Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. Sign in or register to get started.

Reshuffle talk is in the air but Reeves is safe but not Phillipson – politicalbetting.com

12346»

Comments

  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 37,394

    Is the cybertruck order an instance of:-

    1. Elon grifting?
    2. the SoS currying favour?
    3. the deep state manufacturing a conflict of interest in order to recuse Musk?
    Straight grift

    They announced it, and when people noticed this looks like grift, they changed the announcement

    It no longer says Tesla

    It now just says electric vehicles. Everyone will be amazed when Tesla win the bid...
  • TazTaz Posts: 17,116
    edited February 13

    We much prefer to give public sector workers enormous pensions.
    And far better holiday entitlement too. Something when they whinge about their pay comparing it to the private sector they singularly omit to mention.

    Employers contribution to the local govt scheme is around 19%, the NHS is over 25% (cannot quite remember what the figure was on my wifes latest statement but it was over 25%).

    By employer they, of course, mean us the taxpayer. Their pension is final salary too. Private sector (thanks Gordon) get to take their chances with a DC scheme.

    I get, as a contribution, and it is not bad for private sector, 9%.

  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 50,732

    I hope he survives. There can be few figures in history who can match his fortitude. Mandela, Churchill? He is right up there with the greats IMO.
    I recently lisrened to this book. Great on Ukranian Russian history and the rise of Zelensky from star of a satirical comedy show to President.

    Listen to War and Punishment by Mikhail Zygar on Audible. https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/B0BVWL85X3?source_code=ASSOR150021921000V

    It's an extraordinary story.
  • ChrisChris Posts: 11,867
    Foxy said:

    If so isn't it better to have forensic accountants doing the audit than teenage coding internship?
    Use shorter words. You're talking to someone who is a Musk fan.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,203
    Nigelb said:

    Yeah, which idiot decided to set up their state next to Russia ?
    Just careless.
    Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 50,732
    Taz said:

    And far better holiday entitlement too. Something when they whinge about their pay comparing it to the private sector they singularly omit to mention.

    Employers contribution to the local govt scheme is around 19%, the NHS is over 25% (cannot quite remember what the figure was on my wifes latest statement but it was over 25%).

    By employer they, of course, mean us the taxpayer. Their pension is final salary too. Private sector (thanks Gordon) get to take their chances with a DC scheme.

    I get, as a contribution, and it is not bad for private sector, 9%.

    Yes, I do get 30 days holiday per year, but I also have worked weekends on call, with no time off in lieu for my entire career, on top of a 5 day week.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 75,820
    edited February 13

    Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
    Guatemala and Belize ?
    (A wild guess there.)
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 53,787

    Which idiot decided to set up their state next to Mexican drug cartels?
    Whereas the map of Europe proves that God is an Englishman.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 50,732
    pigeon said:

    Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.

    We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?
    There is an additional problem too. We cannot recruit or retain people in our Armed Forces, even in their depleted state.

    Doubling our forces personnel count is more than a financial issue.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 50,732

    Whereas the map of Europe proves that God is an Englishman.
    Not sure that the Irish, Welsh or Scots would agree.
  • There's been an unfortunate tendency in Europe to neglect the boring bits that actually make a military work. Transport aircraft, supply ships, ammunition stockpiles and the like. The upshot is availability rates that are shockingly low even in peacetime, hence that period a few years ago where Germany had no submarines or fighters available for deployment.

    If Trump forces a 'peace' in Ukraine, Russia will go away and build up again safe in the knowledge that European politicians will take a peace deal as an excuse to quietly dump increases in defence spending. So their militaries will be in the same position as now, unable to sustain a war beyond 4-6 months because of shortages of ammo and parts, lack of airlift capacity, etc.

    Fixing this will be expensive - forget 2.5% of GPD, we're taking 4% or more and a decade of work given the lead times on much of the required hardware.

    While I agree. It's also worth pointing out that it has suited the Americans up to now to do the heavy lifting because it gave them control. Now, very obviously, that has changed. And all of us are going to have to make sacrifices - at a personal level - if we want to prevent Putin dominating Europe.

    Taxes are going to have to go up. Borrowing too. Not only here, but everywhere. This is not just about politicians rising to the moment, it is about all of us doing so. We have spent decades rightly lionising the sacrifices made by our forebears during WW2. Let' see if we are prepared to accept a fraction of the hardship they went through to keep our country and continent safe from fascist aggression.

  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 45,094
    Foxy said:

    Not sure that the Irish, Welsh or Scots would agree.
    They're honorary Englishmen.

    (Runs for cover...)
  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 121,389
    edited February 13

    Whereas the map of Europe proves that God is an Englishman.
    Nah, God put us next to France and Wales.
  • NEW THREAD

  • pigeonpigeon Posts: 5,173
    Taz said:

    And far better holiday entitlement too. Something when they whinge about their pay comparing it to the private sector they singularly omit to mention.

    Employers contribution to the local govt scheme is around 19%, the NHS is over 25% (cannot quite remember what the figure was on my wifes latest statement but it was over 25%).

    By employer they, of course, mean us the taxpayer. Their pension is final salary too. Private sector (thanks Gordon) get to take their chances with a DC scheme.

    I get, as a contribution, and it is not bad for private sector, 9%.

    These conversations always come round to the colossal burden of an ageing society eventually. According to OBR figures from 2023 that I just dug up, spending on public sector pensions was already running at £53bn per year at that point, and will inevitably balloon through the cumulative effects of an ageing population and the luxurious terms of the schemes. But that, in turn, is but a small fraction of total expenditure on the aged, which encompasses half of the adult social care budget, half of the gargantuan NHS budget, and over half of all social security expenditure.

    With taxes on incomes and productive economic activity already where they are, there is no solution to finding huge sums of extra money for essential investment in areas like public infrastructure and defence that does not encompass making elderly benefits stingier, or extracting a lot more money from the elderly in taxes - and the one policy even more unpopular than snatching benefits from granny is going after her house, whether it's ramping up property taxes whilst she's still living there or creaming off a big chunk of the estate after she's been carried out in a box. Is it any wonder we are all, collectively, up the proverbial sans paddle?
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 9,188
    .
    Taz said:

    Olaf Scholz has taken a firm line, saying the perpetratory cannot expect to remain in Germany.

    Tough talk that.
    It's an interesting point though - what do you do in a case like this? Or others? What if you send him back to Afghanistan and he's treated as a hero, given a life of luxury - or, worse, put in charge of a new extremist recruitment/training unit?

    Surely you lock him up for an appropriate amount of time in Germany and then boot him out when that's done? Although maybe the appropriate amount of time is life.

    It's fine to send people back if the country in question has rule of law etc and jurisdiction to themselves lock him up for life. But in most cases, if the perpetrator is an asylum seeker, that probably cannot be relied on. Even if the current regime obliges - say if this had happened in pre-current-Taliban Afghanistan - the next one might make him foreign secretary.
  • pigeon said:

    Two big problems: first, Governments don't want to spend the money (because there are no votes in defence); second, no country in Europe is big enough to build a spectrum of capabilities remotely close to that of the United States, so it needs a whole group of committed and reliable allies to make the required level of investment. If the UK elected to rebuild itself as a naval power and helped to pay for it by economising on the army, which would be a logical use of our finite resources, then a large flotilla of capable submarines and destroyers would still be of only limited use without Germany, for example, fielding a load of tanks.

    We need everyone to pull their weight, not just a collection of frightened states around the Baltic Sea. The prospects for this happening do not look encouraging. The UK would need to find £30bn a year extra just to bring its military budget up to the American standard in terms of percentage of GDP; most of NATO would need to make larger proportional increases than that, which was a legitimate Trump gripe from last time around that largely remains unfixed. Where are they going to find that much money except through deeply unpopular tax rises and/or cuts to social expenditure?

    I think there are votes in ensuring our continent is controlled by a murderous fascist. This is not just about protecting Ukraine, it's about safeguarding Europe from an economic and security catastrophe. Just a couple of examples:

    (1) if Putin wins in Ukraine, refugee flows from east to west would be like nothing we have seen before.

    (2) if he marched Russian troops into a Baltic state, markets across the world would tank.

    Either proposition would be far more expensive than the additional defence expenditure needed to prevent then happening.

  • rkrkrkrkrkrk Posts: 8,612
    One thing I think we need to interrogate a lot more is whether Europe is getting value from its military spending. UK + EU spends enough to be the third most powerful military... but do we get value for that?

    Doubtless there's huge inefficiency to having so many individual militaries...
  • pigeonpigeon Posts: 5,173

    I think there are votes in ensuring our continent is controlled by a murderous fascist. This is not just about protecting Ukraine, it's about safeguarding Europe from an economic and security catastrophe. Just a couple of examples:

    (1) if Putin wins in Ukraine, refugee flows from east to west would be like nothing we have seen before.

    (2) if he marched Russian troops into a Baltic state, markets across the world would tank.

    Either proposition would be far more expensive than the additional defence expenditure needed to prevent then happening.

    I agree, but the voters won't until something like that actually happens, by which point it will be far too late.
  • sarissasarissa Posts: 2,085

    They're honorary Englishmen.

    (Runs for cover...)
    As opposed to dishonourable Englishmen?
  • LeonLeon Posts: 59,274
    The only choice for Germany and the rest of Europe is some humane, democratic version of “expelliamus”

    The experiment is a terrible failure and it will be reversed
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 13,328

    I read pretty thoroughly, and I am reading that you are desperately trying to excuse a liar simply because she wears a red rosette. We now have the suggestion that she was "economic" with her interpretation of expenses rules. This is on top of the hideously inappropriate acceptance of bungs in the form of clothes from a Labour donor.

    Not a good look really is it? Very few other walks of life would find this acceptable. Her probity is being proven to be no better, and probably worse, than Boris Johnson.
    Surely it is a good thing for an economist to be "economic" with their interpretation of expenses rules.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 13,328

    Is the cybertruck order an instance of:-
    1. Elon grifting?
    2. the SoS currying favour?
    3. the deep state manufacturing a conflict of interest in order to recuse Musk?
    On (3), the White House has said that Musk will police his own conflicts of interest: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-02-05/white-house-says-musk-will-police-his-own-conflicts-of-interest

    Drain the swamp! Drain the swamp! Drain the swamp!
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 34,384
    edited February 13
    Foxy said:

    Yes, I do get 30 days holiday per year, but I also have worked weekends on call, with no time off in lieu for my entire career, on top of a 5 day week.
    I got Time off in Lieu for my on-call time when I worked for the NHS. And I got upgraded six months before I retired.
    I was very, very lucky.
    Much better than when worked 'outside'.
  • DopermeanDopermean Posts: 878

    I got Time off in Lieu for my on-call time when I worked for the NHS. And I got upgraded six months before I retired.
    I was very, very lucky.
    Much better than when worked 'outside'.
    The employers' contribution to the pension scheme in the public sector isn't ringfenced for that employee, unlike a money-purchase private pension, that 25% is also paying the cost of pensions for current pensioners. A function of increased life expectancy, outsourcing (so fewer paying in) and other factors.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 30,410
    ...
    kjh said:

    I haven't seen the original Reform quote so maybe I am being unfair, but the original post just said 'Banning battery storage' so I am relying on that. I hope that is not what Reform are proposing.

    Nobody here said they were in favour of unsafe battery storage, they were just commenting upon banning battery storage (safe or otherwise). You brought in the unsafe element to the discussion. All energy production is dangerous and has environmental impacts, particularly when it goes wrong and nuclear, solar, wind, etc, etc tend to have a much better safety and environmental record than traditional energy production. That doesn't mean they don't have any impact or go wrong, sometime spectacularly. You try to mitigate that.

    The alternative is no energy production whatsoever.
    Then you also haven't seen Reform's justification for their moratorium, which is that they've been unable to establish which agency will be responsible for any safety breaches on these sites and that the overseas builders of these stations will simply conform to their own ideas of safety.

    It doesn't look great to me:
    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/17/california-battery-plant-fire-monterey
This discussion has been closed.