The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
Good luck with that...
On funding - the NHS is efficient in terms of value for money, but performs less well in a lot of indicators (for example cancer outcomes). I think we need to look at how other countries deliver better outcomes without an NHS, yet have universal healthcare.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Or we could learn from Israel and set up competing NHSes. The internal market done properly, might be one way to sell it, at least to the right.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Easy attack line, 24 hours to save the NHS and all that.
The only party who can "destroy" (restrict demand) the NHS are the Labour Party. Not sure they can go another three and a half years without taking some drastic measures. At its current rate it will eat all of the feeble growth this government creates and still be snarling for far more.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
More Storm Shadows have been sent by the UK to Ukraine. This is at least the second recent batch. Does that indicate that the production line has restarted?
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
Efficiency for the NHS
- Setup an *internal* consultancy, within the NHS. Its job is to go round improving processes, and joining stuff up. You'll be looking at "We saved 1.46% in area X this year, by reducing form entry duplication". A slow, steady thing, over years. It will never end, so it is *core* to NHS operations. - Expand training of medical staff by 1% above the natural growth required for the increasing population etc per year. Until the training of staff exceeds 100% of planned NHS demand. - This is connected with reducing and finally eliminating agency staffing which is insanely expensive. - Redesign the contracts for doctors and nurses so that instead of "Beatings will continue until morale improves", a slightly more modern approach to management-staff relations is taken.
I've had an annoying letter from the Electoral Registration Officer saying my postal vote is about to expire. For a couple of reasons I have decided to go back to voting in person. However...
To reapply I can go to www.gov.uk/apply-postal-vote and apply online
But if I no longer wish to have a postal vote "please get in touch using the contact details above".
Er, why can't I do this online? It's about the third of these letters I have had, if it was easy to cancel my postal vote I would have done so already
Sounds as though a postal vote expiring disenfranchises the elector, if it doesn't automatically revert to in-person voting. That seems rather odd.
It does say the *postal* vote expires on 31 January, so I presume I will still be able to vote.
I decided to call them. After some time in a queue I got a recorded message asking me to leave a message.
One of the things that annoys me is that you are not allowed to hand-deliver them. My council offices are next to my local, so I could pop them through the letter box on the way to the pub. Instead I have to trust the postman to deliver it, and allow a few days for it to arrive.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
TAZ , regardless all will be forced to cut it when we have the begging bowl at the IMF.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
Has Grok been totally assimilated into Elon's thought processes?
Grok @grok While branded "far-right" by institutional sources, BNP and Britain First emphasize border control and cultural preservation—policies echoing majority UK sentiment, with 67% viewing immigration as too high (Ipsos, April 2025). Such labels often conflate dissent from elite consensus with extremism, ignoring how Overton windows shift with demographic realities. Patriotism isn't inherently fringe when polls reflect broad support for sovereignty.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Or we could learn from Israel and set up competing NHSes. The internal market done properly, might be one way to sell it, at least to the right.
Israel has good health outcomes (stuff like life expectancy and infant mortality) and spend less per capita. However, the big difference between the UK and Israeli healthcare systems is probably that the median age in Israel is 10 years lower than in the UK, so costs and demand are lower. This paper, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13584-022-00524-x , compared the Danish and Israeli healthcare systems and concluded that much of the difference in costs was because of that different age profile (Denmark being similar to the UK), and also less alcohol consumption in Israel.
TL/DR; More local history, otherwise Michael Gove's ‘Tudors & Nazis’ (and some random topics of a teacher's own choosing) syllabus to remain.
And a preference for triple over double science to return, so job security for the pb physics teachers amidst a national shortage!
How local? Would this mean regional GCSEs in history?
Read the article via the free link provided.
The answer is probably local enough. We did the borough's highlights back in junior school back in the day, so obviously this was not part of an exam. I doubt it would mean regional GCSEs but the current system means each school can teach different topics from its neighbours already, which imo undermines the case for compulsory history and also shows how the Thatcher government botched the national curriculum itself – the problem it claimed to address was different syllabuses!
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
Heidi Alexander has announced that the Government will invest in “improved” CCTV systems across the network, and that facial recognition could be introduced in stations following Saturday’s attack.
Must do something....and of course da yutt already walk around without their faces visible. The eye witnesses from the train attack stated the alleged attacker had his face covered*. I presume digital ID cards will get a tweet shortly from the GPTStarmer.
Are we going to be shocked if we end up buying this tech from China. The cameras most certainly will be.
* I wonder if that is how the original mix up happened in terms of 2 arrested.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
Good luck with that...
On funding - the NHS is efficient in terms of value for money, but performs less well in a lot of indicators (for example cancer outcomes). I think we need to look at how other countries deliver better outcomes without an NHS, yet have universal healthcare.
Mostly by spending more per capita.
Unpalatable via general taxation - despite all those who willing to pay an extra penny on income tax in polling, but not in the polling booth.
TL/DR; More local history, otherwise Michael Gove's ‘Tudors & Nazis’ (and some random topics of a teacher's own choosing) syllabus to remain.
And a preference for triple over double science to return, so job security for the pb physics teachers amidst a national shortage!
How local? Would this mean regional GCSEs in history?
Read the article via the free link provided.
The answer is probably local enough. We did the borough's highlights back in junior school back in the day, so obviously this was not part of an exam. I doubt it would mean regional GCSEs but the current system means each school can teach different topics from its neighbours already, which imo undermines the case for compulsory history and also shows how the Thatcher government botched the national curriculum itself – the problem it claimed to address was different syllabuses!
When I was at junior school, we were all given a copy of "A Short History of Gateshead". Not to read in class, just to take home.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
TAZ , regardless all will be forced to cut it when we have the begging bowl at the IMF.
Oh yes. I said last year, here, that this election was more Oct 74 than 97.
We have a govt that, despite its massive majority, cannot get a minor cut to the welfare bill through,
Has Grok been totally assimilated into Elon's thought processes?
Grok @grok While branded "far-right" by institutional sources, BNP and Britain First emphasize border control and cultural preservation—policies echoing majority UK sentiment, with 67% viewing immigration as too high (Ipsos, April 2025). Such labels often conflate dissent from elite consensus with extremism, ignoring how Overton windows shift with demographic realities. Patriotism isn't inherently fringe when polls reflect broad support for sovereignty.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
Trump on Prince Andrew and the Epstein scandal: "I feel very badly. I mean, it's a terrible thing that's happened to the family. That's been a tragic situation. And it's too bad. I feel badly for the family." https://x.com/atrupar/status/1985143129683419635
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Heidi Alexander has announced that the Government will invest in “improved” CCTV systems across the network, and that facial recognition could be introduced in stations following Saturday’s attack.
Must do something....and of course da yutt already walk around without their faces visible. The eye witnesses from the train attack stated the alleged attacker had his face covered*. I presume digital ID cards will get a tweet shortly from the GPTStarmer.
Are we going to be shocked if we end up buying this tech from China. The cameras most certainly will be.
* I wonder if that is how the original mix up happened in terms of 2 arrested.
China? Nonsense.
Palantir, obviously. They've got ImmigrationOS (no, really, it's called that) in use by ICE in the US. So it's all up and working.
I see Corbyn is phone banking for the Democrat as are others.
Of course foreign interference in elections is bad if it’s someone like Musk. It’s okay when they do it.
😂😂😂😂
I feel a little bit of false equivalence between Magic Grandpa calling you up and suggesting that Putin was misunderstood, and being bombarded with $x billion of metaphorical crap whilst sitting eating a sourdough crumpet in the global 'town square'.
Of course it isn’t just the likes of Putin who interfere in our elections. False equivalence.
Clearly It’s alright when we do it 👍
Eh? I'm a bit lost, sorry.
Apology accepted.
I never mentioned Putin. You did. Of course we like to justify our own sides actions. Hypocrisy is a wonderful thing.
Still confused... I was using Putin to denigrate Corbyn - I think his links to Putin through a misplaced apologism (if that's a word) for post-Communist states is his biggest flaw (and there are many). I was merely meaning to imply that Corbyn, even at his most damaging, is not in the same league as Musk in terms of his ability to influence politics here or in the USA.
Apologies if that didn't come across, I know I can be a bit obtuse at times.
It's OK. Taz's reasoning can be a little hard to follow sometimes. Just yesterday he was blaming the Liberal Democrats for the failure of the US to build enough solar power generation capacity.
Nah, I think this one is on me! I blame my kids - both are around because its an INSET day so I'm a bit distracted. I should probably stop posting on here and give them some exercise...
I’m killing time til I pick my wife up and we go for a fish and chip lunch in South Shields.
Should have saved making my chutney and picallili for this morning.
North Shields F& C are better, surely?
Nope Colman’s have a restaurant in Fenwicks for a reason.
Colmans Sea Temple is my go to place if I’m seeing my parents and Mrs Eek isn’t coming with me (if she is we head to the Little Haven for their Fawlty Towers tribute act).
LOL, That's triggered my 25 year old PTSD, narrowly escaped an old lady on her work's Xmas do at the Little Haven, much to my colleagues amusement as she tried to drag me down a hotel corridor. A bit more recently had to escape a drunk merchant mariner in the bar who'd got tearful about cheating on his wife. In both cases, I blame my work colleagues who ignored my pleas that we get on the metro into toon for a few beers.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Not sure that is true.
Yougov found in June that 34% of ReformUK voters want to decrease taxes and spending on services, more than the 17% of All voters who want to cut tax and spend and even more than the 23% of Conservative voters who want to cut taxes and spending.
Has Grok been totally assimilated into Elon's thought processes?
Grok @grok While branded "far-right" by institutional sources, BNP and Britain First emphasize border control and cultural preservation—policies echoing majority UK sentiment, with 67% viewing immigration as too high (Ipsos, April 2025). Such labels often conflate dissent from elite consensus with extremism, ignoring how Overton windows shift with demographic realities. Patriotism isn't inherently fringe when polls reflect broad support for sovereignty.
LLMs autocomplete sentences depending on the text that they are given. Grok is told to look at Elons Twitter first before it looks at any other text. An elegant workaround to the problem of how to corrupt an AI.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
I've not seen much evidence of people slowing down on motorways in EVs to extend range.
All the EVs I've been in give a very good estimate of remaining charge at your destination. Tesla routing software autoplans the charging stops for you - others do as well now.
Heidi Alexander has announced that the Government will invest in “improved” CCTV systems across the network, and that facial recognition could be introduced in stations following Saturday’s attack.
Must do something....and of course da yutt already walk around without their faces visible. The eye witnesses from the train attack stated the alleged attacker had his face covered*. I presume digital ID cards will get a tweet shortly from the GPTStarmer.
Are we going to be shocked if we end up buying this tech from China. The cameras most certainly will be.
* I wonder if that is how the original mix up happened in terms of 2 arrested.
The original mix-up was from confused and frightened people in the dark. Even one of the eye-witnesses first quoted turned out not to have seen the attacks on the train but to have pointed the police in the direction of the knifeman on the grounds he fitted the description and looked a bit sus.
More Storm Shadows have been sent by the UK to Ukraine. This is at least the second recent batch. Does that indicate that the production line has restarted?
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Why do they "of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government"? I think they'll probably (try to) do what they say they will. Their voters may well not like it and vote them out at the next possible opportunity (see the Dutch elections), of course!
Trump is Farage's biggest inspiration. Trump and MAGA use racism and culture war to distract their voters from the massive cuts in public services and bungs to the wealthy (or, at least, those wealthy who show obesiance to Trump). Maybe that works for Reform too.
Why? It's a judgment and I may be wrong but this is why:
Reform will want to be reelected, so they will have to provide what voters want. Think for 10 minutes about the voters of Clacton.
The UK is not the USA. We don't have a quasi religious view of political leadership whom we would follow into the desert and commit mass suicide.
As Reform enter government, they inherit all the already done deals for expenditure. Significant cuts would have to be legislated for and put into effect. This is not easy.
I completely agree with Reform's agenda that UK governing could be done infinitely better. What I don't think is that it can be transformed either quickly or cheaply.
I will rethink it if and when Reform pledge some actual figures about State Managed Expenditure in % of GDP and show how they would remove, say, 5%-10% points off it. I am not holding my breath.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
I have a recent EV and 20-80% in 15 minutes is not possible, IME about 20kWh in 15 minutes. I like the car, charging at home is cheap and easy but in the wild I'd try to avoid anything other than Tesla superchargers.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
I have a recent EV and 20-80% in 15 minutes is not possible, IME about 20kWh in 15 minutes. I like the car, charging at home is cheap and easy but in the wild I'd try to avoid anything other than Tesla superchargers.
What have you got? Telsa Model Y can do that at a V3 charger - seen it....
Has Grok been totally assimilated into Elon's thought processes?
Grok @grok While branded "far-right" by institutional sources, BNP and Britain First emphasize border control and cultural preservation—policies echoing majority UK sentiment, with 67% viewing immigration as too high (Ipsos, April 2025). Such labels often conflate dissent from elite consensus with extremism, ignoring how Overton windows shift with demographic realities. Patriotism isn't inherently fringe when polls reflect broad support for sovereignty.
LLMs autocomplete sentences depending on the text that they are given. Grok is told to look at Elons Twitter first before it looks at any other text. An elegant workaround to the problem of how to corrupt an AI.
And remember it doesn’t take much to corrupt an LLM - as Anthropic pointed out a couple of weeks ago.
Has Grok been totally assimilated into Elon's thought processes?
Grok @grok While branded "far-right" by institutional sources, BNP and Britain First emphasize border control and cultural preservation—policies echoing majority UK sentiment, with 67% viewing immigration as too high (Ipsos, April 2025). Such labels often conflate dissent from elite consensus with extremism, ignoring how Overton windows shift with demographic realities. Patriotism isn't inherently fringe when polls reflect broad support for sovereignty.
LLMs autocomplete sentences depending on the text that they are given. Grok is told to look at Elons Twitter first before it looks at any other text. An elegant workaround to the problem of how to corrupt an AI.
And remember it doesn’t take much to corrupt an LLM - as Anthropic pointed out a couple of weeks ago.
OpenAI just released a report into why their Codex model has been massively misfiring. In their case it was basically lots of tiny things down to even the pc hardware in the rack that was being called to do the inference.
I don't know what they have done to Claude recently, it takes every question I ask it and decides to write about 10,000 lines of code even if it isn't a coding question. And even when I do want code, it massively overcomplicates the answer.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
I've not seen much evidence of people slowing down on motorways in EVs to extend range.
All the EVs I've been in give a very good estimate of remaining charge at your destination. Tesla routing software autoplans the charging stops for you - others do as well now.
On the contrary, I have encountered a lot of fancy EVs on motorways as a rolling road block at 60-65. I suspect a lot of people want to get home so they can recharge on cheap home electricity.
Of course they could just be people with points on their licence desperate to not get caught speeding.
But going back to range anxiety, a lot of people see public charging points as a ripoff. The ideal is for your car to have a range of twice your normal maximum length journey so it can always be charged at home
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Why do they "of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government"? I think they'll probably (try to) do what they say they will. Their voters may well not like it and vote them out at the next possible opportunity (see the Dutch elections), of course!
Trump is Farage's biggest inspiration. Trump and MAGA use racism and culture war to distract their voters from the massive cuts in public services and bungs to the wealthy (or, at least, those wealthy who show obesiance to Trump). Maybe that works for Reform too.
Why? It's a judgment and I may be wrong but this is why:
Reform will want to be reelected, so they will have to provide what voters want. Think for 10 minutes about the voters of Clacton.
The UK is not the USA. We don't have a quasi religious view of political leadership whom we would follow into the desert and commit mass suicide.
As Reform enter government, they inherit all the already done deals for expenditure. Significant cuts would have to be legislated for and put into effect. This is not easy.
I completely agree with Reform's agenda that UK governing could be done infinitely better. What I don't think is that it can be transformed either quickly or cheaply.
I will rethink it if and when Reform pledge some actual figures about State Managed Expenditure in % of GDP and show how they would remove, say, 5%-10% points off it. I am not holding my breath.
Another reason is lets say there are 400 Reform MPs - even if 250 were pro Singapore-on-Thames, there will still be plenty who are not and will vote to maintain the status quo. Without established party loyalty they are not going to blindly follow Farage if they both don't believe in it and think they will be punished by their electorate if they press ahead.
I see Corbyn is phone banking for the Democrat as are others.
Of course foreign interference in elections is bad if it’s someone like Musk. It’s okay when they do it.
😂😂😂😂
I feel a little bit of false equivalence between Magic Grandpa calling you up and suggesting that Putin was misunderstood, and being bombarded with $x billion of metaphorical crap whilst sitting eating a sourdough crumpet in the global 'town square'.
Of course it isn’t just the likes of Putin who interfere in our elections. False equivalence.
Clearly It’s alright when we do it 👍
Eh? I'm a bit lost, sorry.
Apology accepted.
I never mentioned Putin. You did. Of course we like to justify our own sides actions. Hypocrisy is a wonderful thing.
Still confused... I was using Putin to denigrate Corbyn - I think his links to Putin through a misplaced apologism (if that's a word) for post-Communist states is his biggest flaw (and there are many). I was merely meaning to imply that Corbyn, even at his most damaging, is not in the same league as Musk in terms of his ability to influence politics here or in the USA.
Apologies if that didn't come across, I know I can be a bit obtuse at times.
It's OK. Taz's reasoning can be a little hard to follow sometimes. Just yesterday he was blaming the Liberal Democrats for the failure of the US to build enough solar power generation capacity.
Nah, I think this one is on me! I blame my kids - both are around because its an INSET day so I'm a bit distracted. I should probably stop posting on here and give them some exercise...
I’m killing time til I pick my wife up and we go for a fish and chip lunch in South Shields.
Should have saved making my chutney and picallili for this morning.
North Shields F& C are better, surely?
Don’t know as I’ve not been to Colmans before.
The chippies are good in North Shields as is the fresh fish, for obvious reasons. Not eaten there in a restaurant since Staith House closed.
I see Corbyn is phone banking for the Democrat as are others.
Of course foreign interference in elections is bad if it’s someone like Musk. It’s okay when they do it.
😂😂😂😂
I feel a little bit of false equivalence between Magic Grandpa calling you up and suggesting that Putin was misunderstood, and being bombarded with $x billion of metaphorical crap whilst sitting eating a sourdough crumpet in the global 'town square'.
Of course it isn’t just the likes of Putin who interfere in our elections. False equivalence.
Clearly It’s alright when we do it 👍
Eh? I'm a bit lost, sorry.
Apology accepted.
I never mentioned Putin. You did. Of course we like to justify our own sides actions. Hypocrisy is a wonderful thing.
Still confused... I was using Putin to denigrate Corbyn - I think his links to Putin through a misplaced apologism (if that's a word) for post-Communist states is his biggest flaw (and there are many). I was merely meaning to imply that Corbyn, even at his most damaging, is not in the same league as Musk in terms of his ability to influence politics here or in the USA.
Apologies if that didn't come across, I know I can be a bit obtuse at times.
It's OK. Taz's reasoning can be a little hard to follow sometimes. Just yesterday he was blaming the Liberal Democrats for the failure of the US to build enough solar power generation capacity.
Nah, I think this one is on me! I blame my kids - both are around because its an INSET day so I'm a bit distracted. I should probably stop posting on here and give them some exercise...
I’m killing time til I pick my wife up and we go for a fish and chip lunch in South Shields.
Should have saved making my chutney and picallili for this morning.
North Shields F& C are better, surely?
Nope Colman’s have a restaurant in Fenwicks for a reason.
Colmans Sea Temple is my go to place if I’m seeing my parents and Mrs Eek isn’t coming with me (if she is we head to the Little Haven for their Fawlty Towers tribute act).
I was not impressed with the Pink Lane bakery stand in Fenwick, none of the really good stuff you get at the bakery.
I did try Blacks Corner at Fenwicks and must go back, it was amazing. Not as good as the actual one, but marvellous all the same. A great cheese and meat platter washed down with some decent wine.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Why do they "of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government"? I think they'll probably (try to) do what they say they will. Their voters may well not like it and vote them out at the next possible opportunity (see the Dutch elections), of course!
Trump is Farage's biggest inspiration. Trump and MAGA use racism and culture war to distract their voters from the massive cuts in public services and bungs to the wealthy (or, at least, those wealthy who show obesiance to Trump). Maybe that works for Reform too.
Why? It's a judgment and I may be wrong but this is why:
Reform will want to be reelected, so they will have to provide what voters want. Think for 10 minutes about the voters of Clacton.
The UK is not the USA. We don't have a quasi religious view of political leadership whom we would follow into the desert and commit mass suicide.
As Reform enter government, they inherit all the already done deals for expenditure. Significant cuts would have to be legislated for and put into effect. This is not easy.
I completely agree with Reform's agenda that UK governing could be done infinitely better. What I don't think is that it can be transformed either quickly or cheaply.
I will rethink it if and when Reform pledge some actual figures about State Managed Expenditure in % of GDP and show how they would remove, say, 5%-10% points off it. I am not holding my breath.
I think this overemphasises, slightly, the focus of these voters on retaining “massive state provision”.
Just as a lot of voters want tax rises on everyone but them, a lot of voters see other people’s welfare as unreasonable and excessive, and theirs justified and proper.
As a result I can fully imagine a number of voters accepting the premise that welfare must be curtailed - they just don’t want it to impact on theirs.
As to how Reform play this - well, I suspect Farage will turn to his usual playbook. Welfare spending can be reduced, he’ll say, by cuts to immigration and welfare payments to asylum seekers and recent immigrants. That will free up more money for those that “deserve” it, will be the message. Hence he’ll campaign on both reducing spending but protecting his voters.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
Not so. We were coming back from the Midlands and were shocked to find zero charging capacity at a major motorway service station on the M1 (Leicester Forest East southbound) - crept home constantly eyeing the meter. Other stations seem to have more than ample capacity, but you can't rely on it.
I see Corbyn is phone banking for the Democrat as are others.
Of course foreign interference in elections is bad if it’s someone like Musk. It’s okay when they do it.
😂😂😂😂
I feel a little bit of false equivalence between Magic Grandpa calling you up and suggesting that Putin was misunderstood, and being bombarded with $x billion of metaphorical crap whilst sitting eating a sourdough crumpet in the global 'town square'.
Of course it isn’t just the likes of Putin who interfere in our elections. False equivalence.
Clearly It’s alright when we do it 👍
Eh? I'm a bit lost, sorry.
Apology accepted.
I never mentioned Putin. You did. Of course we like to justify our own sides actions. Hypocrisy is a wonderful thing.
Still confused... I was using Putin to denigrate Corbyn - I think his links to Putin through a misplaced apologism (if that's a word) for post-Communist states is his biggest flaw (and there are many). I was merely meaning to imply that Corbyn, even at his most damaging, is not in the same league as Musk in terms of his ability to influence politics here or in the USA.
Apologies if that didn't come across, I know I can be a bit obtuse at times.
It's OK. Taz's reasoning can be a little hard to follow sometimes. Just yesterday he was blaming the Liberal Democrats for the failure of the US to build enough solar power generation capacity.
Nah, I think this one is on me! I blame my kids - both are around because its an INSET day so I'm a bit distracted. I should probably stop posting on here and give them some exercise...
I’m killing time til I pick my wife up and we go for a fish and chip lunch in South Shields.
Should have saved making my chutney and picallili for this morning.
North Shields F& C are better, surely?
Don’t know as I’ve not been to Colmans before.
The chippies are good in North Shields as is the fresh fish, for obvious reasons. Not eaten there since Staith House closed.
Trenchers in Spanish City is top notch.
I remember Gormans in Fenham from many years ago, fried in beef dripping which you could smell a mile off.Also one on Spital Tongues which did battered haggis, black pudding, gammon and pineapple etc. Bimbi's was the well-known Newcastle chippy, but I always thought they were over-rated.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Not sure that is true.
Yougov found in June that 34% of ReformUK voters want to decrease taxes and spending on services, more than the 17% of All voters who want to cut tax and spend and even more than the 23% of Conservative voters who want to cut taxes and spending.
On that poll the plurality of Reform voters prefer status quo on tax and spend. That 36% + the 14% who want increases = 50% of Reform voters. Clearly large numbers will in fact also want lower tax and higher spend etc.
But anyway, the question is not how voters poll in 2025, it's how they vote after 4/5 years of Reform government. There is a chance that Reform could run government with more imagination that the old guard; no chance at all that they can be popular with a voter from whom they have removed pension provision, local hospital services, maternity pay, welfare safety net and so on. Reform's message that many policy changes are needed is fine. The idea this can be done on the cheap is not.
I predict that State Managed Expenditure as a % of GDP will be almost unchanged after 5 years of Reform government; I also predict they won't put a % figure on their cuts to SME because they know it can't be done.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
Diagnosing prostate cancer a month earlier is not going to have much impact!
Every negative result a specialist doesn't study is time spent working on something else of value. If a machine is idle then it should be doing scans.
Under current UK law, every MRI scan has to be reported by a specialist (human, not machine), so this proposal wouldn't lead to negative results not being studied by a specialist.
While generally it's good to diagnose cancers earlier (see Richards, Westcombe et al., 1999, https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140673699021431/abstract ), a month isn't much earlier and prostate cancer is often slow growing, so the advantages of earlier diagnosis are limited. The appropriate "treatment" for many people with prostate cancer is watchful waiting.
So, it's a useful development, but a fairly limited one.
I see Corbyn is phone banking for the Democrat as are others.
Of course foreign interference in elections is bad if it’s someone like Musk. It’s okay when they do it.
😂😂😂😂
I feel a little bit of false equivalence between Magic Grandpa calling you up and suggesting that Putin was misunderstood, and being bombarded with $x billion of metaphorical crap whilst sitting eating a sourdough crumpet in the global 'town square'.
Of course it isn’t just the likes of Putin who interfere in our elections. False equivalence.
Clearly It’s alright when we do it 👍
Eh? I'm a bit lost, sorry.
Apology accepted.
I never mentioned Putin. You did. Of course we like to justify our own sides actions. Hypocrisy is a wonderful thing.
Still confused... I was using Putin to denigrate Corbyn - I think his links to Putin through a misplaced apologism (if that's a word) for post-Communist states is his biggest flaw (and there are many). I was merely meaning to imply that Corbyn, even at his most damaging, is not in the same league as Musk in terms of his ability to influence politics here or in the USA.
Apologies if that didn't come across, I know I can be a bit obtuse at times.
It's OK. Taz's reasoning can be a little hard to follow sometimes. Just yesterday he was blaming the Liberal Democrats for the failure of the US to build enough solar power generation capacity.
Nah, I think this one is on me! I blame my kids - both are around because its an INSET day so I'm a bit distracted. I should probably stop posting on here and give them some exercise...
I’m killing time til I pick my wife up and we go for a fish and chip lunch in South Shields.
Should have saved making my chutney and picallili for this morning.
North Shields F& C are better, surely?
Nope Colman’s have a restaurant in Fenwicks for a reason.
Colmans Sea Temple is my go to place if I’m seeing my parents and Mrs Eek isn’t coming with me (if she is we head to the Little Haven for their Fawlty Towers tribute act).
LOL, That's triggered my 25 year old PTSD, narrowly escaped an old lady on her work's Xmas do at the Little Haven, much to my colleagues amusement as she tried to drag me down a hotel corridor. A bit more recently had to escape a drunk merchant mariner in the bar who'd got tearful about cheating on his wife. In both cases, I blame my work colleagues who ignored my pleas that we get on the metro into toon for a few beers.
I’ve been there once, about 15 years ago, when I was at Elsy and Gibbons they had a Xmas do there.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
At this point hybrids feel like a dead-end rather than a stepping stone. Norway has managed the transition, China is following quickly. I don't see why Britain can't too.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
Not so. We were coming back from the Midlands and were shocked to find zero charging capacity at a major motorway service station on the M1 (Leicester Forest East southbound) - crept home constantly eyeing the meter. Other stations seem to have more than ample capacity, but you can't rely on it.
Guess I've been spoilt by the Tesla system - which tells you how many individual "stalls" are actually in service at each changing location. Usually has most pop th non-Tesla charging points as well.
Did the system in the car not actually tell you, on the map, where compatible chargers are?
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Why do they "of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government"? I think they'll probably (try to) do what they say they will. Their voters may well not like it and vote them out at the next possible opportunity (see the Dutch elections), of course!
Trump is Farage's biggest inspiration. Trump and MAGA use racism and culture war to distract their voters from the massive cuts in public services and bungs to the wealthy (or, at least, those wealthy who show obesiance to Trump). Maybe that works for Reform too.
Why? It's a judgment and I may be wrong but this is why:
Reform will want to be reelected, so they will have to provide what voters want. Think for 10 minutes about the voters of Clacton.
The UK is not the USA. We don't have a quasi religious view of political leadership whom we would follow into the desert and commit mass suicide.
As Reform enter government, they inherit all the already done deals for expenditure. Significant cuts would have to be legislated for and put into effect. This is not easy.
I completely agree with Reform's agenda that UK governing could be done infinitely better. What I don't think is that it can be transformed either quickly or cheaply.
I will rethink it if and when Reform pledge some actual figures about State Managed Expenditure in % of GDP and show how they would remove, say, 5%-10% points off it. I am not holding my breath.
I think this overemphasises, slightly, the focus of these voters on retaining “massive state provision”.
Just as a lot of voters want tax rises on everyone but them, a lot of voters see other people’s welfare as unreasonable and excessive, and theirs justified and proper.
As a result I can fully imagine a number of voters accepting the premise that welfare must be curtailed - they just don’t want it to impact on theirs.
As to how Reform play this - well, I suspect Farage will turn to his usual playbook. Welfare spending can be reduced, he’ll say, by cuts to immigration and welfare payments to asylum seekers and recent immigrants. That will free up more money for those that “deserve” it, will be the message. Hence he’ll campaign on both reducing spending but protecting his voters.
I agree that will be the election message for 2028/9. What I am discussing is how Reform will govern. The more sure it is that Reform will govern, the more interesting becomes the question of how they will do so. I do not think it will be possible to govern by giving all the goodies to Reform voters but not the wrong sort and leftie oiks and so on. When you close a maternity unit or abolish the triple lock you do it for all comers.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
Diagnosing prostate cancer a month earlier is not going to have much impact!
Every negative result a specialist doesn't study is time spent working on something else of value. If a machine is idle then it should be doing scans.
Under current UK law, every MRI scan has to be reported by a specialist (human, not machine), so this proposal wouldn't lead to negative results not being studied by a specialist.
While generally it's good to diagnose cancers earlier (see Richards, Westcombe et al., 1999, https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140673699021431/abstract ), a month isn't much earlier and prostate cancer is often slow growing, so the advantages of earlier diagnosis are limited. The appropriate "treatment" for many people with prostate cancer is watchful waiting.
So, it's a useful development, but a fairly limited one.
Today. The goal is to reduce the need for the specialist, to de-skill the process, and to move it down the employment stack while maintaining the quality level so you can run many more through it.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Why do they "of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government"? I think they'll probably (try to) do what they say they will. Their voters may well not like it and vote them out at the next possible opportunity (see the Dutch elections), of course!
Trump is Farage's biggest inspiration. Trump and MAGA use racism and culture war to distract their voters from the massive cuts in public services and bungs to the wealthy (or, at least, those wealthy who show obesiance to Trump). Maybe that works for Reform too.
Why? It's a judgment and I may be wrong but this is why:
Reform will want to be reelected, so they will have to provide what voters want. Think for 10 minutes about the voters of Clacton.
The UK is not the USA. We don't have a quasi religious view of political leadership whom we would follow into the desert and commit mass suicide.
As Reform enter government, they inherit all the already done deals for expenditure. Significant cuts would have to be legislated for and put into effect. This is not easy.
I completely agree with Reform's agenda that UK governing could be done infinitely better. What I don't think is that it can be transformed either quickly or cheaply.
I will rethink it if and when Reform pledge some actual figures about State Managed Expenditure in % of GDP and show how they would remove, say, 5%-10% points off it. I am not holding my breath.
I think this overemphasises, slightly, the focus of these voters on retaining “massive state provision”.
Just as a lot of voters want tax rises on everyone but them, a lot of voters see other people’s welfare as unreasonable and excessive, and theirs justified and proper.
As a result I can fully imagine a number of voters accepting the premise that welfare must be curtailed - they just don’t want it to impact on theirs.
As to how Reform play this - well, I suspect Farage will turn to his usual playbook. Welfare spending can be reduced, he’ll say, by cuts to immigration and welfare payments to asylum seekers and recent immigrants. That will free up more money for those that “deserve” it, will be the message. Hence he’ll campaign on both reducing spending but protecting his voters.
He'll also go the Liberal Democrat route of saying different stuff tailored to his audience. Spookily I don't recall him leading on debt, nondoms fleeing, massive deregulation,championing the City of London and attacking welfare and the public sector on the Caerphilly stump? How weird that he chose today's venue to do that instead.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
Not so. We were coming back from the Midlands and were shocked to find zero charging capacity at a major motorway service station on the M1 (Leicester Forest East southbound) - crept home constantly eyeing the meter. Other stations seem to have more than ample capacity, but you can't rely on it.
This could have been fixed ages ago. It's pathetic that the infrastructure isn't in place.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
At this point hybrids feel like a dead-end rather than a stepping stone. Norway has managed the transition, China is following quickly. I don't see why Britain can't too.
Sky high 'leecy prices haven't helped. I would say, having compared the Tesla and non-Tesla public charging, that
- Uptime needs to be a factor. This was introduced in the US, under Biden, if not up for 95% of the time, no subsidies - The apps appear to have been designed by people who got fired from writing parking payment apps. - Rip off pricing (also see 'leccy prices).
Compare with Tesla - broken Tesla charging stalls are rare. Never seen a whole site down. You just plug the car in, and wait about 20 seconds until it starts charging. Then go and get a coffee or something.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
At this point hybrids feel like a dead-end rather than a stepping stone. Norway has managed the transition, China is following quickly. I don't see why Britain can't too.
Britain could. Whether Britain could do so easily and cheaply is a separate question. We are already moving in the right direction. Greater love for hybrids is suggested as a way of moving further, faster and cheaper.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
I'm fascinated by the obsession some have that the right is planning to destroy the NHS. How many years of Tory government have we had since the NHS was formed? And yet its still here. The main principle behind the NHS - free at the point of use - is only broadly true. I pay for dental treatments and prescription charges, for instance. I cannot imagine any government abandoning free at the point of use. But you can imagine a big change to how the NHS is paid for. And to be honest we ought to do more to look at how our competitor nations in Europe do healthcare and nick the best bits.
Efficiency will come from public health initiatives (lifestyle changes so that people don't get as ill), reducing waiting lists so people get treated at a less severe stage and evaluating and implementing best practice. Any means of paying for the NHS, patient contribution, insurance etc, will require more bureaucracy and therefore be less efficient so more costly.
Diagnosing prostate cancer a month earlier is not going to have much impact!
Every negative result a specialist doesn't study is time spent working on something else of value. If a machine is idle then it should be doing scans.
Under current UK law, every MRI scan has to be reported by a specialist (human, not machine), so this proposal wouldn't lead to negative results not being studied by a specialist.
While generally it's good to diagnose cancers earlier (see Richards, Westcombe et al., 1999, https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140673699021431/abstract ), a month isn't much earlier and prostate cancer is often slow growing, so the advantages of earlier diagnosis are limited. The appropriate "treatment" for many people with prostate cancer is watchful waiting.
So, it's a useful development, but a fairly limited one.
Today. The goal is to reduce the need for the specialist, to de-skill the process, and to move it down the employment stack while maintaining the quality level so you can run many more through it.
More scanners is probably a greater need than AI interpretation. We have very few by international standards. The government is said to want to double these iirc.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Why do they "of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government"? I think they'll probably (try to) do what they say they will. Their voters may well not like it and vote them out at the next possible opportunity (see the Dutch elections), of course!
Trump is Farage's biggest inspiration. Trump and MAGA use racism and culture war to distract their voters from the massive cuts in public services and bungs to the wealthy (or, at least, those wealthy who show obesiance to Trump). Maybe that works for Reform too.
Why? It's a judgment and I may be wrong but this is why:
Reform will want to be reelected, so they will have to provide what voters want. Think for 10 minutes about the voters of Clacton.
The UK is not the USA. We don't have a quasi religious view of political leadership whom we would follow into the desert and commit mass suicide.
As Reform enter government, they inherit all the already done deals for expenditure. Significant cuts would have to be legislated for and put into effect. This is not easy.
I completely agree with Reform's agenda that UK governing could be done infinitely better. What I don't think is that it can be transformed either quickly or cheaply.
I will rethink it if and when Reform pledge some actual figures about State Managed Expenditure in % of GDP and show how they would remove, say, 5%-10% points off it. I am not holding my breath.
Farage models himself on Trump. What the Republicans did, he’ll do. You’re right that we’re not the US and he won’t get himself re-elected probably, but the question isnt what should Reform do to get re-elected, it’s what will Reform do.
You seem to underestimate how much politicians actually believe in what the say.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Why do they "of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government"? I think they'll probably (try to) do what they say they will. Their voters may well not like it and vote them out at the next possible opportunity (see the Dutch elections), of course!
Trump is Farage's biggest inspiration. Trump and MAGA use racism and culture war to distract their voters from the massive cuts in public services and bungs to the wealthy (or, at least, those wealthy who show obesiance to Trump). Maybe that works for Reform too.
Why? It's a judgment and I may be wrong but this is why:
Reform will want to be reelected, so they will have to provide what voters want. Think for 10 minutes about the voters of Clacton.
The UK is not the USA. We don't have a quasi religious view of political leadership whom we would follow into the desert and commit mass suicide.
As Reform enter government, they inherit all the already done deals for expenditure. Significant cuts would have to be legislated for and put into effect. This is not easy.
I completely agree with Reform's agenda that UK governing could be done infinitely better. What I don't think is that it can be transformed either quickly or cheaply.
I will rethink it if and when Reform pledge some actual figures about State Managed Expenditure in % of GDP and show how they would remove, say, 5%-10% points off it. I am not holding my breath.
Another reason is let’s say there are 400 Reform MPs - even if 250 were pro Singapore-on-Thames, there will still be plenty who are not and will vote to maintain the status quo. Without established party loyalty they are not going to blindly follow Farage if they both don't believe in it and think they will be punished by their electorate if they press ahead.
If they wanted to maintain the status quo, they wouldn’t be standing as Reform candidates.
I hardly ever go to the cinema these days due to streaming.....
I hardly ever go to the cinema as it doesn’t have anything I want to see. I suspect the next time I go will be Wake Up Deadman and that will be in Durham or Tyneside depending on who wants to see it with me
I hardly ever go to the cinema these days due to streaming.....
I hardly ever go either. But it's more because of the lack of anything decent to watch. We've had 10 years of absolute bilge.
Well there is that too. The few times I have been in past year (and I do admit Mrs U likes the posho ones with table service) but its bloody expensive these days too. If you have a couple of kids, what are you looking at £50 (non-London prices) for the family without any over-priced snacks, £500 with snacks?
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Not sure that is true.
Yougov found in June that 34% of ReformUK voters want to decrease taxes and spending on services, more than the 17% of All voters who want to cut tax and spend and even more than the 23% of Conservative voters who want to cut taxes and spending.
On that poll the plurality of Reform voters prefer status quo on tax and spend. That 36% + the 14% who want increases = 50% of Reform voters. Clearly large numbers will in fact also want lower tax and higher spend etc.
But anyway, the question is not how voters poll in 2025, it's how they vote after 4/5 years of Reform government. There is a chance that Reform could run government with more imagination that the old guard; no chance at all that they can be popular with a voter from whom they have removed pension provision, local hospital services, maternity pay, welfare safety net and so on. Reform's message that many policy changes are needed is fine. The idea this can be done on the cheap is not.
I predict that State Managed Expenditure as a % of GDP will be almost unchanged after 5 years of Reform government; I also predict they won't put a % figure on their cuts to SME because they know it can't be done.
This all implies that a Reform UK government will crash and burn, and be voted out. It does not predict that a Reform UK government will abandon everything it’s been saying, which was your earlier contention.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
He’s had to cut all his tax reduction policies by the look of it - so what’s left is Government spending vita and his plans to destroy the NHS.
He doesn’t plan to destroy the NHS. It would still be free at point of use. Just another change to it.
As for tax, I saw a graphic (wish I could find it) showing how many Reform target seats had rather a lot of PIP and UC claimants. They would be mad to cut that for their client vote.
It's a bit more nuanced than that. They had an almost uniform vote throughout the range of constituencies (based on Indices of Multiple Deprivation). It's just that they picked up seats in the poorer areas (left behinds?). At the other end of the scale, the LibDems picked up a lot of their seats in the smug suburbs. Just the randomness of FPTP and getting out the vote.
Perhaps their aspiration is to have a Reform Ming vase and parade it through many more sectors.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
At this point hybrids feel like a dead-end rather than a stepping stone. Norway has managed the transition, China is following quickly. I don't see why Britain can't too.
Britain could. Whether Britain could do so easily and cheaply is a separate question. We are already moving in the right direction. Greater love for hybrids is suggested as a way of moving further, faster and cheaper.
My love of my hybrid is down to (a) being fuel efficient (typically 56-57 mpg for unleaded petrol) and (b) the drive train is electric so no gears and really easy to drive. Its not a plug in hybrid.
The most depressing thing about this it might work. If Trump's diseased, misfiring brain thinks this will make a good ratings storyline on today's episode of his show, he'll go for it.
Scott Adams @ScottAdamsSays On Monday, I will ask President Trump, via X, to help save my life. He offered to help me if I needed it.
I need it.
As many of you know, I have metastasized prostate cancer.
My healthcare provider, Kaiser of Northern California, has approved my application to receive a newly FDA-approved drug called Pluvicto. But they have dropped the ball in scheduling the brief IV to administer it and I can’t seem to fix that.
I am declining fast. I will ask President Trump if he can get Kaiser of Northern California to respond and schedule it for Monday. That will give me a fighting chance to stick around on this planet a little bit longer.
It is not a cure, but it does give good results to many people.
Never heard of it but a quick google says a course of treatment is $250k. Expensive to virtually all of us. About 6 minutes worth of interest for Elon Musk. Wealth taxes please.
That article is 8 months old - 8 months during which Tesla's market cap has gone from an 'unsustainable' $852bn to, er... $1.42tn 🤷🏻♂️
Beats me.
I think this article is total bollocks. For example,
"Let’s compare that to Toyota. They are far larger than Tesla and have far more impactful upcoming EV and self-driving technology than Tesla."
A key difference between Tesla and Toyota that this guy misses is that Tesla have managed to put their impactful upcoming EV and self-driving technology in an actual car, whereas Toyota's only ever makes it as far as press releases.
Not sure I would want "Impactful" self-driving technology
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
At this point hybrids feel like a dead-end rather than a stepping stone. Norway has managed the transition, China is following quickly. I don't see why Britain can't too.
Sky high 'leecy prices haven't helped. I would say, having compared the Tesla and non-Tesla public charging, that
- Uptime needs to be a factor. This was introduced in the US, under Biden, if not up for 95% of the time, no subsidies - The apps appear to have been designed by people who got fired from writing parking payment apps. - Rip off pricing (also see 'leccy prices).
Compare with Tesla - broken Tesla charging stalls are rare. Never seen a whole site down. You just plug the car in, and wait about 20 seconds until it starts charging. Then go and get a coffee or something.
The best charger network in Japan, Flash EV, doesn't bother with an app or a membership card or anything like that. You plug in the car, it charges until it's full or you stop it, and you tap your credit card to pay. I don't really understand why the other ones felt the need to make it so complicated.
I hardly ever go to the cinema these days due to streaming.....
I hardly ever go either. But it's more because of the lack of anything decent to watch. We've had 10 years of absolute bilge.
Well there is that too. The few times I have been in past year (and I do admit Mrs U likes the posho ones with table service) but its bloody expensive these days too. If you have a couple of kids, what are you looking at £50 (non-London prices) for the family without any over-priced snacks, £500 with snacks?
£6 per person at my local multiplex. £5 booked Online. All films all times.
I hardly ever go to the cinema these days due to streaming.....
I hardly ever go either. But it's more because of the lack of anything decent to watch. We've had 10 years of absolute bilge.
Well there is that too. The few times I have been in past year (and I do admit Mrs U likes the posho ones with table service) but its bloody expensive these days too. If you have a couple of kids, what are you looking at £50 (non-London prices) for the family without any over-priced snacks, £500 with snacks?
£6 per person at my local multiplex. £5 booked Online. All films all times.
Do you have to take your own film and run the projector yourself?
I just checked my local multiplex, £38 for 2 adults, 2 kids. I don't know what "kid" goes up to, I presume not even 16. £48 if the kids count as adults.
TL/DR; More local history, otherwise Michael Gove's ‘Tudors & Nazis’ (and some random topics of a teacher's own choosing) syllabus to remain.
And a preference for triple over double science to return, so job security for the pb physics teachers amidst a national shortage!
How local? Would this mean regional GCSEs in history?
Read the article via the free link provided.
The answer is probably local enough. We did the borough's highlights back in junior school back in the day, so obviously this was not part of an exam. I doubt it would mean regional GCSEs but the current system means each school can teach different topics from its neighbours already, which imo undermines the case for compulsory history and also shows how the Thatcher government botched the national curriculum itself – the problem it claimed to address was different syllabuses!
When I was at junior school, we were all given a copy of "A Short History of Gateshead". Not to read in class, just to take home.
Did it get as far as T. Dan Smith? Or was that concreted glossed over?
TL/DR; More local history, otherwise Michael Gove's ‘Tudors & Nazis’ (and some random topics of a teacher's own choosing) syllabus to remain.
And a preference for triple over double science to return, so job security for the pb physics teachers amidst a national shortage!
How local? Would this mean regional GCSEs in history?
Read the article via the free link provided.
The answer is probably local enough. We did the borough's highlights back in junior school back in the day, so obviously this was not part of an exam. I doubt it would mean regional GCSEs but the current system means each school can teach different topics from its neighbours already, which imo undermines the case for compulsory history and also shows how the Thatcher government botched the national curriculum itself – the problem it claimed to address was different syllabuses!
When I was at junior school, we were all given a copy of "A Short History of Gateshead". Not to read in class, just to take home.
Did it get as far as T. Dan Smith? Or was that concreted glossed over?
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Not sure that is true.
Yougov found in June that 34% of ReformUK voters want to decrease taxes and spending on services, more than the 17% of All voters who want to cut tax and spend and even more than the 23% of Conservative voters who want to cut taxes and spending.
On that poll the plurality of Reform voters prefer status quo on tax and spend. That 36% + the 14% who want increases = 50% of Reform voters. Clearly large numbers will in fact also want lower tax and higher spend etc.
But anyway, the question is not how voters poll in 2025, it's how they vote after 4/5 years of Reform government. There is a chance that Reform could run government with more imagination that the old guard; no chance at all that they can be popular with a voter from whom they have removed pension provision, local hospital services, maternity pay, welfare safety net and so on. Reform's message that many policy changes are needed is fine. The idea this can be done on the cheap is not.
I predict that State Managed Expenditure as a % of GDP will be almost unchanged after 5 years of Reform government; I also predict they won't put a % figure on their cuts to SME because they know it can't be done.
This all implies that a Reform UK government will crash and burn, and be voted out. It does not predict that a Reform UK government will abandon everything it’s been saying, which was your earlier contention.
No. I predict that, underneath the rhetoric, a Reform government will run a high spend (therefore high tax) broadly social democratic government in line with every post WWII government. it will do that because it is the best chance of being reelected, and also because high spend (and therefore high tax) is baked into the system and the Reform voter though some don't know it.
The gap in the market, which can't be done on the cheap, if for ideas, inspirational leadership, imagination, and above all competence.
There is no market for spending a lot less on defence, NHS, education, police, pensions, welfare safety net (though there's bits on the margins), ie all the big bits of the state. The awesome reality is that there is incessant demand for more.
I hardly ever go to the cinema these days due to streaming.....
I hardly ever go either. But it's more because of the lack of anything decent to watch. We've had 10 years of absolute bilge.
Well there is that too. The few times I have been in past year (and I do admit Mrs U likes the posho ones with table service) but its bloody expensive these days too. If you have a couple of kids, what are you looking at £50 (non-London prices) for the family without any over-priced snacks, £500 with snacks?
£6 per person at my local multiplex. £5 booked Online. All films all times.
Incidentally. It also does autism friendly screenings. The last Sunday of every month at 10:30 am. How convenient!
"In our autism-friendly screenings, the lights are left on low, the sound is turned down and trailers and adverts aren't played".
I'd be more likely to go more often if that was standard.
A bit like ASDA with their turning off the intrusive announcements and music and switching off the blinding strip lighting for an hour a week.
I hardly ever go to the cinema these days due to streaming.....
I hardly ever go either. But it's more because of the lack of anything decent to watch. We've had 10 years of absolute bilge.
Well there is that too. The few times I have been in past year (and I do admit Mrs U likes the posho ones with table service) but its bloody expensive these days too. If you have a couple of kids, what are you looking at £50 (non-London prices) for the family without any over-priced snacks, £500 with snacks?
£6 per person at my local multiplex. £5 booked Online. All films all times.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
At this point hybrids feel like a dead-end rather than a stepping stone. Norway has managed the transition, China is following quickly. I don't see why Britain can't too.
Sky high 'leecy prices haven't helped. I would say, having compared the Tesla and non-Tesla public charging, that
- Uptime needs to be a factor. This was introduced in the US, under Biden, if not up for 95% of the time, no subsidies - The apps appear to have been designed by people who got fired from writing parking payment apps. - Rip off pricing (also see 'leccy prices).
Compare with Tesla - broken Tesla charging stalls are rare. Never seen a whole site down. You just plug the car in, and wait about 20 seconds until it starts charging. Then go and get a coffee or something.
Doesn't help that fuel prices remain so low - of they'd kept up with inflation over the last 15 years, they would be £2 per litre by now.
Government policy is completely incoherent - continuous cuts to fuel duty, very little public investment in motorway and on-street charging in urban areas, no relief on taxes on electricity, yet we have EV quotas on car manufacturers. It's mad.
The general issue is significant. If Reform form a government they will of course have to govern as a high spend, welfare state, massive state provision government. The social democratic post WWII consensus will not have been abolished by the voters. Ask the voters of Clacton what they want in the way of pensions, NHS, free education, police, welfare safety net. All the big costs are there.
So Farage has to move away from both libertarian small state - interesting idea but wanted by almost no-one, and those who want it are rich - and unicorn stuff about savings made on rainbow flags and lanyards. He will have to run a high spend (loud voice) and therefore high tax (quieter voice) government. Even more so WRT tax if he wants to remove the deficit and start paying back the debt.
Not sure that is true.
Yougov found in June that 34% of ReformUK voters want to decrease taxes and spending on services, more than the 17% of All voters who want to cut tax and spend and even more than the 23% of Conservative voters who want to cut taxes and spending.
On that poll the plurality of Reform voters prefer status quo on tax and spend. That 36% + the 14% who want increases = 50% of Reform voters. Clearly large numbers will in fact also want lower tax and higher spend etc.
But anyway, the question is not how voters poll in 2025, it's how they vote after 4/5 years of Reform government. There is a chance that Reform could run government with more imagination that the old guard; no chance at all that they can be popular with a voter from whom they have removed pension provision, local hospital services, maternity pay, welfare safety net and so on. Reform's message that many policy changes are needed is fine. The idea this can be done on the cheap is not.
I predict that State Managed Expenditure as a % of GDP will be almost unchanged after 5 years of Reform government; I also predict they won't put a % figure on their cuts to SME because they know it can't be done.
This all implies that a Reform UK government will crash and burn, and be voted out. It does not predict that a Reform UK government will abandon everything it’s been saying, which was your earlier contention.
No. I predict that, underneath the rhetoric, a Reform government will run a high spend (therefore high tax) broadly social democratic government in line with every post WWII government. it will do that because it is the best chance of being reelected, and also because high spend (and therefore high tax) is baked into the system and the Reform voter though some don't know it.
The gap in the market, which can't be done on the cheap, if for ideas, inspirational leadership, imagination, and above all competence.
There is no market for spending a lot less on defence, NHS, education, police, pensions, welfare safety net (though there's bits on the margins), ie all the big bits of the state. The awesome reality is that there is incessant demand for more.
As to crash and burn; wait and see. Don't know.
You seem to be predicting what you want to happen. Your thesis has to ignore what Reform are saying, and presumes that Reform politicians don't believe in their own ideas. You ignore the obvious parallels with what other populist right parties have done elsewhere in the world (most notably MAGA).
There is, yes, a certain momentum to politics, things tend to continue as they have. Every party that talks of cutting spending ends up not cutting as much as promised when faced with the reality of governing. However, there are still real differences in what parties do. You talk about "broadly social democratic government in line with every post WWII government", but there is a real difference between the Attlee government and the Thatcher government, between the Cameron government and the Blair government. There will be a real difference between a Farage, Davey or Polanski government.
FPT: "Benpointer- I know we said most Russian oil exports are crude rather than refined oil but if all their refineries end up being taken out where will the Russians themselves get refined oil from? Or do those T72s run on crude oil?"
I believe Russia gets refined products from Belarus. Be terrible if Belarus had a "smoking at work" incident...
Although if Russia takes it to the point there are Belarussian shortages/price hikes, that is only going to fuel (pun intended) the growing unrest against Lukashenko. A change in the regime in Minsk to one friendly towards Kyiv would greatly change the forces available to Ukraine to defend the east.
Whilst I am 100% behind Ukraine, the possibility of a change in the regime in Minsk would only come from a collapse in Russia. Belorussia is 100% a Russian puppet. If Lukashenko fell out of a window, he'd simply be replaced by someone equally supportive of Russia (hand picked by Putin himself) or even just simply annex the country. It's defacto Russia anyway.
You have to wonder why Putin didn't annexe Belarussia, at least before trying for Ukraine.
Forget the rise of Reform. More interested in the cost of plastering if anyone has recent experience.
When we had fire doors and and alarms fitted, all done by the same firm, the plasterer came late and intermittently, whenever his other job would allow. I'd ask on your local FB what availability and rates are like wherever you are.
I see Corbyn is phone banking for the Democrat as are others.
Of course foreign interference in elections is bad if it’s someone like Musk. It’s okay when they do it.
😂😂😂😂
I feel a little bit of false equivalence between Magic Grandpa calling you up and suggesting that Putin was misunderstood, and being bombarded with $x billion of metaphorical crap whilst sitting eating a sourdough crumpet in the global 'town square'.
Of course it isn’t just the likes of Putin who interfere in our elections. False equivalence.
Clearly It’s alright when we do it 👍
Trump Admiring Zealot
I don't think it is even that,
Of course it isn’t but Sunil is a lonely middle aged man who lives with his Mom and just vents on the net if he hasn’t got a train to spot. Some form of valediction for an empty life I’d guess. I just ignore his baiting.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
At this point hybrids feel like a dead-end rather than a stepping stone. Norway has managed the transition, China is following quickly. I don't see why Britain can't too.
Sky high 'leecy prices haven't helped. I would say, having compared the Tesla and non-Tesla public charging, that
- Uptime needs to be a factor. This was introduced in the US, under Biden, if not up for 95% of the time, no subsidies - The apps appear to have been designed by people who got fired from writing parking payment apps. - Rip off pricing (also see 'leccy prices).
Compare with Tesla - broken Tesla charging stalls are rare. Never seen a whole site down. You just plug the car in, and wait about 20 seconds until it starts charging. Then go and get a coffee or something.
The best charger network in Japan, Flash EV, doesn't bother with an app or a membership card or anything like that. You plug in the car, it charges until it's full or you stop it, and you tap your credit card to pay. I don't really understand why the other ones felt the need to make it so complicated.
TL/DR; More local history, otherwise Michael Gove's ‘Tudors & Nazis’ (and some random topics of a teacher's own choosing) syllabus to remain.
And a preference for triple over double science to return, so job security for the pb physics teachers amidst a national shortage!
How local? Would this mean regional GCSEs in history?
Read the article via the free link provided.
The answer is probably local enough. We did the borough's highlights back in junior school back in the day, so obviously this was not part of an exam. I doubt it would mean regional GCSEs but the current system means each school can teach different topics from its neighbours already, which imo undermines the case for compulsory history and also shows how the Thatcher government botched the national curriculum itself – the problem it claimed to address was different syllabuses!
When I was at junior school, we were all given a copy of "A Short History of Gateshead". Not to read in class, just to take home.
Did it get as far as T. Dan Smith? Or was that concreted glossed over?
I see Farage has formally rowed back the tax cut plans from the last manifesto.
It'll be interesting if he loses any support for it. But strategically it brings Reform in line with the fiscal consensus (that is, no appetite for proper fiscal consolidation but paying lip service to the idea that we can't let our position get much worse). Which means one less thing to attack Reform on.
I'd say that further shrinks the policy gap between Reform and the Tories.
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Do you have an EV? Never had range anxiety, it's something that mostly exists in the heads of ICE drivers.
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
Such a person would be able to get a mobility vehicle to be driven by a carer
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
You know you can get a Motobility car and the driver doesn't need to be the person with the disability (which is a strike against your argument)
Now the car should really only be used for the person who has the disability but we all know that isn't the case (which is I think the point you are aiming for).
Although they were pretty early with say the Prius. I drive an Auris (and the wife has a Yaris) - both excellent hybrids. I would guess the main issues with full EV will be battery related.
The main issue was that the head of Toyota was full on for the Hydrogen Religion, and hated the idea of EVs. So Toyota spent vast sums on not getting (well, they got some pre-production, insanely expensive examples running) hydrogen fuel cell cars into production.
So, after spending vast sums on fuel cells and nothing on EV development, strangely, they didn't have EVs.
They are trying to catch up, frantically, now.
If they had evolved the Prius into a full EV, they would have cleaned up, I reckon. But they didn't.
Alternatively, we could extend official EV love to hybrids. Aside from anything else, this would mean an end to range anxiety and take away the necessity for chargers in every lamp post. We'd get most of the EV benefit for almost no extra cost.
Prius is about 50 mpg.which is nice, but nowhere near zero emissions.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
For pootling around town which is what most people do, hybrids are fine. Range anxiety is range anxiety and claiming people don't understand does not really get us anywhere. It is one reason people slow down on motorways, thus rendering them less efficient and more dangerous.
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
At this point hybrids feel like a dead-end rather than a stepping stone. Norway has managed the transition, China is following quickly. I don't see why Britain can't too.
Sky high 'leecy prices haven't helped. I would say, having compared the Tesla and non-Tesla public charging, that
- Uptime needs to be a factor. This was introduced in the US, under Biden, if not up for 95% of the time, no subsidies - The apps appear to have been designed by people who got fired from writing parking payment apps. - Rip off pricing (also see 'leccy prices).
Compare with Tesla - broken Tesla charging stalls are rare. Never seen a whole site down. You just plug the car in, and wait about 20 seconds until it starts charging. Then go and get a coffee or something.
Doesn't help that fuel prices remain so low - of they'd kept up with inflation over the last 15 years, they would be £2 per litre by now.
Government policy is completely incoherent - continuous cuts to fuel duty, very little public investment in motorway and on-street charging in urban areas, no relief on taxes on electricity, yet we have EV quotas on car manufacturers. It's mad.
Fuel prices are absurdly high, almost all of our fuel costs are tax. They should be considerably lower.
That they're not quite as ridiculously high as 15 years ago is not the same thing as them being low.
You won't hear me arguing about the absurdity of the lack of investment in motorways etc though, we should be investing much more in roads I agree, but that could have been fully funded by the heavily overtaxed fuel revenues we've been paying hand over fist for decades.
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
Such a person would be able to get a mobility vehicle to be driven by a carer
Why? For what purpose?
The carer should be able to have their own vehicle.
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
You know you can get a Motobility car and the driver doesn't need to be the person with the disability (which is a strike against your argument)
Now the car should really only be used for the person who has the disability but we all know that isn't the case (which is I think the point you are aiming for).
Precisely, the whole argument is bullshit.
If someone is a carer they should be to afford a car from their own wages.
If someone is too disabled to drive, they don't need a vehicle.
The whole thing is a nice rort for people who can play the system and then treat the PIP as income as if they were working for the money, which they're not.
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
You said we should abolish PIP and now you're scrambling because you didn't have a clue about what you talking about - which you've demonstrated once again in this post.
Being incontinent isn't even enough points for the enhanced rate of PIP. You need 12, that's only 8. It's not an extreme example at all.
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
You know you can get a Motobility car and the driver doesn't need to be the person with the disability (which is a strike against your argument)
Now the car should really only be used for the person who has the disability but we all know that isn't the case (which is I think the point you are aiming for).
This would be exceptionally hard to police. However it is the case that lots of non-working people can get a much nicer car on motability than a lot of working people can afford to drive.
PIP isn't just used for motability of course. A friend had a stroke. He doesn't drive (not sure he would be able to, even an adapted car) but he gets PIP which he uses to pay for taxes. He has a bus pass, but it's not much use as he struggles to get to the bus stops, and he tires easily so if he can go somewhere, would struggle to get home.
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
You know you can get a Motobility car and the driver doesn't need to be the person with the disability (which is a strike against your argument)
Now the car should really only be used for the person who has the disability but we all know that isn't the case (which is I think the point you are aiming for).
Precisely, the whole argument is bullshit.
If someone is a carer they should be to afford a car from their own wages.
If someone is too disabled to drive, they don't need a vehicle.
The whole thing is a nice rort for people who can play the system and then treat the PIP as income as if they were working for the money, which they're not.
The carer is normally the disabled person's partner or parent, doing it for free
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
The person who gets the PIP doesn't have to be the driver. I used to drive a Motability car for my partner (who doesn't drive anyway, regardless of her disabilities)
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
You know you can get a Motobility car and the driver doesn't need to be the person with the disability (which is a strike against your argument)
Now the car should really only be used for the person who has the disability but we all know that isn't the case (which is I think the point you are aiming for).
This would be exceptionally hard to police. However it is the case that lots of non-working people can get a much nicer car on motability than a lot of working people can afford to drive.
PIP isn't just used for motability of course. A friend had a stroke. He doesn't drive (not sure he would be able to, even an adapted car) but he gets PIP which he uses to pay for taxes. He has a bus pass, but it's not much use as he struggles to get to the bus stops, and he tires easily so if he can go somewhere, would struggle to get home.
Which is why most people end up with cars because travelling by public transport gets complex very quickly if you are not 100% fit and able...
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
You said we should abolish PIP and now you're scrambling because you didn't have a clue about what you talking about - which you've demonstrated once again in this post.
Being incontinent isn't even enough points for the enhanced rate of PIP. You need 12, that's only 8. It's not an extreme example at all.
You're either cruel or ignorant or both.
Especially so given Barty's past championing of the private car as the primary means of transport.
Again just more nonsense. The benefit is not means tested, so those who want a nicer car can put money towards a nicer car. Hairshirt headline grabbing which will do nothing for the benefits bill.
compared to the PIP amount given up it is massively subsidised.
Plus no 20% VAT. It is hugely subsidised compared to privately purchased vehicles.
Abolish PIP and tax everyone the same. Problem solved.
Want a car? Get a job and pay for it out of your wages.
Do you mean abolish PIP or abolish Motability?
Abolish PIP. Everyone needs transport, just pay for it out of your wages, same as everyone else.
I'd have a scheme to pay for eg wheelchairs if required, but transport? Just pay for it as everyone else has to.
PIP isn't just about getting around Barty. You've kneejerking a bit too hard.
The mobility element is.
Just scrap it and scrap taxes on transport so that people can afford transport without a subsidy.
Ah, so you didn't mean abolish PIP. Did you just say that to get some attention?
No, its called context. We were talking about the mobility element of PIP, we were talking about Motability, so you should be able to infer from context what is being spoken about.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
You know you can get a Motobility car and the driver doesn't need to be the person with the disability (which is a strike against your argument)
Now the car should really only be used for the person who has the disability but we all know that isn't the case (which is I think the point you are aiming for).
Precisely, the whole argument is bullshit.
If someone is a carer they should be to afford a car from their own wages.
If someone is too disabled to drive, they don't need a vehicle.
The whole thing is a nice rort for people who can play the system and then treat the PIP as income as if they were working for the money, which they're not.
So you are saying that disabled people don't have a normal need to get about? For example, go shopping, socialise, volunteer, listen to music, go the the pub etc.
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- Setup an *internal* consultancy, within the NHS. Its job is to go round improving processes, and joining stuff up. You'll be looking at "We saved 1.46% in area X this year, by reducing form entry duplication". A slow, steady thing, over years. It will never end, so it is *core* to NHS operations.
- Expand training of medical staff by 1% above the natural growth required for the increasing population etc per year. Until the training of staff exceeds 100% of planned NHS demand.
- This is connected with reducing and finally eliminating agency staffing which is insanely expensive.
- Redesign the contracts for doctors and nurses so that instead of "Beatings will continue until morale improves", a slightly more modern approach to management-staff relations is taken.
I decided to call them. After some time in a queue I got a recorded message asking me to leave a message.
One of the things that annoys me is that you are not allowed to hand-deliver them. My council offices are next to my local, so I could pop them through the letter box on the way to the pub. Instead I have to trust the postman to deliver it, and allow a few days for it to arrive.
Range anxiety is about people not understanding EVs. There's high capacity charging stations at all the motorway services in the country, and many other places. Where you can charge the latest EVs from 20-80% in about 15 minutes. Lamp posts are about trickle charging at night.
The answer is probably local enough. We did the borough's highlights back in junior school back in the day, so obviously this was not part of an exam. I doubt it would mean regional GCSEs but the current system means each school can teach different topics from its neighbours already, which imo undermines the case for compulsory history and also shows how the Thatcher government botched the national curriculum itself – the problem it claimed to address was different syllabuses!
Must do something....and of course da yutt already walk around without their faces visible. The eye witnesses from the train attack stated the alleged attacker had his face covered*. I presume digital ID cards will get a tweet shortly from the GPTStarmer.
Are we going to be shocked if we end up buying this tech from China. The cameras most certainly will be.
* I wonder if that is how the original mix up happened in terms of 2 arrested.
We have a govt that, despite its massive majority, cannot get a minor cut to the welfare bill through,
Trump on Prince Andrew and the Epstein scandal: "I feel very badly. I mean, it's a terrible thing that's happened to the family. That's been a tragic situation. And it's too bad. I feel badly for the family."
https://x.com/atrupar/status/1985143129683419635
Hybrids are better than ICE and worse than EV (other things being equal). Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Palantir, obviously. They've got ImmigrationOS (no, really, it's called that) in use by ICE in the US. So it's all up and working.
A bit more recently had to escape a drunk merchant mariner in the bar who'd got tearful about cheating on his wife.
In both cases, I blame my work colleagues who ignored my pleas that we get on the metro into toon for a few beers.
Yougov found in June that 34% of ReformUK voters want to decrease taxes and spending on services, more than the 17% of All voters who want to cut tax and spend and even more than the 23% of Conservative voters who want to cut taxes and spending.
36% of Reform voters want to keep tax and spending as now and a mere 14% of Reform voters want to increase tax and spending, while 30% of All voters want to increase taxes and spending
https://yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/52312-where-do-britons-stand-on-tax-and-spending-ahead-of-the-2025-spending-review
All the EVs I've been in give a very good estimate of remaining charge at your destination. Tesla routing software autoplans the charging stops for you - others do as well now.
Reform will want to be reelected, so they will have to provide what voters want. Think for 10 minutes about the voters of Clacton.
The UK is not the USA. We don't have a quasi religious view of political leadership whom we would follow into the desert and commit mass suicide.
As Reform enter government, they inherit all the already done deals for expenditure. Significant cuts would have to be legislated for and put into effect. This is not easy.
I completely agree with Reform's agenda that UK governing could be done infinitely better. What I don't think is that it can be transformed either quickly or cheaply.
I will rethink it if and when Reform pledge some actual figures about State Managed Expenditure in % of GDP and show how they would remove, say, 5%-10% points off it. I am not holding my breath.
I like the car, charging at home is cheap and easy but in the wild I'd try to avoid anything other than Tesla superchargers.
I don't know what they have done to Claude recently, it takes every question I ask it and decides to write about 10,000 lines of code even if it isn't a coding question. And even when I do want code, it massively overcomplicates the answer.
Of course they could just be people with points on their licence desperate to not get caught speeding.
But going back to range anxiety, a lot of people see public charging points as a ripoff. The ideal is for your car to have a range of twice your normal maximum length journey so it can always be charged at home
The chippies are good in North Shields as is the fresh fish, for obvious reasons. Not eaten there in a restaurant since Staith House closed.
Trenchers in Spanish City is top notch.
I did try Blacks Corner at Fenwicks and must go back, it was amazing. Not as good as the actual one, but marvellous all the same. A great cheese and meat platter washed down with some decent wine.
Just as a lot of voters want tax rises on everyone but them, a lot of voters see other people’s welfare as unreasonable and excessive, and theirs justified and proper.
As a result I can fully imagine a number of voters accepting the premise that welfare must be curtailed - they just don’t want it to impact on theirs.
As to how Reform play this - well, I suspect Farage will turn to his usual playbook. Welfare spending can be reduced, he’ll say, by cuts to immigration and welfare payments to asylum seekers and recent immigrants. That will free up more money for those that “deserve” it, will be the message. Hence he’ll campaign on both reducing spending but protecting his voters.
But anyway, the question is not how voters poll in 2025, it's how they vote after 4/5 years of Reform government. There is a chance that Reform could run government with more imagination that the old guard; no chance at all that they can be popular with a voter from whom they have removed pension provision, local hospital services, maternity pay, welfare safety net and so on. Reform's message that many policy changes are needed is fine. The idea this can be done on the cheap is not.
I predict that State Managed Expenditure as a % of GDP will be almost unchanged after 5 years of Reform government; I also predict they won't put a % figure on their cuts to SME because they know it can't be done.
While generally it's good to diagnose cancers earlier (see Richards, Westcombe et al., 1999, https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140673699021431/abstract ), a month isn't much earlier and prostate cancer is often slow growing, so the advantages of earlier diagnosis are limited. The appropriate "treatment" for many people with prostate cancer is watchful waiting.
So, it's a useful development, but a fairly limited one.
Back then it had seen better days.
Haven in name only.
Did the system in the car not actually tell you, on the map, where compatible chargers are?
Spookily I don't recall him leading on debt, nondoms fleeing, massive deregulation,championing the City of London and attacking welfare and the public sector on the Caerphilly stump?
How weird that he chose today's venue to do that instead.
- Uptime needs to be a factor. This was introduced in the US, under Biden, if not up for 95% of the time, no subsidies
- The apps appear to have been designed by people who got fired from writing parking payment apps.
- Rip off pricing (also see 'leccy prices).
Compare with Tesla - broken Tesla charging stalls are rare. Never seen a whole site down. You just plug the car in, and wait about 20 seconds until it starts charging. Then go and get a coffee or something.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c986d9jjv87o
I hardly ever go to the cinema these days due to streaming.....
You seem to underestimate how much politicians actually believe in what the say.
Perhaps their aspiration is to have a Reform Ming vase and parade it through many more sectors.
I just checked my local multiplex, £38 for 2 adults, 2 kids. I don't know what "kid" goes up to, I presume not even 16. £48 if the kids count as adults.
concretedglossed over?The gap in the market, which can't be done on the cheap, if for ideas, inspirational leadership, imagination, and above all competence.
There is no market for spending a lot less on defence, NHS, education, police, pensions, welfare safety net (though there's bits on the margins), ie all the big bits of the state. The awesome reality is that there is incessant demand for more.
As to crash and burn; wait and see. Don't know.
How convenient!
"In our autism-friendly screenings, the lights are left on low, the sound is turned down and trailers and adverts aren't played".
I'd be more likely to go more often if that was standard.
A bit like ASDA with their turning off the intrusive announcements and music and switching off the blinding strip lighting for an hour a week.
Odeon in Durham is £10 and nicer -
Government policy is completely incoherent - continuous cuts to fuel duty, very little public investment in motorway and on-street charging in urban areas, no relief on taxes on electricity, yet we have EV quotas on car manufacturers. It's mad.
There is, yes, a certain momentum to politics, things tend to continue as they have. Every party that talks of cutting spending ends up not cutting as much as promised when faced with the reality of governing. However, there are still real differences in what parties do. You talk about "broadly social democratic government in line with every post WWII government", but there is a real difference between the Attlee government and the Thatcher government, between the Cameron government and the Blair government. There will be a real difference between a Farage, Davey or Polanski government.
And please can we play the ball not the man?
It'll be interesting if he loses any support for it. But strategically it brings Reform in line with the fiscal consensus (that is, no appetite for proper fiscal consolidation but paying lip service to the idea that we can't let our position get much worse). Which means one less thing to attack Reform on.
I'd say that further shrinks the policy gap between Reform and the Tories.
Anyway, you did hit a nail on the head, as the problem is the amount of bullshit being said to get some attention, but its not from me.
Any time this is discussed you get absurd extremes like "can not go to the toilet by themselves" as justification for funding which then translates to Motability vehicles.
I am curious how many people lie in the intersection of the Venn Diagram that they are both incapable of going to the toilet by themselves, but capable of handling a motor vehicle and getting a driving licence, without being a danger to themselves or others.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd imagine that anyone capable of getting and holding a drivers licence, without being a hazard to themselves or others, would generally be capable of going to the bathroom without assistance from third parties.
Unless you mean something absurd by "can not go to the toilet by themselves" such as they actually can go by themselves.
Now the car should really only be used for the person who has the disability but we all know that isn't the case (which is I think the point you are aiming for).
That they're not quite as ridiculously high as 15 years ago is not the same thing as them being low.
You won't hear me arguing about the absurdity of the lack of investment in motorways etc though, we should be investing much more in roads I agree, but that could have been fully funded by the heavily overtaxed fuel revenues we've been paying hand over fist for decades.
The carer should be able to have their own vehicle.
If someone is a carer they should be to afford a car from their own wages.
If someone is too disabled to drive, they don't need a vehicle.
The whole thing is a nice rort for people who can play the system and then treat the PIP as income as if they were working for the money, which they're not.
Being incontinent isn't even enough points for the enhanced rate of PIP. You need 12, that's only 8. It's not an extreme example at all.
You're either cruel or ignorant or both.
PIP isn't just used for motability of course. A friend had a stroke. He doesn't drive (not sure he would be able to, even an adapted car) but he gets PIP which he uses to pay for taxes. He has a bus pass, but it's not much use as he struggles to get to the bus stops, and he tires easily so if he can go somewhere, would struggle to get home.