"Offer shopping vouchers to customers in return for being active and eating healthily, via a new app"
Hm. I realise I'm an outlier when it comes to loathing mobiles and not having a smartphone, but normalising the state monitoring your diet and exercise regimes is not something I like the sound of.
They are just trying to replicate the successful insurance policies in the US which give you a lower premium if you are a healthy weight. I'd rather went went for £100 off income tax/uplift to UC payments than this though.
The other option is slap a tax on high calorie density food, but that has collateral damage compared with the simple one on drinks Osborne introduced.
Apropos of which, healthcare is now the highest category of consumer spending in the US.
@DPJHodges This is utterly nuts. Liz Kendall has effectively admitted her changes threaten benefits for people who genuinely need it. That's why she's guaranteed to retain it for existing claimants. But she's also saying she's happy to see others in genuine need lose support from next year.
An interesting piece in The Guardian - Britain is sick. Massive inequality and chronic poverty combined with front line service cuts means an NHS under siege and incurring enormous costs from people made ill by previous cuts.
I'll keep making this point until the hard of thinking (hello Labour!!!) get it - cuts without reform cost more money than you save.
We're going to need to spend more now on actual frontline healthcare to save a lot more in the long term and that means making savings on the stuff we are wasting money on. Cutting sickness welfare is not the answer, making people healthier is.
Indeed. So much of Cameron and Osborne's programme of savings and long-term prudence turned out to be anything but that. Avoiding productive long-term investments, like the current governments crazy decision to scrap most of their green growth plan, can have parallel effects in the economic sphere.
The problem comes when trying to get people to acknowledge that there is a limit to spending. We have plenty of MPs who quite simply don’t believe that you can’t just stick it on the national credit card
Indeed, but, conversely, this can also just as easily become a fetishisation of cuts in themselves, and as an end in themselves.
Cameron and Osborne shouted this narrative almost every day, and yet they left the country in an even worse condition than when they started.
The problem they had was a structural deficit.
The response was *reduce the rate of increase of government spending* to above inflation, but below the rate of increase in GDP. Spending was never actually cut, overall.
So the key question is where do you cut, and where do you borrow or spend. Cameron and Osbourne seem to have got the calculus badly wrong, and all the bills are coming in now.
Neither unlimited spending or a Caneroonist narrativeil of cuts are going to get is out of this, I would say.
Invent a time machine and tell people to vote Tory in 1997?
For an even bigger financial bubble and crash, yes.
How? Ken Clarke would have kept control of interest rates and would have raised taxes during the 97-01 term. The bubble was all on Brown and Blair.
The MBS and derivatives bubble (and subsequent crash and credit crunch) would have happened anyway assuming no change in America. The key question therefore is, would the City under the Tories have been more or less likely to become a feckless Wall St tribute act?
My answer to this is certainly not less likely and most probably more. Yes, I know there was a speech by Peter Lilley. But that was an outlier and against the grain. In the years preceding the crash the Tory message was for lighter regulation because "those guys know what they're doing".
None of this is to excuse Brown btw. He got enamoured of the City (or rather its tax revenues) and took his eye off the ball. He dealt with the crisis brilliantly as PM but as Chancellor was culpable for our extreme vulnerability to it.
Under the Tories no bank was allowed to operate at 70:1 leverage after Barings went bankrupt. That was all on Labour and that's what created the crash in the UK. In retrospect the government should have let RBS and HBOS go bankrupt and only guaranteed 100% of customer deposits. Bailing out the financial services industry and socialising their losses set a terrible precedent and we're still paying for it today.
Northern Rock would of course have had to go bankrupt too on that basis.
The Bush administration of course let Lehmans go bankrupt with no bailout by contrast
Also fine. Bailing out the banks was a shit idea, the government should have, on day one just guaranteed 100% of customer deposits and then let the banks themselves go under then let the assets get sold off piecemeal. Let the shareholders and bondholders take the hit.
I would frame it as "let the market clear". The big jump in government debt was the price of failing to do that.
It's a little more complex than that: one person's saving is another one's debt. When is becomes clear that not all the debts will be repaid, then - one way or another - the value of savings need to be diminished. That can either be done via inflation, socialization, or the collapse of the banking system. (Guaranteeing all the deposits is just one of the forms of socialization.)
Value is a tricky word. The crisis itself was deflationary, so it's possible that people could have taken a nominal haircut on their savings without the value of those savings being affected.
One person's savings is another's debt.
When you save you are deferring consumption, by sending the fruits of your labor to someone else who is promising to deliver you the fruits of his labor in the future. All a bank is is a very thin sliver of equity between those two people.
And if that guy is unable to deliver the fruits of his labor in the future, then it is said saver who is on the hook.
Sure, but a financial crisis doesn't change the demographics, it doesn't destroy machinery and it doesn't render anyone infirm.
When assets get mispriced, you need to allow the deck to be reshuffled and for people who made bad bets to pay the price (and I include making deposits in a risky bank as a bad bet).
All of this academic commentary assumes that depositors are playing “capitalism”. In their eyes, they are not. They are just putting their hard-earned savings in what they think is a safe place for later use.
Up to a point. If someone makes a decision to put their money in an Icelandic savings account offering a higher rate of interest, they should be conscious that they are taking on additional risk.
Iceland handled the crisis very well indeed.
They didn't try to "save" their banks and allowed them to fail, implementing the deposit protection schemes.
Those who were protected, got their protections, up to pre-existing limits.
Those who were not, faced a haircut, as they should.
Creditors faced a haircut, as they should.
The taxpayer did not get an open-ended obligation.
As I recall, Iceland had the advantage that it was UK depositors who funded their banks not Icelandic ones. The Icelandic banks effectively let their UK subsidiaries fail, pushing the cost onto the UK taxpayer.
The UK taxpayer had no legal obligation to protect Icelandic deposits.
You're missing the point again. Robert's comment nothing to do with 'legal obligation', rather that Iceland didn't have to worry about that part of the downstream consequences of letting their banks go under.
That was the UK's problem, whether ur not we decided to protect the deposits.
You were arguing that Iceland was proof we could have done the same. Quite clearly the consequences for us would have been very different.
We absolutely could have done the same.
Iceland honoured their legal obligations and let anyone who wasn't legally protected face the consequences.
We chose not to.
That was a political choice, not an economic necessity.
Iceland did have to worry about downstream consequences, but they worried about the ones they were legally obliged to do so, rather than protecting them all. We chose not to, but we had no reason why we couldn't have done the same as them.
Not all UK banks depositors were British citizens either, just like the Icelandic ones.
And saw unemployment soar in Iceland, its currency's value halve and its stock market effectively wiped out
Which was the medicine they needed to take to get over the crisis. Wiping out failed businesses sees unemployment rise, absolutely, but is better than keeping zombie firms alive unproductively.
They took a sharper hit during the crisis, as they let the crisis hit as it should rather than using taxpayers money to save failed, zombie firms.
As a result they've grown considerably better since then, than we have. They shed the deadweight and recovered and are growing well.
Had the UK allowed our failed businesses to fail we may have seen a deeper contraction originally, but we wouldn't then be struggling to keep alive moribund, failed businesses and throwing good taxpayers money after bad.
We might actually have some productivity growth now.
The banks and building societies themselves weren't outmoded businesses, what crashed Northern Rock, RBS, HBOS, Lehmans etc was lending far more than they held in capital and in particular giving loans to mortgage holders six or seven time their salary to buy homes when the absolute maximum should have been about 4 times. There was plenty of demand for their services
All banks lend a multiple of their deposits and always have. It is how the business works. If all depositors asked for their money back any bank would go under at any time in modern history.
"Offer shopping vouchers to customers in return for being active and eating healthily, via a new app"
Hm. I realise I'm an outlier when it comes to loathing mobiles and not having a smartphone, but normalising the state monitoring your diet and exercise regimes is not something I like the sound of.
Isn't that little different from the Vitality Health app which gave discounts for doing monitored exercise
One is a private company, where you are making a trade - they track your exercise habits, and in return you pay lower premiums.
The other is the goverment. Now, I realise there are some people out there with greater trust in our "leaders" than me. But generally speaking, the government should know no more than the absolute minimum required for them to do their job.
@DPJHodges This is utterly nuts. Liz Kendall has effectively admitted her changes threaten benefits for people who genuinely need it. That's why she's guaranteed to retain it for existing claimants. But she's also saying she's happy to see others in genuine need lose support from next year.
This is going to be a very close vote
I think they scrape through but what a terrible mess.
A very odd Guardian story of a firm of solicitors doing its job in an unremarkable way, the Guardian hyping it up as if it's some sort of wicked injustice. Strange even by Guardian standards. And massively prejudicial towards the firm involved, almost as if it had some strange power to tell the courts what to order by way of injunction. A huge car crash of worthless opinion masquerading as news
Looks OK to me, neither prejudicial nor even particularly interesting but why specify British law firm as if we might default to thinking of a German or Finnish practice?
It's like the old days under the Tories when we were told the only effective opposition to the Conservative Government came from within the Conservative Parliamentary Party.
Now, there seems to be a new "opposition party" being launched every few days.
"Offer shopping vouchers to customers in return for being active and eating healthily, via a new app"
Hm. I realise I'm an outlier when it comes to loathing mobiles and not having a smartphone, but normalising the state monitoring your diet and exercise regimes is not something I like the sound of.
Isn't that little different from the Vitality Health app which gave discounts for doing monitored exercise
One is a private company, where you are making a trade - they track your exercise habits, and in return you pay lower premiums.
The other is the goverment. Now, I realise there are some people out there with greater trust in our "leaders" than me. But generally speaking, the government should know no more than the absolute minimum required for them to do their job.
It's not clear from the article text whether this would be a government app or a supermarket app.
@DPJHodges This is utterly nuts. Liz Kendall has effectively admitted her changes threaten benefits for people who genuinely need it. That's why she's guaranteed to retain it for existing claimants. But she's also saying she's happy to see others in genuine need lose support from next year.
This is going to be a very close vote
I think they scrape through but what a terrible mess.
I agree, but I wouldn't discount payroll undeclared resigning and breaking for voting against. And Burnham/Khan's interventions will have hardened dissent. I think if no three line whip they risk defeat but if whipped they might lose 50 MPs
@DPJHodges This is utterly nuts. Liz Kendall has effectively admitted her changes threaten benefits for people who genuinely need it. That's why she's guaranteed to retain it for existing claimants. But she's also saying she's happy to see others in genuine need lose support from next year.
This is going to be a very close vote
I think they scrape through but what a terrible mess.
An interesting piece in The Guardian - Britain is sick. Massive inequality and chronic poverty combined with front line service cuts means an NHS under siege and incurring enormous costs from people made ill by previous cuts.
I'll keep making this point until the hard of thinking (hello Labour!!!) get it - cuts without reform cost more money than you save.
We're going to need to spend more now on actual frontline healthcare to save a lot more in the long term and that means making savings on the stuff we are wasting money on. Cutting sickness welfare is not the answer, making people healthier is.
Indeed. So much of Cameron and Osborne's programme of savings and long-term prudence turned out to be anything but that. Avoiding productive long-term investments, like the current governments crazy decision to scrap most of their green growth plan, can have parallel effects in the economic sphere.
The problem comes when trying to get people to acknowledge that there is a limit to spending. We have plenty of MPs who quite simply don’t believe that you can’t just stick it on the national credit card
Indeed, but, conversely, this can also just as easily become a fetishisation of cuts in themselves, and as an end in themselves.
Cameron and Osborne shouted this narrative almost every day, and yet they left the country in an even worse condition than when they started.
The problem they had was a structural deficit.
The response was *reduce the rate of increase of government spending* to above inflation, but below the rate of increase in GDP. Spending was never actually cut, overall.
So the key question is where do you cut, and where do you borrow or spend. Cameron and Osbourne seem to have got the calculus badly wrong, and all the bills are coming in now.
Neither unlimited spending or a Caneroonist narrativeil of cuts are going to get is out of this, I would say.
Invent a time machine and tell people to vote Tory in 1997?
For an even bigger financial bubble and crash, yes.
How? Ken Clarke would have kept control of interest rates and would have raised taxes during the 97-01 term. The bubble was all on Brown and Blair.
The MBS and derivatives bubble (and subsequent crash and credit crunch) would have happened anyway assuming no change in America. The key question therefore is, would the City under the Tories have been more or less likely to become a feckless Wall St tribute act?
My answer to this is certainly not less likely and most probably more. Yes, I know there was a speech by Peter Lilley. But that was an outlier and against the grain. In the years preceding the crash the Tory message was for lighter regulation because "those guys know what they're doing".
None of this is to excuse Brown btw. He got enamoured of the City (or rather its tax revenues) and took his eye off the ball. He dealt with the crisis brilliantly as PM but as Chancellor was culpable for our extreme vulnerability to it.
Under the Tories no bank was allowed to operate at 70:1 leverage after Barings went bankrupt. That was all on Labour and that's what created the crash in the UK. In retrospect the government should have let RBS and HBOS go bankrupt and only guaranteed 100% of customer deposits. Bailing out the financial services industry and socialising their losses set a terrible precedent and we're still paying for it today.
Northern Rock would of course have had to go bankrupt too on that basis.
The Bush administration of course let Lehmans go bankrupt with no bailout by contrast
Also fine. Bailing out the banks was a shit idea, the government should have, on day one just guaranteed 100% of customer deposits and then let the banks themselves go under then let the assets get sold off piecemeal. Let the shareholders and bondholders take the hit.
I would frame it as "let the market clear". The big jump in government debt was the price of failing to do that.
It's a little more complex than that: one person's saving is another one's debt. When is becomes clear that not all the debts will be repaid, then - one way or another - the value of savings need to be diminished. That can either be done via inflation, socialization, or the collapse of the banking system. (Guaranteeing all the deposits is just one of the forms of socialization.)
Value is a tricky word. The crisis itself was deflationary, so it's possible that people could have taken a nominal haircut on their savings without the value of those savings being affected.
One person's savings is another's debt.
When you save you are deferring consumption, by sending the fruits of your labor to someone else who is promising to deliver you the fruits of his labor in the future. All a bank is is a very thin sliver of equity between those two people.
And if that guy is unable to deliver the fruits of his labor in the future, then it is said saver who is on the hook.
Sure, but a financial crisis doesn't change the demographics, it doesn't destroy machinery and it doesn't render anyone infirm.
When assets get mispriced, you need to allow the deck to be reshuffled and for people who made bad bets to pay the price (and I include making deposits in a risky bank as a bad bet).
All of this academic commentary assumes that depositors are playing “capitalism”. In their eyes, they are not. They are just putting their hard-earned savings in what they think is a safe place for later use.
Up to a point. If someone makes a decision to put their money in an Icelandic savings account offering a higher rate of interest, they should be conscious that they are taking on additional risk.
Iceland handled the crisis very well indeed.
They didn't try to "save" their banks and allowed them to fail, implementing the deposit protection schemes.
Those who were protected, got their protections, up to pre-existing limits.
Those who were not, faced a haircut, as they should.
Creditors faced a haircut, as they should.
The taxpayer did not get an open-ended obligation.
As I recall, Iceland had the advantage that it was UK depositors who funded their banks not Icelandic ones. The Icelandic banks effectively let their UK subsidiaries fail, pushing the cost onto the UK taxpayer.
The UK taxpayer had no legal obligation to protect Icelandic deposits.
You're missing the point again. Robert's comment nothing to do with 'legal obligation', rather that Iceland didn't have to worry about that part of the downstream consequences of letting their banks go under.
That was the UK's problem, whether ur not we decided to protect the deposits.
You were arguing that Iceland was proof we could have done the same. Quite clearly the consequences for us would have been very different.
We absolutely could have done the same.
Iceland honoured their legal obligations and let anyone who wasn't legally protected face the consequences.
We chose not to.
That was a political choice, not an economic necessity.
Iceland did have to worry about downstream consequences, but they worried about the ones they were legally obliged to do so, rather than protecting them all. We chose not to, but we had no reason why we couldn't have done the same as them.
Not all UK banks depositors were British citizens either, just like the Icelandic ones.
And saw unemployment soar in Iceland, its currency's value halve and its stock market effectively wiped out
Which was the medicine they needed to take to get over the crisis. Wiping out failed businesses sees unemployment rise, absolutely, but is better than keeping zombie firms alive unproductively.
They took a sharper hit during the crisis, as they let the crisis hit as it should rather than using taxpayers money to save failed, zombie firms.
As a result they've grown considerably better since then, than we have. They shed the deadweight and recovered and are growing well.
Had the UK allowed our failed businesses to fail we may have seen a deeper contraction originally, but we wouldn't then be struggling to keep alive moribund, failed businesses and throwing good taxpayers money after bad.
We might actually have some productivity growth now.
The banks and building societies themselves weren't outmoded businesses, what crashed Northern Rock, RBS, HBOS, Lehmans etc was lending far more than they held in capital and in particular giving loans to mortgage holders six or seven time their salary to buy homes when the absolute maximum should have been about 4 times. There was plenty of demand for their services
All banks lend a multiple of their deposits and always have. It is how the business works. If all depositors asked for their money back any bank would go under at any time in modern history.
That's not how fractional reserve banking works.
If you look at the balance sheet of pretty much any bank it will look something like this:
Now: some banks might have $60m of customer deposits, and another $30m of Certificates of Deposits or something else. But it simply not the case they lend out a multiple of their deposits.
The issue with fractional reserve banking - and the reason that people get confused - is that when a bank lends money to someone, then it creates a despoit somewhere else in the banking system.
NEWS: Senate votes 53-47 to adopt “current policy baseline” to treat $3.8 trillion in Trump tax cut extensions as costing $0. Every Republican votes YES. This hasn’t been used before in filibuster-proof process to meet targets, and will change how future Senate majorities use it. https://x.com/sahilkapur/status/1939694886447362268
This is a bit like Reeves getting Parliament to vote that it will cost £0 to keep the welfare rules exactly as they are.
@DPJHodges This is utterly nuts. Liz Kendall has effectively admitted her changes threaten benefits for people who genuinely need it. That's why she's guaranteed to retain it for existing claimants. But she's also saying she's happy to see others in genuine need lose support from next year.
This is going to be a very close vote
Listening to Kendall it is embarrassing how she is trying to defend the indefensible
It is obvious that the result of the review by Timms should come before this rush to pass a bill that means that some disabled people receiving PIPs today would not receive it in 2026
I simply cannot understand how any Labour mp can vote for this
"Offer shopping vouchers to customers in return for being active and eating healthily, via a new app"
Hm. I realise I'm an outlier when it comes to loathing mobiles and not having a smartphone, but normalising the state monitoring your diet and exercise regimes is not something I like the sound of.
Isn't that little different from the Vitality Health app which gave discounts for doing monitored exercise
One is a private company, where you are making a trade - they track your exercise habits, and in return you pay lower premiums.
The other is the goverment. Now, I realise there are some people out there with greater trust in our "leaders" than me. But generally speaking, the government should know no more than the absolute minimum required for them to do their job.
That's great *in theory*. But the problem is that some private companies make money by selling your private data to other companies; to the extent it is no longer private.
Which is why it'll be a cold day in Hell before I willingly give my genetic data to any ancestry or similar site...
@DPJHodges This is utterly nuts. Liz Kendall has effectively admitted her changes threaten benefits for people who genuinely need it. That's why she's guaranteed to retain it for existing claimants. But she's also saying she's happy to see others in genuine need lose support from next year.
This is going to be a very close vote
Listening to Kendall it is embarrassing how she is trying to defend the indefensible
It is obvious that the result of the review by Timms should come before this rush to pass a bill that means that some disabled people receiving PIPs today would not receive it in 2026
I simply cannot understand how any Labour mp can vote for this
I think one of the reasons - and I'm just spitballing here - is because SKS is a bit shit.
An interesting piece in The Guardian - Britain is sick. Massive inequality and chronic poverty combined with front line service cuts means an NHS under siege and incurring enormous costs from people made ill by previous cuts.
I'll keep making this point until the hard of thinking (hello Labour!!!) get it - cuts without reform cost more money than you save.
We're going to need to spend more now on actual frontline healthcare to save a lot more in the long term and that means making savings on the stuff we are wasting money on. Cutting sickness welfare is not the answer, making people healthier is.
Indeed. So much of Cameron and Osborne's programme of savings and long-term prudence turned out to be anything but that. Avoiding productive long-term investments, like the current governments crazy decision to scrap most of their green growth plan, can have parallel effects in the economic sphere.
The problem comes when trying to get people to acknowledge that there is a limit to spending. We have plenty of MPs who quite simply don’t believe that you can’t just stick it on the national credit card
Indeed, but, conversely, this can also just as easily become a fetishisation of cuts in themselves, and as an end in themselves.
Cameron and Osborne shouted this narrative almost every day, and yet they left the country in an even worse condition than when they started.
The problem they had was a structural deficit.
The response was *reduce the rate of increase of government spending* to above inflation, but below the rate of increase in GDP. Spending was never actually cut, overall.
So the key question is where do you cut, and where do you borrow or spend. Cameron and Osbourne seem to have got the calculus badly wrong, and all the bills are coming in now.
Neither unlimited spending or a Caneroonist narrativeil of cuts are going to get is out of this, I would say.
Invent a time machine and tell people to vote Tory in 1997?
For an even bigger financial bubble and crash, yes.
How? Ken Clarke would have kept control of interest rates and would have raised taxes during the 97-01 term. The bubble was all on Brown and Blair.
The MBS and derivatives bubble (and subsequent crash and credit crunch) would have happened anyway assuming no change in America. The key question therefore is, would the City under the Tories have been more or less likely to become a feckless Wall St tribute act?
My answer to this is certainly not less likely and most probably more. Yes, I know there was a speech by Peter Lilley. But that was an outlier and against the grain. In the years preceding the crash the Tory message was for lighter regulation because "those guys know what they're doing".
None of this is to excuse Brown btw. He got enamoured of the City (or rather its tax revenues) and took his eye off the ball. He dealt with the crisis brilliantly as PM but as Chancellor was culpable for our extreme vulnerability to it.
Under the Tories no bank was allowed to operate at 70:1 leverage after Barings went bankrupt. That was all on Labour and that's what created the crash in the UK. In retrospect the government should have let RBS and HBOS go bankrupt and only guaranteed 100% of customer deposits. Bailing out the financial services industry and socialising their losses set a terrible precedent and we're still paying for it today.
Northern Rock would of course have had to go bankrupt too on that basis.
The Bush administration of course let Lehmans go bankrupt with no bailout by contrast
Also fine. Bailing out the banks was a shit idea, the government should have, on day one just guaranteed 100% of customer deposits and then let the banks themselves go under then let the assets get sold off piecemeal. Let the shareholders and bondholders take the hit.
I would frame it as "let the market clear". The big jump in government debt was the price of failing to do that.
It's a little more complex than that: one person's saving is another one's debt. When is becomes clear that not all the debts will be repaid, then - one way or another - the value of savings need to be diminished. That can either be done via inflation, socialization, or the collapse of the banking system. (Guaranteeing all the deposits is just one of the forms of socialization.)
Value is a tricky word. The crisis itself was deflationary, so it's possible that people could have taken a nominal haircut on their savings without the value of those savings being affected.
One person's savings is another's debt.
When you save you are deferring consumption, by sending the fruits of your labor to someone else who is promising to deliver you the fruits of his labor in the future. All a bank is is a very thin sliver of equity between those two people.
And if that guy is unable to deliver the fruits of his labor in the future, then it is said saver who is on the hook.
Sure, but a financial crisis doesn't change the demographics, it doesn't destroy machinery and it doesn't render anyone infirm.
When assets get mispriced, you need to allow the deck to be reshuffled and for people who made bad bets to pay the price (and I include making deposits in a risky bank as a bad bet).
All of this academic commentary assumes that depositors are playing “capitalism”. In their eyes, they are not. They are just putting their hard-earned savings in what they think is a safe place for later use.
Up to a point. If someone makes a decision to put their money in an Icelandic savings account offering a higher rate of interest, they should be conscious that they are taking on additional risk.
Iceland handled the crisis very well indeed.
They didn't try to "save" their banks and allowed them to fail, implementing the deposit protection schemes.
Those who were protected, got their protections, up to pre-existing limits.
Those who were not, faced a haircut, as they should.
Creditors faced a haircut, as they should.
The taxpayer did not get an open-ended obligation.
As I recall, Iceland had the advantage that it was UK depositors who funded their banks not Icelandic ones. The Icelandic banks effectively let their UK subsidiaries fail, pushing the cost onto the UK taxpayer.
The UK taxpayer had no legal obligation to protect Icelandic deposits.
You're missing the point again. Robert's comment nothing to do with 'legal obligation', rather that Iceland didn't have to worry about that part of the downstream consequences of letting their banks go under.
That was the UK's problem, whether ur not we decided to protect the deposits.
You were arguing that Iceland was proof we could have done the same. Quite clearly the consequences for us would have been very different.
We absolutely could have done the same.
Iceland honoured their legal obligations and let anyone who wasn't legally protected face the consequences.
We chose not to.
That was a political choice, not an economic necessity.
Iceland did have to worry about downstream consequences, but they worried about the ones they were legally obliged to do so, rather than protecting them all. We chose not to, but we had no reason why we couldn't have done the same as them.
Not all UK banks depositors were British citizens either, just like the Icelandic ones.
And saw unemployment soar in Iceland, its currency's value halve and its stock market effectively wiped out
Which was the medicine they needed to take to get over the crisis. Wiping out failed businesses sees unemployment rise, absolutely, but is better than keeping zombie firms alive unproductively.
They took a sharper hit during the crisis, as they let the crisis hit as it should rather than using taxpayers money to save failed, zombie firms.
As a result they've grown considerably better since then, than we have. They shed the deadweight and recovered and are growing well.
Had the UK allowed our failed businesses to fail we may have seen a deeper contraction originally, but we wouldn't then be struggling to keep alive moribund, failed businesses and throwing good taxpayers money after bad.
We might actually have some productivity growth now.
The banks and building societies themselves weren't outmoded businesses, what crashed Northern Rock, RBS, HBOS, Lehmans etc was lending far more than they held in capital and in particular giving loans to mortgage holders six or seven time their salary to buy homes when the absolute maximum should have been about 4 times. There was plenty of demand for their services
All banks lend a multiple of their deposits and always have. It is how the business works. If all depositors asked for their money back any bank would go under at any time in modern history.
That's not how fractional reserve banking works.
If you look at the balance sheet of pretty much any bank it will look something like this:
Now: some banks might have $60m of customer deposits, and another $30m of Certificates of Deposits or something else. But it simply not the case they lend out a multiple of their deposits.
The issue with fractional reserve banking - and the reason that people get confused - is that when a bank lends money to someone, then it creates a despoit somewhere else in the banking system.
Fractional reserve banking predates the invention of the central bank - and bank failures created by the practice led to the creation of central banks.
It's essentially their job to stop it all falling apart too frequently.
@DPJHodges This is utterly nuts. Liz Kendall has effectively admitted her changes threaten benefits for people who genuinely need it. That's why she's guaranteed to retain it for existing claimants. But she's also saying she's happy to see others in genuine need lose support from next year.
This is going to be a very close vote
Listening to Kendall it is embarrassing how she is trying to defend the indefensible
It is obvious that the result of the review by Timms should come before this rush to pass a bill that means that some disabled people receiving PIPs today would not receive it in 2026
I simply cannot understand how any Labour mp can vote for this
Its an apalling bill that does absolutely nothing to improve the situation for anyone except maybe SKS
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
Either that, or the Chiles visit. It jumped its shark.
I'm tempted to try to come up with an alternative.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
Oh no, how awful.
I am sure calling out one of the biggest music organisers / promoters in the business for anti-Semitic rant probably didn't help.
I am interested to know if the tweet by a journalist that claimed a private letter to Glastonbury organisers signed by leading music promoters got leaked with their personal emails. Hence Ranty McRanty Face knew about Harvey Goldsmith.
@DPJHodges This is utterly nuts. Liz Kendall has effectively admitted her changes threaten benefits for people who genuinely need it. That's why she's guaranteed to retain it for existing claimants. But she's also saying she's happy to see others in genuine need lose support from next year.
This is going to be a very close vote
If Starmer loses this despite the massive U-turn he is surely in Actual Trouble as leader. He will be entirely paralysed by his own backbenchers, who clearly have no love, fear or respect for him
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
Thought Rod was going to try and get the crowd chanting “Maggie, Maggie” as a sly retort
Is this still Kookabura balls? Getting the England players used to it for the Ashes (except the England players aren't playing in the Championship?). See also Worcester vs Hants...
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
You're falling into the same trap that many 'anti-woke' idiots do: "If I don't like it, it's woke'
What they're saying is in no way woke. If it has any purpose, it is to get them publicity.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
Are you a free speech absolutist or not today? I have to confess I lose track.
And you have an increasingly, er, interesting definition of woke.
I suspect Glastonbury might just survive the disapprobation of an aging flint knapper in a small corner of the internet.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
It's funny how the free speech zealots in America are cancelling or declining to issue so many visas over hurty words.
Writing as someone who watched precisely none of the Glastonbury coverage, I'd not miss it if it were gone but am puzzled why the BBC did not simply put a short delay on the feed.
What happened to the other lot? Kneecap, was it? Did they go ahead? Were they miffed at being upstaged by these newcomers?
DJL's 17th law of life. If you set out to be offensive, be aware that you might succeed.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
It's funny how the free speech zealots in America are cancelling or declining to issue so many visas over hurty words.
Writing as someone who watched precisely none of the Glastonbury coverage, I'd not miss it if it were gone but am puzzled why the BBC did not simply put a short delay on the feed.
What happened to the other lot? Kneecap, was it? Did they go ahead? Were they miffed at being upstaged by these newcomers?
DJL's 17th law of life. If you set out to be offensive, be aware that you might succeed.
Why they don't have a delay on their live feed when they do for things like phone ins is quite strange. Also, Ranty McRanty Face has been ranting for years and in particular on this topic across Europe, so claims they just weren't aware are about as likely as Starmer having never read his Rivers of Blood Speech.
Like Kneecap, they are absolutely nobodies who have been trying the clickbait cosplay terrorist revolutionary stuff for years and got nowhere because unlike say RATM their music is shit. Everybody has now jumped into their playbook.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
Oh no, how awful.
I am sure calling out one of the biggest music organisers / promters in the business for anti-Semitic rant probably didn't help.
if you were one of the 50,000 imbeciles drunkenly shouting “kill, kill, kill” and “Fuck Britain it’s my country now” or whatever it was, I do hope you are now suffering Terminal Cringe to a toxic painful degree
Glasto needs to go back to its roots as a fun place to get off your tits, get laid, make nice noises about world peace, do more drugs, get laid again, fall in a ditch, get covered in shite, accidentally listen to some great music, fall asleep on top of a van then make you way home with your penis inexplicably sunburned
I’m quite serious. The heavy politics is killing it. And I like the “idea” of Glasto, and I’ve had great times there. Needs rescuing from the wankers
It would probably be better if they reduced the price to ten quid and excluded the upper middle class
18 members of Palestine Action including Sam Corner and BBC script writer William Plastow are charged with carrying out an armed attack on Israeli defence firm Elbit Systems UK in Patchway, Bristol. A female police officer was allegedly beaten with a sledge hammer in the attack.
18 members of Palestine Action including Sam Corner and BBC script writer William Plastow are charged with carrying out an armed attack on Israeli defence firm Elbit Systems UK in Patchway, Bristol. A female police officer was allegedly beaten with a sledge hammer in the attack.
They're Putin's allies. And therefore allies of imperialism and fascism...
18 members of Palestine Action including Sam Corner and BBC script writer William Plastow are charged with carrying out an armed attack on Israeli defence firm Elbit Systems UK in Patchway, Bristol. A female police officer was allegedly beaten with a sledge hammer in the attack.
Its one thing saying I am not sure they should be proscribed as a terrorist organisation. That is a tricky thing, as there are other groups who don't go blowing stuff up that are on that list as well. But there is an argument that says it might not be the right thing.
The Luuvies for Terrorists are throwing their lot in with not only a nasty bunch, trying to whitewash their actions, but look at some of the signatories, they have said really anti-Semitic stuff in the past. I wouldn't want to be associated with some of the people on that list.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
Oh no, how awful.
I am sure calling out one of the biggest music organisers / promters in the business for anti-Semitic rant probably didn't help.
if you were one of the 50,000 imbeciles drunkenly shouting “kill, kill, kill” and “Fuck Britain it’s my country now” or whatever it was, I do hope you are now suffering Terminal Cringe to a toxic painful degree
Glasto needs to go back to its roots as a fun place to get off your tits, get laid, make nice noises about world peace, do more drugs, get laid again, fall in a ditch, get covered in shite, accidentally listen to some great music, fall asleep on top of a van then make you way home with your penis inexplicably sunburned
I’m quite serious. The heavy politics is killing it. And I like the “idea” of Glasto, and I’ve had great times there. Needs rescuing from the wankers
It would probably be better if they reduced the price to ten quid and excluded the upper middle class
You and I both know that won't happen - the "upper middle class" (whoever they may be) are the golden goose who will keep on laying.
There's no concert in 2026 and by 2027 everyone will have forgotten about it and the crowds will flock away to see whoever they put on as the headline act(s).
Glastonbury needs to get back to its roots, when it wasn't all political! Back to when it first became a regular fitting, in the 1980s, and was co-organised with the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament!
@DPJHodges This is utterly nuts. Liz Kendall has effectively admitted her changes threaten benefits for people who genuinely need it. That's why she's guaranteed to retain it for existing claimants. But she's also saying she's happy to see others in genuine need lose support from next year.
This is going to be a very close vote
Listening to Kendall it is embarrassing how she is trying to defend the indefensible
It is obvious that the result of the review by Timms should come before this rush to pass a bill that means that some disabled people receiving PIPs today would not receive it in 2026
I simply cannot understand how any Labour mp can vote for this
I think one of the reasons - and I'm just spitballing here - is because SKS is a bit shit.
Is spitballing the LA equivalent of ‘Busting balls’ ?
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
Oh no, how awful.
I am sure calling out one of the biggest music organisers / promters in the business for anti-Semitic rant probably didn't help.
if you were one of the 50,000 imbeciles drunkenly shouting “kill, kill, kill” and “Fuck Britain it’s my country now” or whatever it was, I do hope you are now suffering Terminal Cringe to a toxic painful degree
Glasto needs to go back to its roots as a fun place to get off your tits, get laid, make nice noises about world peace, do more drugs, get laid again, fall in a ditch, get covered in shite, accidentally listen to some great music, fall asleep on top of a van then make you way home with your penis inexplicably sunburned
I’m quite serious. The heavy politics is killing it. And I like the “idea” of Glasto, and I’ve had great times there. Needs rescuing from the wankers
It would probably be better if they reduced the price to ten quid and excluded the upper middle class
I was watching the Levellers set on YouTube yesterday when they played largest crowd ever Glastonbury crowd, a mere 300,000 people. Now they are massive lefties and I am sure they aren't very happy with Israel's actions, but a) they can really play (30 years ago, with zero auto-tune etc and they sound great) and b) the songs are the message, they are telling you stories about injustice with some great lyrics. No need for chants of DEATH TO THE IDF...
18 members of Palestine Action including Sam Corner and BBC script writer William Plastow are charged with carrying out an armed attack on Israeli defence firm Elbit Systems UK in Patchway, Bristol. A female police officer was allegedly beaten with a sledge hammer in the attack.
Its one thing saying I am not sure they should be proscribed as a terrorist organisation. That is a tricky thing, as there are other groups who don't go blowing stuff up that are on that list as well. But there is an argument that says it might not be the right thing.
The Luuvies for Terrorists are throwing their lot in with not only a nasty bunch, trying to whitewash their actions, but look at some of the signatories, they have said really anti-Semitic stuff in the past. I wouldn't want to be associated with some of the people on that list.
It's why you want to be very careful when signing a list when you don't know who else might be on the list.
(Wasn't there a TV show or film or cartoon where the text of what was being signed was actually obscured, and people signed it anyway?)
Glastonbury needs to get back to its roots, when it wasn't all political! Back to when it first became a regular fitting, in the 1980s, and was co-organised with the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament!
Or in 1971, when Churchill's granddaughter helped organise it as part of a protest against the VIetnam war, after the press chased her around London.
No politics then, just music, ofcourse. It's just the wokies messing it up, now!
Glastonbury needs to get back to its roots, when it wasn't all political! Back to when it first became a regular fitting, in the 1980s, and was co-organised with the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament!
I'd argue that subsequent events have proved CND to be utterly wrong...
Glastonbury needs to get back to its roots, when it wasn't all political! Back to when it first became a regular fitting, in the 1980s, and was co-organised with the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament!
Back in those days, the BBC didn't really go near it, did it?
Criminal investigation launched into Glastonbury sets
If you can't get done for calling for killing your local Tory MP, this won't go anywhere. Nor should it as it just gives them more publicity. Nasty piece of work, crap music, let him disappear back into obscurity and going on antisemitic rants about leading music promoters probably will make it a tad tricky to get booked going forward.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
You're falling into the same trap that many 'anti-woke' idiots do: "If I don't like it, it's woke'
What they're saying is in no way woke. If it has any purpose, it is to get them publicity.
"Kill the IDF" and "Fuck the British" is pretty much textbook woke. They just need a "trans women are women" and they've covered all bases.
Glastonbury needs to get back to its roots, when it wasn't all political! Back to when it first became a regular fitting, in the 1980s, and was co-organised with the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament!
Back in those days, the BBC didn't really go near it, did it?
I believe Channel 4 was the first network to show it back in 94 and 95. Uncut versions of those shows are nearly impossible to get hold of.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
It's funny how the free speech zealots in America are cancelling or declining to issue so many visas over hurty words.
Writing as someone who watched precisely none of the Glastonbury coverage, I'd not miss it if it were gone but am puzzled why the BBC did not simply put a short delay on the feed.
What happened to the other lot? Kneecap, was it? Did they go ahead? Were they miffed at being upstaged by these newcomers?
DJL's 17th law of life. If you set out to be offensive, be aware that you might succeed.
I have no support for the current authoritarian kleptocracy in the USA at all; but as a supporter of free speech (as I can best understand it - see PB debates passim) I don't think there is any relationship between the idea of the right to free speech (excellent) and the idea of the right to free speech without personal consequences (entirely meaningless).
You have a right to free speech; I have a right to act in response to what it is you say. And vice versa.
Tolerance of free speech is not remotely the same as respect for opinions uttered.
18 members of Palestine Action including Sam Corner and BBC script writer William Plastow are charged with carrying out an armed attack on Israeli defence firm Elbit Systems UK in Patchway, Bristol. A female police officer was allegedly beaten with a sledge hammer in the attack.
You will be shocked to know that Will-Nyerere Plastow is a Cambridge graduate. Really weirdly when the BBC did a soft soap piece on him they failed to mentioned he had been an employee,
Glastonbury needs to get back to its roots, when it wasn't all political! Back to when it first became a regular fitting, in the 1980s, and was co-organised with the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament!
Back in those days, the BBC didn't really go near it, did it?
I believe Channel 4 was the first network to show it back in 94 and 95. Uncut versions of those shows are nearly impossible to get hold of.
Yes, Channel 4 started in 1994, then the BBC took over from 1997, just in time for the most important ever event in Glastonbury history, Radiohead headlining the Pyramid Stage.
I suspect some combination of (a) marketing ploy (how many had heard of him yesterday) and (b) mild concern about what TSA might find on his phone at the airport meaning he wanted a way to extract himself from his US tour.
18 members of Palestine Action including Sam Corner and BBC script writer William Plastow are charged with carrying out an armed attack on Israeli defence firm Elbit Systems UK in Patchway, Bristol. A female police officer was allegedly beaten with a sledge hammer in the attack.
You will be shocked to know that Will-Nyerere Plastow is a Cambridge graduate. Really weirdly when the BBC did a soft soap piece on him they failed to mentioned he had been an employee,
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
Oh no, how awful.
I am sure calling out one of the biggest music organisers / promters in the business for anti-Semitic rant probably didn't help.
if you were one of the 50,000 imbeciles drunkenly shouting “kill, kill, kill” and “Fuck Britain it’s my country now” or whatever it was, I do hope you are now suffering Terminal Cringe to a toxic painful degree
Glasto needs to go back to its roots as a fun place to get off your tits, get laid, make nice noises about world peace, do more drugs, get laid again, fall in a ditch, get covered in shite, accidentally listen to some great music, fall asleep on top of a van then make you way home with your penis inexplicably sunburned
I’m quite serious. The heavy politics is killing it. And I like the “idea” of Glasto, and I’ve had great times there. Needs rescuing from the wankers
It would probably be better if they reduced the price to ten quid and excluded the upper middle class
I was watching the Levellers set on YouTube yesterday when they played largest crowd ever Glastonbury crowd, a mere 300,000 people. Now they are massive lefties and I am sure they aren't very happy with Israel's actions, but a) they can really play (30 years ago, with zero auto-tune etc and they sound great) and b) the songs are the message, they are telling you stories about injustice with some great lyrics. No need for chants of DEATH TO THE IDF...
They are massive lefties, but actually their songs have a bit of nuance to them. The characters who inhabit them are more than one-dimensional ciphers.
I suspect some combination of (a) marketing ploy (how many had heard of him yesterday) and (b) mild concern about what TSA might find on his phone at the airport meaning he wanted a way to extract himself from his US tour.
Quids in really.
Bob Vylan, confusingly, is a duo, not an individual.
Criminal investigation launched into Glastonbury sets
And I cannot listen to Kendall anymore
How has Labour fallen so far on compassion
You forget there has always been an authoritarian aspect to Labour - Blunkett and Straw as two examples. Labour will know "doing something about welfare" plays well to a considerable section of the population who have been indoctrinted to see those claiming as "scroungers" or "malingerers" and so on.
The other side of the this is the £150 billion (raising to £180 billion by 2029) or so that goes on pensioners can't and won't be touched - pensioners are a growing segment of the electorate and more importantly they vote so you don't want to antagonise them too much. Then there's the £87 billion on Universal Credit.
Do I think Starmer and Kendall are right? No, but there's a wider issue about the cost of welfare which does need to be tackled as it would be is Sunak were still Prime Minister and the alternative to closing down all the options is to let the deficit rise - unless, of course, we're going to raise taxes and cut defence perhaps.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
Oh no, how awful.
I am sure calling out one of the biggest music organisers / promters in the business for anti-Semitic rant probably didn't help.
if you were one of the 50,000 imbeciles drunkenly shouting “kill, kill, kill” and “Fuck Britain it’s my country now” or whatever it was, I do hope you are now suffering Terminal Cringe to a toxic painful degree
Glasto needs to go back to its roots as a fun place to get off your tits, get laid, make nice noises about world peace, do more drugs, get laid again, fall in a ditch, get covered in shite, accidentally listen to some great music, fall asleep on top of a van then make you way home with your penis inexplicably sunburned
I’m quite serious. The heavy politics is killing it. And I like the “idea” of Glasto, and I’ve had great times there. Needs rescuing from the wankers
It would probably be better if they reduced the price to ten quid and excluded the upper middle class
I was watching the Levellers set on YouTube yesterday when they played largest crowd ever Glastonbury crowd, a mere 300,000 people. Now they are massive lefties and I am sure they aren't very happy with Israel's actions, but a) they can really play (30 years ago, with zero auto-tune etc and they sound great) and b) the songs are the message, they are telling you stories about injustice with some great lyrics. No need for chants of DEATH TO THE IDF...
They are massive lefties, but actually their songs have a bit of nuance to them. The characters who inhabit them are more than one-dimensional ciphers.
So you mean they don't just scream,
I hеard you want your country back Ha! Shut the fuck up
on repeat for 3 minutes?
Even RATM who are a lot less nuanced, the lyrics have a fair bit more substance and Tom Morello is a genius on the guitar (so many people think all the noises you hear on the tracks are samples, when it is him).
I seemed to remember for a while Mark Chadwick (lead singer of the Levellers) did stuff like The Wright Stuff for a few years and again was quite nuanced in his opinions.
18 members of Palestine Action including Sam Corner and BBC script writer William Plastow are charged with carrying out an armed attack on Israeli defence firm Elbit Systems UK in Patchway, Bristol. A female police officer was allegedly beaten with a sledge hammer in the attack.
You will be shocked to know that Will-Nyerere Plastow is a Cambridge graduate. Really weirdly when the BBC did a soft soap piece on him they failed to mentioned he had been an employee,
I suspect some combination of (a) marketing ploy (how many had heard of him yesterday) and (b) mild concern about what TSA might find on his phone at the airport meaning he wanted a way to extract himself from his US tour.
Quids in really.
Bob Vylan, confusingly, is a duo, not an individual.
But I think it's Bobby who is either in serious trouble or very much on the make..or both.
Is this still Kookabura balls? Getting the England players used to it for the Ashes (except the England players aren't playing in the Championship?). See also Worcester vs Hants...
Surrey fans will be moaning about sides preparing "total roads" to thwart them yet again...
Pity their two p/t spinners who'll spend the next 2 days trying to get some turn with that burgundy tennis ball.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
You're falling into the same trap that many 'anti-woke' idiots do: "If I don't like it, it's woke'
What they're saying is in no way woke. If it has any purpose, it is to get them publicity.
"Kill the IDF" and "Fuck the British" is pretty much textbook woke. They just need a "trans women are women" and they've covered all bases.
Hello everyone. Looks like my qualifications in Being Human aren't very impressive. I try a few times every day but Vanilla mostly doesn't let me in. Has let me in twice now via my laptop vs not at all via my smartphone. Have fun.
I suspect some combination of (a) marketing ploy (how many had heard of him yesterday) and (b) mild concern about what TSA might find on his phone at the airport meaning he wanted a way to extract himself from his US tour.
Quids in really.
Bob Vylan, confusingly, is a duo, not an individual.
But I think it's Bobby who is either in serious trouble or very much on the make..or both.
As far as I can see, Bobbie supports Bobby in this.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
You're falling into the same trap that many 'anti-woke' idiots do: "If I don't like it, it's woke'
What they're saying is in no way woke. If it has any purpose, it is to get them publicity.
"Kill the IDF" and "Fuck the British" is pretty much textbook woke. They just need a "trans women are women" and they've covered all bases.
Please define 'woke'.
Cookie will have to extract his tongue from his cheek first, methinks
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
You're falling into the same trap that many 'anti-woke' idiots do: "If I don't like it, it's woke'
What they're saying is in no way woke. If it has any purpose, it is to get them publicity.
"Kill the IDF" and "Fuck the British" is pretty much textbook woke. They just need a "trans women are women" and they've covered all bases.
I would agree though that the 1970s to 1980s Glastonbury would never have had death chants, though.
It was often political, but very peaceful in message. The driving forces were the idealists like Andrew Kerr and Arabella Churchill, and the annual peace convoy to Stonehenge.
Criminal investigation launched into Glastonbury sets
And I cannot listen to Kendall anymore
How has Labour fallen so far on compassion
You forget there has always been an authoritarian aspect to Labour - Blunkett and Straw as two examples. Labour will know "doing something about welfare" plays well to a considerable section of the population who have been indoctrinted to see those claiming as "scroungers" or "malingerers" and so on.
The other side of the this is the £150 billion (raising to £180 billion by 2029) or so that goes on pensioners can't and won't be touched - pensioners are a growing segment of the electorate and more importantly they vote so you don't want to antagonise them too much. Then there's the £87 billion on Universal Credit.
Do I think Starmer and Kendall are right? No, but there's a wider issue about the cost of welfare which does need to be tackled as it would be is Sunak were still Prime Minister and the alternative to closing down all the options is to let the deficit rise - unless, of course, we're going to raise taxes and cut defence perhaps.
Roll back disability qualification rules to what they were before Theresa May expanded them. "Anxiety issues" is the new bad back, force them back into work or face the consequences of being a layabout.
Labour needs to hold a leadership contest. Nothing is going to get done at this rate.
Would it make any difference though? a) who is there that is significantly better and b) in order to get things done you need to think about what you want to get done, and then spend a fair amount of time thinking about how that can be achieved and c) finally putting to together the legalisation / budget required. By the time they have done that we will be in electioneering home straight.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
It's funny how the free speech zealots in America are cancelling or declining to issue so many visas over hurty words.
Writing as someone who watched precisely none of the Glastonbury coverage, I'd not miss it if it were gone but am puzzled why the BBC did not simply put a short delay on the feed.
What happened to the other lot? Kneecap, was it? Did they go ahead? Were they miffed at being upstaged by these newcomers?
DJL's 17th law of life. If you set out to be offensive, be aware that you might succeed.
I have no support for the current authoritarian kleptocracy in the USA at all; but as a supporter of free speech (as I can best understand it - see PB debates passim) I don't think there is any relationship between the idea of the right to free speech (excellent) and the idea of the right to free speech without personal consequences (entirely meaningless).
You have a right to free speech; I have a right to act in response to what it is you say. And vice versa.
Tolerance of free speech is not remotely the same as respect for opinions uttered.
Yes, but is it constitutional for the US executive to cancel visas on the basis of political expression which is perfectly legal - and constitutionally protected - in the US ?
Labour needs to hold a leadership contest. Nothing is going to get done at this rate.
Would it make any difference though? In order to get things done you need to think about what you want to get done, and then spend a fair amount of time thinking about to go about it. By the time they have done that we will be in electioneering home straight.
Only one way to find out if anyone has any ideas or a vision…
"Offer shopping vouchers to customers in return for being active and eating healthily, via a new app"
Hm. I realise I'm an outlier when it comes to loathing mobiles and not having a smartphone, but normalising the state monitoring your diet and exercise regimes is not something I like the sound of.
Isn't that little different from the Vitality Health app which gave discounts for doing monitored exercise
One is a private company, where you are making a trade - they track your exercise habits, and in return you pay lower premiums.
The other is the goverment. Now, I realise there are some people out there with greater trust in our "leaders" than me. But generally speaking, the government should know no more than the absolute minimum required for them to do their job.
That's great *in theory*. But the problem is that some private companies make money by selling your private data to other companies; to the extent it is no longer private.
Which is why it'll be a cold day in Hell before I willingly give my genetic data to any ancestry or similar site...
Have you read Michaeel Connelly's Fair Warning? It's a novel, but the stuff around what happens to your genetic data will chill your bones.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
It's funny how the free speech zealots in America are cancelling or declining to issue so many visas over hurty words.
Writing as someone who watched precisely none of the Glastonbury coverage, I'd not miss it if it were gone but am puzzled why the BBC did not simply put a short delay on the feed.
What happened to the other lot? Kneecap, was it? Did they go ahead? Were they miffed at being upstaged by these newcomers?
DJL's 17th law of life. If you set out to be offensive, be aware that you might succeed.
I have no support for the current authoritarian kleptocracy in the USA at all; but as a supporter of free speech (as I can best understand it - see PB debates passim) I don't think there is any relationship between the idea of the right to free speech (excellent) and the idea of the right to free speech without personal consequences (entirely meaningless).
You have a right to free speech; I have a right to act in response to what it is you say. And vice versa.
Tolerance of free speech is not remotely the same as respect for opinions uttered.
Yes, but is it constitutional for the US executive to cancel visas on the basis of political expression which is perfectly legal - and constitutionally protected - in the US ?
I think that only applies if you are a US citizen otherwise things will be used against you for political point scoring
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
It's funny how the free speech zealots in America are cancelling or declining to issue so many visas over hurty words.
Writing as someone who watched precisely none of the Glastonbury coverage, I'd not miss it if it were gone but am puzzled why the BBC did not simply put a short delay on the feed.
What happened to the other lot? Kneecap, was it? Did they go ahead? Were they miffed at being upstaged by these newcomers?
DJL's 17th law of life. If you set out to be offensive, be aware that you might succeed.
I have no support for the current authoritarian kleptocracy in the USA at all; but as a supporter of free speech (as I can best understand it - see PB debates passim) I don't think there is any relationship between the idea of the right to free speech (excellent) and the idea of the right to free speech without personal consequences (entirely meaningless).
You have a right to free speech; I have a right to act in response to what it is you say. And vice versa.
Tolerance of free speech is not remotely the same as respect for opinions uttered.
Yes, but is it constitutional for the US executive to cancel visas on the basis of political expression which is perfectly legal - and constitutionally protected - in the US ?
I think that only applies if you are a US citizen otherwise things will be used against you for political point scoring
Does it ? That really isn't what their constitution has to say about individual rights.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
It's funny how the free speech zealots in America are cancelling or declining to issue so many visas over hurty words.
Writing as someone who watched precisely none of the Glastonbury coverage, I'd not miss it if it were gone but am puzzled why the BBC did not simply put a short delay on the feed.
What happened to the other lot? Kneecap, was it? Did they go ahead? Were they miffed at being upstaged by these newcomers?
DJL's 17th law of life. If you set out to be offensive, be aware that you might succeed.
I have no support for the current authoritarian kleptocracy in the USA at all; but as a supporter of free speech (as I can best understand it - see PB debates passim) I don't think there is any relationship between the idea of the right to free speech (excellent) and the idea of the right to free speech without personal consequences (entirely meaningless).
You have a right to free speech; I have a right to act in response to what it is you say. And vice versa.
Tolerance of free speech is not remotely the same as respect for opinions uttered.
Yes, but is it constitutional for the US executive to cancel visas on the basis of political expression which is perfectly legal - and constitutionally protected - in the US ?
I think they will make the case that all visas are issued solely at the discretion of the executive. So, they can do this,
It is however staggeringly hypocritical to do this while threatening European officials over their insufficient commitment to free speech.
“Kill the IDF” and “fuck the British” rappers Bob Vylan have had their visas revoked and can’t tour the USA. They have also been abandoned by agents and management.
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
It's funny how the free speech zealots in America are cancelling or declining to issue so many visas over hurty words.
Writing as someone who watched precisely none of the Glastonbury coverage, I'd not miss it if it were gone but am puzzled why the BBC did not simply put a short delay on the feed.
What happened to the other lot? Kneecap, was it? Did they go ahead? Were they miffed at being upstaged by these newcomers?
DJL's 17th law of life. If you set out to be offensive, be aware that you might succeed.
I have no support for the current authoritarian kleptocracy in the USA at all; but as a supporter of free speech (as I can best understand it - see PB debates passim) I don't think there is any relationship between the idea of the right to free speech (excellent) and the idea of the right to free speech without personal consequences (entirely meaningless).
You have a right to free speech; I have a right to act in response to what it is you say. And vice versa.
Tolerance of free speech is not remotely the same as respect for opinions uttered.
Yes, but is it constitutional for the US executive to cancel visas on the basis of political expression which is perfectly legal - and constitutionally protected - in the US ?
The US can reject your visa for basically anything they like. And, even if they grant you a visa, the immigration official who greets you has pretty sweeping powers to go wrong trainers, not coming in.
Comments
https://x.com/Maks_NAFO_FELLA/status/1939638194737230299
Ukraine has developed special anti-drone cartridges for small arms.
The manufacturer has already codified the development and aims to equip every infantryman with magazines of such cartridges.
The other is the goverment. Now, I realise there are some people out there with greater trust in our "leaders" than me. But generally speaking, the government should know no more than the absolute minimum required for them to do their job.
Now, there seems to be a new "opposition party" being launched every few days.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EC9icOKGJ94
But most will be reassessed at some point. So surely that is not true?
I think if no three line whip they risk defeat but if whipped they might lose 50 MPs
If you look at the balance sheet of pretty much any bank it will look something like this:
Assets:
Loans - $80m
Goverment Bonds - $20m
Liabilities:
Customer Deposits - $90m
Shareholders Equity - $10m
Now: some banks might have $60m of customer deposits, and another $30m of Certificates of Deposits or something else. But it simply not the case they lend out a multiple of their deposits.
The issue with fractional reserve banking - and the reason that people get confused - is that when a bank lends money to someone, then it creates a despoit somewhere else in the banking system.
NEWS: Senate votes 53-47 to adopt “current policy baseline” to treat $3.8 trillion in Trump tax cut extensions as costing $0. Every Republican votes YES. This hasn’t been used before in filibuster-proof process to meet targets, and will change how future Senate majorities use it.
https://x.com/sahilkapur/status/1939694886447362268
This is a bit like Reeves getting Parliament to vote that it will cost £0 to keep the welfare rules exactly as they are.
Just an order of magnitude or so larger.
It is obvious that the result of the review by Timms should come before this rush to pass a bill that means that some disabled people receiving PIPs today would not receive it in 2026
I simply cannot understand how any Labour mp can vote for this
Which is why it'll be a cold day in Hell before I willingly give my genetic data to any ancestry or similar site...
Not bad.
It's essentially their job to stop it all falling apart too frequently.
Chekov's Gun, in fact
Go woke, go broke
I’m all for free speech and I’m also all for capitalism teaching stiff lessons to hateful morons
I wonder if Glasto will ever quite recover from this
It jumped its shark.
I'm tempted to try to come up with an alternative.
I am sure calling out one of the biggest music organisers / promoters in the business for anti-Semitic rant probably didn't help.
I am interested to know if the tweet by a journalist that claimed a private letter to Glastonbury organisers signed by leading music promoters got leaked with their personal emails. Hence Ranty McRanty Face knew about Harvey Goldsmith.
What they're saying is in no way woke. If it has any purpose, it is to get them publicity.
And you have an increasingly, er, interesting definition of woke.
I suspect Glastonbury might just survive the disapprobation of an aging flint knapper in a small corner of the internet.
Challenge accepted.
Don’t sell enough heat pumps. Fine the companies.
Don’t sell enough EVs. Fine the companies
What next ?
Writing as someone who watched precisely none of the Glastonbury coverage, I'd not miss it if it were gone but am puzzled why the BBC did not simply put a short delay on the feed.
What happened to the other lot? Kneecap, was it? Did they go ahead? Were they miffed at being upstaged by these newcomers?
DJL's 17th law of life. If you set out to be offensive, be aware that you might succeed.
https://x.com/courtnewsuk/status/1939672866468872664?s=61
Like Kneecap, they are absolutely nobodies who have been trying the clickbait cosplay terrorist revolutionary stuff for years and got nowhere because unlike say RATM their music is shit. Everybody has now jumped into their playbook.
Glasto needs to go back to its roots as a fun place to get off your tits, get laid, make nice noises about world peace, do more drugs, get laid again, fall in a ditch, get covered in shite, accidentally listen to some great music, fall asleep on top of a van then make you way home with your penis inexplicably sunburned
I’m quite serious. The heavy politics is killing it. And I like the “idea” of Glasto, and I’ve had great times there. Needs rescuing from the wankers
It would probably be better if they reduced the price to ten quid and excluded the upper middle class
18 members of Palestine Action including Sam Corner and BBC script writer William Plastow are charged with carrying out an armed attack on Israeli defence firm Elbit Systems UK in Patchway, Bristol. A female police officer was allegedly beaten with a sledge hammer in the attack.
The Luuvies for Terrorists are throwing their lot in with not only a nasty bunch, trying to whitewash their actions, but look at some of the signatories, they have said really anti-Semitic stuff in the past. I wouldn't want to be associated with some of the people on that list.
There's no concert in 2026 and by 2027 everyone will have forgotten about it and the crowds will flock away to see whoever they put on as the headline act(s).
Worlds smallest violin time
Bob Vylan holds a concert calling for the death of the IDF.
Bob Vylan’s talent agency drops him.
Bob Vylan’s U.S. visa is revoked.
Bob Vylan’s 26-show U.S. tour is canceled.
So, who’s crying now @BobbyVylan?
https://x.com/afneil/status/1939703469536895181?s=61
(Wasn't there a TV show or film or cartoon where the text of what was being signed was actually obscured, and people signed it anyway?)
Criminal investigation launched into Glastonbury sets
And I cannot listen to Kendall anymore
How has Labour fallen so far on compassion
No politics then, just music, ofcourse. It's just the wokies messing it up, now!
BREAKING: Avon and Somerset Police launch criminal investigation into sets by Kneecap and Bob Vylan at Glastonbury.
“We have received a large amount of contact…from people across the world” they say, and “There is absolutely no place in society for hate.”
Footballer Paul Gascoigne has arrived at scene saying he is a friend of the Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill: Second Reading
You have a right to free speech; I have a right to act in response to what it is you say. And vice versa.
Tolerance of free speech is not remotely the same as respect for opinions uttered.
Mother of protester says trial wait 'outrageous'
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy3zw018jno
A reckon BBC Verify needs to get on the case.
Quids in really.
The other side of the this is the £150 billion (raising to £180 billion by 2029) or so that goes on pensioners can't and won't be touched - pensioners are a growing segment of the electorate and more importantly they vote so you don't want to antagonise them too much. Then there's the £87 billion on Universal Credit.
Do I think Starmer and Kendall are right? No, but there's a wider issue about the cost of welfare which does need to be tackled as it would be is Sunak were still Prime Minister and the alternative to closing down all the options is to let the deficit rise - unless, of course, we're going to raise taxes and cut defence perhaps.
I hеard you want your country back
Ha! Shut the fuck up
on repeat for 3 minutes?
Even RATM who are a lot less nuanced, the lyrics have a fair bit more substance and Tom Morello is a genius on the guitar (so many people think all the noises you hear on the tracks are samples, when it is him).
I seemed to remember for a while Mark Chadwick (lead singer of the Levellers) did stuff like The Wright Stuff for a few years and again was quite nuanced in his opinions.
Pity their two p/t spinners who'll spend the next 2 days trying to get some turn with that burgundy tennis ball.
And Medvedev already out.
It was often political, but very peaceful in message. The driving forces were the idealists like Andrew Kerr and Arabella Churchill, and the annual peace convoy to Stonehenge.
That really isn't what their constitution has to say about individual rights.
See also, for example, due process.
It is however staggeringly hypocritical to do this while threatening European officials over their insufficient commitment to free speech.