@viewcode here. I need to ask a legal question: specifically what can be said regarding an ongoing case. @Cyclefree, @DavidL and other lawyers of PB, can you assist? Shouldn't take longer than five minutes.
I've been out and am in hospital tomorrow. Maybe your query has been answered. But if not let me know.
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
It told Reeves on October 31 that she had a £4.2billion surplus ...
No she f###ing does not!
The Budget deficit is in the hundreds of billions. There is no surplus! WTAF!? 😡😡😡
Ridiculous reporting. Our journalist and MP classes are genuine morons. It's little wonder the country is fucked.
"The current budget is the difference between total current spending (i.e. day-to-day spending excluding capital investment) and total current revenue. It is a similar measure to PSNB in that it includes all public sector current receipts plus current spending, however it excludes depreciation and capital spending." - OBR
Presumably that means it is a kind of real-time measure of tax/revenue income vs day-to-day spending in that current year/quarter?
It told Reeves on October 31 that she had a £4.2billion surplus ...
No she f###ing does not!
The Budget deficit is in the hundreds of billions. There is no surplus! WTAF!? 😡😡😡
Ridiculous reporting. Our journalist and MP classes are genuine morons. It's little wonder the country is fucked.
"The current budget is the difference between total current spending (i.e. day-to-day spending excluding capital investment) and total current revenue. It is a similar measure to PSNB in that it includes all public sector current receipts plus current spending, however it excludes depreciation and capital spending." - OBR
Presumably that means it is a kind of real-time measure of tax/revenue income vs day-to-day spending in that current year/quarter?
And very dependent on how “capital investment” is defined.
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
Did they bloody listen to me? Did they buggery! More fools them. And so here we are in a society which becomes ever more repulsive in small ways and big every day.
I might add that the level of anti-Jewish rhetoric and abuse over the last few years has also created the sea in which the vile scum who murder and attack Jews swim.
It told Reeves on October 31 that she had a £4.2billion surplus ...
No she f###ing does not!
The Budget deficit is in the hundreds of billions. There is no surplus! WTAF!? 😡😡😡
Ridiculous reporting. Our journalist and MP classes are genuine morons. It's little wonder the country is fucked.
"The current budget is the difference between total current spending (i.e. day-to-day spending excluding capital investment) and total current revenue. It is a similar measure to PSNB in that it includes all public sector current receipts plus current spending, however it excludes depreciation and capital spending." - OBR
Presumably that means it is a kind of real-time measure of tax/revenue income vs day-to-day spending in that current year/quarter?
It's not that either, they were talking about the fiscal headroom figure which is tangentially related to the deficit. It's the amount of money the government has available to overspend or undertax and still meet the fiscal rules of having debt falling over a 5 year cycle. The OBR told Reeves that she had £4.2bn in headroom available and then Reeves went on TV and implied that there was a big blackhole which would require tax rises, which was clearly not true.
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
It told Reeves on October 31 that she had a £4.2billion surplus ...
No she f###ing does not!
The Budget deficit is in the hundreds of billions. There is no surplus! WTAF!? 😡😡😡
Ridiculous reporting. Our journalist and MP classes are genuine morons. It's little wonder the country is fucked.
"The current budget is the difference between total current spending (i.e. day-to-day spending excluding capital investment) and total current revenue. It is a similar measure to PSNB in that it includes all public sector current receipts plus current spending, however it excludes depreciation and capital spending." - OBR
Presumably that means it is a kind of real-time measure of tax/revenue income vs day-to-day spending in that current year/quarter?
It's not that either, they were talking about the fiscal headroom figure which is tangentially related to the deficit. It's the amount of money the government has available to overspend or undertax and still meet the fiscal rules of having debt falling over a 5 year cycle. The OBR told Reeves that she had £4.2bn in headroom available and then Reeves went on TV and implied that there was a big blackhole which would require tax rises, which was clearly not true.
Though you would surely have to be insane to run the fiscal headroom down to zero.
It told Reeves on October 31 that she had a £4.2billion surplus ...
No she f###ing does not!
The Budget deficit is in the hundreds of billions. There is no surplus! WTAF!? 😡😡😡
Ridiculous reporting. Our journalist and MP classes are genuine morons. It's little wonder the country is fucked.
"The current budget is the difference between total current spending (i.e. day-to-day spending excluding capital investment) and total current revenue. It is a similar measure to PSNB in that it includes all public sector current receipts plus current spending, however it excludes depreciation and capital spending." - OBR
Presumably that means it is a kind of real-time measure of tax/revenue income vs day-to-day spending in that current year/quarter?
It's not that either, they were talking about the fiscal headroom figure which is tangentially related to the deficit. It's the amount of money the government has available to overspend or undertax and still meet the fiscal rules of having debt falling over a 5 year cycle. The OBR told Reeves that she had £4.2bn in headroom available and then Reeves went on TV and implied that there was a big blackhole which would require tax rises, which was clearly not true.
Though you would surely have to be insane to run the fiscal headroom down to zero.
I don't disagree with you but it was an outright lie that the government had a new fiscal blackhole. That lie kicked off months of speculation on tax rises which damaged investment and jobs. She needs to resign for that.
Andrew Lilico @andrew_lilico · 1h Bad enough lying to the public & the markets. But lying to the Cabinet?? They're not coming back from this. It's only a matter of time now.
@viewcode here. I need to ask a legal question: specifically what can be said regarding an ongoing case. @Cyclefree, DavidL and other lawyers of PB, can you assist? Shouldn't take longer than five minutes.
I've been out and am in hospital tomorrow. Maybe your query has been answered. But if not let me know.
Andrew Lilico @andrew_lilico · 1h Bad enough lying to the public & the markets. But lying to the Cabinet?? They're not coming back from this. It's only a matter of time now.
@viewcode here. I need to ask a legal question: specifically what can be said regarding an ongoing case. @Cyclefree, @DavidL and other lawyers of PB, can you assist? Shouldn't take longer than five minutes.
I've been out and am in hospital tomorrow. Maybe your query has been answered. But if not let me know.
Luke Tryl, More In Common Polling, "Whilst that infighting has been going on, Zack Polanksi has been having by any measure an immensely impressive start as leader of The Greens"
"He's almost positioned The Greens as the best vehicle for disillusioned progressives and is rising in the polls as a result"
"I just wonder if the infighting between Jeremy Corbyn and Zara Sultana, and the rise of The Green Party, might mean that Your Party has lost its moment"
Andrew Lilico @andrew_lilico I think we can safely begin the serious phase of the "Who will succeed Starmer?" discourse now. Whom is your money on & why?
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
Did they bloody listen to me? Did they buggery! More fools them. And so here we are in a society which becomes ever more repulsive in small ways and big every day.
I might add that the level of anti-Jewish rhetoric and abuse over the last few years has also created the sea in which the vile scum who murder and attack Jews swim.
Leaving to one side your point about anti-Jewish sentiment, I don't think Jenrick has done anything wrong. One can feel sympathy with difficult personal circumstances whilst still recognising that it is utterly unacceptable and unjustifiable for judges to be political activists. I think if you place real importance on the impartiality of judges as I know that you do, this should be obvious. Such people do not deserve to have their lives and children threatened with violence, but they do deserve dismissal as judges.
@viewcode here. I need to ask a legal question: specifically what can be said regarding an ongoing case. @Cyclefree, @DavidL and other lawyers of PB, can you assist? Shouldn't take longer than five minutes.
I've been out and am in hospital tomorrow. Maybe your query has been answered. But if not let me know.
"'I saw them driving over injured people' - the terrifying escape from war in Sudan"
A 'proper' collapse of Sudan and potential f**king around with the Nile really should get more coverage. But it's clearly not been as newsworthy as who said she said he said to senior anonymous source who pronounced it tomatoh.
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
Did they bloody listen to me? Did they buggery! More fools them. And so here we are in a society which becomes ever more repulsive in small ways and big every day.
I might add that the level of anti-Jewish rhetoric and abuse over the last few years has also created the sea in which the vile scum who murder and attack Jews swim.
Leaving to one side your point about anti-Jewish sentiment, I don't think Jenrick has done anything wrong. One can feel sympathy with difficult personal circumstances whilst still recognising that it is utterly unacceptable and unjustifiable for judges to be political activists. I think if you place real importance on the impartiality of judges as I know that you do, this should be obvious. Such people do not deserve to have their lives and children threatened with violence, but they do deserve dismissal as judges.
Somewhat related :
"There is the hanging judge, that sinister figure who rides on the top of the coach and will, in no circumstances, take a money-bribe.
There is the deep, deep belief in ‘the law’, always thought of as something above the State and not to be swayed by influence, patronage or private advantage. It is something which is cruel and stupid, of course, but at any rate incorruptible"
I did a comparison of my wages now vs. 2010 recently, and it turns out it would take a 17.5% pay rise to get me back to evens against inflation. This years pay offer is 1.4%.
I did a comparison of my wages now vs. 2010 recently, and it turns out it would take a 17.5% pay rise to get me back to evens against inflation. This years pay offer is 1.4%.
It's certainly a phenomenon not confined to the teaching profession. Though it hits hard there given the requirement of four years studying and accumulating student debt to become a teacher.
The Ex-President Whom Trump Plans to Pardon Flooded America With Cocaine Juan Orlando Hernández, whom Mr. Trump called a victim of persecution, helped orchestrate a decades-long trafficking conspiracy. It ravaged his Central American country.
At the federal trial of Juan Orlando Hernández in New York, testimony and evidence showed how the former president maintained Honduras as a bastion of the global drug trade. He orchestrated a vast trafficking conspiracy that prosecutors said raked in millions for cartels while keeping Honduras one of Central America’s poorest, most violent and most corrupt countries.
Last year, Mr. Hernández was convicted on drug trafficking and weapons charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison. It was one of the most sweeping drug-trafficking cases to come before a U.S. court since the trial of the Panamanian strongman Gen. Manuel Noriega three decades before. But on Friday, President Trump announced that he would pardon Mr. Hernandez, 57, who he said was a victim of political persecution, though Mr. Trump offered no evidence to support that claim. It would be a head-spinning resolution to a case that for prosecutors was a pinnacle, striking at the heart of a narcostate...
The Ex-President Whom Trump Plans to Pardon Flooded America With Cocaine Juan Orlando Hernández, whom Mr. Trump called a victim of persecution, helped orchestrate a decades-long trafficking conspiracy. It ravaged his Central American country.
At the federal trial of Juan Orlando Hernández in New York, testimony and evidence showed how the former president maintained Honduras as a bastion of the global drug trade. He orchestrated a vast trafficking conspiracy that prosecutors said raked in millions for cartels while keeping Honduras one of Central America’s poorest, most violent and most corrupt countries.
Last year, Mr. Hernández was convicted on drug trafficking and weapons charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison. It was one of the most sweeping drug-trafficking cases to come before a U.S. court since the trial of the Panamanian strongman Gen. Manuel Noriega three decades before. But on Friday, President Trump announced that he would pardon Mr. Hernandez, 57, who he said was a victim of political persecution, though Mr. Trump offered no evidence to support that claim. It would be a head-spinning resolution to a case that for prosecutors was a pinnacle, striking at the heart of a narcostate...
Trump certainly does love a good pardon, though I think he generally prefers to pardon fraudsters for some unknowable reason. The immediate exercise of personal power probably appeals to him.
In fairness, whether past presidents abused the pardon power I have no idea (other than Biden pardoning his son, which was always going to happen). But I'd be astonished if he was not setting new ground.
Which is mainly down to the massively increased minimum wage, which is also partly the reason unemployment is now 5% in the UK and rising as it is more costly to employ low skilled employees
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
Did they bloody listen to me? Did they buggery! More fools them. And so here we are in a society which becomes ever more repulsive in small ways and big every day.
I might add that the level of anti-Jewish rhetoric and abuse over the last few years has also created the sea in which the vile scum who murder and attack Jews swim.
Leaving to one side your point about anti-Jewish sentiment, I don't think Jenrick has done anything wrong. One can feel sympathy with difficult personal circumstances whilst still recognising that it is utterly unacceptable and unjustifiable for judges to be political activists. I think if you place real importance on the impartiality of judges as I know that you do, this should be obvious. Such people do not deserve to have their lives and children threatened with violence, but they do deserve dismissal as judges.
Somewhat related :
"There is the hanging judge, that sinister figure who rides on the top of the coach and will, in no circumstances, take a money-bribe.
There is the deep, deep belief in ‘the law’, always thought of as something above the State and not to be swayed by influence, patronage or private advantage. It is something which is cruel and stupid, of course, but at any rate incorruptible"
Can we have the Australian Labor government running the UK as well?
I just love the fact that they've decided to do the right thing, and they don't really care what anyone else thinks about it. We need more of that elsewhere.
Look at the big companies, around the world, over the time period from 1800, onward.
Notice something?
Innovation rarely comes from big, existing companies. Due to socio-economic resistance to change.
Innovation eats into existing companies profit margins.
The World's largest manufacturer of steam shovels declined to pursue small cheap hydraulic backhoes...
Are NVIDIA, Apple and Pfizer not innovating?
Can't comment on Pfizer, but Nvidia and Apple get most of their revenue from putting out new products that are very slight improvements on last year's model. They haven't done anything that would disrupt their business model, not for many years.
Companies innovate when they have nothing to lose and much to gain. Since we're taking the tech industry, a case in point is AMD. A relatively small player, driven to the edge of bankruptcy by a much larger competitor, Intel. So they decided there was nothing left but to take risks, throw every new innovation they could drag up into one product that might save them.
Eight years later AMD is now worth almost twice as much as Intel, still benefiting from the fruit of that desperation.
Pfizer (and most big pharma) doesn’t have the risk appetite for R&D so they buy in successful biotechs instead
A model that suggests you need both new entrants and established companies. The new entrants can innovate, but they can’t get to market, so they sell up to Pfizer.
Increasingly biotechs launch themselves in the US before selling and partner ex US (because of the complexity). They only sell when Pharma pays more (due to a lower cost of capital / return expectations from their investors)
Pharma faces a significant regulatory burden, but now the UK has left the EU, the market you gain going through the UK system is rather limited. It's more attractive to go through the US or EU systems.
No one else felt the need to bring brexit into a discussion about innovation in the US pharmaceutical market
Funding for innovation scales with the size of the directly addressable market. Brexit cut ours by around 85%.
It’s way more complicated than that (in any event the US was something like 50% of revenues and 70% of gross profit in the industry irrespective of Brexit).
But it was an interesting discussion on innovation between big companies and small companies. Nothing to do with Brexit or the UK.
Of course it's complicated; most stuff is. Brexit's effects are at the margin, but it's absurd to argue that it hasn't affected the pharma/biotech sector.
No one did that.
The discussion was about whether big companies or small companies were more important for innovation. Someone mentioned Pfizer so it veered off into a discussion about biotech and big pharma.
It was literally nothing to do with Brexit.
But there are some people who are so f**king monomaniacal that you can’t have an interesting discussion without them dragging it into a tedious cul-de-sac
I've talked on PB about the pharma industry quite a lot in the past, and I have to say that I think you're wrong on all counts.
For a start, the distinction between pharma and biotech - certainly in the US - which is being drawn is to a great extent an artificial one.
There are plenty of small research oriented biotechs which have grown rapidly to the point of becoming a sizeable as some of the old pharma companies (for example, Regeneron)
There are also large pharmas which have remained highly research oriented, and taken huge decade long bets on very expensive research (see for example Eli Lilly in Alzheimer's; costly failure - and obesity; massive success).
At the opposite pole, pharmas which have in recent years largely bought in research, and small, single program research companies.
And the whole spectrum between.
The UK doesn't, and never has had that diversity or depth. We have a history of great research, a handful of big pharmas (really, two these days), and a small biotechs which occasionally hit on huge commercial successes (Cambridge Antibody) which someone else exploits.
The EU is somewhat closer to being a smaller version of the US than are we - but less so since we Brexited.
And the new, rapidly developing competitor with its own huge domestic market is China.
I don't think you'll find very many people in the industry who think Brexit was helpful for either us or for the EU in trying to stay competitive in research and development.
This was a conversation about Pfizer acquiring biotech because they can’t innovate.
Lilly has been lucky with glp-1 but I remember the dark days of 2002… (they’ve been a client since 2007)
Just had a really creepy experience, which is unusual for me.
In this Daily Mail article, there's a test where you have to decide whether faces are real or AI-generated. I got 7/10. For some reason it's really spooked me out, especially the three I got wrong. (It's not the first test on the page, which is to do with super-recognisers).
The Ex-President Whom Trump Plans to Pardon Flooded America With Cocaine Juan Orlando Hernández, whom Mr. Trump called a victim of persecution, helped orchestrate a decades-long trafficking conspiracy. It ravaged his Central American country.
At the federal trial of Juan Orlando Hernández in New York, testimony and evidence showed how the former president maintained Honduras as a bastion of the global drug trade. He orchestrated a vast trafficking conspiracy that prosecutors said raked in millions for cartels while keeping Honduras one of Central America’s poorest, most violent and most corrupt countries.
Last year, Mr. Hernández was convicted on drug trafficking and weapons charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison. It was one of the most sweeping drug-trafficking cases to come before a U.S. court since the trial of the Panamanian strongman Gen. Manuel Noriega three decades before. But on Friday, President Trump announced that he would pardon Mr. Hernandez, 57, who he said was a victim of political persecution, though Mr. Trump offered no evidence to support that claim. It would be a head-spinning resolution to a case that for prosecutors was a pinnacle, striking at the heart of a narcostate...
Trump certainly does love a good pardon, though I think he generally prefers to pardon fraudsters for some unknowable reason. The immediate exercise of personal power probably appeals to him.
In fairness, whether past presidents abused the pardon power I have no idea (other than Biden pardoning his son, which was always going to happen). But I'd be astonished if he was not setting new ground.
His administration is engaged in large scale extra-judicial killing of alleged drug traffickers.
And here he is pardoning a convicted trafficker responsible for trafficking on a huge scale.
Look at the big companies, around the world, over the time period from 1800, onward.
Notice something?
Innovation rarely comes from big, existing companies. Due to socio-economic resistance to change.
Innovation eats into existing companies profit margins.
The World's largest manufacturer of steam shovels declined to pursue small cheap hydraulic backhoes...
Are NVIDIA, Apple and Pfizer not innovating?
Can't comment on Pfizer, but Nvidia and Apple get most of their revenue from putting out new products that are very slight improvements on last year's model. They haven't done anything that would disrupt their business model, not for many years.
Companies innovate when they have nothing to lose and much to gain. Since we're taking the tech industry, a case in point is AMD. A relatively small player, driven to the edge of bankruptcy by a much larger competitor, Intel. So they decided there was nothing left but to take risks, throw every new innovation they could drag up into one product that might save them.
Eight years later AMD is now worth almost twice as much as Intel, still benefiting from the fruit of that desperation.
Pfizer (and most big pharma) doesn’t have the risk appetite for R&D so they buy in successful biotechs instead
A model that suggests you need both new entrants and established companies. The new entrants can innovate, but they can’t get to market, so they sell up to Pfizer.
Increasingly biotechs launch themselves in the US before selling and partner ex US (because of the complexity). They only sell when Pharma pays more (due to a lower cost of capital / return expectations from their investors)
Pharma faces a significant regulatory burden, but now the UK has left the EU, the market you gain going through the UK system is rather limited. It's more attractive to go through the US or EU systems.
No one else felt the need to bring brexit into a discussion about innovation in the US pharmaceutical market
Funding for innovation scales with the size of the directly addressable market. Brexit cut ours by around 85%.
It’s way more complicated than that (in any event the US was something like 50% of revenues and 70% of gross profit in the industry irrespective of Brexit).
But it was an interesting discussion on innovation between big companies and small companies. Nothing to do with Brexit or the UK.
Of course it's complicated; most stuff is. Brexit's effects are at the margin, but it's absurd to argue that it hasn't affected the pharma/biotech sector.
No one did that.
The discussion was about whether big companies or small companies were more important for innovation. Someone mentioned Pfizer so it veered off into a discussion about biotech and big pharma.
It was literally nothing to do with Brexit.
But there are some people who are so f**king monomaniacal that you can’t have an interesting discussion without them dragging it into a tedious cul-de-sac
I've talked on PB about the pharma industry quite a lot in the past, and I have to say that I think you're wrong on all counts.
For a start, the distinction between pharma and biotech - certainly in the US - which is being drawn is to a great extent an artificial one.
There are plenty of small research oriented biotechs which have grown rapidly to the point of becoming a sizeable as some of the old pharma companies (for example, Regeneron)
There are also large pharmas which have remained highly research oriented, and taken huge decade long bets on very expensive research (see for example Eli Lilly in Alzheimer's; costly failure - and obesity; massive success).
At the opposite pole, pharmas which have in recent years largely bought in research, and small, single program research companies.
And the whole spectrum between.
The UK doesn't, and never has had that diversity or depth. We have a history of great research, a handful of big pharmas (really, two these days), and a small biotechs which occasionally hit on huge commercial successes (Cambridge Antibody) which someone else exploits.
The EU is somewhat closer to being a smaller version of the US than are we - but less so since we Brexited.
And the new, rapidly developing competitor with its own huge domestic market is China.
I don't think you'll find very many people in the industry who think Brexit was helpful for either us or for the EU in trying to stay competitive in research and development.
This was a conversation about Pfizer acquiring biotech because they can’t innovate.
Lilly has been lucky with glp-1 but I remember the dark days of 2002… (they’ve been a client since 2007)
"Got lucky" is successfully innovated. That is the industry, whether pharma company or development biotech. Most biotech programmes fail, too. Lilly is now the biggest pharma in the world on the back of their research.
The other developer of GLP-1, of course, was Novo Nordisk - also a pharma.
You're arguing about a single company; I'm saying that (outside of the UK) the distinction between pharma and biotech is now largely an artificial one. The industry is more of a continuum from the smallest through to the largest.
Even Europe has its large biotechs which are possibly/probably on the way towards becoming fully fledged pharma companies - Genmab; Argenx; BioNTech*. The UK, for all its history of medical innovation, simply doesn't have anything on that scale.
*Note that two of those three are from quite small counties - Belgium and Denmark. The benefits of access to a large market...
The Ex-President Whom Trump Plans to Pardon Flooded America With Cocaine Juan Orlando Hernández, whom Mr. Trump called a victim of persecution, helped orchestrate a decades-long trafficking conspiracy. It ravaged his Central American country.
At the federal trial of Juan Orlando Hernández in New York, testimony and evidence showed how the former president maintained Honduras as a bastion of the global drug trade. He orchestrated a vast trafficking conspiracy that prosecutors said raked in millions for cartels while keeping Honduras one of Central America’s poorest, most violent and most corrupt countries.
Last year, Mr. Hernández was convicted on drug trafficking and weapons charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison. It was one of the most sweeping drug-trafficking cases to come before a U.S. court since the trial of the Panamanian strongman Gen. Manuel Noriega three decades before. But on Friday, President Trump announced that he would pardon Mr. Hernandez, 57, who he said was a victim of political persecution, though Mr. Trump offered no evidence to support that claim. It would be a head-spinning resolution to a case that for prosecutors was a pinnacle, striking at the heart of a narcostate...
Trump certainly does love a good pardon, though I think he generally prefers to pardon fraudsters for some unknowable reason. The immediate exercise of personal power probably appeals to him.
In fairness, whether past presidents abused the pardon power I have no idea (other than Biden pardoning his son, which was always going to happen). But I'd be astonished if he was not setting new ground.
His administration is engaged in large scale extra-judicial killing of alleged drug traffickers.
And here he is pardoning a convicted trafficker responsible for trafficking on a huge scale.
Why ?
The replies to this tweet from a GOP senator...
Why would we pardon this guy and then go after Maduro for running drugs into the United States? Lock up every drug runner! Don’t understand why he is being pardoned. https://x.com/SenBillCassidy/status/1995213682406760812
Reporter: You have made so clear how you want to keep drugs out of the US—
Trump: Right
Reporter: Can you explain why you would pardon a notorious drug trafficker?
Trump: I don’t know who you are talking about
Reporter: Juan Orlando Hernandez
Trump: Many of the people of Honduras said it was a Biden setup. I looked at the facts and agreed with them.
Reporter: What evidence can you share that it was a setup?
Trump: You can take any country you want, if somebody sells drugs in that country, that doesn’t mean you arrest the president and put him in jail for the rest of his life. https://x.com/Acyn/status/1995264536526639152
The Ex-President Whom Trump Plans to Pardon Flooded America With Cocaine Juan Orlando Hernández, whom Mr. Trump called a victim of persecution, helped orchestrate a decades-long trafficking conspiracy. It ravaged his Central American country.
At the federal trial of Juan Orlando Hernández in New York, testimony and evidence showed how the former president maintained Honduras as a bastion of the global drug trade. He orchestrated a vast trafficking conspiracy that prosecutors said raked in millions for cartels while keeping Honduras one of Central America’s poorest, most violent and most corrupt countries.
Last year, Mr. Hernández was convicted on drug trafficking and weapons charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison. It was one of the most sweeping drug-trafficking cases to come before a U.S. court since the trial of the Panamanian strongman Gen. Manuel Noriega three decades before. But on Friday, President Trump announced that he would pardon Mr. Hernandez, 57, who he said was a victim of political persecution, though Mr. Trump offered no evidence to support that claim. It would be a head-spinning resolution to a case that for prosecutors was a pinnacle, striking at the heart of a narcostate...
So far as I can see the reason that Trump pardoned a man who was head of one of the biggest drug smuggling cartels in history is purely because Hernandez was convicted under Biden.
Its much the same reason that Trump is so pro-Putin, because Biden was close to Ukraine.
He is obsessed with petty vendettas. How history deals with such a tyrant is going to be interesting, but it is extraordinary that he still has supporters.
The Ex-President Whom Trump Plans to Pardon Flooded America With Cocaine Juan Orlando Hernández, whom Mr. Trump called a victim of persecution, helped orchestrate a decades-long trafficking conspiracy. It ravaged his Central American country.
At the federal trial of Juan Orlando Hernández in New York, testimony and evidence showed how the former president maintained Honduras as a bastion of the global drug trade. He orchestrated a vast trafficking conspiracy that prosecutors said raked in millions for cartels while keeping Honduras one of Central America’s poorest, most violent and most corrupt countries.
Last year, Mr. Hernández was convicted on drug trafficking and weapons charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison. It was one of the most sweeping drug-trafficking cases to come before a U.S. court since the trial of the Panamanian strongman Gen. Manuel Noriega three decades before. But on Friday, President Trump announced that he would pardon Mr. Hernandez, 57, who he said was a victim of political persecution, though Mr. Trump offered no evidence to support that claim. It would be a head-spinning resolution to a case that for prosecutors was a pinnacle, striking at the heart of a narcostate...
So far as I can see the reason that Trump pardoned a man who was head of one of the biggest drug smuggling cartels in history is purely because Hernandez was convicted under Biden.
Its much the same reason that Trump is so pro-Putin, because Biden was close to Ukraine.
He is obsessed with petty vendettas. How history deals with such a tyrant is going to be interesting, but it is extraordinary that he still has supporters.
The Ex-President Whom Trump Plans to Pardon Flooded America With Cocaine Juan Orlando Hernández, whom Mr. Trump called a victim of persecution, helped orchestrate a decades-long trafficking conspiracy. It ravaged his Central American country.
At the federal trial of Juan Orlando Hernández in New York, testimony and evidence showed how the former president maintained Honduras as a bastion of the global drug trade. He orchestrated a vast trafficking conspiracy that prosecutors said raked in millions for cartels while keeping Honduras one of Central America’s poorest, most violent and most corrupt countries.
Last year, Mr. Hernández was convicted on drug trafficking and weapons charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison. It was one of the most sweeping drug-trafficking cases to come before a U.S. court since the trial of the Panamanian strongman Gen. Manuel Noriega three decades before. But on Friday, President Trump announced that he would pardon Mr. Hernandez, 57, who he said was a victim of political persecution, though Mr. Trump offered no evidence to support that claim. It would be a head-spinning resolution to a case that for prosecutors was a pinnacle, striking at the heart of a narcostate...
So far as I can see the reason that Trump pardoned a man who was head of one of the biggest drug smuggling cartels in history is purely because Hernandez was convicted under Biden.
Its much the same reason that Trump is so pro-Putin, because Biden was close to Ukraine.
He is obsessed with petty vendettas. How history deals with such a tyrant is going to be interesting, but it is extraordinary that he still has supporters.
More likely he was just paid an enormous bribe.
He doesn't like seeing presidents who are criminals going to jail.
"...that doesn’t mean you arrest the president and put him in jail for the rest of his life.."
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
Which is mainly down to the massively increased minimum wage, which is also partly the reason unemployment is now 5% in the UK and rising as it is more costly to employ low skilled employees
We've been importing a lot of those. Perhaps it's time to stop and concentrate on reskilling and education. As the saying goes - if you think education is expensive, try ignorance.
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
"In office, but not in power" was a phrase Kemi used a few weeks ago. Perhaps she was just projecting.
It can be both true that immigration judges are activists judges, and that they shouldn’t be in fear of people targeting their addresses. People need to be called out for what they are.
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
"In office, but not in power" was a phrase Kemi used a few weeks ago. Perhaps she was just projecting.
It can be both true that immigration judges are activists judges, and that they shouldn’t be in fear of people targeting their addresses. People need to be called out for what they are.
I was referring to Kemi's lack of backbone. I did not comment on whether politicians should try to exert control over the judiciary by fair or foul means. That's a different discussion.
Which is mainly down to the massively increased minimum wage, which is also partly the reason unemployment is now 5% in the UK and rising as it is more costly to employ low skilled employees
The income tax and national insurance paid compèred to the early 2010s on NMW has now tripled…
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
"In office, but not in power" was a phrase Kemi used a few weeks ago. Perhaps she was just projecting.
It can be both true that immigration judges are activists judges, and that they shouldn’t be in fear of people targeting their addresses. People need to be called out for what they are.
The evidence that Jenrick is unfit for public office is much less ambiguous than it is for the judges.
It's interesting Your Party have gone for collective leadership just as the Greens have reverted back to a single leader approach.
It also guards against any sort of cult of personality developing since a committee can't be expected to have a personality.
Best be wary of whomever becomes the general secretary of the committee.
Somehow I doubt such leadership would prevent a face for the pouring of bile though. Some person or persons on it would inevitably become more prominent and known - as anyone who's ever sat on a committee knows, not all participants will be of equal ability/drive/influence.
People would just get angry at the leadership, even if they were unlikely to remember everyone who was a part of it. That's one reason people voted for Corbyn when he ran for the leadership surely - most people won't have known much about the various candidates, but they knew who was an outsider to the old leadership and who was not.
Plus I expect the factions vying to get people onto the ruling committee would make it known who to blame for things.
You're probably right. Although judging by how things are going so far it's all pretty much the definition of hypothetical. What a shambles. Polanski (for better or worse and imo worse) seems far more attuned to the times.
Hang on K - you're not actually serious are you?
(Edit: seeing the below I realise not)
That Polanski is more of a 'today' politician than either Corbyn or Sultana? Yes I meant that seriously.
How very unwise!
No doubt you've entertained the unwisdom of it so there's no need for me to tell you so though.
I do look forwards to what you might say next though. Highly odd!
Well thank you, O, and here it is:
Polanski. Zack. This opinion might be harsh, and I'm prepared to revise it as more evidence accumulates, but he strikes me as a chancer with the gift of the gab.
From what I have seen so far he understands social media comms better than anyone in politics except perhaps Farage.
But sod all understanding of how to grow an economy.
Do the Greens want to grow the economy though?
A bold strategy when growth will be the battleground of the next election.
Parties who supported leaving the EU single market are stuffed then.
Which is mainly down to the massively increased minimum wage, which is also partly the reason unemployment is now 5% in the UK and rising as it is more costly to employ low skilled employees
I'm not sure about the comparison. Nowadays, you have millions of people on or close to the mininum wage. Back in 2008, how many people were earning £5.70 an hour?.
What's you'd want to do is look at the the wage distrubution and compare the 30th percentile to teachers salary now and then.
"From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" capitalism edition.
Both of those salaries/wages are 100% determined by the state.
Only in a very simplistic way. Teachers operate in a labour market like everyone else - a sticky one, given the time taken train up - but their wages are determined by what they can earn elsewhere too. Check out Baumol cost disease.
The minimum wage is more interesting because there is a balance to be struck between it and welfare. Typically in-work poverty and benefits are a bigger issue for the UK than OOW, so there is incentive for the government to increase. It probably stimulates some productivity growth (because you can't employ lots of low wage workers to do simple tasks), and deters mass visa provision by firms. This is a major issue for sectors like the social care and hospitality - but good for British workers.
It's interesting Your Party have gone for collective leadership just as the Greens have reverted back to a single leader approach.
It also guards against any sort of cult of personality developing since a committee can't be expected to have a personality.
Best be wary of whomever becomes the general secretary of the committee.
Somehow I doubt such leadership would prevent a face for the pouring of bile though. Some person or persons on it would inevitably become more prominent and known - as anyone who's ever sat on a committee knows, not all participants will be of equal ability/drive/influence.
People would just get angry at the leadership, even if they were unlikely to remember everyone who was a part of it. That's one reason people voted for Corbyn when he ran for the leadership surely - most people won't have known much about the various candidates, but they knew who was an outsider to the old leadership and who was not.
Plus I expect the factions vying to get people onto the ruling committee would make it known who to blame for things.
You're probably right. Although judging by how things are going so far it's all pretty much the definition of hypothetical. What a shambles. Polanski (for better or worse and imo worse) seems far more attuned to the times.
Hang on K - you're not actually serious are you?
(Edit: seeing the below I realise not)
That Polanski is more of a 'today' politician than either Corbyn or Sultana? Yes I meant that seriously.
How very unwise!
No doubt you've entertained the unwisdom of it so there's no need for me to tell you so though.
I do look forwards to what you might say next though. Highly odd!
Well thank you, O, and here it is:
Polanski. Zack. This opinion might be harsh, and I'm prepared to revise it as more evidence accumulates, but he strikes me as a chancer with the gift of the gab.
From what I have seen so far he understands social media comms better than anyone in politics except perhaps Farage.
But sod all understanding of how to grow an economy.
Do the Greens want to grow the economy though?
A bold strategy when growth will be the battleground of the next election.
Parties who supported leaving the EU single market are stuffed then.
If only we had the growth of Germany (0.2%) or France (0.7%). Clearly being in the Single Market has been a great help for them....
Which is mainly down to the massively increased minimum wage, which is also partly the reason unemployment is now 5% in the UK and rising as it is more costly to employ low skilled employees
The income tax and national insurance paid compèred to the early 2010s on NMW has now tripled…
The lowest paid losing more money in tax is not a great argument for anything.
It's interesting Your Party have gone for collective leadership just as the Greens have reverted back to a single leader approach.
It also guards against any sort of cult of personality developing since a committee can't be expected to have a personality.
Best be wary of whomever becomes the general secretary of the committee.
Somehow I doubt such leadership would prevent a face for the pouring of bile though. Some person or persons on it would inevitably become more prominent and known - as anyone who's ever sat on a committee knows, not all participants will be of equal ability/drive/influence.
People would just get angry at the leadership, even if they were unlikely to remember everyone who was a part of it. That's one reason people voted for Corbyn when he ran for the leadership surely - most people won't have known much about the various candidates, but they knew who was an outsider to the old leadership and who was not.
Plus I expect the factions vying to get people onto the ruling committee would make it known who to blame for things.
You're probably right. Although judging by how things are going so far it's all pretty much the definition of hypothetical. What a shambles. Polanski (for better or worse and imo worse) seems far more attuned to the times.
Hang on K - you're not actually serious are you?
(Edit: seeing the below I realise not)
That Polanski is more of a 'today' politician than either Corbyn or Sultana? Yes I meant that seriously.
How very unwise!
No doubt you've entertained the unwisdom of it so there's no need for me to tell you so though.
I do look forwards to what you might say next though. Highly odd!
Well thank you, O, and here it is:
Polanski. Zack. This opinion might be harsh, and I'm prepared to revise it as more evidence accumulates, but he strikes me as a chancer with the gift of the gab.
From what I have seen so far he understands social media comms better than anyone in politics except perhaps Farage.
But sod all understanding of how to grow an economy.
Do the Greens want to grow the economy though?
A bold strategy when growth will be the battleground of the next election.
Parties who supported leaving the EU single market are stuffed then.
If only we had the growth of Germany (0.2%) or France (0.7%). Clearly being in the Single Market has been a great help for them....
Used to love these discussions about relative economic growth when we used to have economic cycles. You could argue black is white depending on where you decided the cycle started or finished. But when Gordon Brown did away with boom and bust, we can no longer use such cycles as a way of comparing different economies.
Another reality check for the 'why can't we all just get along' tendency.
Putin signed a decree this week escalating efforts to erase all traces of Ukrainian language, culture, and national identity in areas currently under Russian occupation. Hopes for a compromise peace are delusional. Putin is determined to destroy Ukraine https://x.com/Biz_Ukraine_Mag/status/1995069657066463459
The Russian missiles that just spent 12 hours raining on the heavily populated areas of Kyiv were loaded with cluster munitions meant to increase civilian casualties. https://x.com/JayinKyiv/status/1994722675072405606
It's interesting Your Party have gone for collective leadership just as the Greens have reverted back to a single leader approach.
It also guards against any sort of cult of personality developing since a committee can't be expected to have a personality.
Best be wary of whomever becomes the general secretary of the committee.
Somehow I doubt such leadership would prevent a face for the pouring of bile though. Some person or persons on it would inevitably become more prominent and known - as anyone who's ever sat on a committee knows, not all participants will be of equal ability/drive/influence.
People would just get angry at the leadership, even if they were unlikely to remember everyone who was a part of it. That's one reason people voted for Corbyn when he ran for the leadership surely - most people won't have known much about the various candidates, but they knew who was an outsider to the old leadership and who was not.
Plus I expect the factions vying to get people onto the ruling committee would make it known who to blame for things.
You're probably right. Although judging by how things are going so far it's all pretty much the definition of hypothetical. What a shambles. Polanski (for better or worse and imo worse) seems far more attuned to the times.
Hang on K - you're not actually serious are you?
(Edit: seeing the below I realise not)
That Polanski is more of a 'today' politician than either Corbyn or Sultana? Yes I meant that seriously.
How very unwise!
No doubt you've entertained the unwisdom of it so there's no need for me to tell you so though.
I do look forwards to what you might say next though. Highly odd!
Well thank you, O, and here it is:
Polanski. Zack. This opinion might be harsh, and I'm prepared to revise it as more evidence accumulates, but he strikes me as a chancer with the gift of the gab.
From what I have seen so far he understands social media comms better than anyone in politics except perhaps Farage.
But sod all understanding of how to grow an economy.
Do the Greens want to grow the economy though?
A bold strategy when growth will be the battleground of the next election.
Parties who supported leaving the EU single market are stuffed then.
If only we had the growth of Germany (0.2%) or France (0.7%). Clearly being in the Single Market has been a great help for them....
Perhaps they would have had -0.8% and -0.3% if it wasn't for the single market? Some of the economic analysis on PB is mind-bogglingly simplistic at times.
On the broader point, I know Labour have made a kind of mania on "growth" but I'm really not convinved the public has the same feelings on it. It's cost of living above all else (even above real wages), and we can look to the US for a very fast growing economy that doesn't deliver that to a large majority of the population.
People have an underlying sense that the economic returns accrue to only a small part of the population - fairness is much more important. That polling that showed that people were keen on a tax on the rich even if it damaged the economic was genuinely shocking to me, but it shows where we are at. It could demonstrate a deeply nuanced sense that such inequality is damaging to the fabric of the nation; more likely it's a giant fuck you to the minted classes. The Greens are well-placed.
Which is mainly down to the massively increased minimum wage, which is also partly the reason unemployment is now 5% in the UK and rising as it is more costly to employ low skilled employees
I'm not sure about the comparison. Nowadays, you have millions of people on or close to the mininum wage. Back in 2008, how many people were earning £5.70 an hour?.
What's you'd want to do is look at the the wage distrubution and compare the 30th percentile to teachers salary now and then.
Minimum wage increases redistribute income from the middle of the wage distribution to the bottom. That is a valid political choice. When I was young I worked in a restaurant for £1.50 an hour. Not great for me or for those trying to raise a family earning less than £2 an hour, but good for our middle income customers who got £3 pizzas. Now we have people in the middle feeling squeezed because they can't aford to eat out as frequently, but lower income families who can feed and clothe their children properly. I think that is probably a better outcome overall but I understand others may feel differently.
It's interesting Your Party have gone for collective leadership just as the Greens have reverted back to a single leader approach.
It also guards against any sort of cult of personality developing since a committee can't be expected to have a personality.
Best be wary of whomever becomes the general secretary of the committee.
Somehow I doubt such leadership would prevent a face for the pouring of bile though. Some person or persons on it would inevitably become more prominent and known - as anyone who's ever sat on a committee knows, not all participants will be of equal ability/drive/influence.
People would just get angry at the leadership, even if they were unlikely to remember everyone who was a part of it. That's one reason people voted for Corbyn when he ran for the leadership surely - most people won't have known much about the various candidates, but they knew who was an outsider to the old leadership and who was not.
Plus I expect the factions vying to get people onto the ruling committee would make it known who to blame for things.
You're probably right. Although judging by how things are going so far it's all pretty much the definition of hypothetical. What a shambles. Polanski (for better or worse and imo worse) seems far more attuned to the times.
Hang on K - you're not actually serious are you?
(Edit: seeing the below I realise not)
That Polanski is more of a 'today' politician than either Corbyn or Sultana? Yes I meant that seriously.
How very unwise!
No doubt you've entertained the unwisdom of it so there's no need for me to tell you so though.
I do look forwards to what you might say next though. Highly odd!
Well thank you, O, and here it is:
Polanski. Zack. This opinion might be harsh, and I'm prepared to revise it as more evidence accumulates, but he strikes me as a chancer with the gift of the gab.
From what I have seen so far he understands social media comms better than anyone in politics except perhaps Farage.
But sod all understanding of how to grow an economy.
Do the Greens want to grow the economy though?
A bold strategy when growth will be the battleground of the next election.
Parties who supported leaving the EU single market are stuffed then.
If only we had the growth of Germany (0.2%) or France (0.7%). Clearly being in the Single Market has been a great help for them....
Perhaps they would have had -0.8% and -0.3% if it wasn't for the single market? Some of the economic analysis on PB is mind-bogglingly simplistic at times.
On the broader point, I know Labour have made a kind of mania on "growth" but I'm really not convinved the public has the same feelings on it. It's cost of living above all else (even above real wages), and we can look to the US for a very fast growing economy that doesn't deliver that to a large majority of the population.
People have an underlying sense that the economic returns accrue to only a small part of the population - fairness is much more important. That polling that showed that people were keen on a tax on the rich even if it damaged the economic was genuinely shocking to me, but it shows where we are at. It could demonstrate a deeply nuanced sense that such inequality is damaging to the fabric of the nation; more likely it's a giant fuck you to the minted classes.
There's more than one flavour of unfairness. Gouging the working population for taxes to pump directly into increasing benefits hasn't exactly gone down well.
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
"In office, but not in power" was a phrase Kemi used a few weeks ago. Perhaps she was just projecting.
It can be both true that immigration judges are activists judges, and that they shouldn’t be in fear of people targeting their addresses. People need to be called out for what they are.
There's a simple solution surely.
Just like in the US, where ICE employees where face masks and don't identify themselves because of their fear of doxxing, immigration judges in the UK should be similarly anonymous.
"'I saw them driving over injured people' - the terrifying escape from war in Sudan"
A 'proper' collapse of Sudan and potential f**king around with the Nile really should get more coverage. But it's clearly not been as newsworthy as who said she said he said to senior anonymous source who pronounced it tomatoh.
The BBC has had extensive coverage of Sudan. What are you going on about?
Which is mainly down to the massively increased minimum wage, which is also partly the reason unemployment is now 5% in the UK and rising as it is more costly to employ low skilled employees
The income tax and national insurance paid compèred to the early 2010s on NMW has now tripled…
The lowest paid losing more money in tax is not a great argument for anything.
There is an argument that even the low paid should pay income tax, in order that the tax base is broad and everyone has a stake in the national tax rates.
I note that in 2009-10 the Personal Allowance was £6 475, which would inflation adjust to £10 430 now, so considerably below the current PA. Incidentally there was a higher PA for each of the over 65 and 75s then too, so plenty of precedent for a different rate for pensioners.
Robert Jenrick inciting hooligans to terrorise immigration judges out of their homes.
Living with an immigration judge was never supposed to be a high-octane affair. But the humdrum of tribunal life was interrupted a few months ago when the threats started.
“We had to leave our home – we had less than 24 hours to get out,” the partner of one judge said. They called the police, stayed with friends, and tried to make sense of how their lives had been upended.
“It completely removes your feeling of security in your home,” the partner said. “You worry that your children will somehow get caught up in this. It turns your life upside down and nothing feels secure afterwards.”
The ordeal started after Robert Jenrick began a campaign highlighting what the shadow justice secretary described as “activist judges”. After months of news reports and feverish online rhetoric about immigration tribunal decisions, in April the Tory frontbencher began naming judges on social media. Jenrick pledged that under his regime, “biased judges will be sacked automatically” and at the Conservative party conferencelast month he revealed that he had compiled a list of more than 30 judges who he claimed had links to “open border charities”. His posts have been circulated among far-right groups online.
An Observer investigation has established that at least six immigration judges have been subjected to threats since April. At least two immigration judges have been advised to move out of their homes. Some have had their home addresses published on social media by far-right activists. One judge received a threat saying: “We know which bus your child catches”.
"In office, but not in power" was a phrase Kemi used a few weeks ago. Perhaps she was just projecting.
It can be both true that immigration judges are activists judges, and that they shouldn’t be in fear of people targeting their addresses. People need to be called out for what they are.
If anyone wants to complain about a judge, they can do so through the Judicial Conduct Investigations Office. Jenrick can do that. (Of course, Jenrick could have done a lot more when he was immigration minister too, but oddly he’s only noticed these problems subsequently.) Naming judges on social media is not the right way to call them out and obviously has the risk of leading to threats and violence. The Conservative Party should stand up for law and order, not vigilantism.
But presumably Jenrick has chosen this route because he doesn’t actually have any evidence of misconduct and is just rabble-rousing.
Look at the big companies, around the world, over the time period from 1800, onward.
Notice something?
Innovation rarely comes from big, existing companies. Due to socio-economic resistance to change.
Innovation eats into existing companies profit margins.
The World's largest manufacturer of steam shovels declined to pursue small cheap hydraulic backhoes...
Are NVIDIA, Apple and Pfizer not innovating?
Can't comment on Pfizer, but Nvidia and Apple get most of their revenue from putting out new products that are very slight improvements on last year's model. They haven't done anything that would disrupt their business model, not for many years.
Companies innovate when they have nothing to lose and much to gain. Since we're taking the tech industry, a case in point is AMD. A relatively small player, driven to the edge of bankruptcy by a much larger competitor, Intel. So they decided there was nothing left but to take risks, throw every new innovation they could drag up into one product that might save them.
Eight years later AMD is now worth almost twice as much as Intel, still benefiting from the fruit of that desperation.
Pfizer (and most big pharma) doesn’t have the risk appetite for R&D so they buy in successful biotechs instead
A model that suggests you need both new entrants and established companies. The new entrants can innovate, but they can’t get to market, so they sell up to Pfizer.
Increasingly biotechs launch themselves in the US before selling and partner ex US (because of the complexity). They only sell when Pharma pays more (due to a lower cost of capital / return expectations from their investors)
Pharma faces a significant regulatory burden, but now the UK has left the EU, the market you gain going through the UK system is rather limited. It's more attractive to go through the US or EU systems.
No one else felt the need to bring brexit into a discussion about innovation in the US pharmaceutical market
Funding for innovation scales with the size of the directly addressable market. Brexit cut ours by around 85%.
It’s way more complicated than that (in any event the US was something like 50% of revenues and 70% of gross profit in the industry irrespective of Brexit).
But it was an interesting discussion on innovation between big companies and small companies. Nothing to do with Brexit or the UK.
Of course it's complicated; most stuff is. Brexit's effects are at the margin, but it's absurd to argue that it hasn't affected the pharma/biotech sector.
No one did that.
The discussion was about whether big companies or small companies were more important for innovation. Someone mentioned Pfizer so it veered off into a discussion about biotech and big pharma.
It was literally nothing to do with Brexit.
But there are some people who are so f**king monomaniacal that you can’t have an interesting discussion without them dragging it into a tedious cul-de-sac
I've talked on PB about the pharma industry quite a lot in the past, and I have to say that I think you're wrong on all counts.
For a start, the distinction between pharma and biotech - certainly in the US - which is being drawn is to a great extent an artificial one.
There are plenty of small research oriented biotechs which have grown rapidly to the point of becoming a sizeable as some of the old pharma companies (for example, Regeneron)
There are also large pharmas which have remained highly research oriented, and taken huge decade long bets on very expensive research (see for example Eli Lilly in Alzheimer's; costly failure - and obesity; massive success).
At the opposite pole, pharmas which have in recent years largely bought in research, and small, single program research companies.
And the whole spectrum between.
The UK doesn't, and never has had that diversity or depth. We have a history of great research, a handful of big pharmas (really, two these days), and a small biotechs which occasionally hit on huge commercial successes (Cambridge Antibody) which someone else exploits.
The EU is somewhat closer to being a smaller version of the US than are we - but less so since we Brexited.
And the new, rapidly developing competitor with its own huge domestic market is China.
I don't think you'll find very many people in the industry who think Brexit was helpful for either us or for the EU in trying to stay competitive in research and development.
This was a conversation about Pfizer acquiring biotech because they can’t innovate.
Lilly has been lucky with glp-1 but I remember the dark days of 2002… (they’ve been a client since 2007)
"Got lucky" is successfully innovated. That is the industry, whether pharma company or development biotech. Most biotech programmes fail, too. Lilly is now the biggest pharma in the world on the back of their research.
The other developer of GLP-1, of course, was Novo Nordisk - also a pharma.
You're arguing about a single company; I'm saying that (outside of the UK) the distinction between pharma and biotech is now largely an artificial one. The industry is more of a continuum from the smallest through to the largest.
Even Europe has its large biotechs which are possibly/probably on the way towards becoming fully fledged pharma companies - Genmab; Argenx; BioNTech*. The UK, for all its history of medical innovation, simply doesn't have anything on that scale.
*Note that two of those three are from quite small counties - Belgium and Denmark. The benefits of access to a large market...
I don’t know what you do, but I’ve spent close to 30 years operating at the intersection of biotech and pharma. Yes it’s been evolving - hence my point that many biotechs now retain US rights - but there is a distinction between biotech, big biotech, pharma, spec pharma, Gx, Ax, Cx, etc.
Denmark benefits from the Leo, Lundbeck and Novo foundations (in the way that the UK benefits from Wellcome). Belgian’s industry largely comes out of the Janssen heritage. Those advantages all existed before the EU/EC.
Comments
https://x.com/historianblood/status/1995096497575137377?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q
(Though getting off at Fratton is a euphemism for... look, you can all check. Suffice to say that Fratton is the station just before Portsmouth.)
Presumably that means it is a kind of real-time measure of tax/revenue income vs day-to-day spending in that current year/quarter?
Did they bloody listen to me? Did they buggery! More fools them. And so here we are in a society which becomes ever more repulsive in small ways and big every day.
I might add that the level of anti-Jewish rhetoric and abuse over the last few years has also created the sea in which the vile scum who murder and attack Jews swim.
Andrew Lilico
@andrew_lilico
·
1h
Bad enough lying to the public & the markets. But lying to the Cabinet?? They're not coming back from this. It's only a matter of time now.
https://x.com/andrew_lilico/status/1995239893442969810
Farrukh
@implausibleblog
Luke Tryl, More In Common Polling, "Whilst that infighting has been going on, Zack Polanksi has been having by any measure an immensely impressive start as leader of The Greens"
"He's almost positioned The Greens as the best vehicle for disillusioned progressives and is rising in the polls as a result"
"I just wonder if the infighting between Jeremy Corbyn and Zara Sultana, and the rise of The Green Party, might mean that Your Party has lost its moment"
https://x.com/implausibleblog/status/1995205176764833906
yah think?
History is full of foreigners who thought they could profit by cozying up to Russia. It always ends the same way: they lose everything.
https://x.com/KuldkeppMart/status/1995072734657941916
Andrew Lilico
@andrew_lilico
I think we can safely begin the serious phase of the "Who will succeed Starmer?" discourse now. Whom is your money on & why?
https://x.com/andrew_lilico/status/1995259192823947526
Edit: Looking at my own betfair account - I'm saying Rayner or wee dougie.
Do you not understand that they spell their way and not yours ?
Just wait until you discover that some countries have their own completely different languages...
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cpvdn8pmmd1o
"'I saw them driving over injured people' - the terrifying escape from war in Sudan"
A 'proper' collapse of Sudan and potential f**king around with the Nile really should get more coverage. But it's clearly not been as newsworthy as who said she said he said to senior anonymous source who pronounced it tomatoh.
So it's just possible that he knows what he's talking about.
A teacher in 2008 started on £20,627. This was ~85% higher than minimum wage.
Today, they start on £32,916. Which is only 33% higher than minimum wage. This doesn't even account for student loans or pension contributions.
The gap is closing and closing fast!
https://x.com/joel120193/status/1994153059182686544
(Unless you're thinking of Reform ?)
"There is the hanging judge, that sinister figure who rides on the top of the coach and will, in no circumstances, take a money-bribe.
There is the deep, deep belief in ‘the law’, always thought of as something above the State and not to be swayed by influence, patronage or private advantage. It is something which is cruel and stupid, of course, but at any rate incorruptible"
Though it hits hard there given the requirement of four years studying and accumulating student debt to become a teacher.
The Ex-President Whom Trump Plans to Pardon Flooded America With Cocaine
Juan Orlando Hernández, whom Mr. Trump called a victim of persecution, helped orchestrate a decades-long trafficking conspiracy. It ravaged his Central American country.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/29/nyregion/honduras-hernandez-drug-trafficking.html?unlocked_article_code=1.5E8.q_5m.6Y2S2-TpcREp&smid=tw-share
He once boasted that he would “stuff the drugs up the gringos’ noses.” He accepted a $1 million bribe from El Chapo to allow cocaine shipments to pass through Honduras. A man was killed in prison to protect him.
At the federal trial of Juan Orlando Hernández in New York, testimony and evidence showed how the former president maintained Honduras as a bastion of the global drug trade. He orchestrated a vast trafficking conspiracy that prosecutors said raked in millions for cartels while keeping Honduras one of Central America’s poorest, most violent and most corrupt countries.
Last year, Mr. Hernández was convicted on drug trafficking and weapons charges and sentenced to 45 years in prison. It was one of the most sweeping drug-trafficking cases to come before a U.S. court since the trial of the Panamanian strongman Gen. Manuel Noriega three decades before.
But on Friday, President Trump announced that he would pardon Mr. Hernandez, 57, who he said was a victim of political persecution, though Mr. Trump offered no evidence to support that claim. It would be a head-spinning resolution to a case that for prosecutors was a pinnacle, striking at the heart of a narcostate...
In fairness, whether past presidents abused the pardon power I have no idea (other than Biden pardoning his son, which was always going to happen). But I'd be astonished if he was not setting new ground.
Can we have the Australian Labor government running the UK as well?
I just love the fact that they've decided to do the right thing, and they don't really care what anyone else thinks about it. We need more of that elsewhere.
Lilly has been lucky with glp-1 but I remember the dark days of 2002… (they’ve been a client since 2007)
https://x.com/Seoirse_/status/1993662285093769423#m
In this Daily Mail article, there's a test where you have to decide whether faces are real or AI-generated. I got 7/10. For some reason it's really spooked me out, especially the three I got wrong. (It's not the first test on the page, which is to do with super-recognisers).
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-15325275/Are-YOU-super-recogniser-test.html
And here he is pardoning a convicted trafficker responsible for trafficking on a huge scale.
Why ?
That is the industry, whether pharma company or development biotech. Most biotech programmes fail, too.
Lilly is now the biggest pharma in the world on the back of their research.
The other developer of GLP-1, of course, was Novo Nordisk - also a pharma.
You're arguing about a single company; I'm saying that (outside of the UK) the distinction between pharma and biotech is now largely an artificial one. The industry is more of a continuum from the smallest through to the largest.
Even Europe has its large biotechs which are possibly/probably on the way towards becoming fully fledged pharma companies - Genmab; Argenx; BioNTech*. The UK, for all its history of medical innovation, simply doesn't have anything on that scale.
*Note that two of those three are from quite small counties - Belgium and Denmark.
The benefits of access to a large market...
Why would we pardon this guy and then go after Maduro for running drugs into the United States? Lock up every drug runner! Don’t understand why he is being pardoned.
https://x.com/SenBillCassidy/status/1995213682406760812
Reporter: You have made so clear how you want to keep drugs out of the US—
Trump: Right
Reporter: Can you explain why you would pardon a notorious drug trafficker?
Trump: I don’t know who you are talking about
Reporter: Juan Orlando Hernandez
Trump: Many of the people of Honduras said it was a Biden setup. I looked at the facts and agreed with them.
Reporter: What evidence can you share that it was a setup?
Trump: You can take any country you want, if somebody sells drugs in that country, that doesn’t mean you arrest the president and put him in jail for the rest of his life.
https://x.com/Acyn/status/1995264536526639152
Its much the same reason that Trump is so pro-Putin, because Biden was close to Ukraine.
He is obsessed with petty vendettas. How history deals with such a tyrant is going to be interesting, but it is extraordinary that he still has supporters.
"...that doesn’t mean you arrest the president and put him in jail for the rest of his life.."
F1: well, that was an interesting strategy call.
Or that YP are vegetables??
McLaren were more like work experience Ferrari strategists.
Unbelievable.
The former minister and niece of Sheikh Hasina, the ousted Bangladeshi PM, was found guilty over claims she obtained land in Dhaka via ‘abuse of influence’
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/tulip-siddiq-sentenced-jailed-bangladesh-corruption-labour-mp-vrhqgnddv (£££)
Nitrous oxide can provide a ‘significant’ reduction to sufferers’ symptoms — but its effects are temporary
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/healthcare/article/laughing-gas-depression-nhs-nd8hc07sx (£££)
Party animals one step ahead of quacks and boffins there; wonder if they've got the cure for cancer as well.
What's you'd want to do is look at the the wage distrubution and compare the 30th percentile to teachers salary now and then.
The minimum wage is more interesting because there is a balance to be struck between it and welfare. Typically in-work poverty and benefits are a bigger issue for the UK than OOW, so there is incentive for the government to increase. It probably stimulates some productivity growth (because you can't employ lots of low wage workers to do simple tasks), and deters mass visa provision by firms. This is a major issue for sectors like the social care and hospitality - but good for British workers.
Putin signed a decree this week escalating efforts to erase all traces of Ukrainian language, culture, and national identity in areas currently under Russian occupation. Hopes for a compromise peace are delusional. Putin is determined to destroy Ukraine
https://x.com/Biz_Ukraine_Mag/status/1995069657066463459
https://x.com/JayinKyiv/status/1994722675072405606
On the broader point, I know Labour have made a kind of mania on "growth" but I'm really not convinved the public has the same feelings on it. It's cost of living above all else (even above real wages), and we can look to the US for a very fast growing economy that doesn't deliver that to a large majority of the population.
People have an underlying sense that the economic returns accrue to only a small part of the population - fairness is much more important. That polling that showed that people were keen on a tax on the rich even if it damaged the economic was genuinely shocking to me, but it shows where we are at. It could demonstrate a deeply nuanced sense that such inequality is damaging to the fabric of the nation; more likely it's a giant fuck you to the minted classes. The Greens are well-placed.
NEW THREAD
Just like in the US, where ICE employees where face masks and don't identify themselves because of their fear of doxxing, immigration judges in the UK should be similarly anonymous.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c79x8x82gy4o
I note that in 2009-10 the Personal Allowance was £6 475, which would inflation adjust to £10 430 now, so considerably below the current PA. Incidentally there was a higher PA for each of the over 65 and 75s then too, so plenty of precedent for a different rate for pensioners.
But presumably Jenrick has chosen this route because he doesn’t actually have any evidence of misconduct and is just rabble-rousing.
Denmark benefits from the Leo, Lundbeck and Novo foundations (in the way that the UK benefits from Wellcome). Belgian’s industry largely comes out of the Janssen heritage. Those advantages all existed before the EU/EC.