I’m glad you mentioned this. IBM fully understood that the microcomputer was coming, but they failed to anticipate how large the market would be and how cost sensitive it was. It was buying in hardware and software that worked, no trying to build a cheaper minicomputer. IBM had similar issues with PS/2, MCA and OS/2. PowerPC again made some of the same mistakes. Almost all minicomputer companies also failed to deal with the microcomputer revolution. The workstation guys got clobbered too.
I've always found it interesting that IBM positioned the original 5150 PC as fairly high-end as microcomputers went, but the underlying design was actually quite basic and could have been sold for much less. They could have easily undercut the Apple II, for example, but decided they could not be seen to be competing with upstarts.
How different things would have been if IBM was more concerned about sales than the company's image.
GB News have 80,000 viewers on average and that's the most watched news service?
I met a girl yesterday who's an influencer who models and sells lingerie online and she has 220,000 followers.
I'm surprised GB News on those figures can keep running
They've been bleeding money since launch, but have deep-pocketed backers. A broadcast news channel is mostly a vanity project now.
In the same reports that talked about viewership said they are now break even.
However, from the get go it was obviously there is no massive pot of gold like in the US for tv news, it has never got massive viewership outside those 30 mins primetime slots on BBC / ITV. We aren't like the US were Fox can get 3 million viewers for a late night satire show.
The big loser in all this is Sky News, they are getting absolutely hammered.
Gutfeld’s show is aimed straight at the Colberts and Fallons, and beats them all in the ratings.
There’s only two American late-night shows really worth watching these days, Gutfeld and Bill Maher, who understand that the first rule of comedy is that it has to be funny, and aren’t afraid to go after their own side when justified. The rest are all totally one-sided propagandists, working a time slot when most people want to have a laugh and disconnect from the world.
This is true and also rather sad, because Stephen Colbert is genuinely very funny, and used to be hysterical when he was "in character" as a rightwing loon. Plus he wasn't afraid to attack the Democratic left. Now he's a pitiful Woke shadow of what was, and the show has been shuttered
Damn shame
I'm fairly sure he'll shrug off your (some might say pitiful anti-woke obsessed) judgment.
He seems pretty bitter about his show getting cancelled while CBS just spent $1bn on securing South Park rights for another 5 years.
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
STP was far better at social commentary than most of those who make a career out of it.
Acyn @Acyn · 18m Watters: You know how this ends? Sydney Sweeney is going to marry Barron Trump and it's going to create the greatest political dynasty in American history.
GB News have 80,000 viewers on average and that's the most watched news service?
I met a girl yesterday who's an influencer who models and sells lingerie online and she has 220,000 followers.
I'm surprised GB News on those figures can keep running
They've been bleeding money since launch, but have deep-pocketed backers. A broadcast news channel is mostly a vanity project now.
In the same reports that talked about viewership said they are now break even.
However, from the get go it was obviously there is no massive pot of gold like in the US for tv news, it has never got massive viewership outside those 30 mins primetime slots on BBC / ITV. We aren't like the US were Fox can get 3 million viewers for a late night satire show.
The big loser in all this is Sky News, they are getting absolutely hammered.
Gutfeld’s show is aimed straight at the Colberts and Fallons, and beats them all in the ratings.
There’s only two American late-night shows really worth watching these days, Gutfeld and Bill Maher, who understand that the first rule of comedy is that it has to be funny, and aren’t afraid to go after their own side when justified. The rest are all totally one-sided propagandists, working a time slot when most people want to have a laugh and disconnect from the world.
This is true and also rather sad, because Stephen Colbert is genuinely very funny, and used to be hysterical when he was "in character" as a rightwing loon. Plus he wasn't afraid to attack the Democratic left. Now he's a pitiful Woke shadow of what was, and the show has been shuttered
Damn shame
I'm fairly sure he'll shrug off your (some might say pitiful anti-woke obsessed) judgment.
OK boomer
lol. You're pretty outdated yourself.
That was the gag
Incidentally, today I got the train from Gatwick to St Pancras, Thameslink (I only realised this existed a year ago, making Gatwick vastly easier). On the way it stopped at Blackfriars, OVER the Thames, where you get this stupendous view of the City, and Borough, and the Shard, with Canary Wharf behind it. Endless towers and Wren churches, ancient cathedrals and skyscrapers, then forests of more towers, and 2000 years of history, Roman walls to shimmering cyberprisms
It is gob-smacking. If you don't know London, it must be overwhelming. It's not lyrically, harmoniously beautiful like Paris, nor is it bracingly and excitingly lofty like New York City, but it is arguably MORE epic than both: the collision of history and modernity, beauty and squalor, power and fragility, empire and melancholy, slums and wealth, all under a sternly black and stormy summer sky. If Britain really is about to fall apart and die, let us note that we made quite the town, with our unexampled capital city, on this humble green archipelago
Also worth mentioning that the snail's pace at which that train proceeds from about a mile before London Bridge all the way to St Pancras gives the traveller an abundance of time to enjoy the views.
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
Nice chart from Morgan Stanley. I hadn't realised quite how large the nonfarm payroll data revisions for April and May were - the largest downward change, ex-Covid, since 1979.
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
We shouldn't be unreasonably gloomy.
We're stagnating, maybe even growing a little, but should be doing far, far better.
We're not declining in absolute terms, despite our government's best efforts.
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
There are some old Asimov "sci-fi" stories which ring ever more true on the relative balance between continents as time has gone by. Never mind the whole MultiVac aspect.
Google does not reveal if she's related to Danny John-Jules, formerly of Red Dwarf and Death in Paradise - and with his own conviction related to anger against foreigners. But it's a rare surname.
"Brent Magistrates' Court heard that John-Jules shouted and swore at Jan Lisiecki and his son Jaroslaw when they would not accept his recycling bin as it contained items they did not collect.
The actor kicked the container, kicked Mr Lisiecki Snr on the leg, punched his son and spat in his son's face, the court heard.
Jan Lisiecki was also punched and hurt his head as he fell against the metal handles of the lorry."
Google does not reveal if she's related to Danny John-Jules, formerly of Red Dwarf and Death in Paradise - and with his own conviction related to anger against foreigners. But it's a rare surname.
"Brent Magistrates' Court heard that John-Jules shouted and swore at Jan Lisiecki and his son Jaroslaw when they would not accept his recycling bin as it contained items they did not collect.
The actor kicked the container, kicked Mr Lisiecki Snr on the leg, punched his son and spat in his son's face, the court heard.
Jan Lisiecki was also punched and hurt his head as he fell against the metal handles of the lorry."
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Illinois being another state where the Dems have gerrymandered the district boundaries.
The GOP are by far the worst at gerrymandering and the Dems have given up trying to be fair and they no longer have a choice but to fight fire with fire .
BBC not having a lot of luck with their popular "safe" shows at the moment. We have n word rapping and willy waving on Master Chef, allegedly heavy snowfall on strictly and now this.
The UK will begin detaining people who arrive on small boats and returning some to France “within days” after the EU gave the green light to a deal agreed with the French president, Emmanuel Macron.
The treaty between France and the UK will allow the Home Office to return some asylum seekers back across the Channel for the first time in exchange for accepting others directly from France via a safe route.
Those who have crossed the Channel to the UK using small boats will become inadmissible for safe routes, according to the terms of the treaty. About 50 people a week are expected to be returned during the pilot of the so-called “one in, one out” scheme.
Surely a demonstration of assimilation into British society that should warm the cockles of any Reform voters heart?
“Bloody immigrants, they’re even taking over the racism. Time was you went down the Dog & Duck for some proper Saloon Bar racism. Cost a bit, but it was proper racism. These days they’re doing dodgy cheap foreign racism on street corners.”
Tucker Carlson asks if Israel can hit a suspect from 30,000 feet how can they not see a church with a huge cross on the front? Tucker has had a damacene conversion somewhere along the line. I can see why he gets the big bucks
Another answer, of course, is that he's a paid Russian shill. As Russia doesn't like what happened to its ally Iran by Israel, then Carlson is suddenly against the murder of civilians by Israel. The murder of Ukrainian civilians is, of course, still a-okay in his book.
(Yes, I do realise you were very much tongue in cheek, but I couldn't miss an opportunity to call Carlson a grade A shit.)
More likely this is a standard MAGA line from Tucker Carlson. You can imagine President Trump saying something like it. They condemn all war, especially where America is involved. Hmm. Trump, Carlson, Jeremy Corbyn – what an unholy trio, yet somehow on the side of the angels.
Perhaps, but there condemnation always seems to involve the side the Russians don't like should just surrender to stop the killing. Ukraine should just surrender to stop being killed (the fact if Ukraine surrendered, the killing would actually increase is, of course, ignored). Israel should stop killing Palestinians because Russia doesn't like Israel.
No thought that Russia could just withdraw. Ukraine isn't launching a counteroffensive to Moscow.
Tucker Carlson asks if Israel can hit a suspect from 30,000 feet how can they not see a church with a huge cross on the front? Tucker has had a damacene conversion somewhere along the line. I can see why he gets the big bucks
Another answer, of course, is that he's a paid Russian shill. As Russia doesn't like what happened to its ally Iran by Israel, then Carlson is suddenly against the murder of civilians by Israel. The murder of Ukrainian civilians is, of course, still a-okay in his book.
(Yes, I do realise you were very much tongue in cheek, but I couldn't miss an opportunity to call Carlson a grade A shit.)
More likely this is a standard MAGA line from Tucker Carlson. You can imagine President Trump saying something like it. They condemn all war, especially where America is involved. Hmm. Trump, Carlson, Jeremy Corbyn – what an unholy trio, yet somehow on the side of the angels.
Perhaps, but there condemnation always seems to involve the side the Russians don't like should just surrender to stop the killing. Ukraine should just surrender to stop being killed (the fact if Ukraine surrendered, the killing would actually increase is, of course, ignored). Israel should stop killing Palestinians because Russia doesn't like Israel.
No thought that Russia could just withdraw. Ukraine isn't launching a counteroffensive to Moscow.
President Trump is currently ramping up pressure on Russia with the announcement on US submarine movements and the threat of secondary tariffs on countries that move or buy Russian oil, which is causing concern in India.
I do not know Russia does not like Israel which has traditionally been a friendly country if not an ally, but do recall Israel refused to allow Iron Dome air defence systems to be sent to Ukraine.
The history of cricket in art is up for sale – this is why it will go at a loss One of the finest cricket-themed art collections in the world is only estimated to fetch £40,000 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/art/artists/history-cricket/ (£££)
Basically sporting art has fallen out of bed, so much so that Christie's no longer bothers with it. The link to the auction for PBers who want to bid or just look at pictures is given at the top of this post.
Just when you think Miss Sweeney can't get any more attractive it turns out she's a conservative. Hot girls for Trump vs blue haired blobs for Harris indeed.
Taylor Swift supported Harris, didn't she?
No she memorably didn't even after many requests from the Harris camp for an endorsement and an appearance. Either way Sydney Sweeney is levels above Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift is the English teacher you fancied in sixth form, Sydney Sweeney is the girl in the magazine you daydreamed about.
On the other hand, Ms Swift is also a self made billionaire.
Personally, I think Ms Robbie would be my favorite. I have no idea of her politics. And don't really care.
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Don’t arrest warrants require a crime?
It is estimated that the average American commits two or three felonies a day. The charm of American law is that its statutes are so widely and badly drafted is that you can always find something to charge someone with.
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Don’t arrest warrants require a crime?
It is estimated that the average American commits two or three felonies a day. The charm of American law is that its statutes are so widely and badly drafted is that you can always find something to charge someone with.
Turns out it’s not an arrest warrant - the GOP are making sh1t up.
The Serjeant at Arms has the right to “arrest” any representatives not in attendance and “bring them to the house”.
The UK will begin detaining people who arrive on small boats and returning some to France “within days” after the EU gave the green light to a deal agreed with the French president, Emmanuel Macron.
The treaty between France and the UK will allow the Home Office to return some asylum seekers back across the Channel for the first time in exchange for accepting others directly from France via a safe route.
Those who have crossed the Channel to the UK using small boats will become inadmissible for safe routes, according to the terms of the treaty. About 50 people a week are expected to be returned during the pilot of the so-called “one in, one out” scheme.
50 a week isn't much. It would need to be almost all of them to stop it and, even then, it might simply increase overall asylum numbers via the "safe" route.
No-one wants to get on a small boat if they don't have to.
It's actually about "Motability", not "The Benefits System". He probably does not wish to rip up his own pension and concessionary travel pass, perhaps. It reads like his main research was in the Daily Mail, with a bit of (somewhat accurate) history of motability, around it seeming "Fair enough. don't you think."
Well, if it's "fair enough" he should either be supporting or coming up with some sensible thought. He talks about "free cars", yet I don't see how £65 a week going to pay for a car that would otherwise be available to spend for other things is "free". If there's an (alleged) vulnerabilty to fraud, then deal with the fraud. He even acknowledges that the scheme is far more cost effective than individual purchases.
IMO the problem there is that Matthew Parris hasn't got a clue about what he wants to do, or why he wants to do it. It's an inchoate howl from a rich and able-bodied 75 year old living in a large property-with-land in a desirable remote Derbyshire village, a holiday home in Spain and an apartment in Limehouse, and a large pension. When he abandoned the Conservative Party in 2019 he termed it "the nasty party", and yet here we are.
He's done these pieces before. I took against him when he wrote about the need to tie piano wire across country lanes at neck height back at Christmas 2007 to decapitate cyclists, then hid behind 'it was a joke and I was being funny'. That was at a time when such offences were not unusual. He did apologise later, but imo he has very little judgement.
In this case he needs to exercise his little grey cells. He could suggest a decent network of mobility tracks and inclusive residents parking, which would remove many of the need for a car - but he'd probably write a ranting column about that too.
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
But it’s still relatively.,er..relative. If a pair of boots cost £500+ it’s still worthwhile. Agree that it’s not worth it with eg a pair of M&S made in India specials, you might as well buy a new pair. Money aside, as usual I think it’s largely a matter of aesthetics; Northampton made veldtschoen look good as they age, cheap high street Jobs not so much (see also housing).
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
If you want to dump goods, people, drugs, gangsters etc, you do it in a country where there is less enforcement as the rule of law depends on how committed you are to enforcing those rules. The last 14 years is coming back to haunt us.
Acyn @Acyn · 18m Watters: You know how this ends? Sydney Sweeney is going to marry Barron Trump and it's going to create the greatest political dynasty in American history.
Meanwhile over in the US, Trump's sons are getting into the manufacturing business to take advantage of government grants. Wonder if there are 'chinese walls' in the White House.
Google does not reveal if she's related to Danny John-Jules, formerly of Red Dwarf and Death in Paradise - and with his own conviction related to anger against foreigners. But it's a rare surname.
"Brent Magistrates' Court heard that John-Jules shouted and swore at Jan Lisiecki and his son Jaroslaw when they would not accept his recycling bin as it contained items they did not collect.
The actor kicked the container, kicked Mr Lisiecki Snr on the leg, punched his son and spat in his son's face, the court heard.
Jan Lisiecki was also punched and hurt his head as he fell against the metal handles of the lorry."
That psychological mechanism sounds like pavement parking (and other similars).
The problem is not the questioning, it is the questioning of perceived personal entitlement to do X.
GB News have 80,000 viewers on average and that's the most watched news service?
I met a girl yesterday who's an influencer who models and sells lingerie online and she has 220,000 followers.
I'm surprised GB News on those figures can keep running
They've been bleeding money since launch, but have deep-pocketed backers. A broadcast news channel is mostly a vanity project now.
In the same reports that talked about viewership said they are now break even.
However, from the get go it was obviously there is no massive pot of gold like in the US for tv news, it has never got massive viewership outside those 30 mins primetime slots on BBC / ITV. We aren't like the US were Fox can get 3 million viewers for a late night satire show.
The big loser in all this is Sky News, they are getting absolutely hammered.
Gutfeld’s show is aimed straight at the Colberts and Fallons, and beats them all in the ratings.
There’s only two American late-night shows really worth watching these days, Gutfeld and Bill Maher, who understand that the first rule of comedy is that it has to be funny, and aren’t afraid to go after their own side when justified. The rest are all totally one-sided propagandists, working a time slot when most people want to have a laugh and disconnect from the world.
This is true and also rather sad, because Stephen Colbert is genuinely very funny, and used to be hysterical when he was "in character" as a rightwing loon. Plus he wasn't afraid to attack the Democratic left. Now he's a pitiful Woke shadow of what was, and the show has been shuttered
Damn shame
I'm fairly sure he'll shrug off your (some might say pitiful anti-woke obsessed) judgment.
He seems pretty bitter about his show getting cancelled while CBS just spent $1bn on securing South Park rights for another 5 years.
If you research the background to the Paramount Skydance deal, the out of court $16m vexatious litigation payout to Trump over the easily defendable lawsuit against 60 minutes, for a positive Harris edit, that it remains the most highly viewed late night show, the fact that up until three months ago the VPs at CBS were making positive sounds regarding a new contract for Colbert.
Now I might like a good conspiracy theory but this one has bells and whistles on it. It is atactic straight out of the authoritarian playbook. Control the means of propaganda, control the media. A very unwelcome precedent has been set.
The history of cricket in art is up for sale – this is why it will go at a loss One of the finest cricket-themed art collections in the world is only estimated to fetch £40,000 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/art/artists/history-cricket/ (£££)
Basically sporting art has fallen out of bed, so much so that Christie's no longer bothers with it. The link to the auction for PBers who want to bid or just look at pictures is given at the top of this post.
I'd expect this to be driven partly by Indian money, perhaps?
It's quite nice to have a Government that actually governs for once, whatever the rhetoric around Mr Starmer , or if like me you think he dithers a bit too much.
Google does not reveal if she's related to Danny John-Jules, formerly of Red Dwarf and Death in Paradise - and with his own conviction related to anger against foreigners. But it's a rare surname.
"Brent Magistrates' Court heard that John-Jules shouted and swore at Jan Lisiecki and his son Jaroslaw when they would not accept his recycling bin as it contained items they did not collect.
The actor kicked the container, kicked Mr Lisiecki Snr on the leg, punched his son and spat in his son's face, the court heard.
Jan Lisiecki was also punched and hurt his head as he fell against the metal handles of the lorry."
That psychological mechanism sounds like pavement parking (and other similars).
The problem is not the questioning, it is the questioning of perceived personal entitlement to do X.
On the specific issue of recycling which does seem to cause more than its fair share of disputes, it might be better to rely on separation at the recycling centre than at collection (especially if you believe the conspiracy theories that separate bins are mixed together in the lorries anyway). It would avoid these disputes for a start. In addition, some of the rules seem quite arbitrary: this sort of glass but not that sort of glass, for instance. Some contamination by food is acceptable but not too much (by whose guesswork?).
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
But it’s still relatively.,er..relative. If a pair of boots cost £500+ it’s still worthwhile. Agree that it’s not worth it with eg a pair of M&S made in India specials, you might as well buy a new pair. Money aside, as usual I think it’s largely a matter of aesthetics; Northampton made veldtschoen look good as they age, cheap high street Jobs not so much (see also housing).
The other thing that makes Vimes boots theory obsolete is that we rarely wear boots or clothes until they wear out. I have been editing my wardrobe recently and have cleared out a couple of bags of shoes and another couple of bags of clothes. A few frayed shirts went in the bin, but the rest to charity collection, not because they were worn out but rather because they no longer fit or that I no longer wear them due to changed taste and style. I used to wear a suit every day, but since covid work attire has become less formal for example.
I do tend to buy reasonably good quality, but mostly because I can afford to dress well and enjoy doing so. Women in particular notice these things, as ZZ Top famously sung "Every girl crazy about a sharp dressed man"
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Does it need a quorum to do that?
Just asking ...
No, but it needs a quorum to remove them from the legislature. So if he tries to remove them all, paradoxically he will be unable to do so...
Since Republican appointed judges have made it clear they consider people have a right to be absent from sessions to deny a quorum under the state's constitution, he's also acting unconstitutionally by demanding their arrest.
But this is, of course, all performative. The redistricting, however, is not.
Greg Abbott is a genuinely nasty man, and shows the malaise in the Republican Party goes far beyond Trump and his coterie in Washington.
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Does it need a quorum to do that?
Just asking ...
I remember a student union meeting once where a quorum call was made, and the meeting was precisely quorate. At which point a couple of students ostentatiously walked out, just for the lolz.
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Does it need a quorum to do that?
Just asking ...
No, but it needs a quorum to remove them from the legislature. So if he tries to remove them all, paradoxically he will be unable to do so...
Since Republican appointed judges have made it clear they consider people have a right to be absent from sessions to deny a quorum under the state's constitution, he's also acting unconstitutionally by demanding their arrest.
But this is, of course, all performative. The redistricting, however, is not.
Greg Abbott is a genuinely nasty man, and shows the malaise in the Republican Party goes far beyond Trump and his coterie in Washington.
America is now a banana republic run by a kleptocracy and headed by a mad king. It still has a lot of momentum, so not yet a failed state, but surely just a matter of time.
Despite our naval gazing we are not so unfortunate, at least not until Reform take over and trash our constitution via their Fuhrerprinzip.
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Does it need a quorum to do that?
Just asking ...
No, but it needs a quorum to remove them from the legislature. So if he tries to remove them all, paradoxically he will be unable to do so...
Since Republican appointed judges have made it clear they consider people have a right to be absent from sessions to deny a quorum under the state's constitution, he's also acting unconstitutionally by demanding their arrest.
But this is, of course, all performative. The redistricting, however, is not.
Greg Abbott is a genuinely nasty man, and shows the malaise in the Republican Party goes far beyond Trump and his coterie in Washington.
America is now a banana republic run by a kleptocracy and headed by a mad king. It still has a lot of momentum, so not yet a failed state, but surely just a matter of time.
Despite our naval gazing we are not so unfortunate, at least not until Reform take over and trash our constitution via their Fuhrerprinzip.
The Mad King did as he liked. Did your uncle ever tell you what happened to him?
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Does it need a quorum to do that?
Just asking ...
I remember a student union meeting once where a quorum call was made, and the meeting was precisely quorate. At which point a couple of students ostentatiously walked out, just for the lolz.
I remember an SU meeting where the Christian Union ran a campaign, and got an anti-abortion vote passed, which mandated the Exec to go to NUS conference and vote against abortion ...
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
But it’s still relatively.,er..relative. If a pair of boots cost £500+ it’s still worthwhile. Agree that it’s not worth it with eg a pair of M&S made in India specials, you might as well buy a new pair. Money aside, as usual I think it’s largely a matter of aesthetics; Northampton made veldtschoen look good as they age, cheap high street Jobs not so much (see also housing).
The other thing that makes Vimes boots theory obsolete is that we rarely wear boots or clothes until they wear out. I have been editing my wardrobe recently and have cleared out a couple of bags of shoes and another couple of bags of clothes. A few frayed shirts went in the bin, but the rest to charity collection, not because they were worn out but rather because they no longer fit or that I no longer wear them due to changed taste and style. I used to wear a suit every day, but since covid work attire has become less formal for example.
I do tend to buy reasonably good quality, but mostly because I can afford to dress well and enjoy doing so. Women in particular notice these things, as ZZ Top famously sung "Every girl crazy about a sharp dressed man"
Good morning, everyone.
I tend to only replace boots when they really need it (either falling apart or waterproofing goes).
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
But it’s still relatively.,er..relative. If a pair of boots cost £500+ it’s still worthwhile. Agree that it’s not worth it with eg a pair of M&S made in India specials, you might as well buy a new pair. Money aside, as usual I think it’s largely a matter of aesthetics; Northampton made veldtschoen look good as they age, cheap high street Jobs not so much (see also housing).
The other thing that makes Vimes boots theory obsolete is that we rarely wear boots or clothes until they wear out. I have been editing my wardrobe recently and have cleared out a couple of bags of shoes and another couple of bags of clothes. A few frayed shirts went in the bin, but the rest to charity collection, not because they were worn out but rather because they no longer fit or that I no longer wear them due to changed taste and style. I used to wear a suit every day, but since covid work attire has become less formal for example.
I do tend to buy reasonably good quality, but mostly because I can afford to dress well and enjoy doing so. Women in particular notice these things, as ZZ Top famously sung "Every girl crazy about a sharp dressed man"
Good morning, everyone.
I tend to only replace boots when they really need it (either falling apart or waterproofing goes).
I have a pair of shoes I bought for my first job in April 2003. Thrice resoled. Still wear them. Cost £57 with a bit of a discount but resoling for £40 was cheaper by far than replacing with similar quality.
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
But it’s still relatively.,er..relative. If a pair of boots cost £500+ it’s still worthwhile. Agree that it’s not worth it with eg a pair of M&S made in India specials, you might as well buy a new pair. Money aside, as usual I think it’s largely a matter of aesthetics; Northampton made veldtschoen look good as they age, cheap high street Jobs not so much (see also housing).
The other thing that makes Vimes boots theory obsolete is that we rarely wear boots or clothes until they wear out. I have been editing my wardrobe recently and have cleared out a couple of bags of shoes and another couple of bags of clothes. A few frayed shirts went in the bin, but the rest to charity collection, not because they were worn out but rather because they no longer fit or that I no longer wear them due to changed taste and style. I used to wear a suit every day, but since covid work attire has become less formal for example.
I do tend to buy reasonably good quality, but mostly because I can afford to dress well and enjoy doing so. Women in particular notice these things, as ZZ Top famously sung "Every girl crazy about a sharp dressed man"
Good morning, everyone.
I tend to only replace boots when they really need it (either falling apart or waterproofing goes).
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
But it’s still relatively.,er..relative. If a pair of boots cost £500+ it’s still worthwhile. Agree that it’s not worth it with eg a pair of M&S made in India specials, you might as well buy a new pair. Money aside, as usual I think it’s largely a matter of aesthetics; Northampton made veldtschoen look good as they age, cheap high street Jobs not so much (see also housing).
The other thing that makes Vimes boots theory obsolete is that we rarely wear boots or clothes until they wear out. I have been editing my wardrobe recently and have cleared out a couple of bags of shoes and another couple of bags of clothes. A few frayed shirts went in the bin, but the rest to charity collection, not because they were worn out but rather because they no longer fit or that I no longer wear them due to changed taste and style. I used to wear a suit every day, but since covid work attire has become less formal for example.
I do tend to buy reasonably good quality, but mostly because I can afford to dress well and enjoy doing so. Women in particular notice these things, as ZZ Top famously sung "Every girl crazy about a sharp dressed man"
Good morning, everyone.
I tend to only replace boots when they really need it (either falling apart or waterproofing goes).
I have a pair of shoes I bought for my first job in April 2003. Thrice resoled. Still wear them. Cost £57 with a bit of a discount but resoling for £40 was cheaper by far than replacing with similar quality.
Just as an actor was described as "having a great face for radio" PB is a safe space for unfashionable men 😀
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Illinois being another state where the Dems have gerrymandered the district boundaries.
The GOP are by far the worst at gerrymandering and the Dems have given up trying to be fair and they no longer have a choice but to fight fire with fire .
So you're saying that Illinois and New York gerrymandering their districts in favour of the Dems was an allowable pre-emptive strike against the threat of Texas doing the same in favour of the GOP ? LOL.
Altogether now:
Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad
Both sides are as bad as each other, both parties are unfit to be in power.
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Illinois being another state where the Dems have gerrymandered the district boundaries.
The GOP are by far the worst at gerrymandering and the Dems have given up trying to be fair and they no longer have a choice but to fight fire with fire .
So you're saying that Illinois and New York gerrymandering their districts in favour of the Dems was an allowable pre-emptive strike against the threat of Texas doing the same in favour of the GOP ? LOL.
Altogether now:
Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad
Both sides are as bad as each other, both parties are unfit to be in power.
And yet the example we saw was little different from the old constituency of York Outer (which was a doughnut around York Inner (City of York). ..
The key is to be well-groomed, smelling pleasant, wearing well-fitting clothes for your body frame, and nice, smart, clean shoes.
The rest is a question of taste/style, but I know few people (especially ladies) who appreciate bad grooming, BO, terrible and badly fitting clothes, or awful shoes, even if many men haven't figured this out yet.
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
But it’s still relatively.,er..relative. If a pair of boots cost £500+ it’s still worthwhile. Agree that it’s not worth it with eg a pair of M&S made in India specials, you might as well buy a new pair. Money aside, as usual I think it’s largely a matter of aesthetics; Northampton made veldtschoen look good as they age, cheap high street Jobs not so much (see also housing).
The other thing that makes Vimes boots theory obsolete is that we rarely wear boots or clothes until they wear out. I have been editing my wardrobe recently and have cleared out a couple of bags of shoes and another couple of bags of clothes. A few frayed shirts went in the bin, but the rest to charity collection, not because they were worn out but rather because they no longer fit or that I no longer wear them due to changed taste and style. I used to wear a suit every day, but since covid work attire has become less formal for example.
I do tend to buy reasonably good quality, but mostly because I can afford to dress well and enjoy doing so. Women in particular notice these things, as ZZ Top famously sung "Every girl crazy about a sharp dressed man"
Good morning, everyone.
I tend to only replace boots when they really need it (either falling apart or waterproofing goes).
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
But it’s still relatively.,er..relative. If a pair of boots cost £500+ it’s still worthwhile. Agree that it’s not worth it with eg a pair of M&S made in India specials, you might as well buy a new pair. Money aside, as usual I think it’s largely a matter of aesthetics; Northampton made veldtschoen look good as they age, cheap high street Jobs not so much (see also housing).
The other thing that makes Vimes boots theory obsolete is that we rarely wear boots or clothes until they wear out. I have been editing my wardrobe recently and have cleared out a couple of bags of shoes and another couple of bags of clothes. A few frayed shirts went in the bin, but the rest to charity collection, not because they were worn out but rather because they no longer fit or that I no longer wear them due to changed taste and style. I used to wear a suit every day, but since covid work attire has become less formal for example.
I do tend to buy reasonably good quality, but mostly because I can afford to dress well and enjoy doing so. Women in particular notice these things, as ZZ Top famously sung "Every girl crazy about a sharp dressed man"
Good morning, everyone.
I tend to only replace boots when they really need it (either falling apart or waterproofing goes).
I have a pair of shoes I bought for my first job in April 2003. Thrice resoled. Still wear them. Cost £57 with a bit of a discount but resoling for £40 was cheaper by far than replacing with similar quality.
Just as an actor was described as "having a great face for radio" PB is a safe space for unfashionable men 😀
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
Could you take a pic of the stated standards applied to e-bike batteries. What certification process do they go through and is it self-certified or independent test house. Got rid of my ebike a few months ago so I would have checked myself.
But I do have some skin in this game as we bought our new grandson an e-pram. The pram will provide assist at certain speeds. We'd like to know the pram is safe. (It's weird watch the pram move back and forwards on one setting. It's like watching the Omen.)
Checking as far as I can easily, these seem to be like E-Scooters, and that would make it a "Personal Light Electric Vehicle - PLEV", AFAICS. That is, outside identified categories.
I think that would make them illegal and potentially subject to confiscation if noticed by police. And you would need a driving license, type approval etc.
But that says nothing about whether they are safe or not. For that I would ask if they are compliant to the BS-EN standard mentioned yesterday, which covers the electrical system. And I would want a removable battery that I can keep separate whilst it is at home, and charge away from the pram, and to be self-contained away from the baby whilst it is in the pram.
Golden Rule One would be "do not charge with the baby in the pram".
Personally I'd keep it in the hard-floored conservatory or porch or garage, and only have the baby in it when in use, and transport the battery separated where I can see it for any distance in eg a car and not in the middle of a boot of "stuff".
More may be known by specialist pram shops, maybe in Which reports etc.
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Illinois being another state where the Dems have gerrymandered the district boundaries.
The GOP are by far the worst at gerrymandering and the Dems have given up trying to be fair and they no longer have a choice but to fight fire with fire .
So you're saying that Illinois and New York gerrymandering their districts in favour of the Dems was an allowable pre-emptive strike against the threat of Texas doing the same in favour of the GOP ? LOL.
Altogether now:
Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad
Both sides are as bad as each other, both parties are unfit to be in power.
That last para is a pure assumption, unless evidence is supplied.
Meanwhile over in the US, Trump's sons are getting into the manufacturing business to take advantage of government grants. Wonder if there are 'chinese walls' in the White House.
The key is to be well-groomed, smelling pleasant, wearing well-fitting clothes for your body frame, and nice, smart, clean shoes.
The rest is a question of taste/style, but I know few people (especially ladies) who appreciate bad grooming, BO, terrible and badly fitting clothes, or awful shoes, even if many men haven't figured this out yet.
Yes, I agree on these basics, but a certain amount of aesthetics are needed too, as clothes make statement about you whether you want them to or not.
F1: rambling about Hungary, including Leclerc's woe, Norris starting badly and being ironically aided by the one-stop it forced him into, and great points for Aston Martin and Bortoleto.
Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump · 35m BREAKING: Texas Democrats have blocked a redistricting vote by breaking quorum.
The Texas House has voted to issue arrest warrants for the Dem lawmakers who fled to Illinois to prevent the vote.
Illinois being another state where the Dems have gerrymandered the district boundaries.
American Gerrymandering is hilarious to see in practice, there’s some totally mad borders caused mostly by the politicians drawing the lines themselves.
US States all need something like the UK Boundary Commissions, I think that only about three of them do, with the rest some form of political interference.
A friend, living in a 5th storey council flat, has 2 folding e-cycles for mobility, an e-Brompton and a Gocycle; both are long established British brands. Her Council have just totally banned all e-scooter and e-bike batteries from the lifts.
Their stance is absolute, and to cite safety concerns and their legal duty to residents i.e. that they could go to prison if they don't take appropriate steps and there's a fire caused by an e-battery. Laptop batteries have not been banned.
It's a strange one with lots of angles. Standards exist. Fires would start when plugged in and charging in the main, surely? And AFAIK there are no stats collected distinguishing laptop batteries from e-bike batteries (does anyone know?) - there is not much difference, so how is the policy justified?
A totally separate angle is cycle storage as part of the residents parking for the block.
And calls for regulation of batteries have been being made consistently for a number of years. This is what happens when appropriate regulation is not done at the appropriate time.
The reason that they have banned e-bike batteries and not laptops, is volume of material. Same on airlines. A laptop battery letting go* is a small danger. An e-bike battery can threaten a whole building. Such fires have already happened and caused massive amounts of damage.
Fires are primarily during charging - but can happen after damage and are often time delayed from the damage - hours later.
After Grenfell, no one is going to take a chance. If they don't ban them and there is a fire, then they would be answering question in the dock. And the government el al will hang them out to dry - a useful scapegoat.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits.
Personally, I would go for staggering fines for importing, possession and use of dangerous batteries. Scaled by the capacity of the battery. Plus criminal liability.
We actually have such rules for dangerous ICEs - but it's a non-existent problem, since the cheapest and worst petrol car conforms to all the regulations about safety with petrol. Petrol contains more energy per kilo than TNT.....
*Increasing problem - people are buying ancient laptops, second hand and replacing the batteries with cheap shite from guess where. There is a whole market in replacement batteries for laptops going back a decade or more.
(Not having a go at you; I'm just exploring the details.)
For me that doesn't convince. It's not purely about capacity and fire risk. It's more broad brush than that.
The 20 mile range battery on my Axxon Rides E-folder is 180Wh. That is exactly the same size as batteries for power tools I have. For my E-Brompton I have batteries of size (checks) 90Wh and 180Wh, the former specced to go on an airline.
Apple currently supply laptop batteries of 100Wh.
Electric wheelchair lithium batteries go from ~250Wh to ~700Wh, including those available on Motability. The airline limit for those is 300Wh.
If the risk profile was so stark electric wheelchair batteries would be banned or required to be small; as far as I know they are not banned or size limited.
I'm not sure that we can say much around "there have already been fires" to justify bans, when data about which categories of battery caused how many fires has just not been collected. The alleged data is probably hearsay.
To me this feels like lazy and easy decisions that do not reflect actual risk.
Regulating the batteries would require strict import control. Which would upset China and all the poorer people using cheap e-bike kits. I think this is important. Where are all these cheap batteries kept? We regulate other things; of course we can regulate these.
Campaign groups in this area need to point the finger at the actual problem, which is cheap and substandard Chinese imports.
HMRC and Trading Standards need to up their game, because it’s not Brompton e-bikes and Apple laptops causing house fires. There need to be businesses shut down and people prosecuted for the sale and import of these incendiary devices. Perhaps then there will be less of an aversion to large batteries in general.
At the moment *my* campaign group are looking for case studies as evidence of Disabled people facing mobility difficulties due to unreasonable restriction of Li-ion battery powered devices, or, as they elucidate it:
We know lots of people are facing problems including restricting their own mobility aid choices because of Li-ion battery issues and outdated "invalid carriage" laws, but because people are completely understandably worried about enforcement, or don't realise what the current laws actually are, it's hard to get case studies!
The context is that the DFT are currently consulting directly at Ministerial level, and this is one issue that my group wants to raise.
At present I'm putting together some words to put in more public fora than the Campaign Network itself; I suspect this is like so many other things - it just gets accepted as an inevitable imposition (see "unlawful obstructions on footpaths").
What's your idea for the mitigation of fire risk?
I need to distinguish here between my view, and the organisation's policy position. This is my personal view.
My first target for change would be acceptance of known safe batteries - that is to British (or whatever) Standard, and from known good brands, used by disabled people. We certify mobility scooters and power wheelchairs with Lithium Ion batteries (some are even on Motability) ; so we can do it for mobility aids which are not currently in the "formally recognised" bucket, such as sit-down scooters and clip on e-assist handcycles. That's not really a big change, and you can see how it ties in to the existing .. er .. process, rather than challenging it.
I'd push it further in some directions - eg certified / tested folding or non-folding e-bikes, but I'd call that step 2.
That's not really relevant to the Chinese battery fire risk. My approach to that would be marketplace regulation - which is just the normal way of doing things. We do it with every other product category (eg kettles, furniture) without throwing our hands up in despair, so I don't see that this one is impossible. Trading Standards would need some rebuilding.
Comments, including hostile ones, are welcome of course. One reason for me to put this thinking here is exactly to get a range of considered opinions - which, amongst everything else, is one good feature of PB.
My guess is that you'd hit pushback couched as "Trade barriers".
The real issues would be that this would require wholesale testing and certification of lithium batteries. The problem is that self test works for reputable brands. But there will be a howl from China et al, if you don't allow them the same courtesy as Apple or Brompton.
The quality producers will be upset if nothing is done to stop the shitbags - because the shitbags are cheaper and will take the market.
Let them howl, their substandard products are not only burning houses down and killing people, but are also easily modifiable as to be be dangerous on the roads, killing more people.
Why would China (as opposed to a few of their more dodgy suppliers) howl ? For now, they're the ones most able to meet any such standards at the most competitive price.
Indeed, so China needs to clamp down on suppliers of dodgy batteries and e-bikes, to the satisfaction of Western authorities.
Apple and Brompton almost certainly get their batteries from China, but they are built to Western standards. Then the same factory runs a dodgy night shift making substandard parts that look identical to the originals. That’s before we get to the many factories that pay no attention to Western standards whatsoever.
I’m a free market kinda guy in general, but when it comes to things that kill people when they go wrong there obviously needs to be regulation in place, along with enforcement by customs and trading standards.
Just how many people are dodgy batteries killing? We typically have a lot of pushback on regulations (or speed limits) on PB - interested in the relative benefits and costs of additional rules/enforcement.
Good question.
Here’s a press release last year from the London Fire Brigade:
On average there was a fire every two days in 2023 in London. London Fire Brigade attended 143 e-bike fires along with 36 blazes involving e-scooters. Sadly, there were 3 deaths and around 60 injuries caused by these fires.
Many of these fires are caused by incompatible chargers, modifications to e-bikes, or faulty or counterfeit products which are purchased online. This includes chargers, lithium batteries and conversion kits for e-bikes.
To put that number in some context, in 2012-2017 (ie before e-bikes were a thing) apart from the huge outlier of Grenvile Tower, LFB was attributing between 2 and 13 deaths a year to the cause of "faulty appliance or supply" (which I would assume is what e-bike battery fires are classed as).
Putting it that way certainly makes the case - consider that most of us don't have an e-scooter in the flat (but all of us have a fridge), so the rate is very high.
Because of how they are stored (which is a huge hurdle for all forms of micro-transport, including conventional cycling), they need to be treated like a white good.
That's a very interesting comparison - compare with white goods, which require independent certification.
Unlawful micro mobility of various sorts have a high rate of fires. Certified ones, such as power wheelchairs and mobility scooters and e-cycles which are BSI compliant have a very low rate. We can get that much from the stats, at least indicatively.
And if we can certify 28 million washers and 28 million fridges (estimated), why can't we apply the same process to micro mobility devices?
I'll make the suggestion - it is a good counter to the response of the previous government which was something between "unnecessary because of freedom", "can't be arsed" and "too difficult".
Yep - plus enforcement issue. If someone was selling dodgy fridges that burst into flames every now and again we'd have cracked into them hard.
Pushing it a bit further:
Grenfell Tower fire started because of an Electrical Fault in A Fridge, yet we have not banned fridges. In fact it is unthinkable.
Why not, and why are e-mobility transport appliances - especially for disabled people for whom they are their legs - different, in terms of making them safe and permitting their use?
We could actually push it to the model used elsewhere where certification is by independent industry bodies - for example FIRA (Furniture Industry Research Association). The e-bike industry could be required to have a similar structure.
Indeed. The reason fridges weren’t banned is that there is fairly robust standards in place. Which reduce fridge fire incidence to a very, very low level.
Fridge fires and leaks of toxic coolant used to be a big problem. As did other white goods. Hence the robust standards.
Incidentally, shitty no-name white goods are becoming a problem. Guess what they cause?
Enforcement of standards on swathes of dangerous stuff doesn’t happen on many imports, it seems.
You mean, the EU used to do that for us?
Ha. The same shit is happening in Germany, France and the rest of the EU.
They don’t have a magic fence that keeps out dangerous stuff.
The problem is that regulation was predicated on responsible, on shore manufacturers. So Brompton make sure they use quality batteries - inspect the factories etc. Same for all the big, known, names.
What to do when people are direct ordering from a website in another country and having their goods delivered by post? The names and brands change monthly. Instead of dealing with a few companies, it now looks like we will need the kind of customs inspections that haven’t been a thing for many decades.
Sure re the ebike crap, LI batteries shite. Nem con from this end.
But your post did refer - apparently - specifically to white goods, which caught my attention and puzzled me.
ISTR, by the way, reading a memoir by a NYC pathologist who helped to bring the problem of CO poisoning by water heaters, gas powered fridges, etc. to light back in the, what was it. 1920s and 1930s?
Cheap shit white goods are showing up in shops in poorer areas. Quality and safety as you might expect.
There's cheaper than Beko? Blimey.
The shit that’s sold to really really poor around the world is showing up here now.
Globalisation works both ways
We're meeting the third world on their upslope, as we do the downslope.
Not so much that. But we’ve chosen to import ultra cheap labour from developing countries. You want ultra cheap labour? Then they are going to live ultra cheap lifestyles.
They have to, to work at Deliveroo. So you get the exploding e-bikes (they can’t afford a nice Brompton) and other cheap, shoddy goods.
Miele is slightly out of their price bracket.
Slave wages means goods made for the serfs.
It's the Sam Vimes "Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness," theory. People in poverty buy cheaper, lower-quality items that wear out quickly, ultimately costing them more in the long run than if they could afford to buy higher-quality, longer-lasting goods.
Bit out of date though. Might have been true fifty years ago before globalisation.
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
But it’s still relatively.,er..relative. If a pair of boots cost £500+ it’s still worthwhile. Agree that it’s not worth it with eg a pair of M&S made in India specials, you might as well buy a new pair. Money aside, as usual I think it’s largely a matter of aesthetics; Northampton made veldtschoen look good as they age, cheap high street Jobs not so much (see also housing).
It's good that we have PBers who, despite charges of the place being a white, male, well-off, privileged elite, nevertheless discuss topics which everyone can relate to and which keep our feet on the ground. In this case literally.
GB News have 80,000 viewers on average and that's the most watched news service?
I met a girl yesterday who's an influencer who models and sells lingerie online and she has 220,000 followers.
I'm surprised GB News on those figures can keep running
They've been bleeding money since launch, but have deep-pocketed backers. A broadcast news channel is mostly a vanity project now.
In the same reports that talked about viewership said they are now break even.
However, from the get go it was obviously there is no massive pot of gold like in the US for tv news, it has never got massive viewership outside those 30 mins primetime slots on BBC / ITV. We aren't like the US were Fox can get 3 million viewers for a late night satire show.
The big loser in all this is Sky News, they are getting absolutely hammered.
Gutfeld’s show is aimed straight at the Colberts and Fallons, and beats them all in the ratings.
There’s only two American late-night shows really worth watching these days, Gutfeld and Bill Maher, who understand that the first rule of comedy is that it has to be funny, and aren’t afraid to go after their own side when justified. The rest are all totally one-sided propagandists, working a time slot when most people want to have a laugh and disconnect from the world.
This is true and also rather sad, because Stephen Colbert is genuinely very funny, and used to be hysterical when he was "in character" as a rightwing loon. Plus he wasn't afraid to attack the Democratic left. Now he's a pitiful Woke shadow of what was, and the show has been shuttered
Damn shame
I'm fairly sure he'll shrug off your (some might say pitiful anti-woke obsessed) judgment.
OK boomer
lol. You're pretty outdated yourself.
That was the gag
Incidentally, today I got the train from Gatwick to St Pancras, Thameslink (I only realised this existed a year ago, making Gatwick vastly easier). On the way it stopped at Blackfriars, OVER the Thames, where you get this stupendous view of the City, and Borough, and the Shard, with Canary Wharf behind it. Endless towers and Wren churches, ancient cathedrals and skyscrapers, then forests of more towers, and 2000 years of history, Roman walls to shimmering cyberprisms
It is gob-smacking. If you don't know London, it must be overwhelming. It's not lyrically, harmoniously beautiful like Paris, nor is it bracingly and excitingly lofty like New York City, but it is arguably MORE epic than both: the collision of history and modernity, beauty and squalor, power and fragility, empire and melancholy, slums and wealth, all under a sternly black and stormy summer sky. If Britain really is about to fall apart and die, let us note that we made quite the town, with our unexampled capital city, on this humble green archipelago
Ooh, didn’t know you could get a train from LGW to STP. Very useful information in planning a trip in the next few days. Thanks!
Comments
How different things would have been if IBM was more concerned about sales than the company's image.
"Rip Up The Benefits System and Start Again" (£)
https://www.thetimes.com/comment/columnists/article/rip-up-the-benefits-system-and-start-again-qdd6sghkd
EXCLUSIVE: Sean Duffy will announce expedited plans to build a nuclear reactor on the moon, his first major action as interim NASA administrator.
https://bsky.app/profile/politico.com/post/3lvm3sj6bmc2i
@Acyn
·
18m
Watters: You know how this ends? Sydney Sweeney is going to marry Barron Trump and it's going to create the greatest political dynasty in American history.
https://x.com/Acyn/status/1952482499764101244
My £180 washing machine has done ten years and is going strong.
And, to take the analogy literally, it isn't really cheaper to buy good boots and have them resoled these days: a resoling is close to £100.
Nice chart from Morgan Stanley. I hadn't realised quite how large the nonfarm payroll data revisions for April and May were - the largest downward change, ex-Covid, since 1979.
https://x.com/Birdyword/status/1952487633571197317
We're stagnating, maybe even growing a little, but should be doing far, far better.
We're not declining in absolute terms, despite our government's best efforts.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14966333/Watford-FC-diversity-officer-country-bloody-Indians-railway-staff.html
Fun for the whole family, there
"Brent Magistrates' Court heard that John-Jules shouted and swore at Jan Lisiecki and his son Jaroslaw when they would not accept his recycling bin as it contained items they did not collect.
The actor kicked the container, kicked Mr Lisiecki Snr on the leg, punched his son and spat in his son's face, the court heard.
Jan Lisiecki was also punched and hurt his head as he fell against the metal handles of the lorry."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyreece_John-Jules
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/who-controlled-redistricting-every-state
Police said in a statement tonight that the 55-year-old father-of-three would appear at magistrates' court next Wednesday, The Sun reported.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14970315/Repair-Shop-host-Jay-Blades-charged-two-counts-rape-awaits-trial-separate-charge-controlling-coercive-behaviour.html
BBC not having a lot of luck with their popular "safe" shows at the moment. We have n word rapping and willy waving on Master Chef, allegedly heavy snowfall on strictly and now this.
The treaty between France and the UK will allow the Home Office to return some asylum seekers back across the Channel for the first time in exchange for accepting others directly from France via a safe route.
Those who have crossed the Channel to the UK using small boats will become inadmissible for safe routes, according to the terms of the treaty. About 50 people a week are expected to be returned during the pilot of the so-called “one in, one out” scheme.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/aug/04/uk-to-start-small-boats-returns-france-within-days-after-eu-gives-green-light
Ukraine should just surrender to stop being killed (the fact if Ukraine surrendered, the killing would actually increase is, of course, ignored). Israel should stop killing Palestinians because Russia doesn't like Israel.
No thought that Russia could just withdraw. Ukraine isn't launching a counteroffensive to Moscow.
I do not know Russia does not like Israel which has traditionally been a friendly country if not an ally, but do recall Israel refused to allow Iron Dome air defence systems to be sent to Ukraine.
https://auctions.dreweatts.com/auctions/9365/drewea1-10581
The history of cricket in art is up for sale – this is why it will go at a loss
One of the finest cricket-themed art collections in the world is only estimated to fetch £40,000
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/art/artists/history-cricket/ (£££)
Basically sporting art has fallen out of bed, so much so that Christie's no longer bothers with it. The link to the auction for PBers who want to bid or just look at pictures is given at the top of this post.
The Serjeant at Arms has the right to “arrest” any representatives not in attendance and “bring them to the house”.
50 a week isn't much. It would need to be almost all of them to stop it and, even then, it might simply increase overall asylum numbers via the "safe" route.
No-one wants to get on a small boat if they don't have to.
Emergency measures bailed out jails at last minute as No 10 refused to cut prisoner numbers until ‘cliff edge’ reached, former watchdog reports
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/aug/05/prison-system-was-days-from-collapse-three-times-under-sunak-review-finds
Well, if it's "fair enough" he should either be supporting or coming up with some sensible thought. He talks about "free cars", yet I don't see how £65 a week going to pay for a car that would otherwise be available to spend for other things is "free". If there's an (alleged) vulnerabilty to fraud, then deal with the fraud. He even acknowledges that the scheme is far more cost effective than individual purchases.
IMO the problem there is that Matthew Parris hasn't got a clue about what he wants to do, or why he wants to do it. It's an inchoate howl from a rich and able-bodied 75 year old living in a large property-with-land in a desirable remote Derbyshire village, a holiday home in Spain and an apartment in Limehouse, and a large pension. When he abandoned the Conservative Party in 2019 he termed it "the nasty party", and yet here we are.
He's done these pieces before. I took against him when he wrote about the need to tie piano wire across country lanes at neck height back at Christmas 2007 to decapitate cyclists, then hid behind 'it was a joke and I was being funny'. That was at a time when such offences were not unusual. He did apologise later, but imo he has very little judgement.
In this case he needs to exercise his little grey cells. He could suggest a decent network of mobility tracks and inclusive residents parking, which would remove many of the need for a car - but he'd probably write a ranting column about that too.
(Sorry Andy !)
The problem is not the questioning, it is the questioning of perceived personal entitlement to do X.
Now I might like a good conspiracy theory but this one has bells and whistles on it. It is atactic straight out of the authoritarian playbook. Control the means of propaganda, control the media. A very unwelcome precedent has been set.
eg "Coronation Portrait of Ranji."
Just asking ...
I do tend to buy reasonably good quality, but mostly because I can afford to dress well and enjoy doing so. Women in particular notice these things, as ZZ Top famously sung "Every girl crazy about a sharp dressed man"
Since Republican appointed judges have made it clear they consider people have a right to be absent from sessions to deny a quorum under the state's constitution, he's also acting unconstitutionally by demanding their arrest.
But this is, of course, all performative. The redistricting, however, is not.
Greg Abbott is a genuinely nasty man, and shows the malaise in the Republican Party goes far beyond Trump and his coterie in Washington.
Despite our naval gazing we are not so unfortunate, at least not until Reform take over and trash our constitution via their Fuhrerprinzip.
Lee Anderson's column:
https://www.chad.co.uk/news/opinion/lee-andersons-weekly-column-5252063
Pushback from an Opinion piece by a young woman at the counter-demonstration:
https://www.chad.co.uk/news/opinion/opinion-lee-anderson-doesnt-speak-for-all-of-us-in-sutton-in-ashfield-5255475
I tend to only replace boots when they really need it (either falling apart or waterproofing goes).
Altogether now:
Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad
Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad
Our gerrymandering good, their gerrymandering bad
Both sides are as bad as each other, both parties are unfit to be in power.
The rest is a question of taste/style, but I know few people (especially ladies) who appreciate bad grooming, BO, terrible and badly fitting clothes, or awful shoes, even if many men haven't figured this out yet.
Checking as far as I can easily, these seem to be like E-Scooters, and that would make it a "Personal Light Electric Vehicle - PLEV", AFAICS. That is, outside identified categories.
I think that would make them illegal and potentially subject to confiscation if noticed by police. And you would need a driving license, type approval etc.
But that says nothing about whether they are safe or not. For that I would ask if they are compliant to the BS-EN standard mentioned yesterday, which covers the electrical system. And I would want a removable battery that I can keep separate whilst it is at home, and charge away from the pram, and to be self-contained away from the baby whilst it is in the pram.
Golden Rule One would be "do not charge with the baby in the pram".
Personally I'd keep it in the hard-floored conservatory or porch or garage, and only have the baby in it when in use, and transport the battery separated where I can see it for any distance in eg a car and not in the middle of a boot of "stuff".
More may be known by specialist pram shops, maybe in Which reports etc.
Anyhoo - time to do things, have a good day all.
https://x.com/afpost/status/1952090812420157787?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q
NEW THREAD
Podbean: https://undercutters.podbean.com/e/f1-2025-hungarian-grand-prix-review/
Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/f1-2025-hungarian-grand-prix-review/id1786574257?i=1000720686680
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3pY779CSNXjrwFrndvfZdu
Amazon: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/bcfe213b-55fb-408a-a823-dc6693ee9f78/episodes/bf72d485-b20c-4b17-aed0-d9d8fd106e65/undercutters---f1-podcast-f1-2025-hungarian-grand-prix-review
Transcript: https://morrisf1.blogspot.com/2025/08/f1-2025-hungarian-grand-prix-review.html
US States all need something like the UK Boundary Commissions, I think that only about three of them do, with the rest some form of political interference.
More people will be watching the ducks in the local park’s lake though.