Big row brewing in French politics - leader of centre-right Les Republicains (party of Chirac Sarkozy) - says he supports the party forming a right-wing alliance with Marine Le Pen's National Rally party.
Big names from the party - from Pécresse to Wauquiez and Xavier Bertrand - all are vehemently against the move.
So looks like Les Republicains are in the process of splitting before our eyes. Must have MLP rubbing her hands.
It's an interesting mirror of what might happen to the Tories post election if reform do well. We've seen Suella firing the opening salvos already.
Possibly, there’s a very big difference in that there’s no populist centrist who has eviscerated the establishment parties. Macron squats across the political centre so the only viable alternative is MLP. The dynamics in the UK are very different.
Is the self-employed NI the only rabbit from this hat?
A straightforward bribe to the self-employed that might buy a few votes, I guess. I'm struggling to remember the current ins and outs for self-employed versus employed taxation but... should all income from whatever source be taxed equitably?
IR35 is the killer for freelancers at the moment. And businesses employing them. It's raised costs across the board, and now you're treated like an employee for tax purposes but with none of the job security, HR protections or holiday time etc.
If you talk to small business people there are loads of issues that need addressing, a special NI tax cut isn't really the core issue. IR35 is a huge mess, the balance of taxes in some industries heavily weighted to turn-over taxes rather than profit (which yes we know Amazon etc from the fact they are worldwide can exploit profit based taxation, but some bloke with 5 employees is totally different kettle of fish), etc.
I keep banging on about this, productivity and the imbalance of the size of businesses are key problems in our economy. It is very very hard to go from 1 man band to 50 people, and then from 50 to 500 or 1000, it is horrifically hard as the whole system starts to become really problematic.
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
We could have had a one-off wealth tax to cover all the costs.
Every time Fraser Nelson mentions that the top 1% contribute 28% of all income tax, it just serves as a reminder that the 1% are minted and the rest of the country isn't earning much at all.
The same with this stat. Something has gone horribly wrong when pensioners are the biggest contributors of incometax.
We have a crop of pensioners who put lots into pensions and as a result quite a few have high pension incomes in retirement.
Which is better than them all starving in heaps.
We also have a crop of pensioners on extremely generous gold plated defined benefit pensions that they did not contribute in full towards.
Pensions that were not funded at the time and instead set up on the basis that future workers would pay for the costs instead then they'd get future pensions afterwards, except then the ladder was removed and those pensions aren't available to today's workers.
So we have a triple whammy of needing to pay for pensions that were never costed at the time, not being eligible for those ourselves despite paying for them, AND having to pay higher taxes too.
I'm very sorry you haven't got a DB pension Barty but you do appreciate they were part of the package which some people chose to accept, others opted for different packages at different employers.
You have not paid a penny of my DB pension, unless you contributed to the profits of those companies I worked for, and then presumably you did so because you chose to.
They were a part of the package yes.
But they were never paid for at the time. The bill was passed on.
We're still paying today for DB schemes. Every taxpayer is.
Instead of NI being a higher rate of tax on employment, a higher rate of tax on DB pensions to reflect the way they were unfunded and still need paying for would make more sense.
Alternatively we could tax everyone the same.
But that's how finances work. If you have a mortgage you aren't setting aside a fund out of which to make future payments, you are relying on the prospect of future wages. People tend to start costing the NHS once they hit 50. Do you want to deny them treatment because nobody set aside a fund in 1974 to pay for their future ailments?
No.
I want today's well off pensioners who are in a privileged position to pay at least the same rate of tax as someone earning the same income via PAYE.
I support that 100%
Also those living off any non-work income.
You want those on benefits to pay tax as well on their benefits and rent and council tax benefits, disability allowances, etc no doubt.
Is the self-employed NI the only rabbit from this hat?
A straightforward bribe to the self-employed that might buy a few votes, I guess. I'm struggling to remember the current ins and outs for self-employed versus employed taxation but... should all income from whatever source be taxed equitably?
IR35 is the killer for freelancers at the moment. And businesses employing them. It's raised costs across the board, and now you're treated like an employee for tax purposes but with none of the job security, HR protections or holiday time etc.
But IR35 protects £60bn of employer NI taxes, it simply isn't going anywhere...
Big row brewing in French politics - leader of centre-right Les Republicains (party of Chirac Sarkozy) - says he supports the party forming a right-wing alliance with Marine Le Pen's National Rally party.
Big names from the party - from Pécresse to Wauquiez and Xavier Bertrand - all are vehemently against the move.
So looks like Les Republicains are in the process of splitting before our eyes. Must have MLP rubbing her hands.
It's an interesting mirror of what might happen to the Tories post election if reform do well. We've seen Suella firing the opening salvos already.
The Rishi legacy might actually be managing to fill many of their remaining seats with “his people” which prevents the Suella/Kemi wing from taking over the party after his defenestration allowing the Tories to recover as a sensible force quicker than they might have.
Big row brewing in French politics - leader of centre-right Les Republicains (party of Chirac Sarkozy) - says he supports the party forming a right-wing alliance with Marine Le Pen's National Rally party.
Big names from the party - from Pécresse to Wauquiez and Xavier Bertrand - all are vehemently against the move.
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
Given it went mainly to the Tories and their chums, perhaps they should be paying it back and not the plebs. Poor got next to nothing
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
The last time we did that, we invented the income tax to pay for war with France and the colonies. It wasn’t as time limited as we hoped.
The people doing Tory strategy should never work again in politics or PR....
Tax cuts for landlords, opening door for some real dodgy tax avoidance when selling and for NI for "self employed"....nobody likes landlords, I am not sure even landlords like landlords, and public don't like other people taking advantage of tax efficiencies (even if they do it themselves).
Where as IHT is for people who actually vote something that concerns them (even if today they wouldn't pay it), it goes to the heart of I want to leave something to my children.
If you are going to go fantasy magic money tree, as least have populist policies.
The avoidance opportunities with the landlords CGT move are not only endless, but not easily countered by anti-avoidance. There would be two main options here.
1. A time limit test, i.e. tenant needs to have been renting for at least x years/months - anticipated anyway I think., but the trouble is either you set the bar at very long tenancy that would exclude many bona fide arrangements, or make it short enough that it's worth people doing some avoidance 2. A purposive test i.e. if there is a pre-ordained series of steps leading to the sale of the property. But that one would be very hard to prove and could take up a lot of litigation time
3. It's not going to happen anyway.
The thing is the Tories have no excuse for this hamfistedness. They have the whole Treasury and HMRC available to work through the feasibility of a policy. Labour have to rely on a handful of SPADs. Which suggests they have only given HMT a cursory glimpse at this and possibly not even consulted HMRC.
Labour should use that attack line:
"The Tories say they asked the Treasury to cost our tax plans. Maybe they should have done the same for their own?"
Big row brewing in French politics - leader of centre-right Les Republicains (party of Chirac Sarkozy) - says he supports the party forming a right-wing alliance with Marine Le Pen's National Rally party.
Big names from the party - from Pécresse to Wauquiez and Xavier Bertrand - all are vehemently against the move.
So looks like Les Republicains are in the process of splitting before our eyes. Must have MLP rubbing her hands.
It's an interesting mirror of what might happen to the Tories post election if reform do well. We've seen Suella firing the opening salvos already.
The Rishi legacy might actually be managing to fill many of their remaining seats with “his people” which prevents the Suella/Kemi wing from taking over the party after his defenestration allowing the Tories to recover as a sensible force quicker than they might have.
Struggling to reconcile "his people" with "sensible force"
Current performance suggests they are uniformly shit. That might be a step up from batshit crazy, but barely...
I'm in the biggest work slump of my freelance career and the grand or two I make a month would go much further outside the UK. Combine that with a potential incoming wealth tax (I earn little, but I used to earn a lot, so have plenty of assets) and it becomes a no-brainer. I was previously looking at Portugal, but it's probably not much cheaper living than the UK.
I can't imagine I'm the only person making the same calculation.
I'm thinking of retiring early and joining the economically inactive (well, apart from a few jobs for Mrs Flatlander's business to make use of the threshold) as we are very Yorkshire and don't spend a lot of money.
We've saved about 20-30x income over the years at a savings rate of over 50% despite avoiding the 40% threshold. I guess that makes us members of the 'FIRE' community even if I'd never heard of such a thing until recently.
I dread what form Labour's wealth tax is going to take. A property tax would be OK as that is cheap here in the Flatlands but any taxes on savings or the like and I'm going to be absolutely livid.
I prefer to have time rather than stuff. Is that not going to be allowed now?
I worked extremely hard for twenty years, saved most of my money and invested it. Paying 40% tax on the bulk of it.
I'm now in the unlucky situation that I'm barely employable, having suffered health issues in recent years, and the market for freelancers is dead. So I lose money and draw down on my investments every month.
Being taxed on them at a further 40% for example after being taxed at 40% on the money I used to invest, especially when my investments could have (and at points did) go down strikes me as unfair. Throw a 1% wealth tax on top of that and I see no reason to stick it out in the UK when my four or five days freelancing a month pays for a decent lifestyle on a digital nomad style visa, without the need to draw down on my investments.
We're not all rentiers living off inherited wealth. I'm a hard worker with some health issues in an industry that's currently in a huge slump (contractors and freelancers the first to go, but full timers getting laid off left right and centre too), hence living off money I wisely stacked away while times were good.
I don't fancy sticking around for my punishment beating for daring to be frugal and sensible during the good times.
Big row brewing in French politics - leader of centre-right Les Republicains (party of Chirac Sarkozy) - says he supports the party forming a right-wing alliance with Marine Le Pen's National Rally party.
Big names from the party - from Pécresse to Wauquiez and Xavier Bertrand - all are vehemently against the move.
King Charles first official portrait is vandalised by animal rights activists: Two Animal Rising protesters cover monarch's face with Wallace and Gromit image and stick on speech bubble message about 'cruelty on RSPCA farms
Throwing a rock at someone’s head could conceivably be “attempted murder”? You are deliberately doing something violent to someone in the full knowledge it might kill them, and for no other reason than to hurt them
IANAL but that feels qualitatively different to the milkshakes
Knowledge it "might" kill them is insufficient for attempted murder. You need to intend to kill.
Attempted murder is harder to prosecute in that sense than murder, as the mens rea is narrower. For murder the intent can be "only" to seriously injure.
My success rate with attempted murder would be anecdotal evidence in support of your statement but the intent is inferred objectively by the action. So if you throw a rock at someone's head the jury should infer that you either intended to kill them or were recklessly indifferent as to the possible consequences.
In practice this does mean that those who got lucky often get away with attempted murder (albeit being convicted of an aggravated assault) and those who are unlucky often get convicted of murder.
As noted judicial scholars, Fun Boy Three, put it, "Consequences alter cases, like broken noses alter faces".
Just about every driver in Britain has driven carelessly at some point, but only the unlucky few are involved in situations where consequences result.
King Charles first official portrait is vandalised by animal rights activists: Two Animal Rising protesters cover monarch's face with Wallace and Gromit image and stick on speech bubble message about 'cruelty on RSPCA farms
F##king lock Hermine and Jasper up.
They really test the limits of my opposition to corporal and capital punishment.
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
We could have had a one-off wealth tax to cover all the costs.
Worldwide the 20 richest people could have paid for the entirety of the global economic burden from covid, and still remained as multi billionaires afterwards. Crazy world we live in.
On imperial measures: "Whoever bought a kilo of anything? ...apart from me mate Dave. And he is doing a five-year stretch."
Didn't he have a story about going onto a school roof to recover a child who had climbed a drainpipe and refused to come down?
Found it:
I blew the whistle for the class to come in but nobody appeared and when I went out the pupils were pointing not to the Archangel Gabriel, but to the second-floor roof on which was a boy whom I called "C", and he was the most difficult boy in the class. They said, "What are you going to do about him, sir ?". Fortunately I had been trained in the navy and I climbed the drainpipe all the way. This is all public knowledge because I have written it up. I got hold of the boy and brought him down, kicking him as we came. There was no corporal punishment, of course. When we got to the bottom there was a great cheer and the class said, "Good old sir. That was good, sir." They ran in like a set of whippets and I had no more trouble with them. One must pay attention to great philosophy, but one must also be sure that one can climb the rigging. https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199394/cmhansrd/1994-05-03/Debate-3.html
In the three months to April, there were 9.43m people who were economically inactive in Britain, meaning they are neither in a job nor looking for one.
These included a record number of people out of work due to long-term sickness, which rose 55,000 to 2.83m.
It means the worklessness crisis has reached a scale that threatens to undermine the economy’s growth potential, according to Tony Wilson, director of the Institute for Employment Studies.
King Charles first official portrait is vandalised by animal rights activists: Two Animal Rising protesters cover monarch's face with Wallace and Gromit image and stick on speech bubble message about 'cruelty on RSPCA farms
F##king lock Hermine and Jasper up.
Their first plan was to throw red paint on it, apparently.
About the only time I graze on the newsagents’ shelves nowadays is in airports. On my way to Bergerac today via Edinburgh (still one of the shittier ones) and I note that W.H. Smiths stocks something called Hungarian Conservative, wtf is that all about? Looks reasonably plush and I assume they don’t make many sales amongst the couthy Lothianers so certainly subsidised to spout Orbanite propaganda.
At least my partner didn’t buy a Speccie this time.
Throwing a rock at someone’s head could conceivably be “attempted murder”? You are deliberately doing something violent to someone in the full knowledge it might kill them, and for no other reason than to hurt them
IANAL but that feels qualitatively different to the milkshakes
Knowledge it "might" kill them is insufficient for attempted murder. You need to intend to kill.
Attempted murder is harder to prosecute in that sense than murder, as the mens rea is narrower. For murder the intent can be "only" to seriously injure.
My success rate with attempted murder would be anecdotal evidence in support of your statement but the intent is inferred objectively by the action. So if you throw a rock at someone's head the jury should infer that you either intended to kill them or were recklessly indifferent as to the possible consequences.
In practice this does mean that those who got lucky often get away with attempted murder (albeit being convicted of an aggravated assault) and those who are unlucky often get convicted of murder.
As noted judicial scholars, Fun Boy Three, put it, "Consequences alter cases, like broken noses alter faces".
Just about every driver in Britain has driven carelessly at some point, but only the unlucky few are involved in situations where consequences result.
“It ain’t what you do; it’s the way that you do it.”
I am not sure the Telegraph headline of "tax cut for 4 million self-employed" is quite a good headline Tory CCHQ / Torygraph might think.
People don't like to see others get tax cuts, especially when they are hard pressed.
Wait until the employed work out that the self-employed are going to get a free state pension having paid nothing into the system!
Not strictly true. I believe you have to pay Class 2 contributions at £3.45 pw or £179.40 a year for 35 years to earn a full state pension if you're self-employed.
So ignoring inflation, self-employed would be buy a full state pension (£11,500 pa) for... £6,279. Mmmm
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
We could have had a one-off wealth tax to cover all the costs.
Worldwide the 20 richest people could have paid for the entirety of the global economic burden from covid, and still remained as multi billionaires afterwards. Crazy world we live in.
The problem with socialism is you always run out of other people's money.
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
We could have had a one-off wealth tax to cover all the costs.
Worldwide the 20 richest people could have paid for the entirety of the global economic burden from covid, and still remained as multi billionaires afterwards. Crazy world we live in.
Excpet they couldn't as their wealth isn't actually available to them like that. Zuckerberg, Bezo, Musk can't sell all their shares tomorrow and not tank the share price, so they can't actually realise that paper wealth in a short period of time.
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
We could have had a one-off wealth tax to cover all the costs.
Worldwide the 20 richest people could have paid for the entirety of the global economic burden from covid, and still remained as multi billionaires afterwards. Crazy world we live in.
The problem with socialism is you always run out of other people's money.
You problems with capitalism is that left unchecked you end up with oligarchy.
About the only time I graze on the newsagents’ shelves nowadays is in airports. On my way to Bergerac today via Edinburgh (still one of the shittier ones) and I note that W.H. Smiths stocks something called Hungarian Conservative, wtf is that all about? Looks reasonably plush and I assume they don’t make many sales amongst the couthy Lothianers so certainly subsidised to spout Orbanite propaganda.
At least my partner didn’t buy a Speccie this time.
Just back from the Dordogne myself!
Bordeaux airport is the latest addition to my list of 'places to land but not depart from'....
I am not sure the Telegraph headline of "tax cut for 4 million self-employed" is quite a good headline Tory CCHQ / Torygraph might think.
People don't like to see others get tax cuts, especially when they are hard pressed.
Wait until the employed work out that the self-employed are going to get a free state pension having paid nothing into the system!
Nothing? So none of them pay income tax or VAT?
We really need to get away from the idea that NI is 'paying in' to anything.
There is a difference between PB posts which describe what a poster thinks, and posts which describe what the voting public think.
For example, I tried to explain why I think anti-ULEZ could be a good policy for the Conservatives in provincial towns and rural areas, but soon had people explaining to me why ULEZ isn't such a bad policy.
@Geri_E_L_Scott In this-is-fine news, Tunbridge Wells Tory candidate says the party has “disappointed” with “some poor policies, worse implementation, infighting. Announcements in the rain”. 😬
Distances himself from govt, says: “We have let you down - I am so very sorry.”
I'm not saying Neil Mahapatra has had a ticking off from CCHQ but he has now said Rishi Sunak is a "man of decency and integrity" who has inherited a "poisoned chalice" and blames PM's advisers for damage to the party.
Good news for Mike Martin. I think he has a decent chance.
I am hearing things are going well for the Lib Dems.
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
We could have had a one-off wealth tax to cover all the costs.
Worldwide the 20 richest people could have paid for the entirety of the global economic burden from covid, and still remained as multi billionaires afterwards. Crazy world we live in.
The problem with socialism is you always run out of other people's money.
Plenty of version of capitalism, including those we grew up with, didn't give the majority of the spoils to the top 1%.
King Charles first official portrait is vandalised by animal rights activists: Two Animal Rising protesters cover monarch's face with Wallace and Gromit image and stick on speech bubble message about 'cruelty on RSPCA farms
Big row brewing in French politics - leader of centre-right Les Republicains (party of Chirac Sarkozy) - says he supports the party forming a right-wing alliance with Marine Le Pen's National Rally party.
Big names from the party - from Pécresse to Wauquiez and Xavier Bertrand - all are vehemently against the move.
Yes it's not clear to me why naked prejudice against one of our neighbours is acceptable – especially from an otherwise kind, gentle and intelligent person.
Is the self-employed NI the only rabbit from this hat?
A straightforward bribe to the self-employed that might buy a few votes, I guess. I'm struggling to remember the current ins and outs for self-employed versus employed taxation but... should all income from whatever source be taxed equitably?
Yes. How about:
A 20% tax on your income called income tax. A 20% tax for welfare called national insurance. A 20% tax on spending called VAT. A 20% sales tax like the Americans have. And a 20% tax on unspent money, to encourage growth.
There we are. A 20% headline rate for everything. Very equitable. HMRC will love it.
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
Temporary surcharges are never temporary. It was why Sunak idea of NI++ from a Tory idealogical perspective was so idiotic, it would have only got larger and wider.
Yeah. Still waiting for the temporary income tax to help fund the Napoleonic wars to be repealled.....
About the only time I graze on the newsagents’ shelves nowadays is in airports. On my way to Bergerac today via Edinburgh (still one of the shittier ones) and I note that W.H. Smiths stocks something called Hungarian Conservative, wtf is that all about? Looks reasonably plush and I assume they don’t make many sales amongst the couthy Lothianers so certainly subsidised to spout Orbanite propaganda.
At least my partner didn’t buy a Speccie this time.
Just back from the Dordogne myself!
Bordeaux airport is the latest addition to my list of 'places to land but not depart from'....
Hope you had a great time, absolutely wonderful part of the world.
You will never complain about British pot-holes again - once you’ve been in a bus hurtling down a Ukrainian motorway that has recent suffered bomb damage
On imperial measures: "Whoever bought a kilo of anything? ...apart from me mate Dave. And he is doing a five-year stretch."
After having asked if it was good to get caned in school.
The original Ali G interviews, for “The 11 O’Clock Show” were some of the funniest television ever made. They filmed the whole series before the first one was broadcast, and none of the guests had a clue what was going on.
The pandemic has to be paid for. It might have made sense to have a specific post-pandemic surcharge on income tax, to be abolished when the pandemic debt was repaid, but I'm guessing government accounting is not so simple.
Politically it might have been helpful, though. We borrowed lots of money to get through a difficult situation. Now we have to pay it back.
Temporary surcharges are never temporary. It was why Sunak idea of NI++ from a Tory idealogical perspective was so idiotic, it would have only got larger and wider.
Yeah. Still waiting for the temporary income tax to help fund the Napoleonic wars to be repealled.....
A Pedant writes: it was, in fact, repealed in 1813.
It was re-introduced by the second Peel minstry's Income Tax Act 1842, initially temporary to cover the cost of the concurrent reduction in import duties, later made permanent in 1846 when tariffs were abolished altogether.
In the three months to April, there were 9.43m people who were economically inactive in Britain, meaning they are neither in a job nor looking for one.
These included a record number of people out of work due to long-term sickness, which rose 55,000 to 2.83m.
It means the worklessness crisis has reached a scale that threatens to undermine the economy’s growth potential, according to Tony Wilson, director of the Institute for Employment Studies.
National service for the 50-65 early retired.....its only a weekend after all.....
Complete early retirement is terrible for the individual and the country. I have long thought the government needs to nudge towards having people gradually moving towards retirement where possible, 5 days a week to 4 days to 3 days, rather than Bob packing in on a Friday and never working again for 30+ years. It is better for the individual and also better for the country as organisations don't lose that knowledge and experience overnight.
Great post. Absolutely right. My father really suffered from early retirement. People need things to keep them occupied in life.
My Dad went from being an Acting Superintendent (Police) to nothing overnight. My mum was still at work and they had recently moved into a new build house (so no maintenance required etc). I think he was lost for a few years. Spent long days walking on Salisbury Plain, mainly, I think, for something to do.
He did adjust in the end - gained an allotment (he had had a decent veg patch before the move) and dabbled in restoring Dinky toys and building model remote controlled aircraft. But I think it was a shock.
Personally interesting as I'm contemplating retirement (at 74) after a stroke last month that's left no physical signs except a need to sleep more - harder to judge mental effects. I've been signed off work to end-June and then have various options. Switching from 4 days a week to 0 seems drastic, but working for the sake of working seems unnecessary. I think I'll aim to come back for a few months at a reduced level, and then do one-off contracts if they seem interesting.
Politically inept manifesto from a politically inept leader.
Sub 100 beckons for the Blue team.
It makes no sense. Why not go out all guns blazing, if you know you're going to lose anyway.
Either they are without ideas or without the sense to see how stuffed they are.
Wet, centrist backers of Rishi are going to own this car crash of an approach, and a campaign, for a generation.
Time to get the actual Tory party back.....
Rishi is not a wet centrist. The Conservative Party win elections from the Centre. This is a clown show trying to out-nasty Nigel, and they are just not very good at performative cruelty.
If you are so keen on a socially and fiscally hawkish party surely Nigel's latest vehicle should be right up your strasse.
Politically inept manifesto from a politically inept leader.
Sub 100 beckons for the Blue team.
It makes no sense. Why not go out all guns blazing, if you know you're going to lose anyway.
Either they are without ideas or without the sense to see how stuffed they are.
Wet, centrist backers of Rishi are going to own this car crash of an approach, and a campaign, for a generation.
Time to get the actual Tory party back.....
Rishi is not a wet centrist. The Conservative Party win elections from the Centre. This is a clown show trying to out-nasty Nigel, and they are just not very good at performative cruelty.
If you are so keen on a socially and fiscally hawkish party surely Nigel's latest vehicle should be right up your strasse.
Throwing a rock at someone’s head could conceivably be “attempted murder”? You are deliberately doing something violent to someone in the full knowledge it might kill them, and for no other reason than to hurt them
IANAL but that feels qualitatively different to the milkshakes
Hard to prove it was aimed at the head with an intent to kill
About the only time I graze on the newsagents’ shelves nowadays is in airports. On my way to Bergerac today via Edinburgh (still one of the shittier ones) and I note that W.H. Smiths stocks something called Hungarian Conservative, wtf is that all about? Looks reasonably plush and I assume they don’t make many sales amongst the couthy Lothianers so certainly subsidised to spout Orbanite propaganda.
At least my partner didn’t buy a Speccie this time.
If truth-in-advertising laws applies, that rag should dub itself "Hungarian Neo-Communist".
Politically inept manifesto from a politically inept leader.
Sub 100 beckons for the Blue team.
It makes no sense. Why not go out all guns blazing, if you know you're going to lose anyway.
Either they are without ideas or without the sense to see how stuffed they are.
Wet, centrist backers of Rishi are going to own this car crash of an approach, and a campaign, for a generation.
Time to get the actual Tory party back.....
Rishi is not a wet centrist. The Conservative Party win elections from the Centre. This is a clown show trying to out-nasty Nigel, and they are just not very good at performative cruelty.
If you are so keen on a socially and fiscally hawkish party surely Nigel's latest vehicle should be right up your strasse.
The Labour party win elections from the centre.
The Tory party win elections from the right.
The winning election strategy is cultural centre-right + economic centre-left + competence in execution. But the elites are culturally on the left and economically on the right and push their views into almost all media dialogue.
Use AI to free up Doctors / Nurses time - as someone who knows a bit about AI how is that going to work?
Radiology would be one example
The claims from the AI boosters that AI would make radiology obsolete & we should stop training radiologists immediately as it was all wasted effort have been shown to be wildly naïve & over confident. In reality AI has (so far) turned out to be terrible at correctly identifying problematic scans: the false negative rate is way, way too high. However, it has turned out to be pretty good at identifying which scans amongst the ones rejected as negative by radiologists deserve a second look.
I’ll have to see if I can dig out the paper but, paradoxically, the evidence is that AI actually increases the demand for radiologists. By using AI we get better accuracy & better patient outcomes but only because we can use it to identify cases that radiologists might have missed. That in turn means spending more radiologist time on checking scans that AI picked up as potential false negatives, not less!
We get better radiologist accuracy, but only by spending more £ on radiologist time & even more £ on the AI systems. The healthcare expense curse wins again!
In Irelandf, crunch time approaching in Dublin Euro constituency, after 16 counts (lots of independents & smaller parties to eliminate & redistribute their accumulated votes).
So far 0 of 5 seats up for grabs has been decided, but that will change today.
As I type, votes cast/accumulated for left candidate for People Before Profit-Solidarity candidate are being redistributed among the 7 hopefuls still in the hunt.
BARRY ANDREWS FF 66226 REGINA DOHERTY FG 65148 LYNN BOYLAN SF 47349 NIALL BOYLAN II 43642 CIARÁN CUFFE GP 37842 AODHÁN Ó RÍORDÁIN LAB 37403 CLARE DALY I4C 32870 BRÍD SMITH PBP-SOL 28772 - Excluded
Lowest on the greasy poll is Clare Daly of Independents 4 Change; immediate question is, will she OR won't she receive enough transfers to pass Labour's Aodhán Ó Ríordáin?
Based on above, Andrews & Doherty will be elected for sure, and probably Boyland the SFer as well. Leaving two seats left to fill, between two left candidates AND rightwing anti-immigrant shock jock the other Boylan.
Am wondering IF either is related to the famous (in literary circles anyway) Blazes Boylan? Whom wiki describes as "well known and well liked around [Dublin] but comes across as a rather sleazy individual, especially regarding his attitudes toward women." Which sounds just like the shock jock!
In the three months to April, there were 9.43m people who were economically inactive in Britain, meaning they are neither in a job nor looking for one.
These included a record number of people out of work due to long-term sickness, which rose 55,000 to 2.83m.
It means the worklessness crisis has reached a scale that threatens to undermine the economy’s growth potential, according to Tony Wilson, director of the Institute for Employment Studies.
National service for the 50-65 early retired.....its only a weekend after all.....
Complete early retirement is terrible for the individual and the country. I have long thought the government needs to nudge towards having people gradually moving towards retirement where possible, 5 days a week to 4 days to 3 days, rather than Bob packing in on a Friday and never working again for 30+ years. It is better for the individual and also better for the country as organisations don't lose that knowledge and experience overnight.
Great post. Absolutely right. My father really suffered from early retirement. People need things to keep them occupied in life.
My Dad went from being an Acting Superintendent (Police) to nothing overnight. My mum was still at work and they had recently moved into a new build house (so no maintenance required etc). I think he was lost for a few years. Spent long days walking on Salisbury Plain, mainly, I think, for something to do.
He did adjust in the end - gained an allotment (he had had a decent veg patch before the move) and dabbled in restoring Dinky toys and building model remote controlled aircraft. But I think it was a shock.
Personally interesting as I'm contemplating retirement (at 74) after a stroke last month that's left no physical signs except a need to sleep more - harder to judge mental effects. I've been signed off work to end-June and then have various options. Switching from 4 days a week to 0 seems drastic, but working for the sake of working seems unnecessary. I think I'll aim to come back for a few months at a reduced level, and then do one-off contracts if they seem interesting.
In the three months to April, there were 9.43m people who were economically inactive in Britain, meaning they are neither in a job nor looking for one.
These included a record number of people out of work due to long-term sickness, which rose 55,000 to 2.83m.
It means the worklessness crisis has reached a scale that threatens to undermine the economy’s growth potential, according to Tony Wilson, director of the Institute for Employment Studies.
Comments
I keep banging on about this, productivity and the imbalance of the size of businesses are key problems in our economy. It is very very hard to go from 1 man band to 50 people, and then from 50 to 500 or 1000, it is horrifically hard as the whole system starts to become really problematic.
But IR35 protects £60bn of employer NI taxes, it simply isn't going anywhere...
Sub 100 beckons for the Blue team.
"The Tories say they asked the Treasury to cost our tax plans. Maybe they should have done the same for their own?"
Current performance suggests they are uniformly shit. That might be a step up from batshit crazy, but barely...
I'm now in the unlucky situation that I'm barely employable, having suffered health issues in recent years, and the market for freelancers is dead. So I lose money and draw down on my investments every month.
Being taxed on them at a further 40% for example after being taxed at 40% on the money I used to invest, especially when my investments could have (and at points did) go down strikes me as unfair. Throw a 1% wealth tax on top of that and I see no reason to stick it out in the UK when my four or five days freelancing a month pays for a decent lifestyle on a digital nomad style visa, without the need to draw down on my investments.
We're not all rentiers living off inherited wealth. I'm a hard worker with some health issues in an industry that's currently in a huge slump (contractors and freelancers the first to go, but full timers getting laid off left right and centre too), hence living off money I wisely stacked away while times were good.
I don't fancy sticking around for my punishment beating for daring to be frugal and sensible during the good times.
You're welcome to reciprocate, but you'll only get three.
Wet, centrist backers of Rishi are going to own this car crash of an approach, and a campaign, for a generation.
Time to get the actual Tory party back.....
F##king lock Hermine and Jasper up.
We really need to get away from the idea that NI is 'paying in' to anything.
Just about every driver in Britain has driven carelessly at some point, but only the unlucky few are involved in situations where consequences result.
Found it:
I blew the whistle for the class to come in but nobody appeared and when I went out the pupils were pointing not to the Archangel Gabriel, but to the second-floor roof on which was a boy whom I called "C", and he was the most difficult boy in the class. They said, "What are you going to do about him, sir ?". Fortunately I had been trained in the navy and I climbed the drainpipe all the way. This is all public knowledge because I have written it up. I got hold of the boy and brought him down, kicking him as we came. There was no corporal punishment, of course. When we got to the bottom there was a great cheer and the class said, "Good old sir. That was good, sir." They ran in like a set of whippets and I had no more trouble with them. One must pay attention to great philosophy, but one must also be sure that one can climb the rigging.
https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199394/cmhansrd/1994-05-03/Debate-3.html
At least my partner didn’t buy a Speccie this time.
NEW THREAD
So ignoring inflation, self-employed would be buy a full state pension (£11,500 pa) for... £6,279. Mmmm
Bordeaux airport is the latest addition to my list of 'places to land but not depart from'....
For example, I tried to explain why I think anti-ULEZ could be a good policy for the Conservatives in provincial towns and rural areas, but soon had people explaining to me why ULEZ isn't such a bad policy.
All it means is they have to provide other means-tested benefits to fill the gap. Extra bureaucracy all round.
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/article/2024/jun/06/evil-penguin-feathers-mcgraw-to-return-in-new-wallace-and-gromit-film
A 20% tax on your income called income tax.
A 20% tax for welfare called national insurance.
A 20% tax on spending called VAT.
A 20% sales tax like the Americans have.
And a 20% tax on unspent money, to encourage growth.
There we are. A 20% headline rate for everything. Very equitable.
HMRC will love it.
Ouch. Ouch ouch OUCH
The original Ali G interviews, for “The 11 O’Clock Show” were some of the funniest television ever made. They filmed the whole series before the first one was broadcast, and none of the guests had a clue what was going on.
It was re-introduced by the second Peel minstry's Income Tax Act 1842, initially temporary to cover the cost of the concurrent reduction in import duties, later made permanent in 1846 when tariffs were abolished altogether.
If you are so keen on a socially and fiscally hawkish party surely Nigel's latest vehicle should be right up your strasse.
The Tory party win elections from the right.
Reckless endangerment seems more likely
I’ll have to see if I can dig out the paper but, paradoxically, the evidence is that AI actually increases the demand for radiologists. By using AI we get better accuracy & better patient outcomes but only because we can use it to identify cases that radiologists might have missed. That in turn means spending more radiologist time on checking scans that AI picked up as potential false negatives, not less!
We get better radiologist accuracy, but only by spending more £ on radiologist time & even more £ on the AI systems. The healthcare expense curse wins again!
So far 0 of 5 seats up for grabs has been decided, but that will change today.
As I type, votes cast/accumulated for left candidate for People Before Profit-Solidarity candidate are being redistributed among the 7 hopefuls still in the hunt.
BARRY ANDREWS FF 66226
REGINA DOHERTY FG 65148
LYNN BOYLAN SF 47349
NIALL BOYLAN II 43642
CIARÁN CUFFE GP 37842
AODHÁN Ó RÍORDÁIN LAB 37403
CLARE DALY I4C 32870
BRÍD SMITH PBP-SOL 28772 - Excluded
Lowest on the greasy poll is Clare Daly of Independents 4 Change; immediate question is, will she OR won't she receive enough transfers to pass Labour's Aodhán Ó Ríordáin?
Based on above, Andrews & Doherty will be elected for sure, and probably Boyland the SFer as well. Leaving two seats left to fill, between two left candidates AND rightwing anti-immigrant shock jock the other Boylan.
Am wondering IF either is related to the famous (in literary circles anyway) Blazes Boylan? Whom wiki describes as "well known and well liked around [Dublin] but comes across as a rather sleazy individual, especially regarding his attitudes toward women." Which sounds just like the shock jock!