I think Eton’s still a great school. I worry that it has become too academically selective, I think one of its great strengths was that it had some very bright people, and also some who were really quite thick, but often they were the real characters. I hope there is still room for eccentrics – David Cameron.
Food for thought?
We had plenty of unacademic "characters" (ie loud) at my school too. So very like Eton in this respect.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
And Kemi is one of the best leaders they've had for ages, ironically.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
How does an insurance-based NHS, with the additional administration that will entail, have any bearing on whether there are sufficient resources to treat people? Unless the unsaid part is that some people will no longer get treated.
Changing the means by which funding is raised does not increase the funding or reduce the resources required for treatment.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Yes. It isn't possible to be a country with many good features, and to this day one of of the world's largest economies, and a great place to live if you ignore for a moment our love of self deprecation and the best efforts of some PBers, without it being in part due to that Tory party who have run the government for so much of that time. I hope they can find their way back to relevance.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
How does an insurance-based NHS, with the additional administration that will entail, have any bearing on whether there are sufficient resources to treat people? Unless the unsaid part is that some people will no longer get treated.
Changing the means by which funding is raised does not increase the funding or reduce the resources required for treatment.
One possible shift would be that entitlement to use the NHS would belong to the specific individual on the basis of their individual status in relation to the scheme - which to some extent is true now but I doubt if it is much enforced - though personally I see no merit in that path at all.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
I suspect they won't do as badly as the FoN MRP suggests but they will struggle to hold 100 seats unless Labour start dropping further or the reform bubble bursts. I also suspect the LDs will not do nearly as well as the calculators project via being squeezed and losing some of the tactical votes that boosted their 2024 seat total - they are playing fourth party in a four and a half party system this time. I think something like Reform 250 Labour 180 Con 90 LD 45 SNP 35 Green 5 Indies etc 10
On topic, it's a very silly poll that asks much too much of respondents. The first question asks about the empirical effects of tax increases, without specifying which taxes will be increased, or by how much. Even if you know both, the long-term results of such an increase is the kind of question on which two reputable economics studies can produce wildly different results. So of what value is the average person's opinion? None at all.
Again, on the second question it doesn't say how many of the very rich would leave, how much tax revenue the government would lose, or whose taxes would be increased as a result. Or maybe the government would reduce spending (we can always dream) but if so, what kind and how much. Or maybe we'd just borrow more and pass the bill to our grandkids.
So overall a worthless exercise and the results are likewise of no value at all.
This blonde lady with glasses on GB News can't say her 'O's properly! She says things like "herm" instead of "home", and "ner" instead of "no".
What a disgraceful example to set for our younger people, and also the hundreds of migrants who have valiantly made the dangerous crossing of the Channel just to learn our beautiful English language!
Politics of envy is one interpretation but I don't think it's just that. Consider how London is now so unaffordable for so many people. There is a lot of inequality research now that shows it can be problematic.
One other thing. In an era of global openness we have spent a great deal of time or at least political talk focusing on attracting foreign investment and foreign talent to the UK. If our politicians had realised that most solutions need to be coming from the talent and resources that are already here perhaps we'd see different attitudes. We're paying a price for that I think.
That this bustling bilingual medieval port city, which was briefly the final capital of the Third Reich (which surely must be a pub quiz question?), has a long tradition of rum production, sale and consumption is perhaps both a clue and an impediment to Trump’s designs on Greenland….
Flensburg is bilingual?
The Danish minority is now apparently small, but street signs, public notices etc. are in two languages and there are a number of Danish language institutions here.
The rum arises from the former Danish West Indies, supplied to and from here, which gave Denmark and its navy a similar rum drinking tradition to the British with our Jamaica et al. The Trump encouragement is that Denmark sold its Indies to the US during WW1 (now the US Virgin Islands) and the impediment is that the same treaty contains the US’s formal recognition that Greenland is Danish.
Fun fact: Britain occupied the former Danish West Indies between 1801 and 1802, and between 1807 and 1815.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
How does an insurance-based NHS, with the additional administration that will entail, have any bearing on whether there are sufficient resources to treat people? Unless the unsaid part is that some people will no longer get treated.
Changing the means by which funding is raised does not increase the funding or reduce the resources required for treatment.
Some information from the Kings Fund. Usually one of the better sources of comparative information on health.
1. NHS spending performs well on some efficiency measures 2. Patients are better protected from high medical costs 3. The UK has less medical equipment and fewer beds 4. The UK has fewer doctors and nurses 5. Patient outcomes are worse than average
This blonde lady with glasses on GB News can't say her 'O's properly! She says things like "herm" instead of "home", and "ner" instead of "no".
What a disgraceful example to set for our younger people, and also the hundreds of migrants who have valiantly made the dangerous crossing of the Channel just to learn our beautiful English language!
On the poll in the thread header: this seems to me to be in line with psychology research that shows that humans will generally be willing to punish what they see as "violations of fairness" even when it's at a cost to themselves. The phrasing "super-rich individuals" I think for a lot of people will evoke an image of somebody with a huge pile of cash who is not paying their "fair share", hence the result (especially since the cost of the "punishment" is not quantified here, plus it's a hypothetical)...
Being envious is proscribed in a lot of religions, and a lot of people are less religious today — especially those living in "red wall" areas.
One of the problems I have with Christianity and the 10 commandments. We should be content in our slavedom. It's perfectly natural to covet something that someone else has and you don't. It's a useful guide to telling you what you want. Resentment is the problem as far as I'm concerned.
(Maybe some are using envy and resentment interchangeably).
This blonde lady with glasses on GB News can't say her 'O's properly! She says things like "herm" instead of "home", and "ner" instead of "no".
What a disgraceful example to set for our younger people, and also the hundreds of migrants who have valiantly made the dangerous crossing of the Channel just to learn our beautiful English language!
I love the Hull accent!
There are some AA adverts on the radio with a Geordie lady. They literally hired someone who can't say A.
Mind you, HMRC has some adverts running with a chap who can't say H, so it's rife.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
I remember discussing this with a distinguished psychiatrist. A young laddie had been seriously hurt when his pal had wrapped his car around a tree. He had a lot of pain and "self medicated" with cannabis to cope. He developed psychosis and spent the remainder of his very sad life in a mental hospital.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Yes. It isn't possible to be a country with many good features, and to this day one of of the world's largest economies, and a great place to live if you ignore for a moment our love of self deprecation and the best efforts of some PBers, without it being in part due to that Tory party who have run the government for so much of that time. I hope they can find their way back to relevance.
By the time I've read Algarkirky I'll be reluctantly "liking" ...
(I'll be doing a few more of these 'work poster names into iconic ditties', all be forewarned)
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
How does an insurance-based NHS, with the additional administration that will entail, have any bearing on whether there are sufficient resources to treat people? Unless the unsaid part is that some people will no longer get treated.
Changing the means by which funding is raised does not increase the funding or reduce the resources required for treatment.
Warm enough here in London Town this evening, the heat doesn't work for a lot of people who seem to get a little over excited.
The MiC headline VI numbers this morning see the Reform and Conservatives both down suggesting last week's poll may have been a wee bit of an outlier and the Ref/Con vs Lab/LD/Green "split" is back to 47-46 which seems reasonable.
The YouGov numbers very little changed from last week so it's Ref/Con 44, Lab/LD/Green 49 so all within your margins of error to be honest.
In truth, we have a similar "left", "right" or "up", "down" or whatever you want to call it split as we had in 2019 but back then one side had one party and the other had three so the fragmentation of both voting blocs explains where we are now.
Still looking for the data tables for the Savanta London poll but given the fieldwork was between April 29th and May 21st, it's already ancient history.
Of slightly more relevance in advance of next year's locals, two elected Labour Councillors, one in Lewisham and the other, who was sitting as an Independent in Harringey, have moved to the Greens.
Whether the Greens will make headway against Labour in Inner London next year, I don't know but there must be a real chanve they will gain seats.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
Except on current polls the main beneficiary and likely next governnment would be the even harder Brexit Farage's Reform
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
And Kemi is one of the best leaders they've had for ages, ironically.
She is doing some good policy work but she needs to make more impact in the media or the polls, otherwise by the end of next year the odds are she will have been replaced by Cleverly or Jenrick
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Being envious is proscribed in a lot of religions, and a lot of people are less religious today — especially those living in "red wall" areas.
One of the problems I have with Christianity and the 10 commandments. We should be content in our slavedom. It's perfectly natural to covet something that someone else has and you don't. It's a useful guide to telling you what you want. Resentment is the problem as far as I'm concerned.
(Maybe some are using envy and resentment interchangeably).
Yes. There's nothing wrong with envy per se. Eg I'm envious of people who have talents that I don't have but it doesn't come with resentment - thankfully since we're talking 99% of the population here.
Being envious is proscribed in a lot of religions, and a lot of people are less religious today — especially those living in "red wall" areas.
One of the problems I have with Christianity and the 10 commandments. We should be content in our slavedom. It's perfectly natural to covet something that someone else has and you don't. It's a useful guide to telling you what you want. Resentment is the problem as far as I'm concerned.
(Maybe some are using envy and resentment interchangeably).
Yes. There's nothing wrong with envy per se. Eg I'm envious of people who have talents that I don't have but it doesn't come with resentment - thankfully since we're talking 99% of the population here.
Surely "Aspiration" = "coveting something that someone else has" (eg. home, car, swimming pool, room for a pony, etc.).
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
I remember discussing this with a distinguished psychiatrist. A young laddie had been seriously hurt when his pal had wrapped his car around a tree. He had a lot of pain and "self medicated" with cannabis to cope. He developed psychosis and spent the remainder of his very sad life in a mental hospital.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
I would also add that the nature of cannabis has changed.
When the modern, super strength stuff first appeared, everyone I knew dropped out smoking cannabis very rapidly. I’d say, personally, it was the difference between 4% beer and 79.9% by volume Polish Pure Spirit.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
Being envious is proscribed in a lot of religions, and a lot of people are less religious today — especially those living in "red wall" areas.
One of the problems I have with Christianity and the 10 commandments. We should be content in our slavedom. It's perfectly natural to covet something that someone else has and you don't. It's a useful guide to telling you what you want. Resentment is the problem as far as I'm concerned.
(Maybe some are using envy and resentment interchangeably).
Yes. There's nothing wrong with envy per se. Eg I'm envious of people who have talents that I don't have but it doesn't come with resentment - thankfully since we're talking 99% of the population here.
Surely "Aspiration" = "coveting something that someone else has" (eg. home, car, swimming pool, room for a pony, etc.).
Yes but not to take it away from them. Unless they're taking the piss of course - then we act.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
I remember discussing this with a distinguished psychiatrist. A young laddie had been seriously hurt when his pal had wrapped his car around a tree. He had a lot of pain and "self medicated" with cannabis to cope. He developed psychosis and spent the remainder of his very sad life in a mental hospital.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
I would also add that the nature of cannabis has changed.
When the modern, super strength stuff first appeared, everyone I knew dropped out smoking cannabis very rapidly. I’d say, personally, it was the difference between 4% beer and 79.9% by volume Polish Pure Spirit.
Yes, 100%. The seventies style cannabis would give you enough of a hit, the stuff around now is ludicrous.
Being envious is proscribed in a lot of religions, and a lot of people are less religious today — especially those living in "red wall" areas.
One of the problems I have with Christianity and the 10 commandments. We should be content in our slavedom. It's perfectly natural to covet something that someone else has and you don't. It's a useful guide to telling you what you want. Resentment is the problem as far as I'm concerned.
(Maybe some are using envy and resentment interchangeably).
Yes. There's nothing wrong with envy per se. Eg I'm envious of people who have talents that I don't have but it doesn't come with resentment - thankfully since we're talking 99% of the population here.
I think the meaning of both 'envy' and 'covet' for lots of people involve the sort of emotional attachment to something you haven't got which is damaging to the individual and is without difficulty distinguished from a normal wish to acquire by honest means something you haven't got, and the excellent quality of appreciating qualities in others you may not have yourself. (In my case rather a lot, so I get loads of practice.)
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
And it was a remarkable treble shitshow
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
One sage wrote that however a computer system was developed, it should be documented as if it had been waterfall.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
I remember discussing this with a distinguished psychiatrist. A young laddie had been seriously hurt when his pal had wrapped his car around a tree. He had a lot of pain and "self medicated" with cannabis to cope. He developed psychosis and spent the remainder of his very sad life in a mental hospital.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
I would also add that the nature of cannabis has changed.
When the modern, super strength stuff first appeared, everyone I knew dropped out smoking cannabis very rapidly. I’d say, personally, it was the difference between 4% beer and 79.9% by volume Polish Pure Spirit.
Yes, 100%. The seventies style cannabis would give you enough of a hit, the stuff around now is ludicrous.
I remember in the 90s when we would smoke really gentle resin and the odd bit of grass that made you feel very chilled but still normal. Like three or four beers. Then the skunk started creeping in which was brutal and left you having whiteys and feeling very spun out. Had to be v careful after then when buying grass that it wasn’t skunk. Over the space of about two years you just couldn’t get “gentler” cannabis anywhere.
A good friend of mine went nuts on skunk - super intelligent and brilliant long distance runner and cricketer. Got expelled and we would just see him wandering around town strung out. God knows what happened to him after but it was definitely the skunk that changed his brain.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
And it was a remarkable treble shitshow
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
If Labour had voted for the withdrawal agreement in the first place, instead of waiting for Boris Johnson to become PM and to defeat them in the 2019 election, then that period would have been very different.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
Oddly enough, youtube decided to show me some old clips of Steve Jobs recently. One of the clips that struck me was him describing "Hire good people, give them the goals and vision, trust them to get on with it".
This blonde lady with glasses on GB News can't say her 'O's properly! She says things like "herm" instead of "home", and "ner" instead of "no".
What a disgraceful example to set for our younger people, and also the hundreds of migrants who have valiantly made the dangerous crossing of the Channel just to learn our beautiful English language!
I love the Hull accent!
There are some AA adverts on the radio with a Geordie lady. They literally hired someone who can't say A.
Mind you, HMRC has some adverts running with a chap who can't say H, so it's rife.
We can say A alreet. It's the rest of yous who cannit.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
And it was a remarkable treble shitshow
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
If Labour had voted for the withdrawal agreement in the first place, instead of waiting for Boris Johnson to become PM and to defeat them in the 2019 election, then that period would have been very different.
When a government can't muster the votes to pass its signature policy, and looks like it might fall as a consequence, it's a big ask of the opposition that they bail it out.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
I quite like the "one nation" brand of Conservatism. I am not sure that has necessarily been to the fore since the fall of Heath. Perhaps Major and Hague were the leadership exceptions. I am not sure about Cameron, Osborne and May. Perhaps Mrs May was an old feudal Tory too. Ever since Johnson and Brexit they have gone to the dogs. Mind you what looks to be replacing the Conservatives from within or without looks far, far worse.
Is the Jenrick Tory more offensive than Farage Reform?
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
Oddly enough, youtube decided to show me some old clips of Steve Jobs recently. One of the clips that struck me was him describing "Hire good people, give them the goals and vision, trust them to get on with it".
Sadly not enough of that going around.
I remember it being absolutely great on the odd occasion I stumbled across that.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
I remember discussing this with a distinguished psychiatrist. A young laddie had been seriously hurt when his pal had wrapped his car around a tree. He had a lot of pain and "self medicated" with cannabis to cope. He developed psychosis and spent the remainder of his very sad life in a mental hospital.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
I would also add that the nature of cannabis has changed.
When the modern, super strength stuff first appeared, everyone I knew dropped out smoking cannabis very rapidly. I’d say, personally, it was the difference between 4% beer and 79.9% by volume Polish Pure Spirit.
Yes, 100%. The seventies style cannabis would give you enough of a hit, the stuff around now is ludicrous.
Which is another reason why it should be legalised.
Legal and clearly shown strength, like we have with alcohol. Can be taxed based on strength too.
Illegal there's an incentive to go as strong as possible.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
And it was a remarkable treble shitshow
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
If Labour had voted for the withdrawal agreement in the first place, instead of waiting for Boris Johnson to become PM and to defeat them in the 2019 election, then that period would have been very different.
When a government can't muster the votes to pass its signature policy, and looks like it might fall as a consequence, it's a big ask of the opposition that they bail it out.
Starmer did eventually whip Labour MPs to vote for it, and it wasn't so much the signature policy of the government as enacting the decision made in a referendum that Labour had voted for.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
I quite like the "one nation" brand of Conservatism. I am not sure that has necessarily been to the fore since the fall of Heath. Perhaps Major and Hague were the leadership exceptions. I am not sure about Cameron, Osborne and May. Perhaps Mrs May was an old feudal Tory too. Ever since Johnson and Brexit they have gone to the dogs. Mind you what looks to be replacing the Conservatives from within or without looks far, far worse.
Is the Jenrick Tory more offensive than Farage Reform?
I'll put this out there and take the consequences - I prefer Farage to Jenrick.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
How does an insurance-based NHS, with the additional administration that will entail, have any bearing on whether there are sufficient resources to treat people? Unless the unsaid part is that some people will no longer get treated.
Changing the means by which funding is raised does not increase the funding or reduce the resources required for treatment.
Some information from the Kings Fund. Usually one of the better sources of comparative information on health.
1. NHS spending performs well on some efficiency measures 2. Patients are better protected from high medical costs 3. The UK has less medical equipment and fewer beds 4. The UK has fewer doctors and nurses 5. Patient outcomes are worse than average
Whoa - “ Administrative costs of health providers (eg, hospitals) are not included”? That must make a major difference where frontline medical staff are required to do a significant part of admin.
Anyway, I’m getting those Europe-is-great vibes as I stroll through the streets between the Amsterdam Hilton and Vondelpark in the warm summer gloaming past clusters of cheerful outdoor diners, chirruping children and upright cyclists with their baskets.
There is nowhere in the USA like this little quarter. Not in NYC, or Boston, or Beverly Hills. But plenty similar in Britain and almost every other European country.
There's no WW3, the cricket has finished, no by elections today, the government isn't falling right now, Jeremy Corbyn and Rupert Lowe haven't got off their arses and formed new parties and Find out Now haven't released an MRP in the last hour showing Reform winning 567 seats on 21% of the vote. I demand gratification dammit!
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
And it was a remarkable treble shitshow
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
If Labour had voted for the withdrawal agreement in the first place, instead of waiting for Boris Johnson to become PM and to defeat them in the 2019 election, then that period would have been very different.
When a government can't muster the votes to pass its signature policy, and looks like it might fall as a consequence, it's a big ask of the opposition that they bail it out.
Stretching it a bit to describe it as Labour's signature policy. If it were, they'd not have these problems.
For all of you interested in gambling. How about this.The May winner of the 16 billion Colombian peso (about £3m) rollover jackpot on the Medellin state organised lottery was the wife if rhe deputy manager of the lottery. What an amazing coincidence.
There's no WW3, the cricket has finished, no by elections today, the government isn't falling right now, Jeremy Corbyn and Rupert Lowe haven't got off their arses and formed new parties and Find out Now haven't released an MRP in the last hour showing Reform winning 567 seats on 21% of the vote. I demand gratification dammit!
On the More In Common polling, it seems we now have a two-party system.
The Anti-Labour bloc and the Anti-Reform bloc - the other three parties don't really figure currently and are as the little fish living near the jaws of the shark.
Reform voters are less unwilling to vote Conservative than Conservative supporters are to vote Reform which suggests in Lab-Ref marginals it's going to be tough to persuade Conservatives to switch to Reform whereas in Lab-Con marginals it might be easier to get Reform supporters to tactically vote Conservative.
In Con-Ref marginals, the unwillingness of Lab, LD and Green supporters to vote Reform might ensure a tactical vote for the Conservatives.
I share the thoughts of those who think there might be an upside to Conservative seat num\bers but more likely to come from gains from Labour than from the LDs on this evidence. Worth mentioning 39 of the top 50 Conservative targets are held by Labour.
Ok I've temporarily amused myself looking at the changes between the March FoN MRP and now Ref +4% Labour-2% Con -3% LD +1%
But things are so precarious that has given Reform an extra 150 seats, Lib Dems pick up an extra 20 , Labour lose 48 and the Conservatives slip from 133 to 29, losing 104 seats. From changes slightly outwith MoE
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
And it was a remarkable treble shitshow
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
If Labour had voted for the withdrawal agreement in the first place, instead of waiting for Boris Johnson to become PM and to defeat them in the 2019 election, then that period would have been very different.
When a government can't muster the votes to pass its signature policy, and looks like it might fall as a consequence, it's a big ask of the opposition that they bail it out.
Stretching it a bit to describe it as Labour's signature policy. If it were, they'd not have these problems.
On topic, we are no longer an aspirational country.
It doesn't bode well for our future success.
Of course we are. Its just that intergenerational inequality and housing costs means too large a number of working people don't get to enjoy the prosperity that should come from work. It's not sloth - 85% of working age households have at least one adult in employment.
And that inequality has led to only about 30% of households being net contributors. That means that a majority of those 22 million in-work households depend more on the state than they generate in tax.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
It’s the incremental nature of most change that is important.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
It's finally happened, the Democrats have crossed the line. Zohran Mamdani, a 100% Communist Lunatic, has just won the Dem Primary, and is on his way to becoming Mayor. We've had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous. He looks TERRIBLE, his voice is grating, he's not very smart, he's got AOC+3, Dummies ALL, backing him, and even our Great Palestinian Senator, Cryin' Chuck Schumer, is groveling over him. Yes, this is a big moment in the History of our Country!
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
And it was a remarkable treble shitshow
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
If Labour had voted for the withdrawal agreement in the first place, instead of waiting for Boris Johnson to become PM and to defeat them in the 2019 election, then that period would have been very different.
When a government can't muster the votes to pass its signature policy, and looks like it might fall as a consequence, it's a big ask of the opposition that they bail it out.
Of every registered political party in the UK the one which would least like a general election right now is the Conservatives.
On the More In Common polling, it seems we now have a two-party system.
The Anti-Labour bloc and the Anti-Reform bloc - the other three parties don't really figure currently and are as the little fish living near the jaws of the shark.
Reform voters are less unwilling to vote Conservative than Conservative supporters are to vote Reform which suggests in Lab-Ref marginals it's going to be tough to persuade Conservatives to switch to Reform whereas in Lab-Con marginals it might be easier to get Reform supporters to tactically vote Conservative.
In Con-Ref marginals, the unwillingness of Lab, LD and Green supporters to vote Reform might ensure a tactical vote for the Conservatives.
I share the thoughts of those who think there might be an upside to Conservative seat num\bers but more likely to come from gains from Labour than from the LDs on this evidence. Worth mentioning 39 of the top 50 Conservative targets are held by Labour.
How far Lib Dems get squeezed might determine how deep they have to defend. I still thinking somewhere near 50 seats is about right if they come in at around 14%. If the Tories drop far enough to not threaten it means the Reform vote is coming through hard if the duality mentioned holds. Seats like Banbury, Rugby, Peterborough, (possibly Norfolk South locally) look ripe for Lab to Con switching. London is looking increasingly mad the more the Lab vote slides there. Some really strange results possible. Im going to hunt out long shots - Feltham and Heston to Reform looks possible
There's no WW3, the cricket has finished, no by elections today, the government isn't falling right now, Jeremy Corbyn and Rupert Lowe haven't got off their arses and formed new parties and Find out Now haven't released an MRP in the last hour showing Reform winning 567 seats on 21% of the vote. I demand gratification dammit!
Why doesn't Jezza join the Green Meanies? Seems like he agrees with them on most things.
On the More In Common polling, it seems we now have a two-party system.
The Anti-Labour bloc and the Anti-Reform bloc - the other three parties don't really figure currently and are as the little fish living near the jaws of the shark.
Reform voters are less unwilling to vote Conservative than Conservative supporters are to vote Reform which suggests in Lab-Ref marginals it's going to be tough to persuade Conservatives to switch to Reform whereas in Lab-Con marginals it might be easier to get Reform supporters to tactically vote Conservative.
In Con-Ref marginals, the unwillingness of Lab, LD and Green supporters to vote Reform might ensure a tactical vote for the Conservatives.
I share the thoughts of those who think there might be an upside to Conservative seat num\bers but more likely to come from gains from Labour than from the LDs on this evidence. Worth mentioning 39 of the top 50 Conservative targets are held by Labour.
How far Lib Dems get squeezed might determine how deep they have to defend. I still thinking somewhere near 50 seats is about right if they come in at around 14%. If the Tories drop far enough to not threaten it means the Reform vote is coming through hard if the duality mentioned holds. Seats like Banbury, Rugby, Peterborough, (possibly Norfolk South locally) look ripe for Lab to Con switching. London is looking increasingly mad the more the Lab vote slides there. Some really strange results possible. Im going to hunt out long shots - Feltham and Heston to Reform looks possible
You’re consistent in your predictions of a Lib Dem squeeze in LD-Tory marginals. I don’t see it - that would require 1. Labour tactical voters to move back home, 2. No Tory leakage to Reform.
It’s a bit far out from the next election but once we’re a year out I’m up for a private bet on this.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
It’s the incremental nature of most change that is important.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
Yep.
Or to turn to something dear to my heart, there's nothing wrong with Britain that a massive and irreversible shift of wealth and opportunity in favour of working people won't fix. But this can't and shouldn't happen overnight. Incremental not big bang applies here just as much as with any other project. You need direction and a good working culture to get there. And time.
I'd be happy with 50 years. 50 years of competent, assiduous Labour government, interspersed with the occasional Tory one to keep things honest and avoid the pitfalls of one party state, should be sufficient.
To the extent I have a political vision, this is it.
On the More In Common polling, it seems we now have a two-party system.
The Anti-Labour bloc and the Anti-Reform bloc - the other three parties don't really figure currently and are as the little fish living near the jaws of the shark.
Reform voters are less unwilling to vote Conservative than Conservative supporters are to vote Reform which suggests in Lab-Ref marginals it's going to be tough to persuade Conservatives to switch to Reform whereas in Lab-Con marginals it might be easier to get Reform supporters to tactically vote Conservative.
In Con-Ref marginals, the unwillingness of Lab, LD and Green supporters to vote Reform might ensure a tactical vote for the Conservatives.
I share the thoughts of those who think there might be an upside to Conservative seat num\bers but more likely to come from gains from Labour than from the LDs on this evidence. Worth mentioning 39 of the top 50 Conservative targets are held by Labour.
How far Lib Dems get squeezed might determine how deep they have to defend. I still thinking somewhere near 50 seats is about right if they come in at around 14%. If the Tories drop far enough to not threaten it means the Reform vote is coming through hard if the duality mentioned holds. Seats like Banbury, Rugby, Peterborough, (possibly Norfolk South locally) look ripe for Lab to Con switching. London is looking increasingly mad the more the Lab vote slides there. Some really strange results possible. Im going to hunt out long shots - Feltham and Heston to Reform looks possible
You’re consistent in your predictions of a Lib Dem squeeze in LD-Tory marginals. I don’t see it - that would require 1. Labour tactical voters to move back home, 2. No Tory leakage to Reform.
It’s a bit far out from the next election but once we’re a year out I’m up for a private bet on this.
Yeah we can talk closer to the election. Obviously I'm going with what I expect to happen from here. If things go differently then I'm wrong and I'll reassess! My thought on point 1 you make is that YouGov aside the LD score is close to the 2024 percentage which means if they are retaining the Labour tacticals from 2024 they are both adding nothing nationally and the tacticals that went to Labour are not coming home either - why? The battle is no longer stop the Tories/GTTO. But as you say we are a way out, let's talk nearer to the GE (if I disappear for a few months as I have before because of health etc ill be back at some point). Id be happy to look at a bet framed around how many LD seats go Tory or something like that Edit - note I am not a wealthy guy so it would be a small monetary value bet
It's finally happened, the Democrats have crossed the line. Zohran Mamdani, a 100% Communist Lunatic, has just won the Dem Primary, and is on his way to becoming Mayor. We've had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous. He looks TERRIBLE, his voice is grating, he's not very smart, he's got AOC+3, Dummies ALL, backing him, and even our Great Palestinian Senator, Cryin' Chuck Schumer, is groveling over him. Yes, this is a big moment in the History of our Country!
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
And it was a remarkable treble shitshow
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
If Labour had voted for the withdrawal agreement in the first place, instead of waiting for Boris Johnson to become PM and to defeat them in the 2019 election, then that period would have been very different.
When a government can't muster the votes to pass its signature policy, and looks like it might fall as a consequence, it's a big ask of the opposition that they bail it out.
Of every registered political party in the UK the one which would least like a general election right now is the Conservatives.
Nick Tenconi and UKIP are gagging for it. Them and all 15 supporters!
There's no WW3, the cricket has finished, no by elections today, the government isn't falling right now, Jeremy Corbyn and Rupert Lowe haven't got off their arses and formed new parties and Find out Now haven't released an MRP in the last hour showing Reform winning 567 seats on 21% of the vote. I demand gratification dammit!
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
Serves them right for the Brexit shitshow
And it was a remarkable treble shitshow
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
If Labour had voted for the withdrawal agreement in the first place, instead of waiting for Boris Johnson to become PM and to defeat them in the 2019 election, then that period would have been very different.
When a government can't muster the votes to pass its signature policy, and looks like it might fall as a consequence, it's a big ask of the opposition that they bail it out.
Of every registered political party in the UK the one which would least like a general election right now is the Conservatives.
For sure. Possible extinction event. Although I was referring back to the Cons and Brexit there. The "scandal" of Labour not backing Mrs May's deal. That old chestnut.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
It’s the incremental nature of most change that is important.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
USS Nevada introduced the "all or nothing" armor layout.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
I remember discussing this with a distinguished psychiatrist. A young laddie had been seriously hurt when his pal had wrapped his car around a tree. He had a lot of pain and "self medicated" with cannabis to cope. He developed psychosis and spent the remainder of his very sad life in a mental hospital.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
I would also add that the nature of cannabis has changed.
When the modern, super strength stuff first appeared, everyone I knew dropped out smoking cannabis very rapidly. I’d say, personally, it was the difference between 4% beer and 79.9% by volume Polish Pure Spirit.
Yes, 100%. The seventies style cannabis would give you enough of a hit, the stuff around now is ludicrous.
Which is another reason why it should be legalised.
Legal and clearly shown strength, like we have with alcohol. Can be taxed based on strength too.
Illegal there's an incentive to go as strong as possible.
It still puzzles me why Labour or the Conservatives haven't bitten the legalisation bullet. Sure, some bad Daily Mail headlines in the short term - but the tax income and reduced police/court costs are surely worth it given the largesse it would allow them.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
It’s the incremental nature of most change that is important.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
Yep.
Or to turn to something dear to my heart, there's nothing wrong with Britain that a massive and irreversible shift of wealth and opportunity in favour of working people won't fix. But this can't and shouldn't happen overnight. Incremental not big bang applies here just as much as with any other project. You need direction and a good working culture to get there. And time.
I'd be happy with 50 years. 50 years of competent, assiduous Labour government, interspersed with the occasional Tory one to keep things honest and avoid the pitfalls of one party state, should be sufficient.
To the extent I have a political vision, this is it.
After this one, they must never be allowed to return to power.
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
I remember discussing this with a distinguished psychiatrist. A young laddie had been seriously hurt when his pal had wrapped his car around a tree. He had a lot of pain and "self medicated" with cannabis to cope. He developed psychosis and spent the remainder of his very sad life in a mental hospital.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
I would also add that the nature of cannabis has changed.
When the modern, super strength stuff first appeared, everyone I knew dropped out smoking cannabis very rapidly. I’d say, personally, it was the difference between 4% beer and 79.9% by volume Polish Pure Spirit.
Yes, 100%. The seventies style cannabis would give you enough of a hit, the stuff around now is ludicrous.
Which is another reason why it should be legalised.
Legal and clearly shown strength, like we have with alcohol. Can be taxed based on strength too.
Illegal there's an incentive to go as strong as possible.
It still puzzles me why Labour or the Conservatives haven't bitten the legalisation bullet. Sure, some bad Daily Mail headlines in the short term - but the tax income and reduced police/court costs are surely worth it given the largesse it would allow them.
The LibDems are the official pothead party. If getting stoned is your priority, vote LD.
Interesting..... suggests a very different tactical voting set up this time round
I wonder if the figures and the graphs also show up something else: that the next election really will be Lab v Reform. The two parties that show up, way ahead of the field, to be worth voting against will be the parties to beat. The fact that very few are bothered to vote against the Tories really does look fatal for them. They don't matter.
Yes, i agree with that i think, although it might mean thd blue wall throws up some interesting reruns as a side show. I suppose it might save the odd Tory seat in places like my Norfolk too where there are Tory-Reform match ups if there is anti reform sentiment outweighing anti Tory.
Overall though it suggests tories will not be competitive at largest Party level
Although I like several Conservative people and MPs, I'm not a fan of the Conservative Party per se. But even I must admit to a frisson of sadness at their present state. If they do perform as badly in 2029 as their polls suggest, it will be a big thing. They've been a perfect, efficient, killing machine for centuries, and now they are falling apart, blank eyed, incomprehending their fate. You've got to admit, it'll be the end of an era...
I quite like the "one nation" brand of Conservatism. I am not sure that has necessarily been to the fore since the fall of Heath. Perhaps Major and Hague were the leadership exceptions. I am not sure about Cameron, Osborne and May. Perhaps Mrs May was an old feudal Tory too. Ever since Johnson and Brexit they have gone to the dogs. Mind you what looks to be replacing the Conservatives from within or without looks far, far worse.
Is the Jenrick Tory more offensive than Farage Reform?
Major started off as the right wing candidate but moderated once in office. Hague really only after he stood down. Cameron was more in the One Nation line. Ironically Boris had pretty liberal instincts, especially on the environment but weaponised Europe and threw his lot on with the ultras.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
It’s the incremental nature of most change that is important.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
Yep.
Or to turn to something dear to my heart, there's nothing wrong with Britain that a massive and irreversible shift of wealth and opportunity in favour of working people won't fix. But this can't and shouldn't happen overnight. Incremental not big bang applies here just as much as with any other project. You need direction and a good working culture to get there. And time.
I'd be happy with 50 years. 50 years of competent, assiduous Labour government, interspersed with the occasional Tory one to keep things honest and avoid the pitfalls of one party state, should be sufficient.
To the extent I have a political vision, this is it.
After this one, they must never be allowed to return to power.
They won't. Whatever happens after this, Labour are finished. Tories too
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
I remember discussing this with a distinguished psychiatrist. A young laddie had been seriously hurt when his pal had wrapped his car around a tree. He had a lot of pain and "self medicated" with cannabis to cope. He developed psychosis and spent the remainder of his very sad life in a mental hospital.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
I would also add that the nature of cannabis has changed.
When the modern, super strength stuff first appeared, everyone I knew dropped out smoking cannabis very rapidly. I’d say, personally, it was the difference between 4% beer and 79.9% by volume Polish Pure Spirit.
Yes, 100%. The seventies style cannabis would give you enough of a hit, the stuff around now is ludicrous.
Which is another reason why it should be legalised.
Legal and clearly shown strength, like we have with alcohol. Can be taxed based on strength too.
Illegal there's an incentive to go as strong as possible.
It still puzzles me why Labour or the Conservatives haven't bitten the legalisation bullet. Sure, some bad Daily Mail headlines in the short term - but the tax income and reduced police/court costs are surely worth it given the largesse it would allow them.
The LibDems are the official pothead party. If getting stoned is your priority, vote LD.
I realise the LibDems back it - but they back many things - often contradictory. It's just a puzzle why the 'big two' (for now) avoid it.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
It’s the incremental nature of most change that is important.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
Yep.
Or to turn to something dear to my heart, there's nothing wrong with Britain that a massive and irreversible shift of wealth and opportunity in favour of working people won't fix. But this can't and shouldn't happen overnight. Incremental not big bang applies here just as much as with any other project. You need direction and a good working culture to get there. And time.
I'd be happy with 50 years. 50 years of competent, assiduous Labour government, interspersed with the occasional Tory one to keep things honest and avoid the pitfalls of one party state, should be sufficient.
To the extent I have a political vision, this is it.
What a ridiculous pile of warmed-over political puke
It's like an intellectually mangy cat vommed up a furball of pitiful ideas, just behind the philosophical golf shoes
Sword attacker guilty of murdering schoolboy in east London street rampage
[The local CPS boss said] There was no doubt Arduini-Monzo was in grips of a psychotic episode, but the challenge for our specialist homicide prosecutors in this case was proving that his mental state was the result of his cannabis misuse – not an underlying mental health condition such as schizophrenia.
Without going all Peter Hitchens about life, we do need to take a serious look at cannabis – harmless and should be decriminalised, or induces psychosis leading to schizophrenia and even murder?
And tbh the legalistic distinction leaves me cold. Either the killer was in a psychotic state or he wasn't. What are the odds against him pitching up in Broadmoor before he is up for parole?
Ilford North makes the news for all the wrong reasons
It really is a terrible story and I'd urge PBers to think twice before reading the details.
I remember discussing this with a distinguished psychiatrist. A young laddie had been seriously hurt when his pal had wrapped his car around a tree. He had a lot of pain and "self medicated" with cannabis to cope. He developed psychosis and spent the remainder of his very sad life in a mental hospital.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
I would also add that the nature of cannabis has changed.
When the modern, super strength stuff first appeared, everyone I knew dropped out smoking cannabis very rapidly. I’d say, personally, it was the difference between 4% beer and 79.9% by volume Polish Pure Spirit.
Yes, 100%. The seventies style cannabis would give you enough of a hit, the stuff around now is ludicrous.
Which is another reason why it should be legalised.
Legal and clearly shown strength, like we have with alcohol. Can be taxed based on strength too.
Illegal there's an incentive to go as strong as possible.
It still puzzles me why Labour or the Conservatives haven't bitten the legalisation bullet. Sure, some bad Daily Mail headlines in the short term - but the tax income and reduced police/court costs are surely worth it given the largesse it would allow them.
The LibDems are the official pothead party. If getting stoned is your priority, vote LD.
I really thought Corbyn was going to make it Labour policy, particularly as his son was in the whole CBD space at the time.
Now, you might say, that could have got him those 10,000s of extra votes he needed, but that requires relying on stoners actually turning up at the ballot box.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
It’s the incremental nature of most change that is important.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
Yep.
Or to turn to something dear to my heart, there's nothing wrong with Britain that a massive and irreversible shift of wealth and opportunity in favour of working people won't fix. But this can't and shouldn't happen overnight. Incremental not big bang applies here just as much as with any other project. You need direction and a good working culture to get there. And time.
I'd be happy with 50 years. 50 years of competent, assiduous Labour government, interspersed with the occasional Tory one to keep things honest and avoid the pitfalls of one party state, should be sufficient.
To the extent I have a political vision, this is it.
I think that they should aspire to 50 days of competent government first. Ideally starting tomorrow.
Fraser Nelson on Times Radio said as part of a documentary they did survation polling and that Reform polling only went down a couple of points when asked if they would still vote for Reform if there was no Farage.
Nah. Without the spiv they sink to low teens and then disappear. Nobody is queueing up to see Tice and Yusuf on the campaign trail. They'd particularly lose the Boris Granny votes
But nobody is going to admit that.
One of the stories we tell ourselves is that we are all highly rational political calculating machines, thoughtfully considering the various manifestoes. Certainly not going for something as superficial and shallow as "I like politician X". That is very rarely true- most of us (me included) get no further than some inherited prejudices, whether we like the current state of the nation, and what we think of the cut of people's jib.
It's a mad system, but better than the alternatives.
Exactly, so hypothetical polling won't pick up the very very obvious reality that Reform ARE Farage and Farage almost exclusively. They'd have no seats in parliament but for his return
Except my family is voting Reform DESPITE Farage. They don’t like him very much but they feel they have no choice now but to roll the dice
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
It’s the incremental nature of most change that is important.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
Yep.
Or to turn to something dear to my heart, there's nothing wrong with Britain that a massive and irreversible shift of wealth and opportunity in favour of working people won't fix. But this can't and shouldn't happen overnight. Incremental not big bang applies here just as much as with any other project. You need direction and a good working culture to get there. And time.
I'd be happy with 50 years. 50 years of competent, assiduous Labour government, interspersed with the occasional Tory one to keep things honest and avoid the pitfalls of one party state, should be sufficient.
To the extent I have a political vision, this is it.
Ewwwww. If i invite Tony Blair for Christmas hes leaving before i put on the Xmas QI on Dave, feckers not hanging about till Easter. Midday till 9pm Dec 25th is the absolute limit i'll put up with Labour in any given year, because of the baby Jesus' birthday and being nice to dumb animals. Or something
On topic, we are no longer an aspirational country.
It doesn't bode well for our future success.
Too many people have had their normal aspirations blocked because Britain has become a rentier economy where the majority are unable to get on.
I was talking to some Young People(TM) a while back. The thought of buying their own places was just an unimaginable fantasy to them. Young enough that their parents were on the borderline cusp of only just having snuck onto the property ladder themselves later in life. Their main 'aspiration' was simply not getting sacked and not being chucked out by their landlord.
Wow. Cost of living and NHS nearly twice as important to Labour --> Reform switchers as immigration.
Has anyone told them about Nigel's plans for a contributory insurance based NHS? Moving on...
We will have no real idea what Reform's manifesto will say about the NHS until about 2029. My guess is that on the major planks of the social welfare state (ie every one of the expensive bits of discretionary state expenditure) it will play it straight down the centre and promise no significant front line cuts, and no change to how things are funded.
Why not a contributory insurance based NHS? We might not have millions on an operating waiting list..and be just like every other modern European nation..🧐
If we were starting from scratch we might not invent the NHS exactly as it is, but it doesn't follow from this that it ought to be radically changed. Re-engineering something as complex and central to our society as healthcare is a massive undertaking fraught with risk and unintended consequences. It would take time (longer than electoral time), serious money, and great skill, integrity, diligence. Not the way to go imo. Better to keep the core model and seek continual incremental improvement in outcomes and value-for-money.
No Big Bang project has ever worked.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
Yes, my time in the City (which you're still doing, I believe) taught me this. You need a direction and a good positive culture. Both were often lacking.
It’s the incremental nature of most change that is important.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
Yep.
Or to turn to something dear to my heart, there's nothing wrong with Britain that a massive and irreversible shift of wealth and opportunity in favour of working people won't fix. But this can't and shouldn't happen overnight. Incremental not big bang applies here just as much as with any other project. You need direction and a good working culture to get there. And time.
I'd be happy with 50 years. 50 years of competent, assiduous Labour government, interspersed with the occasional Tory one to keep things honest and avoid the pitfalls of one party state, should be sufficient.
To the extent I have a political vision, this is it.
After this one, they must never be allowed to return to power.
They won't. Whatever happens after this, Labour are finished. Tories too
Comments
Unless the unsaid part is that some people will no longer get treated.
Changing the means by which funding is raised does not increase the funding or reduce the resources required for treatment.
I think something like
Reform 250
Labour 180
Con 90
LD 45
SNP 35
Green 5
Indies etc 10
Isn't a mile off where we are right now
Again, on the second question it doesn't say how many of the very rich would leave, how much tax revenue the government would lose, or whose taxes would be increased as a result. Or maybe the government would reduce spending (we can always dream) but if so, what kind and how much. Or maybe we'd just borrow more and pass the bill to our grandkids.
So overall a worthless exercise and the results are likewise of no value at all.
What a disgraceful example to set for our younger people, and also the hundreds of migrants who have valiantly made the dangerous crossing of the Channel just to learn our beautiful English language!
One other thing. In an era of global openness we have spent a great deal of time or at least political talk focusing on attracting foreign investment and foreign talent to the UK. If our politicians had realised that most solutions need to be coming from the talent and resources that are already here perhaps we'd see different attitudes. We're paying a price for that I think.
https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/insight-and-analysis/blogs/comparing-nhs-to-health-care-systems-other-countries
Summary:
1. NHS spending performs well on some efficiency measures
2. Patients are better protected from high medical costs
3. The UK has less medical equipment and fewer beds
4. The UK has fewer doctors and nurses
5. Patient outcomes are worse than average
(Maybe some are using envy and resentment interchangeably).
Mind you, HMRC has some adverts running with a chap who can't say H, so it's rife.
So, could it be said that there was a causal connection? The consultant thought not. His point was that cannabis consumption had increased exponentially but that diagnoses of psychosis and schizophrenia had not. He thought this disproved a direct causal relationship. OTOH it did appear that if you had a predilection for psychosis cannabis had a tendency to both accelerate and deepen the illness, particularly with younger male brains that were still developing.
This was quite a few years ago now but I have not seen much since that caused me to doubt his assessment. He was one of those people whose views you take very seriously.
(I'll be doing a few more of these 'work poster names into iconic ditties', all be forewarned)
https://vote-2012.proboards.com/thread/19397/local-council-elections-26th-june
Warm enough here in London Town this evening, the heat doesn't work for a lot of people who seem to get a little over excited.
The MiC headline VI numbers this morning see the Reform and Conservatives both down suggesting last week's poll may have been a wee bit of an outlier and the Ref/Con vs Lab/LD/Green "split" is back to 47-46 which seems reasonable.
The YouGov numbers very little changed from last week so it's Ref/Con 44, Lab/LD/Green 49 so all within your margins of error to be honest.
In truth, we have a similar "left", "right" or "up", "down" or whatever you want to call it split as we had in 2019 but back then one side had one party and the other had three so the fragmentation of both voting blocs explains where we are now.
Still looking for the data tables for the Savanta London poll but given the fieldwork was between April 29th and May 21st, it's already ancient history.
Of slightly more relevance in advance of next year's locals, two elected Labour Councillors, one in Lewisham and the other, who was sitting as an Independent in Harringey, have moved to the Greens.
Whether the Greens will make headway against Labour in Inner London next year, I don't know but there must be a real chanve they will gain seats.
Chance would be a fine thing.
The founding of the NHS was, in many ways, incremental on what went before.
When the Great NHS IT Contract comedy was at its height, I was an attending a project management methodology course.
The chap giving the course, a well respected Canadian expert, asked me at lunch if I knew why the projects were being done like this. Since nothing this scale had ever worked using waterfall methods.
The biggest problem is the refusal, on many areas, to contemplate incremental change. And try experimental change in limited areas.
See the repeated rejection of trials of decreasing class sizes in state schools.
When the modern, super strength stuff first appeared, everyone I knew dropped out smoking cannabis very rapidly. I’d say, personally, it was the difference between 4% beer and 79.9% by volume Polish Pure Spirit.
One for @Richard_Tyndall (I think it is he) ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KArs2GZJwsc
1. An idea that was always an irrational act of self harm in the first place
2. That the Tories set about implementing in the most damaging way, and while finding next to nothing by way of mitigating benefit
3. That tied up and distracted both government and officials for years, while pretty much all public services fell apart
A good friend of mine went nuts on skunk - super intelligent and brilliant long distance runner and cricketer. Got expelled and we would just see him wandering around town strung out. God knows what happened to him after but it was definitely the skunk that changed his brain.
Sadly not enough of that going around.
Is the Jenrick Tory more offensive than Farage Reform?
Legal and clearly shown strength, like we have with alcohol. Can be taxed based on strength too.
Illegal there's an incentive to go as strong as possible.
There is nowhere in the USA like this little quarter. Not in NYC, or Boston, or Beverly Hills. But plenty similar in Britain and almost every other European country.
It doesn't bode well for our future success.
I demand gratification dammit!
Trump calls for journalist Natasha Bertrand to be fired.
@alexisconran.bsky.social
Every time I read these stories I cant help but think of Vance who came to Munich to tell Europe that we have freedom of speech problem.
The Anti-Labour bloc and the Anti-Reform bloc - the other three parties don't really figure currently and are as the little fish living near the jaws of the shark.
Reform voters are less unwilling to vote Conservative than Conservative supporters are to vote Reform which suggests in Lab-Ref marginals it's going to be tough to persuade Conservatives to switch to Reform whereas in Lab-Con marginals it might be easier to get Reform supporters to tactically vote Conservative.
In Con-Ref marginals, the unwillingness of Lab, LD and Green supporters to vote Reform might ensure a tactical vote for the Conservatives.
I share the thoughts of those who think there might be an upside to Conservative seat num\bers but more likely to come from gains from Labour than from the LDs on this evidence. Worth mentioning 39 of the top 50 Conservative targets are held by Labour.
Ref +4%
Labour-2%
Con -3%
LD +1%
But things are so precarious that has given Reform an extra 150 seats, Lib Dems pick up an extra 20 , Labour lose 48 and the Conservatives slip from 133 to 29, losing 104 seats. From changes slightly outwith MoE
And that inequality has led to only about 30% of households being net contributors. That means that a majority of those 22 million in-work households depend more on the state than they generate in tax.
So everyone ends up pissed off.
For example, HMS Dreadnought was actually both evolutionary and revolutionary. The design was really a continuation of the Lord Nelson’s, with 12” guns in their standard turrets replacing the 9,2” guns. Arguably, the Americans did better by going to superfiring turrets straightaway.
The framing, armour layout and compartmentation was all tuned up version of what came before. The turbines were a genuine leap though.
It's finally happened, the Democrats have crossed the line. Zohran Mamdani, a 100% Communist Lunatic, has just won the Dem Primary, and is on his way to becoming Mayor. We've had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous. He looks TERRIBLE, his voice is grating, he's not very smart, he's got AOC+3, Dummies ALL, backing him, and even our Great Palestinian Senator, Cryin' Chuck Schumer, is groveling over him. Yes, this is a big moment in the History of our Country!
Seats like Banbury, Rugby, Peterborough, (possibly Norfolk South locally) look ripe for Lab to Con switching.
London is looking increasingly mad the more the Lab vote slides there. Some really strange results possible. Im going to hunt out long shots - Feltham and Heston to Reform looks possible
It’s a bit far out from the next election but once we’re a year out I’m up for a private bet on this.
Or to turn to something dear to my heart, there's nothing wrong with Britain that a massive and irreversible shift of wealth and opportunity in favour of working people won't fix. But this can't and shouldn't happen overnight. Incremental not big bang applies here just as much as with any other project. You need direction and a good working culture to get there. And time.
I'd be happy with 50 years. 50 years of competent, assiduous Labour government, interspersed with the occasional Tory one to keep things honest and avoid the pitfalls of one party state, should be sufficient.
To the extent I have a political vision, this is it.
My thought on point 1 you make is that YouGov aside the LD score is close to the 2024 percentage which means if they are retaining the Labour tacticals from 2024 they are both adding nothing nationally and the tacticals that went to Labour are not coming home either - why? The battle is no longer stop the Tories/GTTO.
But as you say we are a way out, let's talk nearer to the GE (if I disappear for a few months as I have before because of health etc ill be back at some point). Id be happy to look at a bet framed around how many LD seats go Tory or something like that
Edit - note I am not a wealthy guy so it would be a small monetary value bet
I eat tuna steak with anchonvy, caper, lemon, sourdough breadcrumb; and I sip Albarino de Fefinanes; and the moments pass
VIBE
It's like an intellectually mangy cat vommed up a furball of pitiful ideas, just behind the philosophical golf shoes
Now, you might say, that could have got him those 10,000s of extra votes he needed, but that requires relying on stoners actually turning up at the ballot box.
Something very funny might be about to happen
https://bsky.app/profile/lowrhoufo.bsky.social/post/3lshdjudsik2x
If i invite Tony Blair for Christmas hes leaving before i put on the Xmas QI on Dave, feckers not hanging about till Easter. Midday till 9pm Dec 25th is the absolute limit i'll put up with Labour in any given year, because of the baby Jesus' birthday and being nice to dumb animals. Or something