrial facilities.
Hydrogen will definitely have its place in a renewable economy - but the cost timeline on the production of green hydrogen, and the likely massive cost of upgrading national gas networks (and domestic pipework), make planning to use it to replace gas in domestic heating completely nuts.
As an industrial feedstock, from electrolysis using zero marginal cost renewables which go beyond what's needed to charge whatever battery storage demand is out there from hour to hour, bulk generation of green hydrogen will at some point make quite a lot of sense economically.
Creating hydrogen for steel production, actually makes some sense.
The cycle of electricity -> hydrogen -> compress/cool -> store -> uncompress -> electricity is so inefficient that hydrogen power storage is unlikely to make sense. Nearly every other method is cheaper and better. Remember you have significant loses per day - several percent.
Also ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen as an aviation fuel (though not without issues).
A jet turbine will burn pretty much anything combustible with only minor modification.
They will, just not for very long unless specifically designed for an alternate fuel. Jet A-1 is blended to have excellent lubricating properties as it's otherwise very difficult to lubricate the HP fuel pumps at the very high fuel pressures that jet engines run. It was 2,200psi in the Sea Harrier! So you could run it on turps but the fuel pumps and other ancillaries would wear quickly in the best case or melt in the worse.
This especially applies to aircraft with fueldraulic actuated systems (F-35, Su-30/35 and probably some civvie shit I don't know about) where pressures are 3,000+ psi.
The gas turbine OEMs are developing machines to run on hydrogen and/or ammonia.
Ammonia is a handy transportation vector for hydrogen, especially if it is going a long way by ship (e.g. Australia to Japan/Korea, Middle East to Europe), and if you can burn it directly and avoid the faff of cracking it back to hydrogen, happy days.
And before people start flapping about the risks associated with ammonia (which I agree should not be underestimated), there used to be daily train loads of the stuff running between Teesside and Grangemouth, back in the day. I remember on one occasion the Class 40 on the train struggling on greasy rails through platform 8 (now 2) at Newcastle Central, and giving maximum thrash under the station roof to keep the train moving.
But I don't want the domestic gas supply converted to ammonia, before someone asks!
Isn't there an issue with incomplete combustion leading to NOx production? Not a major worry for industry where it can be scrubbed, but perhaps more of a problem in aircraft?
The paper I referenced suggested that the lower operating temperatures of an ammonia fuelled turbofan might make that issue something of a wash.
OTOH, there's this one on ammonia in hypersonic scramjets...
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
One of the main points of the Cass review is clinicians do not know which kids are "trans' - and thats why going through puberty is a useful way for them to work it out for themselves. Meanwhile multiple other issues are ignored because "trans" is the only thing being treated.
Do you know which kids are trans?
The text explicitly says Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment,
So in what way is it "denying the existence of trans people"?
The guidance sets out the law as it is - if you wan't to campaign for lowering the age of gender reassignment from 18, feel free - but thats what the law says today.
Aren't you misapplying Cass - on medicine - to teaching in schools? Note that what is being proposed isn't about just talking to kids who may be trans; it may be to friends and other classmates. Essentially: trans people don't exist.
Yet they do.
Say one kid in school thinks they may be trans, and is getting bullied because of it; or even because one of their parents is trans. The root cause of the bullying would not be able to be addressed - because the very idea someone can feel their gender is wrong - or have issued with gender - is verboten. And the fact it's verboten will make it seem odd; disturbing. Worthy of being bullied about.
And then you morph this into some sh*t about lowering the age of gender reassignment.
Are you reading the same thing as me?
It explicitly states in the guidance that kids should be taught about "gender reassignment" - i.e. about people being trans and having that recognised with a GRC, as protected by the Equality Act.
It forbids teaching some of the stuff that, whenever I complain about it, I am told that is not what being trans is - i.e. the stuff about being trans if you don't fit into stereotypes on clothing or hobbies or colour preference.
She's certainly had a varied and (reasonably) successful career, but I do wonder if she might not enjoy the limelight a bit too much for this sort of role...
She's been a disaster at John Lewis, and besides which Labour are a long way from Government. They haven't won this 1992- style GE yet.
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
One of the main points of the Cass review is clinicians do not know which kids are "trans' - and thats why going through puberty is a useful way for them to work it out for themselves. Meanwhile multiple other issues are ignored because "trans" is the only thing being treated.
Do you know which kids are trans?
The text explicitly says Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment,
So in what way is it "denying the existence of trans people"?
The guidance sets out the law as it is - if you wan't to campaign for lowering the age of gender reassignment from 18, feel free - but thats what the law says today.
Aren't you misapplying Cass - on medicine - to teaching in schools? Note that what is being proposed isn't about just talking to kids who may be trans; it may be to friends and other classmates. Essentially: trans people don't exist.
Yet they do.
Say one kid in school thinks they may be trans, and is getting bullied because of it; or even because one of their parents is trans. The root cause of the bullying would not be able to be addressed - because the very idea someone can feel their gender is wrong - or have issued with gender - is verboten. And the fact it's verboten will make it seem odd; disturbing. Worthy of being bullied about.
And then you morph this into some sh*t about lowering the age of gender reassignment.
The protected characteristic of gender reassignment starts at 18, so legally no kids can have that applied to them.
The advice specifically covers the protected characteristics - including gender reassignment - and respect. So no one is saying “trans people don’t exist”.
But again, you ignore the point - if clinicians don’t know who will have a stable trans identity from childhood into adulthood, how do you?
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
I can't remember. Did Section Wotsit simply say not to teach the bairns about gayness in an approving manner, or did it say to keep completely silent?
Local Government Act 1988, Section 28 28 Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1)The following section shall be inserted after section 2 of the Local Government Act 1986 (prohibition of political publicity)—
"...Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material. (1) A local authority shall not— (a) intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality; (b) promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship. (2) Nothing in subsection (1) above shall be taken to prohibit the doing of anything for the purpose of treating or preventing the spread of disease...
Interesting, thanks. (b) is otiose - obviously aimed as a barb to keep the anti-gays happy. And (2) is in its way just as maliciously redundant.
Though what I hadn't realised was that it was absolutely OK for Sir or Miss to give an approving picture of homosexuality if one taught at Fettes or Roedean!
It's almost like somebody wrote an article about how social issues are resolved in the United Kingdom in a tripartite settlement where the rich can do as they please, the middle class can muddle along but at cost, and the working class get nothing or a placebo.
The government will fail to meet its targets on heat pump rollout. The promised lifting of a ban on new onshore windfarms has not gone far enough. Massive investment is needed in the electricity grid. There is no proper plan for rail in the north and Midlands now that the northern leg of HS2 has been cancelled, severely inhibiting economic growth in those regions. Water bills will need to go up to fix the sewage crisis, and more reservoirs are needed to avoid drought, while water companies have done too little to staunch leaks. The UK lacks a coherent strategy on flooding, with more than 900,000 properties at risk of river or sea flooding and 910,000 at risk of surface water flooding. Good progress has been made on the rollout of gigabit broadband around the country.
Armitt called for this government, and the next, to act swiftly. “It’s not too late to catch up in many of the areas we’ve highlighted, if the goals are matched with policies of sufficient scale. But the window is closing,” he said.
“Ducking big decisions over the next 12 months will put the major goals of net zero, regional economic growth, and environmental protection in jeopardy,” he warned.
Greater investment was needed in public transport, the NIC found. Uniquely in Europe, the UK’s second and third cities showed lower economic productivity than the national average, largely because of poor transport links, the review found.
The axing of the next phases of the HS2 high-speed rail project left a “critical gap” in rail connectivity between the Midlands and the north, with northern cities likely to “remain poorly served” without further investment.
Given long-term growth in demand “a do-nothing scenario north of the proposed connection of HS2 and the west coast mainline at Handsacre is not sustainable”, the report found.
The target of rolling out 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 to reach 7m homes by 2035 was way off track, the report found, while putting off a decision on hydrogen for home heating until 2026 had created uncertainty.
The next government should end new connections to Britain’s gas network from 2025, and ban the sale of new gas boilers for homes and fossil fuel heating in large commercial buildings by 2035, according to the report. It also called on the government to rule out subsidies for hydrogen heating...
The two highlighted items in particular are just economic stupidity from the government. I don't think there's any reasonable grounds to argue about that.
Holy Moly, are they really thinking of piping hydrogen to homes? That is the stupidest fucking decision in history. Any minister stupid enough to authorise that should be shot. We need to stop being governed by morons.
The current plan is to mix 15% hydrogen in with the natural gas, isn't it? So the same partial pressure of hydrogen as in the old town gas mix...
Perfectly safe, just a slightly lower heating value.
...and a much higher hydrogen leakage value. Which then explodes.
Reasons for not using hydrogen are:
Hydrogen is just greenwashed coal: it takes more energy to produce than it releases.
It leaks like a bastard.
It is worse than all the other alternatives.
So it's expensive to make, impossible to store, dangerous to transport and pointless. It has a large red flashing sign over it saying "THIS IS A MASSIVE ERROR". It is Blackadder levels of wrong. It's not just wrong it's stupidly wrong. I could do a Baldrick impersonation whilst saying "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong..." but I think my view is clear at this point.
You need it to get to a certain concentration for it to explode, though, surely? And with it being so leaky that's going to be hard to achieve - no-one encloses their boiler that well.
But I don't disagree that domestic hydrogen's a dead end given the continuing development of heat pumps - as you say, there's still no economic source for the volume needed.
It'd be better to just set a date now for switching off gas altogether rather than stringing it out with the promise of a hydrogen transition that will probably never happen.
I would like to see the writeup for "the environment is so leaky that leaking hydrogen is no biggy". As in legally-responsible-for-the-result writeup and signature.
I mean, we used town gas for however long that lasted, and that was 50% hydrogen...
Yes, sure, there'll be some unsuitable materials used in the 80s before anyone began to think of hydrogen compatibility, and we would need a plan to replace those. But that's mainly an issue in the distribution network rather than in the home, and that can be solved by re-lining the pipes where necessary.
And since more than 95% of the deaths from gas come from CO poisoning, a pure hydrogen network would likely work out as being safer than natural gas.
But I don't see it winning out against electricity, and think the real danger is that certain sectors of industry will try to keep us throwing money at it in an effort to keep the possibility of domestic hydrogen alive. We ought to make a decision rather than dithering.
(I do agree that a 'a few more explosions but far fewer poisonings!' is hardly a great safety case. But that's an argument against all domestic gas, not just against hydrogen)
Hydrogen embrittlement was largely discovered through town gas - pipes you could collapse by rapping on them with your knuckle.
You can't reline domestic pipes - between embrittlement and leaks, you'd have to redo all the pipework between the street and boiler. Even the solder used to join metal has to be the right kind. Hydrogen can leak *through* solid materials.
Gas explosions have dropped massively since the town gas days - the question is whether this was partly due to no hydrogen in the mix. It probably was.
From a good thread on the Rotterdam hydrogen summit:
Mobility and heating definitely have a muted presence, with a lot more focus on ammonia, eSAF, P2X, and large scale industrial facilities.
Hydrogen will definitely have its place in a renewable economy - but the cost timeline on the production of green hydrogen, and the likely massive cost of upgrading national gas networks (and domestic pipework), make planning to use it to replace gas in domestic heating completely nuts.
As an industrial feedstock, from electrolysis using zero marginal cost renewables which go beyond what's needed to charge whatever battery storage demand is out there from hour to hour, bulk generation of green hydrogen will at some point make quite a lot of sense economically.
Creating hydrogen for steel production, actually makes some sense.
The cycle of electricity -> hydrogen -> compress/cool -> store -> uncompress -> electricity is so inefficient that hydrogen power storage is unlikely to make sense. Nearly every other method is cheaper and better. Remember you have significant loses per day - several percent.
Also ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen as an aviation fuel (though not without issues).
A jet turbine will burn pretty much anything combustible with only minor modification.
They will, just not for very long unless specifically designed for an alternate fuel. Jet A-1 is blended to have excellent lubricating properties as it's otherwise very difficult to lubricate the HP fuel pumps at the very high fuel pressures that jet engines run. It was 2,200psi in the Sea Harrier! So you could run it on turps but the fuel pumps and other ancillaries would wear quickly in the best case or melt in the worse.
This especially applies to aircraft with fueldraulic actuated systems (F-35, Su-30/35 and probably some civvie shit I don't know about) where pressures are 3,000+ psi.
The gas turbine OEMs are developing machines to run on hydrogen and/or ammonia.
Ammonia is a handy transportation vector for hydrogen, especially if it is going a long way by ship (e.g. Australia to Japan/Korea, Middle East to Europe), and if you can burn it directly and avoid the faff of cracking it back to hydrogen, happy days.
And before people start flapping about the risks associated with ammonia (which I agree should not be underestimated), there used to be daily train loads of the stuff running between Teesside and Grangemouth, back in the day. I remember on one occasion the Class 40 on the train struggling on greasy rails through platform 8 (now 2) at Newcastle Central, and giving maximum thrash under the station roof to keep the train moving.
But I don't want the domestic gas supply converted to ammonia, before someone asks!
The tankage for enough ammonia to run an airport of planes flying from Heathrow, say, would be a fairly serious risk to West London, if breached.
An airliner running on ammonia would make a fairly serious chemical weapon.
I think aviation is more likely to go with "SAF", essentially Jet-A1 made from biomass, and pretend that the CO2 is not coming out of their engines. Proponents of SAF like to use terms like "ultra-clean drop-in fuel".
[Factory being set up at Carcroft, just north of Doncaster]
Not entirely convinced but it might work for short haul.
Airships use much more fuel (lots and lots of drag, and travel slowly)
They also are playthings of the wind.
They might or might not have a niche in moving large objects moderate distances, then lowering them to the ground while hovering.
The company blurb says 75% less emissions, although exactly how that is achieved isn't entirely clear.
I'd be surprised if they used a lot more fuel.
Slower means less parasitic drag and lighter means less induced drag from producing lift. The frontal area is the one downside.
Wind I'll give you, although 100mph is a lot faster than the old Good Year blimp.
I looked into this a little when they were back at Cardington (I never did get to see it out there...). Airships can be *really* good for some purposes, particularly cargo. But they have a massive issue with that - they can be adjusted to allow them to carry (say) 50 tonnes of cargo, and it will do it fine. But when they drop that cargo off, suddenly they have 50 tonnes of excess buoyancy. This is a bad thing.
There have been various attempts to fix this, including (from memory) rapidly compressing some of the envelope, or ensuring it is fully moored before unloading - which increases mission complexity considerably. I can't recall how Airlander hopes to tackle it.
The government will fail to meet its targets on heat pump rollout. The promised lifting of a ban on new onshore windfarms has not gone far enough. Massive investment is needed in the electricity grid. There is no proper plan for rail in the north and Midlands now that the northern leg of HS2 has been cancelled, severely inhibiting economic growth in those regions. Water bills will need to go up to fix the sewage crisis, and more reservoirs are needed to avoid drought, while water companies have done too little to staunch leaks. The UK lacks a coherent strategy on flooding, with more than 900,000 properties at risk of river or sea flooding and 910,000 at risk of surface water flooding. Good progress has been made on the rollout of gigabit broadband around the country.
Armitt called for this government, and the next, to act swiftly. “It’s not too late to catch up in many of the areas we’ve highlighted, if the goals are matched with policies of sufficient scale. But the window is closing,” he said.
“Ducking big decisions over the next 12 months will put the major goals of net zero, regional economic growth, and environmental protection in jeopardy,” he warned.
Greater investment was needed in public transport, the NIC found. Uniquely in Europe, the UK’s second and third cities showed lower economic productivity than the national average, largely because of poor transport links, the review found.
The axing of the next phases of the HS2 high-speed rail project left a “critical gap” in rail connectivity between the Midlands and the north, with northern cities likely to “remain poorly served” without further investment.
Given long-term growth in demand “a do-nothing scenario north of the proposed connection of HS2 and the west coast mainline at Handsacre is not sustainable”, the report found.
The target of rolling out 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 to reach 7m homes by 2035 was way off track, the report found, while putting off a decision on hydrogen for home heating until 2026 had created uncertainty.
The next government should end new connections to Britain’s gas network from 2025, and ban the sale of new gas boilers for homes and fossil fuel heating in large commercial buildings by 2035, according to the report. It also called on the government to rule out subsidies for hydrogen heating...
The two highlighted items in particular are just economic stupidity from the government. I don't think there's any reasonable grounds to argue about that.
Holy Moly, are they really thinking of piping hydrogen to homes? That is the stupidest fucking decision in history. Any minister stupid enough to authorise that should be shot. We need to stop being governed by morons.
The current plan is to mix 15% hydrogen in with the natural gas, isn't it? So the same partial pressure of hydrogen as in the old town gas mix...
Perfectly safe, just a slightly lower heating value.
...and a much higher hydrogen leakage value. Which then explodes.
Reasons for not using hydrogen are:
Hydrogen is just greenwashed coal: it takes more energy to produce than it releases.
It leaks like a bastard.
It is worse than all the other alternatives.
So it's expensive to make, impossible to store, dangerous to transport and pointless. It has a large red flashing sign over it saying "THIS IS A MASSIVE ERROR". It is Blackadder levels of wrong. It's not just wrong it's stupidly wrong. I could do a Baldrick impersonation whilst saying "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong..." but I think my view is clear at this point.
You need it to get to a certain concentration for it to explode, though, surely? And with it being so leaky that's going to be hard to achieve - no-one encloses their boiler that well.
But I don't disagree that domestic hydrogen's a dead end given the continuing development of heat pumps - as you say, there's still no economic source for the volume needed.
It'd be better to just set a date now for switching off gas altogether rather than stringing it out with the promise of a hydrogen transition that will probably never happen.
I would like to see the writeup for "the environment is so leaky that leaking hydrogen is no biggy". As in legally-responsible-for-the-result writeup and signature.
I mean, we used town gas for however long that lasted, and that was 50% hydrogen...
Yes, sure, there'll be some unsuitable materials used in the 80s before anyone began to think of hydrogen compatibility, and we would need a plan to replace those. But that's mainly an issue in the distribution network rather than in the home, and that can be solved by re-lining the pipes where necessary.
And since more than 95% of the deaths from gas come from CO poisoning, a pure hydrogen network would likely work out as being safer than natural gas.
But I don't see it winning out against electricity, and think the real danger is that certain sectors of industry will try to keep us throwing money at it in an effort to keep the possibility of domestic hydrogen alive. We ought to make a decision rather than dithering.
(I do agree that a 'a few more explosions but far fewer poisonings!' is hardly a great safety case. But that's an argument against all domestic gas, not just against hydrogen)
Hydrogen embrittlement was largely discovered through town gas - pipes you could collapse by rapping on them with your knuckle.
You can't reline domestic pipes - between embrittlement and leaks, you'd have to redo all the pipework between the street and boiler. Even the solder used to join metal has to be the right kind. Hydrogen can leak *through* solid materials.
Gas explosions have dropped massively since the town gas days - the question is whether this was partly due to no hydrogen in the mix. It probably was.
From a good thread on the Rotterdam hydrogen summit:
Mobility and heating definitely have a muted presence, with a lot more focus on ammonia, eSAF, P2X, and large scale industrial facilities.
Hydrogen will definitely have its place in a renewable economy - but the cost timeline on the production of green hydrogen, and the likely massive cost of upgrading national gas networks (and domestic pipework), make planning to use it to replace gas in domestic heating completely nuts.
As an industrial feedstock, from electrolysis using zero marginal cost renewables which go beyond what's needed to charge whatever battery storage demand is out there from hour to hour, bulk generation of green hydrogen will at some point make quite a lot of sense economically.
Creating hydrogen for steel production, actually makes some sense.
The cycle of electricity -> hydrogen -> compress/cool -> store -> uncompress -> electricity is so inefficient that hydrogen power storage is unlikely to make sense. Nearly every other method is cheaper and better. Remember you have significant loses per day - several percent.
Also ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen as an aviation fuel (though not without issues).
A jet turbine will burn pretty much anything combustible with only minor modification.
They will, just not for very long unless specifically designed for an alternate fuel. Jet A-1 is blended to have excellent lubricating properties as it's otherwise very difficult to lubricate the HP fuel pumps at the very high fuel pressures that jet engines run. It was 2,200psi in the Sea Harrier! So you could run it on turps but the fuel pumps and other ancillaries would wear quickly in the best case or melt in the worse.
This especially applies to aircraft with fueldraulic actuated systems (F-35, Su-30/35 and probably some civvie shit I don't know about) where pressures are 3,000+ psi.
The gas turbine OEMs are developing machines to run on hydrogen and/or ammonia.
Ammonia is a handy transportation vector for hydrogen, especially if it is going a long way by ship (e.g. Australia to Japan/Korea, Middle East to Europe), and if you can burn it directly and avoid the faff of cracking it back to hydrogen, happy days.
And before people start flapping about the risks associated with ammonia (which I agree should not be underestimated), there used to be daily train loads of the stuff running between Teesside and Grangemouth, back in the day. I remember on one occasion the Class 40 on the train struggling on greasy rails through platform 8 (now 2) at Newcastle Central, and giving maximum thrash under the station roof to keep the train moving.
But I don't want the domestic gas supply converted to ammonia, before someone asks!
The tankage for enough ammonia to run an airport of planes flying from Heathrow, say, would be a fairly serious risk to West London, if breached.
An airliner running on ammonia would make a fairly serious chemical weapon.
I think aviation is more likely to go with "SAF", essentially Jet-A1 made from biomass, and pretend that the CO2 is not coming out of their engines. Proponents of SAF like to use terms like "ultra-clean drop-in fuel".
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
One of the main points of the Cass review is clinicians do not know which kids are "trans' - and thats why going through puberty is a useful way for them to work it out for themselves. Meanwhile multiple other issues are ignored because "trans" is the only thing being treated.
Do you know which kids are trans?
The text explicitly says Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment,
So in what way is it "denying the existence of trans people"?
The guidance sets out the law as it is - if you wan't to campaign for lowering the age of gender reassignment from 18, feel free - but thats what the law says today.
Aren't you misapplying Cass - on medicine - to teaching in schools? Note that what is being proposed isn't about just talking to kids who may be trans; it may be to friends and other classmates. Essentially: trans people don't exist.
Yet they do.
Say one kid in school thinks they may be trans, and is getting bullied because of it; or even because one of their parents is trans. The root cause of the bullying would not be able to be addressed - because the very idea someone can feel their gender is wrong - or have issued with gender - is verboten. And the fact it's verboten will make it seem odd; disturbing. Worthy of being bullied about.
And then you morph this into some sh*t about lowering the age of gender reassignment.
The protected characteristic of gender reassignment starts at 18, so legally no kids can have that applied to them.
The advice specifically covers the protected characteristics - including gender reassignment - and respect. So no one is saying “trans people don’t exist”.
But again, you ignore the point - if clinicians don’t know who will have a stable trans identity from childhood into adulthood, how do you?
What did you think of the video?
Which video?
I'm not saying - as you seem to be suggesting - that kids should get treatment younger. Just that kids should know that trans people exist. Which is what banning teaching about gender ideology does..
The government will fail to meet its targets on heat pump rollout. The promised lifting of a ban on new onshore windfarms has not gone far enough. Massive investment is needed in the electricity grid. There is no proper plan for rail in the north and Midlands now that the northern leg of HS2 has been cancelled, severely inhibiting economic growth in those regions. Water bills will need to go up to fix the sewage crisis, and more reservoirs are needed to avoid drought, while water companies have done too little to staunch leaks. The UK lacks a coherent strategy on flooding, with more than 900,000 properties at risk of river or sea flooding and 910,000 at risk of surface water flooding. Good progress has been made on the rollout of gigabit broadband around the country.
Armitt called for this government, and the next, to act swiftly. “It’s not too late to catch up in many of the areas we’ve highlighted, if the goals are matched with policies of sufficient scale. But the window is closing,” he said.
“Ducking big decisions over the next 12 months will put the major goals of net zero, regional economic growth, and environmental protection in jeopardy,” he warned.
Greater investment was needed in public transport, the NIC found. Uniquely in Europe, the UK’s second and third cities showed lower economic productivity than the national average, largely because of poor transport links, the review found.
The axing of the next phases of the HS2 high-speed rail project left a “critical gap” in rail connectivity between the Midlands and the north, with northern cities likely to “remain poorly served” without further investment.
Given long-term growth in demand “a do-nothing scenario north of the proposed connection of HS2 and the west coast mainline at Handsacre is not sustainable”, the report found.
The target of rolling out 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 to reach 7m homes by 2035 was way off track, the report found, while putting off a decision on hydrogen for home heating until 2026 had created uncertainty.
The next government should end new connections to Britain’s gas network from 2025, and ban the sale of new gas boilers for homes and fossil fuel heating in large commercial buildings by 2035, according to the report. It also called on the government to rule out subsidies for hydrogen heating...
The two highlighted items in particular are just economic stupidity from the government. I don't think there's any reasonable grounds to argue about that.
Holy Moly, are they really thinking of piping hydrogen to homes? That is the stupidest fucking decision in history. Any minister stupid enough to authorise that should be shot. We need to stop being governed by morons.
The current plan is to mix 15% hydrogen in with the natural gas, isn't it? So the same partial pressure of hydrogen as in the old town gas mix...
Perfectly safe, just a slightly lower heating value.
...and a much higher hydrogen leakage value. Which then explodes.
Reasons for not using hydrogen are:
Hydrogen is just greenwashed coal: it takes more energy to produce than it releases.
It leaks like a bastard.
It is worse than all the other alternatives.
So it's expensive to make, impossible to store, dangerous to transport and pointless. It has a large red flashing sign over it saying "THIS IS A MASSIVE ERROR". It is Blackadder levels of wrong. It's not just wrong it's stupidly wrong. I could do a Baldrick impersonation whilst saying "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong..." but I think my view is clear at this point.
You need it to get to a certain concentration for it to explode, though, surely? And with it being so leaky that's going to be hard to achieve - no-one encloses their boiler that well.
But I don't disagree that domestic hydrogen's a dead end given the continuing development of heat pumps - as you say, there's still no economic source for the volume needed.
It'd be better to just set a date now for switching off gas altogether rather than stringing it out with the promise of a hydrogen transition that will probably never happen.
I would like to see the writeup for "the environment is so leaky that leaking hydrogen is no biggy". As in legally-responsible-for-the-result writeup and signature.
I mean, we used town gas for however long that lasted, and that was 50% hydrogen...
Yes, sure, there'll be some unsuitable materials used in the 80s before anyone began to think of hydrogen compatibility, and we would need a plan to replace those. But that's mainly an issue in the distribution network rather than in the home, and that can be solved by re-lining the pipes where necessary.
And since more than 95% of the deaths from gas come from CO poisoning, a pure hydrogen network would likely work out as being safer than natural gas.
But I don't see it winning out against electricity, and think the real danger is that certain sectors of industry will try to keep us throwing money at it in an effort to keep the possibility of domestic hydrogen alive. We ought to make a decision rather than dithering.
(I do agree that a 'a few more explosions but far fewer poisonings!' is hardly a great safety case. But that's an argument against all domestic gas, not just against hydrogen)
Hydrogen embrittlement was largely discovered through town gas - pipes you could collapse by rapping on them with your knuckle.
You can't reline domestic pipes - between embrittlement and leaks, you'd have to redo all the pipework between the street and boiler. Even the solder used to join metal has to be the right kind. Hydrogen can leak *through* solid materials.
Gas explosions have dropped massively since the town gas days - the question is whether this was partly due to no hydrogen in the mix. It probably was.
From a good thread on the Rotterdam hydrogen summit:
Mobility and heating definitely have a muted presence, with a lot more focus on ammonia, eSAF, P2X, and large scale industrial facilities.
Hydrogen will definitely have its place in a renewable economy - but the cost timeline on the production of green hydrogen, and the likely massive cost of upgrading national gas networks (and domestic pipework), make planning to use it to replace gas in domestic heating completely nuts.
As an industrial feedstock, from electrolysis using zero marginal cost renewables which go beyond what's needed to charge whatever battery storage demand is out there from hour to hour, bulk generation of green hydrogen will at some point make quite a lot of sense economically.
Creating hydrogen for steel production, actually makes some sense.
The cycle of electricity -> hydrogen -> compress/cool -> store -> uncompress -> electricity is so inefficient that hydrogen power storage is unlikely to make sense. Nearly every other method is cheaper and better. Remember you have significant loses per day - several percent.
Also ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen as an aviation fuel (though not without issues).
A jet turbine will burn pretty much anything combustible with only minor modification.
They will, just not for very long unless specifically designed for an alternate fuel. Jet A-1 is blended to have excellent lubricating properties as it's otherwise very difficult to lubricate the HP fuel pumps at the very high fuel pressures that jet engines run. It was 2,200psi in the Sea Harrier! So you could run it on turps but the fuel pumps and other ancillaries would wear quickly in the best case or melt in the worse.
This especially applies to aircraft with fueldraulic actuated systems (F-35, Su-30/35 and probably some civvie shit I don't know about) where pressures are 3,000+ psi.
The gas turbine OEMs are developing machines to run on hydrogen and/or ammonia.
Ammonia is a handy transportation vector for hydrogen, especially if it is going a long way by ship (e.g. Australia to Japan/Korea, Middle East to Europe), and if you can burn it directly and avoid the faff of cracking it back to hydrogen, happy days.
And before people start flapping about the risks associated with ammonia (which I agree should not be underestimated), there used to be daily train loads of the stuff running between Teesside and Grangemouth, back in the day. I remember on one occasion the Class 40 on the train struggling on greasy rails through platform 8 (now 2) at Newcastle Central, and giving maximum thrash under the station roof to keep the train moving.
But I don't want the domestic gas supply converted to ammonia, before someone asks!
The tankage for enough ammonia to run an airport of planes flying from Heathrow, say, would be a fairly serious risk to West London, if breached.
An airliner running on ammonia would make a fairly serious chemical weapon.
I think aviation is more likely to go with "SAF", essentially Jet-A1 made from biomass, and pretend that the CO2 is not coming out of their engines. Proponents of SAF like to use terms like "ultra-clean drop-in fuel".
[Factory being set up at Carcroft, just north of Doncaster]
Not entirely convinced but it might work for short haul.
Airships use much more fuel (lots and lots of drag, and travel slowly)
They also are playthings of the wind.
They might or might not have a niche in moving large objects moderate distances, then lowering them to the ground while hovering.
The company blurb says 75% less emissions, although exactly how that is achieved isn't entirely clear.
I'd be surprised if they used a lot more fuel.
Slower means less parasitic drag and lighter means less induced drag from producing lift. The frontal area is the one downside.
Wind I'll give you, although 100mph is a lot faster than the old Good Year blimp.
I looked into this a little when they were back at Cardington (I never did get to see it out there...). Airships can be *really* good for some purposes, particularly cargo. But they have a massive issue with that - they can be adjusted to allow them to carry (say) 50 tonnes of cargo, and it will do it fine. But when they drop that cargo off, suddenly they have 50 tonnes of excess buoyancy. This is a bad thing.
There have been various attempts to fix this, including (from memory) rapidly compressing some of the envelope, or ensuring it is fully moored before unloading - which increases mission complexity considerably. I can't recall how Airlander hopes to tackle it.
They talk about it being a hybrid vehicle, so maybe it will be trimmed to be close to neutrally buoyant unloaded and any cargo will require additional aerodynamic lift?
The draft statutory SRE guidance has now been published. I haven’t read it all but the section on gender is *eminently* sensible. Shame you couldn’t tell this from all the people losing their minds on this in the last few days.
Children’s education and the medical scandal of the decade - why do you want to ignore it?
We have discussions on cycle paths or infrastructure - why not this too?
Having read the contents of that tweet, it does seem like the new Section 28, and one that will cause harm to trans children.
I know you disagree, but that's my view. It'll be interesting to see how this goes in the long-term.
The Observer Leader writer:
Of course schools shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology beliefs as fact. It’s also likely unlawful given the Education Act clauses on impartiality. There is evidence some schools have been, with risks for children. Of course this should be clarified in guidance....
Always suspected it was going to be sensible from the briefings. Of course it’s totally implausible the govt would “ban” any talk of a protected characteristic in schools. There are a lot of people who should know better who’ve been complicit in the abject conversation about this
Let me ask you a question: what do you think kid should be taught about trans people before the age of 16?
I think the guidelines are clear and appropriate:
If asked about the topic of gender identity, schools should teach the facts about biological sex and not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. Material suggesting that someone’s gender is determined by their interests or clothing choices should not be used as it risks leading pupils who do not comply with sex stereotypes to question their gender when they might not have done so otherwise. Where schools decide to use external resources, they should avoid materials that use cartoons or diagrams that oversimplify this complex concept or that could be interpreted as being aimed at younger children. Schools should consult parents on the content of external resources on this topic in advance and make all materials available to them on request.
As Cass highlighted, clinicians do not know which children will have a stable trans-identity into adulthood, so the concept of a "trans child" is dangerous as it risks diagnostic overshadowing.
Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment, by the end of their secondary education.
That entire thing, if you read it. It takes a 'contested' thing and sets one position: and one that will be harmful to kids who are trans.
That text essentially denies the existence of trans people, if a person is trans because of their gender identity.
But I fear many people don't believe trans people exist, and don't want them to exist.
One of the main points of the Cass review is clinicians do not know which kids are "trans' - and thats why going through puberty is a useful way for them to work it out for themselves. Meanwhile multiple other issues are ignored because "trans" is the only thing being treated.
Do you know which kids are trans?
The text explicitly says Pupils should understand the importance of equality and respect and should learn about the protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment,
So in what way is it "denying the existence of trans people"?
The guidance sets out the law as it is - if you wan't to campaign for lowering the age of gender reassignment from 18, feel free - but thats what the law says today.
Aren't you misapplying Cass - on medicine - to teaching in schools? Note that what is being proposed isn't about just talking to kids who may be trans; it may be to friends and other classmates. Essentially: trans people don't exist.
Yet they do.
Say one kid in school thinks they may be trans, and is getting bullied because of it; or even because one of their parents is trans. The root cause of the bullying would not be able to be addressed - because the very idea someone can feel their gender is wrong - or have issued with gender - is verboten. And the fact it's verboten will make it seem odd; disturbing. Worthy of being bullied about.
And then you morph this into some sh*t about lowering the age of gender reassignment.
Are you reading the same thing as me?
It explicitly states in the guidance that kids should be taught about "gender reassignment" - i.e. about people being trans and having that recognised with a GRC, as protected by the Equality Act.
It forbids teaching some of the stuff that, whenever I complain about it, I am told that is not what being trans is - i.e. the stuff about being trans if you don't fit into stereotypes on clothing or hobbies or colour preference.
I am reading the same thing. It's the 'buy underpants' situation. Because it's quite hard to go the GRC route without acknowledging your gender identity is wrong. And not teaching that there is such a thing as gender identity will not help those kids - or others understand them.
And people have felt differently about their gender throughout time. This is not a modern phenomenon, and is even recorded in ancient history.
Part of the issue - as ever - is that 'trans' covers a whole spectrum of things, from transvestite to transsexual; and there are, in turn, whole ranges amongst those. Handily, enough, this is quite like homosexuality, where the term covers a whole load of things. Although there are stereotypes, there are plenty of gay people who break those stereotypes. Most, perhaps.
The government will fail to meet its targets on heat pump rollout. The promised lifting of a ban on new onshore windfarms has not gone far enough. Massive investment is needed in the electricity grid. There is no proper plan for rail in the north and Midlands now that the northern leg of HS2 has been cancelled, severely inhibiting economic growth in those regions. Water bills will need to go up to fix the sewage crisis, and more reservoirs are needed to avoid drought, while water companies have done too little to staunch leaks. The UK lacks a coherent strategy on flooding, with more than 900,000 properties at risk of river or sea flooding and 910,000 at risk of surface water flooding. Good progress has been made on the rollout of gigabit broadband around the country.
Armitt called for this government, and the next, to act swiftly. “It’s not too late to catch up in many of the areas we’ve highlighted, if the goals are matched with policies of sufficient scale. But the window is closing,” he said.
“Ducking big decisions over the next 12 months will put the major goals of net zero, regional economic growth, and environmental protection in jeopardy,” he warned.
Greater investment was needed in public transport, the NIC found. Uniquely in Europe, the UK’s second and third cities showed lower economic productivity than the national average, largely because of poor transport links, the review found.
The axing of the next phases of the HS2 high-speed rail project left a “critical gap” in rail connectivity between the Midlands and the north, with northern cities likely to “remain poorly served” without further investment.
Given long-term growth in demand “a do-nothing scenario north of the proposed connection of HS2 and the west coast mainline at Handsacre is not sustainable”, the report found.
The target of rolling out 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028 to reach 7m homes by 2035 was way off track, the report found, while putting off a decision on hydrogen for home heating until 2026 had created uncertainty.
The next government should end new connections to Britain’s gas network from 2025, and ban the sale of new gas boilers for homes and fossil fuel heating in large commercial buildings by 2035, according to the report. It also called on the government to rule out subsidies for hydrogen heating...
The two highlighted items in particular are just economic stupidity from the government. I don't think there's any reasonable grounds to argue about that.
Holy Moly, are they really thinking of piping hydrogen to homes? That is the stupidest fucking decision in history. Any minister stupid enough to authorise that should be shot. We need to stop being governed by morons.
The current plan is to mix 15% hydrogen in with the natural gas, isn't it? So the same partial pressure of hydrogen as in the old town gas mix...
Perfectly safe, just a slightly lower heating value.
...and a much higher hydrogen leakage value. Which then explodes.
Reasons for not using hydrogen are:
Hydrogen is just greenwashed coal: it takes more energy to produce than it releases.
It leaks like a bastard.
It is worse than all the other alternatives.
So it's expensive to make, impossible to store, dangerous to transport and pointless. It has a large red flashing sign over it saying "THIS IS A MASSIVE ERROR". It is Blackadder levels of wrong. It's not just wrong it's stupidly wrong. I could do a Baldrick impersonation whilst saying "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong..." but I think my view is clear at this point.
You need it to get to a certain concentration for it to explode, though, surely? And with it being so leaky that's going to be hard to achieve - no-one encloses their boiler that well.
But I don't disagree that domestic hydrogen's a dead end given the continuing development of heat pumps - as you say, there's still no economic source for the volume needed.
It'd be better to just set a date now for switching off gas altogether rather than stringing it out with the promise of a hydrogen transition that will probably never happen.
I would like to see the writeup for "the environment is so leaky that leaking hydrogen is no biggy". As in legally-responsible-for-the-result writeup and signature.
I mean, we used town gas for however long that lasted, and that was 50% hydrogen...
Yes, sure, there'll be some unsuitable materials used in the 80s before anyone began to think of hydrogen compatibility, and we would need a plan to replace those. But that's mainly an issue in the distribution network rather than in the home, and that can be solved by re-lining the pipes where necessary.
And since more than 95% of the deaths from gas come from CO poisoning, a pure hydrogen network would likely work out as being safer than natural gas.
But I don't see it winning out against electricity, and think the real danger is that certain sectors of industry will try to keep us throwing money at it in an effort to keep the possibility of domestic hydrogen alive. We ought to make a decision rather than dithering.
(I do agree that a 'a few more explosions but far fewer poisonings!' is hardly a great safety case. But that's an argument against all domestic gas, not just against hydrogen)
Hydrogen embrittlement was largely discovered through town gas - pipes you could collapse by rapping on them with your knuckle.
You can't reline domestic pipes - between embrittlement and leaks, you'd have to redo all the pipework between the street and boiler. Even the solder used to join metal has to be the right kind. Hydrogen can leak *through* solid materials.
Gas explosions have dropped massively since the town gas days - the question is whether this was partly due to no hydrogen in the mix. It probably was.
From a good thread on the Rotterdam hydrogen summit:
Mobility and heating definitely have a muted presence, with a lot more focus on ammonia, eSAF, P2X, and large scale industrial facilities.
Hydrogen will definitely have its place in a renewable economy - but the cost timeline on the production of green hydrogen, and the likely massive cost of upgrading national gas networks (and domestic pipework), make planning to use it to replace gas in domestic heating completely nuts.
As an industrial feedstock, from electrolysis using zero marginal cost renewables which go beyond what's needed to charge whatever battery storage demand is out there from hour to hour, bulk generation of green hydrogen will at some point make quite a lot of sense economically.
Creating hydrogen for steel production, actually makes some sense.
The cycle of electricity -> hydrogen -> compress/cool -> store -> uncompress -> electricity is so inefficient that hydrogen power storage is unlikely to make sense. Nearly every other method is cheaper and better. Remember you have significant loses per day - several percent.
Also ammonia makes more sense than hydrogen as an aviation fuel (though not without issues).
A jet turbine will burn pretty much anything combustible with only minor modification.
They will, just not for very long unless specifically designed for an alternate fuel. Jet A-1 is blended to have excellent lubricating properties as it's otherwise very difficult to lubricate the HP fuel pumps at the very high fuel pressures that jet engines run. It was 2,200psi in the Sea Harrier! So you could run it on turps but the fuel pumps and other ancillaries would wear quickly in the best case or melt in the worse.
This especially applies to aircraft with fueldraulic actuated systems (F-35, Su-30/35 and probably some civvie shit I don't know about) where pressures are 3,000+ psi.
The gas turbine OEMs are developing machines to run on hydrogen and/or ammonia.
Ammonia is a handy transportation vector for hydrogen, especially if it is going a long way by ship (e.g. Australia to Japan/Korea, Middle East to Europe), and if you can burn it directly and avoid the faff of cracking it back to hydrogen, happy days.
And before people start flapping about the risks associated with ammonia (which I agree should not be underestimated), there used to be daily train loads of the stuff running between Teesside and Grangemouth, back in the day. I remember on one occasion the Class 40 on the train struggling on greasy rails through platform 8 (now 2) at Newcastle Central, and giving maximum thrash under the station roof to keep the train moving.
But I don't want the domestic gas supply converted to ammonia, before someone asks!
The tankage for enough ammonia to run an airport of planes flying from Heathrow, say, would be a fairly serious risk to West London, if breached.
An airliner running on ammonia would make a fairly serious chemical weapon.
I think aviation is more likely to go with "SAF", essentially Jet-A1 made from biomass, and pretend that the CO2 is not coming out of their engines. Proponents of SAF like to use terms like "ultra-clean drop-in fuel".
[Factory being set up at Carcroft, just north of Doncaster]
Not entirely convinced but it might work for short haul.
Airships use much more fuel (lots and lots of drag, and travel slowly)
They also are playthings of the wind.
They might or might not have a niche in moving large objects moderate distances, then lowering them to the ground while hovering.
The company blurb says 75% less emissions, although exactly how that is achieved isn't entirely clear.
I'd be surprised if they used a lot more fuel.
Slower means less parasitic drag and lighter means less induced drag from producing lift. The frontal area is the one downside.
Wind I'll give you, although 100mph is a lot faster than the old Good Year blimp.
The biggie is wandering around in the lower atmosphere. At 35K feet there is a lot less air to get in the way.
That only works for jet engines. Props need the air...
I don't imagine this will be doing Atlantic crossings though, it will be for short hops where a jet would be in the landing pattern before it even reached cruising altitude.
For routes like Leeds to Belfast or Glasgow to the Islands it might work.
I look forward to the first one doing test flights around the Flatlands, anyway.
Re Amnesty and what the Chinese are doing to the Uighurs, I am going to respond to this comment from @Roger
"The Amnesty stuff is horrific. PB's self proclaimed 'champion of the downtrodden' cyclefree could only find HORRIFIC the story of the Jewish Chaplain at Leeds University who was hounded because he chose to post photographs of himself in his IDF uniform having moonlighted for them when he should have been doing pastoral work at the university."
FUCK OFF Roger, really just fuck off.
I wrote about the Uighurs in December 2019 and the genocide within the meaning of the relevant Convention being perpetrated on them and about how so many Muslim states and leaders, so quick to throw out accusations of Israeli genocide, sided with the Chinese state which was - and is - carrying out these horrific acts on fellow Muslims.
Fuck off and find some other woman to bully. Because one thing being an investigator for the best part of 40 years has taught me to do is to keep the receipts.
You may have some difficulty finding a woman to bully on here, of course, because the way the site is going (@148's incoherent rubbish it would take several threads to correct is a particular lowlight) why stick around to endure misogyny on here. We have enough of it in real life.
Point of Order your honour! Slightly unfair to lump 148's 'incoherent rubbish' with mine! I think he's very coherent!
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
Aged 11 we were herded into the hall at primary school to watch a large black and white TV for a handful of Fridays. As the Grampian TV jingle started (I was in ATVland) a half an hour show called "Living and Growing" started. What did I learn? Girls have long hair and boys have short hair. I am yet to have any further formal reproduction lessons outside of Biology lessons I was an only child so am still waiting to learn about the birds and the bees.
These kind of stories polarise opinion. Some would expect a lot of this kind of thing goes on. Some would say its rare, and we get selection bias (we are aware of these cases BECAUSE they get caught). Id be interested to see how this opinion split between left and right and Labour vs Tory.
Isn’t it reckoned that there’s £5.5bn of benefits fraud annually. That suggests that there’s a fair amount of it occurring.
Chase down a handful of Tory crooks and you would recover that amount easily rather than chasing hundreds of thousands and spending more than you recover.
It was over thirty years since I left school, and things will have changed a lot but I’m amazed anyone gets their sex education from teachers or textbooks.
Aged 11 we were herded into the hall at primary school to watch a large black and white TV for a handful of Fridays. As the Grampian TV jingle started (I was in ATVland) a half an hour show called "Living and Growing" started. What did I learn? Girls have long hair and boys have short hair. I am yet to have any further formal reproduction lessons outside of Biology lessons I was an only child so am still waiting to learn about the birds and the bees.
Apart from promoting some views which are at best, contested, I found it confusing as heck.....
That is a thing on YouTube. Is it actually being taught to 11 year olds? Which ones, where, in what context?
Thanks for posting the link. It's only got 75k views which doesn't seem many in a youtube context and there's no evidence on the link that any schools are using it, however having watched it I'm interested in
a) what "views" in the video you think are contested b) what you found confusing
All seemed quite simple to me, if perhaps a bit adult in some respects for an 11 year old wrt to being physically but not romantically or emotionally attached to someone.
These kind of stories polarise opinion. Some would expect a lot of this kind of thing goes on. Some would say its rare, and we get selection bias (we are aware of these cases BECAUSE they get caught). Id be interested to see how this opinion split between left and right and Labour vs Tory.
Isn’t it reckoned that there’s £5.5bn of benefits fraud annually. That suggests that there’s a fair amount of it occurring.
Chase down a handful of Tory crooks and you would recover that amount easily rather than chasing hundreds of thousands and spending more than you recover.
Sickness benefit fraudsters don't donate to the Conservative Party. Fast track PPE billionaires do. Who would you chase down if you were the Tories?
Starmers six pledges are horribly bland and minor. Probably the right call though for election purposes, just have to have fingers crossed they understand the job much better than this:
Sticking to tough spending rules in order to deliver economic stability
Cutting NHS waiting lists by providing 40,000 more appointments each week - funded by tackling tax avoidance and non-dom loopholes
Launching a border security command to stop the gangs arranging small boat crossings
Setting up Great British Energy, a publicly owned clean power energy company
Providing more neighbourhood police officers to reduce antisocial behaviour and introduced new penalties for offenders
Recruiting 6,500 teachers, paid for through ending tax breaks for private schools.
Think this might be the end of the road for politicians pledges. If they raise more questions than they answer, and no-one thinks they account to much, even if they believed them, maybe it's time to bin them.
But aren't the questions entirely centred around their lack of ambition, rather than their believability?
Branding them as "Labour's First Steps..." is a pretty clear acknowledgement of that, so you have to imagine that this is a deliberate safety-first strategy from SKS.
As pledges go, these ones are at least rather more tangible than those chiselled onto the EdStone!
I didn't get a chance to reply to your response. The questions for these pledges I think are mainly in what they don't cover. They don't address at all the most important policy changes that the Labour Party wants to implement, eg climate change, housebuilding, workers rights. Even the second level policies in the pledges have only minimal targets attached. They should be expected to do better than that.
Starmer was reduced to saying, in effect, don't judge us on these pledges. I'm which case why have them? Either say, these are the areas we will focus on, judge us at the next election how well we did. Or do proper SMART goals which are achievable (as well as relevant) but won't always be achieved.
Comments
Where did housing go ?
They also are playthings of the wind.
They might or might not have a niche in moving large objects moderate distances, then lowering them to the ground while hovering.
So Starmer must be somewhat concerned Labour only got 35% NEV at this year's local elections as the precedent of the last 2 general elections we changed government is the winning opposition party ended up with a GE voteshare no higher or even lower than they got at the previous locals.
The idea of putting the tramway there is purely to take space away from cyclists, rather than to have cars sharing with trams (as happens in dozens of European cities).
If it happens it will be a disaster for cycling in Edinburgh as it will force cyclists onto major arterial roads, probably resulting in lots of people just giving up on cycling.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=YPNCzXYy2CE
Apart from promoting some views which are at best, contested, I found it confusing as heck.....
1. Financial stability ie keep doing what Hunt is doing
2. NHS waiting lists - well good luck - Wes Streeting better mean what he says about reform
3. Border security - only time will tell
4. British Energy - good idea but youve given it to Ed Miliband the nations #1 dork
5. Antisocial behaviour - heard it all before, will plods actually be told to be pursue criminals
6. More teachers -why ? Class rolls are falling and schools will close.
Big issues like housing quietly dropped, HoL left as it is, public services unreformed.
It is quite worrying as Rishi is having some really positive feedback for his well received speech on Monday, the "gangbusters" economic picture and one of his better PMQs performances yesterday.
28 Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material.
(1)The following section shall be inserted after section 2 of the Local Government Act 1986 (prohibition of political publicity)—
"...Prohibition on promoting homosexuality by teaching or by publishing material.
(1) A local authority shall not—
(a) intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality;
(b) promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship.
(2) Nothing in subsection (1) above shall be taken to prohibit the doing of anything for the purpose of treating or preventing the spread of disease...
I've omitted (3) and (4) for simplicity. The source is here: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1988/9/section/28/1991-02-01
And of course leaseholders are paying for the developers to lobby against us through our own service charges...
She's certainly had a varied and (reasonably) successful career, but I do wonder if she might not enjoy the limelight a bit too much for this sort of role...
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy6332vx5n8o
I'm starting to think you might, just might, be hedging your disappointment by ramping the Tories.
Yet they do.
Say one kid in school thinks they may be trans, and is getting bullied because of it; or even because one of their parents is trans. The root cause of the bullying would not be able to be addressed - because the very idea someone can feel their gender is wrong - or have issued with gender - is verboten. And the fact it's verboten will make it seem odd; disturbing. Worthy of being bullied about.
And then you morph this into some sh*t about lowering the age of gender reassignment.
And also NOT the kind of place that would elect someone with his politics, CUP or GOP.
Back to "Living and Growing" it is then.
I know people will say that this idea had already died, pointing to changes under either Boris Johnson, or Tony Blair, depending on their politics, but I think it's still possible for Starmer to re-establish the old culture, if he wanted to. But that wouldn't be the way to do it.
I really don't think it's a good change to have a politicised civil service where a new government sees a massive turnover in senior civil service appointments. It looks like that's the way Britain is inexorably heading. I know people are cynical about the civil service, and it was never perfect, but a politicised civil service is worse.
The problem is, not all parents are like us. Many kids have parents who do not do the best for their kids, or even try to pass negative traits and habits onto their kids - racism, sexism, ageism etc. These kids may get some information from friends, or t'internet; but that could be plainly wrong, misguided or gappy - and have parents who will not put them right.
For this reason, schools need to be there to fill in the gaps; to give a view that might conflict with what children have learnt through unofficial sources. Therefore schools need to teach kids these things, even if it embarrasses almost everyone involved, perhaps including the teacher.
Then we get the thorny question of what age is correct for each topic...
I blame Canada.
https://youtu.be/kYB6ZSwdrvM?si=OkCBMw-4M4dESAji&t=24
Though what I hadn't realised was that it was absolutely OK for Sir or Miss to give an approving picture of homosexuality if one taught at Fettes or Roedean!
I expect Starmer to have a much easier time than Sunak, Truss, and especially Johnson had.
Yow Cor wosh yor ands in a buffalo.
"Black country joke "
But only if they are council schools, if the Section 28 precedent is to be followed.
NEW THREAD
I'd be surprised if they used a lot more fuel.
Slower means less parasitic drag and lighter means less induced drag from producing lift. The frontal area is the one downside.
Wind I'll give you, although 100mph is a lot faster than the old Good Year blimp.
"This Labour pledge card launch feels like a mini party conference. Key shad cab ministers speaking. Endorsements. Big stage festooned with slogans. Very different feel to Rishi Sunak’s think tank campaign framing speech on Monday."
https://twitter.com/benrileysmith/status/1791038202607771772
Yes, Momentum don't like it but most of the other usual suspects on the left sound mildly encouraged. I'm not sure where the view that Sunak's speech was better-received than Starmer's is coming from...
https://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2024/04/21/the-history-of-gambling/
On an entirely unconnected note, has anybody else noticed that Baby Spice is bringing up her 13yr old son as her daughter?
OTOH, there's this one on ammonia in hypersonic scramjets...
Performance and emission characteristics of ammonia fueled scramjet engine
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0196890423012591
Might make an interesting fuel option for the proposed Astro Mechanica hybrid turbofan/ramjet/scramjet concept.
It explicitly states in the guidance that kids should be taught about "gender reassignment" - i.e. about people being trans and having that recognised with a GRC, as protected by the Equality Act.
It forbids teaching some of the stuff that, whenever I complain about it, I am told that is not what being trans is - i.e. the stuff about being trans if you don't fit into stereotypes on clothing or hobbies or colour preference.
The advice specifically covers the protected characteristics - including gender reassignment - and respect. So no one is saying “trans people don’t exist”.
But again, you ignore the point - if clinicians don’t know who will have a stable trans identity from childhood into adulthood, how do you?
What did you think of the video?
There have been various attempts to fix this, including (from memory) rapidly compressing some of the envelope, or ensuring it is fully moored before unloading - which increases mission complexity considerably. I can't recall how Airlander hopes to tackle it.
I'm not saying - as you seem to be suggesting - that kids should get treatment younger. Just that kids should know that trans people exist. Which is what banning teaching about gender ideology does..
There's f-all 'respect' in this guidance.
Would need vectored thrust for landing/take off.
And people have felt differently about their gender throughout time. This is not a modern phenomenon, and is even recorded in ancient history.
Part of the issue - as ever - is that 'trans' covers a whole spectrum of things, from transvestite to transsexual; and there are, in turn, whole ranges amongst those. Handily, enough, this is quite like homosexuality, where the term covers a whole load of things. Although there are stereotypes, there are plenty of gay people who break those stereotypes. Most, perhaps.
I don't imagine this will be doing Atlantic crossings though, it will be for short hops where a jet would be in the landing pattern before it even reached cruising altitude.
For routes like Leeds to Belfast or Glasgow to the Islands it might work.
I look forward to the first one doing test flights around the Flatlands, anyway.
It's only got 75k views which doesn't seem many in a youtube context and there's no evidence on the link that any schools are using it, however having watched it I'm interested in
a) what "views" in the video you think are contested
b) what you found confusing
All seemed quite simple to me, if perhaps a bit adult in some respects for an 11 year old wrt to being physically but not romantically or emotionally attached to someone.
Starmer was reduced to saying, in effect, don't judge us on these pledges. I'm which case why have them? Either say, these are the areas we will focus on, judge us at the next election how well we did. Or do proper SMART goals which are achievable (as well as relevant) but won't always be achieved.