Lost for words. Never thought I’d see a British govt trying to set food prices. If there is one highly competitive sector it is food retailing. Do we really want to live in a country where the state sets these prices?
A market Walmart ran away from because they couldn’t compete with Tesco does rather tell you how insane the idea is.
If basic items are expensive then that’s because prices have risen not because Tesco and co are profiteering
The average person in the street, and seemingly the Treasury, thinks that Tesco is ripping us off. In reality they only have a 2% or so profit margin, and are one of the best run businesses in the UK. Tesco make a lot of money because they are massive and efficient. Groceries in the UK is one of our most competitive business sectors.
Which should be wishing that all business sectors were similary run.
I understand, in general, the public not understanding the profit margins of major businesses, I'm as guilty of that as anyone. But I do find it odd that people would think supermarkets are so much more profitable than they are, as it has always felt like such a competitive and cut throat environment - people can and do switch supermarkets based on the best bargains, and everyone uses them and knows that on some level, that it is surprising we'd assume them to still be mega profitable rather than just profitable.
It's one of the few major business sectors where the average person should have some insight into how they cannot rip us off too much or they lose out to rivals fast.
If you ever go to a CostCo, where their model is cost + 15% on basically all items, you quickly see which items supermarket are making their profit and it ain't milk and bread, it stuff like Unilever / Johnson & Johnson branded products like washing powder / gels. Also, farmers have been vocal for years about just how squeezed they are on milk.
Lost for words. Never thought I’d see a British govt trying to set food prices. If there is one highly competitive sector it is food retailing. Do we really want to live in a country where the state sets these prices?
It’s late stage freebie culture. Quite a few people on PB and elsewhere have been flagging this as a major issue that is going to bite us hard - it usually manifests as rent controls and pensioner benefits, this is just a variation.
The latest wheeze is cutting fuel duty (a flat duty) during a catastrophic fossil fuel crisis. Absolutely mental; ineffective, costly, with perverse incentives built in.
COVID was where it all started to go horribly wrong. Shutting down the whole economy isn’t free (even if it’s the right thing to do) - not having the economic honesty to hike taxes to pay for it (particularly the minted house dwelling WFH/pensioners) was ridiculous.
Fuel duty thing, you only have half the picture.
Partly because it feeds into everything, so a raw material price increase feeds inflation very hard, and also because we put VAT on fuel as well as duty, so the chancellor gets a VAT bonanza whenever the prices goes mental. The 5p/l that's come off diesel via the duty cut that the Tories did which Labour are almost inevitably going to have to extend is currently being rather more than offset the ~9.6p/l increase in the VAT takings.
There's also a bit of a problem that fuel taxation is increasingly regressive, because if you're well off with a driveway, you can afford to buy an EV you can run for virtually nothing, whlist if you're poor* you are probably running a 15 year old ICE. The difference in running costs is almost entirely a tax arbitrage of course - if we taxed electricity at the same rate as we tax diesel per KWh, it would be cheaper to drive a diesel car for most people.
*I'm aware that the very poorest tend not to have cars at-all, but that just makes then irrelevant to this point. Burdening the fairly poor with taxes the well-to-do don't have to pay is still horribly regressive.
Mileage also correlates with income. Those in the highest income deciles drive the most by a large margin even among those who own cars, and we’re a very long way from sufficient EV rollout for that to be inverted.
That’s a minor point compared to the absurdity of suppressing a price signal during a supply crisis. It’s downright dangerous given the chance of actually running out. And in the long run, constantly doing so during energy crises (as we did in 2022 with £50 billion in subsidy) cocoons consumers and businesses from reality. We should be encouraging people to move to EVs, to solar, to batteries - not the precise opposite,
To quote the Death of Stalin, I’m very fucking furious.
I'm not supprised that richer people drive more. If they are doing it with an ICE, it's voluntary taxation at this point. Virtually everyone really well off I know now drives an EV, not least because of the insanely generous BIK rules (said BIK rules would make putting my old banger through my business punitively expensive, as for some bizarre reason it's all based off the new vehicle price, not the vehicle's current value - I drive a ~£30k list price car for which I paid £2k).
On fuel duty, if you read my post carefully you will notice that they haven't actually decreased fuel taxation. The total tax on 1 litre of diesel is actually up by ~4.6p, the duty cut has been more than offset by increased VAT.
I'm with you on not destroying price signals - e.g. I thought the 2022 electric price cap subsidy was insanity on stilts, it would have made vastly more sense to make people cash payments based on their previous year's consumption and let them pay the market price (that way you are rewarded for reducing consumption, but are no worse off than before of you can't).
That however is completely different to what the government has done with fuel, where it has merely opted not to *increase* the tax as much as it might otherwise have done *as a result of the price spike*. If nothing else, it means that for a given pump price level, we have slightly more to spend when bidding for fuel in the international markets (someone is going to be going short - the more cash we've got available to bid for cargoes, the less likely it will be us).
Mileage also correlates with income. Those in the highest income deciles drive the most by a large margin even among those who own cars, and we’re a very long way from sufficient EV rollout for that to be inverted. Cutting it is profoundly regressive because most of the gains go to the richest.
That’s a minor point compared to the absurdity of suppressing a price signal during a supply crisis. It’s downright dangerous given the chance of actually running out. And in the long run, constantly doing so during energy crises (as we did in 2022 with £50 billion in subsidy) cocoons consumers and businesses from reality. We should be encouraging people to move to EVs, to solar, to batteries - not the precise opposite,
Among a number of candidates, it’s the policy that infuriates me the most.
Yes the enormous financial support* in 2022, which was probably unavoidable given how rapidly prices rose, has stopped many people changing their behaviour, which has now meant that the Iran War is hitting us harder than it might have if we'd paid a higher price when Russia invaded and changed our energy use sooner.
* It's amazing how many times I've heard people say that "the government did nothing for me" when it was something around £2,000 per household.
There was a Spectator article about Makerfield with a guy moaning that he'd had to give up his job to home educate his kids who he'd taken out of free education. "Where's the help for me?"
Lost for words. Never thought I’d see a British govt trying to set food prices. If there is one highly competitive sector it is food retailing. Do we really want to live in a country where the state sets these prices?
A market Walmart ran away from because they couldn’t compete with Tesco does rather tell you how insane the idea is.
If basic items are expensive then that’s because prices have risen not because Tesco and co are profiteering
The average person in the street, and seemingly the Treasury, thinks that Tesco is ripping us off. In reality they only have a 2% or so profit margin, and are one of the best run businesses in the UK. Tesco make a lot of money because they are massive and efficient. Groceries in the UK is one of our most competitive business sectors.
Which should be wishing that all business sectors were similary run.
I understand, in general, the public not understanding the profit margins of major businesses, I'm as guilty of that as anyone. But I do find it odd that people would think supermarkets are so much more profitable than they are, as it has always felt like such a competitive and cut throat environment - people can and do switch supermarkets based on the best bargains, and everyone uses them and knows that on some level, so it is surprising we'd assume them to still be mega profitable rather than just profitable.
It's one of the few major business sectors where the average person should have some insight into how they cannot rip us off too much or they lose out to rivals fast.
I think it's that people do see frequent price changes for groceries, and change their shopping habits, so it's more noticeable. They don't think as much about utilities bills, insurance, mortgages and rent, and other less tangible services. We should wish there was similar competition in other areas of the economy.
Lost for words. Never thought I’d see a British govt trying to set food prices. If there is one highly competitive sector it is food retailing. Do we really want to live in a country where the state sets these prices?
A market Walmart ran away from because they couldn’t compete with Tesco does rather tell you how insane the idea is.
If basic items are expensive then that’s because prices have risen not because Tesco and co are profiteering
The average person in the street, and seemingly the Treasury, thinks that Tesco is ripping us off. In reality they only have a 2% or so profit margin, and are one of the best run businesses in the UK. Tesco make a lot of money because they are massive and efficient. Groceries in the UK is one of our most competitive business sectors.
Which should be wishing that all business sectors were similary run.
I understand, in general, the public not understanding the profit margins of major businesses, I'm as guilty of that as anyone. But I do find it odd that people would think supermarkets are so much more profitable than they are, as it has always felt like such a competitive and cut throat environment - people can and do switch supermarkets based on the best bargains, and everyone uses them and knows that on some level, so it is surprising we'd assume them to still be mega profitable rather than just profitable.
It's one of the few major business sectors where the average person should have some insight into how they cannot rip us off too much or they lose out to rivals fast.
Particularly given we have “challenger” shops like Aldi. People should instinctively understand that the risk of cartel/oligopoly is limited.
To be fsir, I think people do get that in relative terms compared with water companies, for example.
Lost for words. Never thought I’d see a British govt trying to set food prices. If there is one highly competitive sector it is food retailing. Do we really want to live in a country where the state sets these prices?
A market Walmart ran away from because they couldn’t compete with Tesco does rather tell you how insane the idea is.
If basic items are expensive then that’s because prices have risen not because Tesco and co are profiteering
The average person in the street, and seemingly the Treasury, thinks that Tesco is ripping us off. In reality they only have a 2% or so profit margin, and are one of the best run businesses in the UK. Tesco make a lot of money because they are massive and efficient. Groceries in the UK is one of our most competitive business sectors.
Which should be wishing that all business sectors were similary run.
I understand, in general, the public not understanding the profit margins of major businesses, I'm as guilty of that as anyone. But I do find it odd that people would think supermarkets are so much more profitable than they are, as it has always felt like such a competitive and cut throat environment - people can and do switch supermarkets based on the best bargains, and everyone uses them and knows that on some level, that it is surprising we'd assume them to still be mega profitable rather than just profitable.
It's one of the few major business sectors where the average person should have some insight into how they cannot rip us off too much or they lose out to rivals fast.
If you ever go to a CostCo, where their model is basically cost + 15% on basically all items, you quickly see which items supermarket are making their profit and it ain't milk and bread, it stuff like branded washing powder / gels. Also, farmers have been vocal for years about just how squeezed they are on milk.
Yes, I think milk is only up like 10p a pint since when I was kid 30 years ago (if not that it is close), they must sell it at the bare minimum.
I assume Tesco Expresses and other supermaket equivalents must be more profitable as they generally seem to stock higher priced versions of things, or at least not as many of the cheaper options.
Isn't a disappearing act his usual response to some negative press? It generally seems to have worked to date, but if they are serious about replacing the Tories the Leader cannot just go to ground whenever there's a bad news cycle.
This question is more awkward than most for Nigel and won’t go away as it can be asked until we get a plausible answer
So Nigel, Given that your “I’m a celeb” money is still resting in your business account how did you buy that £1.4m home?
I suspect the strings attached to the £5 million may be more difficult to cover up.
Lost for words. Never thought I’d see a British govt trying to set food prices. If there is one highly competitive sector it is food retailing. Do we really want to live in a country where the state sets these prices?
A market Walmart ran away from because they couldn’t compete with Tesco does rather tell you how insane the idea is.
If basic items are expensive then that’s because prices have risen not because Tesco and co are profiteering
The average person in the street, and seemingly the Treasury, thinks that Tesco is ripping us off. In reality they only have a 2% or so profit margin, and are one of the best run businesses in the UK. Tesco make a lot of money because they are massive and efficient. Groceries in the UK is one of our most competitive business sectors.
Which should be wishing that all business sectors were similary run.
I understand, in general, the public not understanding the profit margins of major businesses, I'm as guilty of that as anyone. But I do find it odd that people would think supermarkets are so much more profitable than they are, as it has always felt like such a competitive and cut throat environment - people can and do switch supermarkets based on the best bargains, and everyone uses them and knows that on some level, so it is surprising we'd assume them to still be mega profitable rather than just profitable.
It's one of the few major business sectors where the average person should have some insight into how they cannot rip us off too much or they lose out to rivals fast.
I think it's that people do see frequent price changes for groceries, and change their shopping habits, so it's more noticeable. They don't think as much about utilities bills, insurance, mortgages and rent, and other less tangible services. We should wish there was similar competition in other areas of the economy.
With gas and water and the like there's supposedly competition, but I've never had positive service from any provider, they were all interchangeably bad, so no surprise I'm much less worried by what might be reasonable warnings about nationalisation in such areas.
Isn't a disappearing act his usual response to some negative press? It generally seems to have worked to date, but if they are serious about replacing the Tories the Leader cannot just go to ground whenever there's a bad news cycle.
This question is more awkward than most for Nigel and won’t go away as it can be asked until we get a plausible answer
So Nigel, Given that your “I’m a celeb” money is still resting in your business account how did you buy that £1.4m home?
I suspect the strings attached to the £5 million may be more difficult to cover up.
Billionaires can be as stingy and mean with their money as anyone, sometimes a lot more so. If it was a random no strings gift then Nige is one very fortunate boy.
"I don’t think people understand what is going to happen to Germany in 10-15 years time: huge unemployment by deliberate economic suicide combined with millions of structurally unemployable welfare-entitled migrants will cause a total collapse of the welfare state and civil-war like circumstances."
I am struck how backward technologically a lot of Germany in many respects. The internet speeds are absolute garbage in lots of places. My mate lives in a town with a major university, he has to pay some stupid amount to get "special" internet that is 50Mbs. That's it, thats the fastest speed that is available.
China is already starting to eat into their high end manufacturing. German Brand is still strong, but its not true now that China can't do super high end / super high quality manufacturing. The most obvious is the EV cars we don't get in the West, XPeng, YangWang.
I haven't been for three years, but I was struck that virtually none of the businesses that wanted your money had free customer WiFi as standard.
About 3 years ago I did some consultancy for a global optician firm - some shopping malls in Germany still only had ISDN lines and I think a couple were worse than that.
Plan was to leave them to the end and hope the lease ran out so they could move somewhere sane
There are some quite big regional variations, but medium speed 60 Mb. Still highly reliant on ADSL. The UK is now 200+ after the big push to get fibre to the cabinet at the very least.
One idly wonders how many fibre connections there would be if BT was still a nationalised company.
A dozen?
I was listening to an old 'Dick Barton' radio series a while back (yes). One of the episodes had a (I'm sure sarcastic by the writer) line where our plucky heroes spotted that a villain was upto no good as they had a new telephone line despite only asking the Post Office for one six months earlier.
Channel 4 have arguably been skating on thin ice with regard to reality programmes ever since they started doing them in the year 2000.
Didn't the original psychologist of Big Brother quit because after one of series where the housemates basically just got on with one another, he said they were deliebrately engineering scenarios to cause strife and drama because the producers said they couldn't have another "boring" series. And of course once you start down that route, every year has to been more dramatic than the last.
It's odd- two of the reality-elimination formats that have lasted best- Strictly and Bake Off- are centred on people being nice to each other. Even The Traitors has a healthy cooperation-to-murdering ratio. Contrast that with The Apprentice, which has fallen into a self-parody of awful people who are mostly shown as being not much good.
Real life isn't just sequins, cakes and group hugs because it's a shame that someone has to leave. But it might be one of the reasons we're all convinced he world is going to pieces.
The most successful worldwide is almost certainly Masterchef
Food is universal. The format is genius. The guy who invented it shares an agent with me. The money he makes is stupefying. Every time any episode of Masterchef is shown or reshown anywhere - Masterchef Australia, Masterchef Bolivia, Masterchef Andorra - he gets a chunk of money
It is literally hundreds of millions of pounds. It is probably the greatest “remuneration per idea” in human history. I can’t think of an equal. Even writing a globally popular number one song or album isn’t the same. Doesn’t have the longevity or global breadth
Lost for words. Never thought I’d see a British govt trying to set food prices. If there is one highly competitive sector it is food retailing. Do we really want to live in a country where the state sets these prices?
A market Walmart ran away from because they couldn’t compete with Tesco does rather tell you how insane the idea is.
If basic items are expensive then that’s because prices have risen not because Tesco and co are profiteering
The average person in the street, and seemingly the Treasury, thinks that Tesco is ripping us off. In reality they only have a 2% or so profit margin, and are one of the best run businesses in the UK. Tesco make a lot of money because they are massive and efficient. Groceries in the UK is one of our most competitive business sectors.
Which should be wishing that all business sectors were similary run.
I understand, in general, the public not understanding the profit margins of major businesses, I'm as guilty of that as anyone. But I do find it odd that people would think supermarkets are so much more profitable than they are, as it has always felt like such a competitive and cut throat environment - people can and do switch supermarkets based on the best bargains, and everyone uses them and knows that on some level, that it is surprising we'd assume them to still be mega profitable rather than just profitable.
It's one of the few major business sectors where the average person should have some insight into how they cannot rip us off too much or they lose out to rivals fast.
If you ever go to a CostCo, where their model is basically cost + 15% on basically all items, you quickly see which items supermarket are making their profit and it ain't milk and bread, it stuff like branded washing powder / gels. Also, farmers have been vocal for years about just how squeezed they are on milk.
Yes, I think milk is only up like 10p a pint since when I was kid 30 years ago (if not that it is close), they must sell it at the bare minimum.
I assume Tesco Expresses and other supermaket equivalents must be more profitable as they generally seem to stock higher priced versions of things, or at least not as many of the cheaper options.
The supermarket “locals” are more expensive to run versus their turnover, than the big shops. Economy of scale stuff.
Which is why they have higher pricing, even in the areas where they directly compete with one another.
Mileage also correlates with income. Those in the highest income deciles drive the most by a large margin even among those who own cars, and we’re a very long way from sufficient EV rollout for that to be inverted. Cutting it is profoundly regressive because most of the gains go to the richest.
That’s a minor point compared to the absurdity of suppressing a price signal during a supply crisis. It’s downright dangerous given the chance of actually running out. And in the long run, constantly doing so during energy crises (as we did in 2022 with £50 billion in subsidy) cocoons consumers and businesses from reality. We should be encouraging people to move to EVs, to solar, to batteries - not the precise opposite,
Among a number of candidates, it’s the policy that infuriates me the most.
Yes the enormous financial support* in 2022, which was probably unavoidable given how rapidly prices rose, has stopped many people changing their behaviour, which has now meant that the Iran War is hitting us harder than it might have if we'd paid a higher price when Russia invaded and changed our energy use sooner.
* It's amazing how many times I've heard people say that "the government did nothing for me" when it was something around £2,000 per household.
The big problem with the 2022 thing was that they did it all wrong.
They could have written every household a £2k cheque, then let electric prices float free.
They could have given everyone a refund of their bill for the previous 12 months, then let the electricity price float free.
Instead they capped the unit price, so completely destroying the price signal, thus zero incentive to reduce demand. It was by far the stupidest thing the Truss government did, but for some bizarre reason she floundered instead on a package of quite minor tax cuts which had at least fighting chance of actually generating some extra economic growth.
Lost for words. Never thought I’d see a British govt trying to set food prices. If there is one highly competitive sector it is food retailing. Do we really want to live in a country where the state sets these prices?
A market Walmart ran away from because they couldn’t compete with Tesco does rather tell you how insane the idea is.
If basic items are expensive then that’s because prices have risen not because Tesco and co are profiteering
The average person in the street, and seemingly the Treasury, thinks that Tesco is ripping us off. In reality they only have a 2% or so profit margin, and are one of the best run businesses in the UK. Tesco make a lot of money because they are massive and efficient. Groceries in the UK is one of our most competitive business sectors.
Which should be wishing that all business sectors were similary run.
Average 71p per transaction profit. Now, that's a mix of £120 family shops and £3.50 meal-deal pop-ins, so hard to tease out. But it ain't much.
Channel 4 have arguably been skating on thin ice with regard to reality programmes ever since they started doing them in the year 2000.
Didn't the original psychologist of Big Brother quit because after one of series where the housemates basically just got on with one another, he said they were deliebrately engineering scenarios to cause strife and drama because the producers said they couldn't have another "boring" series. And of course once you start down that route, every year has to been more dramatic than the last.
It's odd- two of the reality-elimination formats that have lasted best- Strictly and Bake Off- are centred on people being nice to each other. Even The Traitors has a healthy cooperation-to-murdering ratio. Contrast that with The Apprentice, which has fallen into a self-parody of awful people who are mostly shown as being not much good.
Real life isn't just sequins, cakes and group hugs because it's a shame that someone has to leave. But it might be one of the reasons we're all convinced he world is going to pieces.
The most successful worldwide is almost certainly Masterchef
Food is universal. The format is genius. The guy who invented it shares an agent with me. The money he makes is stupefying. Every time any episode of Masterchef is shown or reshown anywhere - Masterchef Australia, Masterchef Bolivia, Masterchef Andorra - he gets a chunk of money
It is literally hundreds of millions of pounds. It is probably the greatest “remuneration per idea” in human history. I can’t think of an equal. Even writing a globally popular number one song or album isn’t the same. Doesn’t have the longevity or global breadth
All for just one excellent idea
I'd struggle to class that as reality TV mind. You don't get to see any of the contestants away from the kitchen till the final. And even then it isn't intrusive. It's a cooking competition. No argument with any of the rest of your post, mind. The truly staggering thing is nobody thought of it before.
The one criticism I would have of lay of the land of UK supermarkets the quality of fresh produce I feel has got worse as stores have fought one another on price. Now don't get me wrong, we aren't like the US, where you have to go to Whole Foods or maybe a Publix to get ok stuff, but it definitely seems like the quality has gone down across the board and sourcing from more non-traditional markets e.g. You can shove your Indian grapes where the sun doesn't shine.
As usual YouGov ask the wrong, or at least an incomplete, question.
People usually want more money spent on them, until the costs are spelt out, which in a full public debate on the subject, presumably they would be. Public spending choices aren't about one thing in isolation, they're about making an acceptable use of limited (these days, very limited) resources.
The real question should be something like "Do you support keeping the triple lock even though welfare spending is taking up more and more of our national income, taxes are at a record high and throttling growth and the young are stuggling under more and more debt?"
Then we'd have an idea of where public opinion would be if and when the debate is ever fully joined.
Bizarre the focus on state pension when benefits are runaway rises, both monetary and people wise , they do not attract any tax and in general are far more generous than state pension. Hardly ever hear a peep about reducing benefits or slowing down the increases, in fact the opposite as it is constant whinging to give them more.
It's not bizarre, the state pension accounts for 42% of govt welfare spending, pensioner benefits in total 55%, working age disability and sickness 23%, working age and child benefits 22%. If you're looking to cut the overall cost then you look at the biggest ticket items.
Anyway as usual you're very ill-informed Benefits like universal credit have taper relief of 55% above an earning allowance of £5-8k, people on UC are have marginal rates of benefit deduction and tax inc NI up to 80%. Pensions aren't tapered, marginal rates above the single person's allowance (>> than UC earnings allowance) are 20%, no NI.
No one has to struggle to imagine the cacophony of outraged screams if state pensions had an 80% marginal rate, it's loud enough at 20%.
Channel 4 have arguably been skating on thin ice with regard to reality programmes ever since they started doing them in the year 2000.
Didn't the original psychologist of Big Brother quit because after one of series where the housemates basically just got on with one another, he said they were deliebrately engineering scenarios to cause strife and drama because the producers said they couldn't have another "boring" series. And of course once you start down that route, every year has to been more dramatic than the last.
It's odd- two of the reality-elimination formats that have lasted best- Strictly and Bake Off- are centred on people being nice to each other. Even The Traitors has a healthy cooperation-to-murdering ratio. Contrast that with The Apprentice, which has fallen into a self-parody of awful people who are mostly shown as being not much good.
Real life isn't just sequins, cakes and group hugs because it's a shame that someone has to leave. But it might be one of the reasons we're all convinced he world is going to pieces.
The most successful worldwide is almost certainly Masterchef
Food is universal. The format is genius. The guy who invented it shares an agent with me. The money he makes is stupefying. Every time any episode of Masterchef is shown or reshown anywhere - Masterchef Australia, Masterchef Bolivia, Masterchef Andorra - he gets a chunk of money
It is literally hundreds of millions of pounds. It is probably the greatest “remuneration per idea” in human history. I can’t think of an equal. Even writing a globally popular number one song or album isn’t the same. Doesn’t have the longevity or global breadth
All for just one excellent idea
I'd struggle to class that as reality TV mind. You don't get to see any of the contestants away from the kitchen till the final. And even then it isn't intrusive. It's a cooking competition. No argument with any of the rest of your post, mind. The truly staggering thing is nobody thought of it before.
Why hasn't the Ready, Steady Cook person sued him for stealing his IP? PB must have an ambulance-chaser that would pursue that no win - no fee
Mileage also correlates with income. Those in the highest income deciles drive the most by a large margin even among those who own cars, and we’re a very long way from sufficient EV rollout for that to be inverted. Cutting it is profoundly regressive because most of the gains go to the richest.
That’s a minor point compared to the absurdity of suppressing a price signal during a supply crisis. It’s downright dangerous given the chance of actually running out. And in the long run, constantly doing so during energy crises (as we did in 2022 with £50 billion in subsidy) cocoons consumers and businesses from reality. We should be encouraging people to move to EVs, to solar, to batteries - not the precise opposite,
Among a number of candidates, it’s the policy that infuriates me the most.
Yes the enormous financial support* in 2022, which was probably unavoidable given how rapidly prices rose, has stopped many people changing their behaviour, which has now meant that the Iran War is hitting us harder than it might have if we'd paid a higher price when Russia invaded and changed our energy use sooner.
* It's amazing how many times I've heard people say that "the government did nothing for me" when it was something around £2,000 per household.
The big problem with the 2022 thing was that they did it all wrong.
They could have written every household a £2k cheque, then let electric prices float free.
They could have given everyone a refund of their bill for the previous 12 months, then let the electricity price float free.
Instead they capped the unit price, so completely destroying the price signal, thus zero incentive to reduce demand. It was by far the stupidest thing the Truss government did, but for some bizarre reason she floundered instead on a package of quite minor tax cuts which had at least fighting chance of actually generating some extra economic growth.
100% this:
£2,000 payments to each household would mean that the incentive to reduce energy consumption would not be diminished.
I've just left the private sector and joined the public sector. The NHS, in fact.
It simply wasn't worth it in the private sector anymore. Just taxed too much for too much stress.
Wow - shock news indeed!!
It can now only be a matter of time before you’re worrying that Labour isn’t radical enough and contemplating voting Green.
I’ve worked with, and for, a multitude of managers who have tried the private to public sector transition, during my career. A majority crash and burn, unable to adapt their ‘just get it done’ mentality to the more complex, multi-stakeholder, highly political environment of the public sector.
That's exactly me, and exactly what I'm trying to do right now.
The public sector need more "just get it done", not less.
I've spent my whole political life being told by right-wingers that the country was going to be bankrupted by lefties voting for higher government handouts and I should be amused that instead it's going to be bankrupted by right-wing voting pensioners, but I can't take any comfort from my antagonists being proved wrong.
That's not inconsistent. The common theme there is high taxes and handouts driving bankruptcy.
I am sure this has been discussed but Reform have gone for the local plumber angle. Not a particular surprise as he seemed the standout candidate.
Another 'I'm a local' video. Quite good but without the political depth (and music licensing spend) of Burnham's effort. Being "a local" is not in and of itself of benefit to the nation.
Burnham video 8.5 Plumber video 7.0
However, he does seem articulate and to have potential to be an asset to Reform if he gets it.
Weirdly, X has banned him, for reasons unknown.
Because he's Andy Burnham and they've had enough of him?
HS2 is grim enough by itself, but it is also symptomatic of a much deeper, grislier malaise in the UK body politic
We are now in a much worse place than we were in the late 70s, when Thatcher rode in to save the day
Its not just HS2, Hinkley point still miles off being done and not just the UK. I was talking to a German friend the other day and he was saying same sort of things are happening there when it comes to building big infrastructure projects.
We love process, regulation, raising issues and problems, and hate making a decision.
Infrastructure projects have become much more complex and few people understand them.
The one criticism I would have of lay of the land of UK supermarkets the quality of fresh produce I feel has got worse as stores have fought one another on price. Now don't get me wrong, we aren't like the US, where you have to go to Whole Foods or maybe a Publix to get ok stuff, but it definitely seems like the quality has gone down across the board and sourcing from more non-traditional markets e.g. You can shove your Indian grapes where the sun doesn't shine.
I've just left the private sector and joined the public sector. The NHS, in fact.
It simply wasn't worth it in the private sector anymore. Just taxed too much for too much stress.
Wow - shock news indeed!!
It can now only be a matter of time before you’re worrying that Labour isn’t radical enough and contemplating voting Green.
I’ve worked with, and for, a multitude of managers who have tried the private to public sector transition, during my career. A majority crash and burn, unable to adapt their ‘just get it done’ mentality to the more complex, multi-stakeholder, highly political environment of the public sector.
That's exactly me, and exactly what I'm trying to do right now.
The public sector need more "just get it done", not less.
There are three possible outcomes, firstly, that the culture and practices of the NHS come round to your way of working, second, that you learn the NHS way of doing things, or thirdly, that neither changes and your transition doesn’t work out so well. It would be impertinent so I’ll leave you to assess the odds, but a clue is that one of these three is significantly less likely than the other two…
I am sure this has been discussed but Reform have gone for the local plumber angle. Not a particular surprise as he seemed the standout candidate.
Another 'I'm a local' video. Quite good but without the political depth (and music licensing spend) of Burnham's effort. Being "a local" is not in and of itself of benefit to the nation.
Burnham video 8.5 Plumber video 7.0
However, he does seem articulate and to have potential to be an asset to Reform if he gets it.
I reckon his video is slightly better than Burnham's. Has a clever gritty local lad vibe, even if Burnham's is more polished
They are both pretty good, by the DIRE standards of these things
It is a genunely difficult race to call. Reform have the national momentum, Burnham has the personal buzz. Labour are hated, but this is a chance to kick Starmer out
I am back at about evens. Those who claim Burnham has got it wrapped up already are fools
Reform candidate doesn’t like privately educated career politicians parachuted into constituencies.
Not a big fan of Farage then.
Yes the plumber video does have a good vibe, but it is totally policy free - for me awkwardly so. Burnham’s is pretty lightweight but it does have a bit of policy. Ironically, because he is aiming to inspire people as the new PM, he sort of has the freedom to riff a bit on his politics. The plumber (need to learn his name) has said nothing, perhaps because apart from Immigration, Reform seem to have become the inheritors of the Ming vase.
I want Reform to eviscerate Labour in the next election, but I am not blind to their flaws.
One thing that struck me was complaining about Labour politicians going to private school and sending their kids there. Which is very true. But that, surely, just highlights that Burnham did neither of those things, despite having the money to do so, doesn't it? It has to be more than immigrants and Labour are crap. Particularly as everyone knows your main opponent is running on half of that agenda.
Didn't all of the Reform MPs other than 30p Lee go to private school?
Its a strange thing to put central to your platform.
Not just the original crime, caused by a stupid and unlawful policy, but the total lack of any safeguarding and breach of the hospital's professional duties, the deliberate obstruction of the police and the resulting harm caused to an innocent mentally ill man charged with a crime he could not possibly have committed.
And who is going to be held accountable for this shitshow?
Answers on the back of the smallest postage stamp you have available.
Why aren't lots of people at the hospital being prosecuted for obstruction of justice? It's quite extraordinary the way they acted.
HS2 is grim enough by itself, but it is also symptomatic of a much deeper, grislier malaise in the UK body politic
We are now in a much worse place than we were in the late 70s, when Thatcher rode in to save the day
Its not just HS2, Hinkley point still miles off being done and not just the UK. I was talking to a German friend the other day and he was saying same sort of things are happening there when it comes to building big infrastructure projects.
We love process, regulation, raising issues and problems, and hate making a decision.
Infrastructure projects have become much more complex and few people understand them.
I often find it odd that so many Politicians sell feel big Infrastructure projects on;
"How Much we are Investing in the Economy!" and "Creating Thousands of High Quality Jobs!" and get applauded by it on things like Question Time by audiences who don't seem to ask;
Who's paying for this and is it value for monetary!
If that is the criteria then HS2 is a bigger success now it is delayed and. costing £100bn than when on schedule and only costing £40bn.
Though I shouldn't say this as I am in the SNP, if we use spending and how many jobs created for how long, Ferguson Marine's two delayed Ferries, that still don't work properly, come out better than the on time, on budget Queensferry crossing that has delivered real benefits.
Maybe our obsession with Spending and Jobs also explains our struggles with Productivity.
Comments
On fuel duty, if you read my post carefully you will notice that they haven't actually decreased fuel taxation. The total tax on 1 litre of diesel is actually up by ~4.6p, the duty cut has been more than offset by increased VAT.
I'm with you on not destroying price signals - e.g. I thought the 2022 electric price cap subsidy was insanity on stilts, it would have made vastly more sense to make people cash payments based on their previous year's consumption and let them pay the market price (that way you are rewarded for reducing consumption, but are no worse off than before of you can't).
That however is completely different to what the government has done with fuel, where it has merely opted not to *increase* the tax as much as it might otherwise have done *as a result of the price spike*. If nothing else, it means that for a given pump price level, we have slightly more to spend when bidding for fuel in the international markets (someone is going to be going short - the more cash we've got available to bid for cargoes, the less likely it will be us).
"Where's the help for me?"
To be fsir, I think people do get that in relative terms compared with water companies, for example.
I assume Tesco Expresses and other supermaket equivalents must be more profitable as they generally seem to stock higher priced versions of things, or at least not as many of the cheaper options.
Food is universal. The format is genius. The guy who invented it shares an agent with me. The money he makes is stupefying. Every time any episode of Masterchef is shown or reshown anywhere - Masterchef Australia, Masterchef Bolivia, Masterchef Andorra - he gets a chunk of money
It is literally hundreds of millions of pounds. It is probably the greatest “remuneration per idea” in human history. I can’t think of an equal. Even writing a globally popular number one song or album isn’t the same. Doesn’t have the longevity or global breadth
All for just one excellent idea
Which is why they have higher pricing, even in the areas where they directly compete with one another.
They could have written every household a £2k cheque, then let electric prices float free.
They could have given everyone a refund of their bill for the previous 12 months, then let the electricity price float free.
Instead they capped the unit price, so completely destroying the price signal, thus zero incentive to reduce demand. It was by far the stupidest thing the Truss government did, but for some bizarre reason she floundered instead on a package of quite minor tax cuts which had at least fighting chance of actually generating some extra economic growth.
It's a cooking competition.
No argument with any of the rest of your post, mind.
The truly staggering thing is nobody thought of it before.
If you're looking to cut the overall cost then you look at the biggest ticket items.
Anyway as usual you're very ill-informed
Benefits like universal credit have taper relief of 55% above an earning allowance of £5-8k, people on UC are have marginal rates of benefit deduction and tax inc NI up to 80%.
Pensions aren't tapered, marginal rates above the single person's allowance (>> than UC earnings allowance) are 20%, no NI.
No one has to struggle to imagine the cacophony of outraged screams if state pensions had an 80% marginal rate, it's loud enough at 20%.
PB must have an ambulance-chaser that would pursue that no win - no fee
Andy Burnham said that men who identify as women should be able to use female toilets - and only a 'small minority' object, he claimed
£2,000 payments to each household would mean that the incentive to reduce energy consumption would not be diminished.
The public sector need more "just get it done", not less.
Doesn't matter who's advocating it.
https://meidasnews.com/news/hitler-went-about-it-wrong-ed-gallrein-political-director-linked-to-white-nationalist-youtube-playlists
Infrastructure projects have become much more complex and few people understand them.
Hopefully the Democrats will demolish them in November
NEW THREAD
Its a strange thing to put central to your platform.
"How Much we are Investing in the Economy!" and "Creating Thousands of High Quality Jobs!" and get applauded by it on things like Question Time by audiences who don't seem to ask;
Who's paying for this and is it value for monetary!
If that is the criteria then HS2 is a bigger success now it is delayed and. costing £100bn than when on schedule and only costing £40bn.
Though I shouldn't say this as I am in the SNP, if we use spending and how many jobs created for how long, Ferguson Marine's two delayed Ferries, that still don't work properly, come out better than the on time, on budget Queensferry crossing that has delivered real benefits.
Maybe our obsession with Spending and Jobs also explains our struggles with Productivity.
Peter.