I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
Great think about Jenrick is that it means you can blame both the Tories and Reform.
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
I’ve been talking about this issue for a while.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way.
It insists on natural ventilation and not using air conditioning unless the natural ventilation cannot be provided.
Which makes it very hard to add air con. But not quite impossible.
Note that ultra expensive bocks of flats still have aircon.
Might be worth asking some questions about how that happened.
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
It’s definitely going to be a big problem for them at the next GE. Every problem the UK currently has was made worse by the last government in some way. Some of them in major, UK changing ways that the electorate really hated.
The flip side is that, historically, the Conservatives have been effective at shedding their old policy positions & adopting new ones & it may be that the electorate will be sufficiently pissed off with the current Labour government that they will forget how many of the problems Labour have been faced with had their origins in the previous Conservative regime.
Shouldn't Blair's comments on Net Zero be challenged, ChatGPT reckons:
Most mainstream economic analysis says that, in the long run, not pursuing net zero would probably cost the UK more than pursuing it — but there are important caveats about who pays, when, and which policies are used.
Here’s the core debate in simple terms:
Arguments that net zero is ultimately cheaper
The UK’s independent advisers — especially the Climate Change Committee and Office for Budget Responsibility — argue that:
climate damage from unchecked warming will become very expensive, fossil fuel price shocks (like the 2022 gas crisis) are costly, renewable electricity and EVs are getting cheaper, and energy independence reduces long-term risk.
The OBR said in 2025 that the estimated fiscal cost of the transition had fallen significantly compared with earlier forecasts, while the expected economic damage from climate change had risen.
The Climate Change Committee also concluded that reaching net zero is “more cost-effective” than continued fossil-fuel dependence in all the scenarios it tested.
Arguments that net zero is expensive
Critics argue that:
households face high upfront costs (heat pumps, insulation, EVs), industry can become less competitive if energy prices rise, government subsidies and infrastructure spending are large, and some technologies may not deliver as cheaply as forecast.
They also argue official estimates can be optimistic and underestimate real system costs.
The important distinction: short term vs long term
A lot depends on the timeframe.
Short term: net zero policies can absolutely increase costs in some sectors and for some households. Long term: most official economic modelling says climate damage, energy insecurity, and fossil fuel volatility would cost more overall if the UK did little or nothing.
So the disagreement is often less about whether there are costs — there clearly are — and more about:
whether the benefits justify them, whether the transition is being managed efficiently, and how fairly the costs are distributed. Bottom line
If you ask:
“Does net zero require major spending and economic change?”
then yes.
If you ask:
“Do most economists and official UK institutions think abandoning net zero would be cheaper overall?”
then generally no — the dominant view in UK official analysis is that failing to decarbonise would likely be more expensive over time because of climate damage and fossil-fuel dependence.
Seems fair to me. So are we in favour of short termism and being hostage to Middle East and Russian problems, or are we in favour of Net Zero?
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
I’ve been talking about this issue for a while.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way.
It insists on natural ventilation and not using air conditioning unless the natural ventilation cannot be provided.
Which makes it very hard to add air con. But not quite impossible.
Note that ultra expensive bocks of flats still have aircon.
Might be worth asking some questions about how that happened.
The problem with the insistence on ventilation & shading (blinds, shutters) is that it assumes that solar radiation is the primary source of heat. When the outside temperature is 35+°C no amount of ventilation is going to help you & blinds only prolong the inevitable.
Coping with future heatwaves is going to require aircon to be widely installed but building regulations simply haven’t caught up with this reality, despite being written with the infamous “climate emergency” as a major justification for the current regs. They were completely focused on CO2 reduction, and not on coping with the inevitable heat that’s going to be part of the standard British summer from now on.
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
I’ve been talking about this issue for a while.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way...
I know. In that way, it's characteristic of the regs, which set out to achieve admirable objectives (eg safer buildings) but are so badly drafted that they just prevent an awful lot of building by pricing it out of the market.
They are massively over prescriptive and bear significant responsibility for the failure to build.
With regards to the energy stuff (which is the bit I'm probably most clued-up about), hasn't it all been overtaken by events? Even if it weren't horribly hot out there for some reason, hasn't solar/wind/battery (plus gas backup for now) won on cost?
And on topic, how is this different to the relaxation in the planning rules introduced (checks notes) last year?
Leaving aside the fact that Kemi can't entirely escape responsibility for the 2019-24 government that she was a minister in, this feeels like it highlights another fundamental problem the Conservatives are facing. Nobody remotely capable seems to be involved in working out and sense-checking policy. It's all reactive nonsense based on whatever they see out of the window.
Shouldn't Blair's comments on Net Zero be challenged, ChatGPT reckons:
Most mainstream economic analysis says that, in the long run, not pursuing net zero would probably cost the UK more than pursuing it — but there are important caveats about who pays, when, and which policies are used.
Here’s the core debate in simple terms:
Arguments that net zero is ultimately cheaper
The UK’s independent advisers — especially the Climate Change Committee and Office for Budget Responsibility — argue that:
climate damage from unchecked warming will become very expensive, fossil fuel price shocks (like the 2022 gas crisis) are costly, renewable electricity and EVs are getting cheaper, and energy independence reduces long-term risk.
The OBR said in 2025 that the estimated fiscal cost of the transition had fallen significantly compared with earlier forecasts, while the expected economic damage from climate change had risen.
The Climate Change Committee also concluded that reaching net zero is “more cost-effective” than continued fossil-fuel dependence in all the scenarios it tested.
Arguments that net zero is expensive
Critics argue that:
households face high upfront costs (heat pumps, insulation, EVs), industry can become less competitive if energy prices rise, government subsidies and infrastructure spending are large, and some technologies may not deliver as cheaply as forecast.
They also argue official estimates can be optimistic and underestimate real system costs.
The important distinction: short term vs long term
A lot depends on the timeframe.
Short term: net zero policies can absolutely increase costs in some sectors and for some households. Long term: most official economic modelling says climate damage, energy insecurity, and fossil fuel volatility would cost more overall if the UK did little or nothing.
So the disagreement is often less about whether there are costs — there clearly are — and more about:
whether the benefits justify them, whether the transition is being managed efficiently, and how fairly the costs are distributed. Bottom line
If you ask:
“Does net zero require major spending and economic change?”
then yes.
If you ask:
“Do most economists and official UK institutions think abandoning net zero would be cheaper overall?”
then generally no — the dominant view in UK official analysis is that failing to decarbonise would likely be more expensive over time because of climate damage and fossil-fuel dependence.
Seems fair to me. So are we in favour of short termism and being hostage to Middle East and Russian problems, or are we in favour of Net Zero?
When was the last election when short-termism didn't win?
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
I’ve been talking about this issue for a while.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way...
I know. In that way, it's characteristic of the regs, which set out to achieve admirable objectives (eg safer buildings) but are so badly drafted that they just prevent an awful lot of building by pricing it out of the market.
They are massively over prescriptive and bear significant responsibility for the failure to build.
And people get upset about my description of the Process State - where ever bigger piles of regulation is better.
When the next Grenfell happens, it will probably be because of a fire in a room storing the documents…
Process should follow from requirements. As short and sweet as possible. So that it is easy to check what has been done and what hasn’t.
An example of a process that works, is the health inspections on food places. Which is simple enough that kebab shop owners can understand how to get a 5.
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
I’ve been talking about this issue for a while.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way.
It insists on natural ventilation and not using air conditioning unless the natural ventilation cannot be provided.
Which makes it very hard to add air con. But not quite impossible.
Note that ultra expensive bocks of flats still have aircon.
Might be worth asking some questions about how that happened.
The problem with the insistence on ventilation & shading (blinds, shutters) is that it assumes that solar radiation is the primary source of heat. When the outside temperature is 35+°C no amount of ventilation is going to help you & blinds only prolong the inevitable.
Coping with future heatwaves is going to require aircon to be widely installed but building regulations simply haven’t caught up with this reality, despite being written with the infamous “climate emergency” as a major justification for the current regs. They were completely focused on CO2 reduction, and not on coping with the inevitable heat that’s going to be part of the standard British summer from now on.
Yup - past 25c air temp, natural ventilation becomes ineffective.
The problem wasn’t so much CO2 emission as getting hung up on “efficiency” as the only way to reduce CO2 emissions.
So the culture of the permanent system of state is that energy usage is bad.
When, in one discussion about a reservoir, the water company in question said that they would run the pumps etc, from 100% green energy and accept intermittent operation, they were told that the energy usage would still be counted at the average national grid emissions rate.
With regards to the energy stuff (which is the bit I'm probably most clued-up about), hasn't it all been overtaken by events? Even if it weren't horribly hot out there for some reason, hasn't solar/wind/battery (plus gas backup for now) won on cost?
And on topic, how is this different to the relaxation in the planning rules introduced (checks notes) last year?
This is again part of the mea culpa we never seem to get from Badenoch or from any other senior Conservative. It's almost as though they want us to believe the world began on July 5th 2024 and they (the Conservatives) had never been in Government.
Treating us as if we have the memory capacity and attention span of a forgetful gnat is just insulting.
I've read Blair's "essay", "intervention", whatever you want to call it.
It's not easy to read - yes, it's long on diagnosis and shorter on treatment. I'm a fan of the "Radical Centre" and like to think it's ground I've visited on occasions. If a solution works, who cares if it's "left" or "right"?
On the central tenet (or one of them) technologies come and industries go would be a trite way of describing the past couple of hundred of years. Automaton and the coming of information systems has replaced rows of men with ledgers but the local council of 1926 was about payments - it wasn't about the provision of adult social care and care for vulnerable children but it is now and even if the assessment can be largely automated, the actual care is probably a harder ask.
With an ageing population, you can see a redistribution of work into other areas - how many robots will it take to mend a pothole, you might ask? Trying to imagine 2126 from 2026 is as difficult as it would have been to imagine 2026 from 1926 yet long term strategic thinking is important to prepare for the world as it might be.
On the energy question, Blair rightly mourns the loss of cheap energy - economic growth is often relied on cheap energy or new energy and while renewables have their place, they can't be the be-all and end-all but nor can we ignore the longer term environmental impacts of pushing for cheap energy to achieve short term growth. Britain has less than 1% of global emissions and somehow that means we can't set an example - we can and in my view should be leading on climate change mitigation and the likes of America, China and India are all vulnerable to climate change on a much larger scale (the "super el nino" coming will likely exacerbate this).
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
Great think about Jenrick is that it means you can blame both the Tories and Reform.
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
I’ve been talking about this issue for a while.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way.
It insists on natural ventilation and not using air conditioning unless the natural ventilation cannot be provided.
Which makes it very hard to add air con. But not quite impossible.
Note that ultra expensive bocks of flats still have aircon.
Might be worth asking some questions about how that happened.
The problem with the insistence on ventilation & shading (blinds, shutters) is that it assumes that solar radiation is the primary source of heat. When the outside temperature is 35+°C no amount of ventilation is going to help you & blinds only prolong the inevitable.
Coping with future heatwaves is going to require aircon to be widely installed but building regulations simply haven’t caught up with this reality, despite being written with the infamous “climate emergency” as a major justification for the current regs. They were completely focused on CO2 reduction, and not on coping with the inevitable heat that’s going to be part of the standard British summer from now on.
Yup - past 25c air temp, natural ventilation becomes ineffective.
The problem wasn’t so much CO2 emission as getting hung up on “efficiency” as the only way to reduce CO2 emissions.
So the culture of the permanent system of state is that energy usage is bad.
When, in one discussion about a reservoir, the water company in question said that they would run the pumps etc, from 100% green energy and accept intermittent operation, they were told that the energy usage would still be counted at the average national grid emissions rate.
Perhaps they suspected they were taking the piss? Like new CO2 emitters that will be offset by CCS for which the emitter gets the engineering done for a feasible concept design that they can show the regulator but don't progress.
Teenage sensation Vaibhav Sooryavanshi produced his latest extraordinary innings by hitting 97 from just 29 balls in the Indian Premier League eliminator against Sunrisers Hyderabad.
In my day, i would have batted all afternoon for that....just aint crrrrricket.
This is again part of the mea culpa we never seem to get from Badenoch or from any other senior Conservative. It's almost as though they want us to believe the world began on July 5th 2024 and they (the Conservatives) had never been in Government.
Treating us as if we have the memory capacity and attention span of a forgetful gnat is just insulting.
I've read Blair's "essay", "intervention", whatever you want to call it.
It's not easy to read - yes, it's long on diagnosis and shorter on treatment. I'm a fan of the "Radical Centre" and like to think it's ground I've visited on occasions. If a solution works, who cares if it's "left" or "right"?
On the central tenet (or one of them) technologies come and industries go would be a trite way of describing the past couple of hundred of years. Automaton and the coming of information systems has replaced rows of men with ledgers but the local council of 1926 was about payments - it wasn't about the provision of adult social care and care for vulnerable children but it is now and even if the assessment can be largely automated, the actual care is probably a harder ask.
With an ageing population, you can see a redistribution of work into other areas - how many robots will it take to mend a pothole, you might ask? Trying to imagine 2126 from 2026 is as difficult as it would have been to imagine 2026 from 1926 yet long term strategic thinking is important to prepare for the world as it might be.
On the energy question, Blair rightly mourns the loss of cheap energy - economic growth is often relied on cheap energy or new energy and while renewables have their place, they can't be the be-all and end-all but nor can we ignore the longer term environmental impacts of pushing for cheap energy to achieve short term growth. Britain has less than 1% of global emissions and somehow that means we can't set an example - we can and in my view should be leading on climate change mitigation and the likes of America, China and India are all vulnerable to climate change on a much larger scale (the "super el nino" coming will likely exacerbate this).
China is currently leading in renewable energy, producing 32% of global renewable electricity. Other notable countries include the United States, Brazil, Canada, and India, but none match China's significant contribution
. Additionally, China has the largest solar energy capacity and is committed to increasing its renewable energy production
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
I’ve been talking about this issue for a while.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way.
It insists on natural ventilation and not using air conditioning unless the natural ventilation cannot be provided.
Which makes it very hard to add air con. But not quite impossible.
Note that ultra expensive bocks of flats still have aircon.
Might be worth asking some questions about how that happened.
The problem with the insistence on ventilation & shading (blinds, shutters) is that it assumes that solar radiation is the primary source of heat. When the outside temperature is 35+°C no amount of ventilation is going to help you & blinds only prolong the inevitable.
Coping with future heatwaves is going to require aircon to be widely installed but building regulations simply haven’t caught up with this reality, despite being written with the infamous “climate emergency” as a major justification for the current regs. They were completely focused on CO2 reduction, and not on coping with the inevitable heat that’s going to be part of the standard British summer from now on.
Yup - past 25c air temp, natural ventilation becomes ineffective.
The problem wasn’t so much CO2 emission as getting hung up on “efficiency” as the only way to reduce CO2 emissions.
So the culture of the permanent system of state is that energy usage is bad.
When, in one discussion about a reservoir, the water company in question said that they would run the pumps etc, from 100% green energy and accept intermittent operation, they were told that the energy usage would still be counted at the average national grid emissions rate.
Perhaps they suspected they were taking the piss? Like new CO2 emitters that will be offset by CCS for which the emitter gets the engineering done for a feasible concept design that they can show the regulator but don't progress.
No. Apparently the rules didn’t include taking into account dedicated sources when considering C02 emissions
Lets be honest, short term the bad news is we're all going to have to get used to being hotter and to avoid hot places particularly those that may fail in hot temps.. so that's most train travel, lifts etc to be treated with caution.
This is again part of the mea culpa we never seem to get from Badenoch or from any other senior Conservative. It's almost as though they want us to believe the world began on July 5th 2024 and they (the Conservatives) had never been in Government.
Treating us as if we have the memory capacity and attention span of a forgetful gnat is just insulting.
I've read Blair's "essay", "intervention", whatever you want to call it.
It's not easy to read - yes, it's long on diagnosis and shorter on treatment. I'm a fan of the "Radical Centre" and like to think it's ground I've visited on occasions. If a solution works, who cares if it's "left" or "right"?
On the central tenet (or one of them) technologies come and industries go would be a trite way of describing the past couple of hundred of years. Automaton and the coming of information systems has replaced rows of men with ledgers but the local council of 1926 was about payments - it wasn't about the provision of adult social care and care for vulnerable children but it is now and even if the assessment can be largely automated, the actual care is probably a harder ask.
With an ageing population, you can see a redistribution of work into other areas - how many robots will it take to mend a pothole, you might ask? Trying to imagine 2126 from 2026 is as difficult as it would have been to imagine 2026 from 1926 yet long term strategic thinking is important to prepare for the world as it might be.
On the energy question, Blair rightly mourns the loss of cheap energy - economic growth is often relied on cheap energy or new energy and while renewables have their place, they can't be the be-all and end-all but nor can we ignore the longer term environmental impacts of pushing for cheap energy to achieve short term growth. Britain has less than 1% of global emissions and somehow that means we can't set an example - we can and in my view should be leading on climate change mitigation and the likes of America, China and India are all vulnerable to climate change on a much larger scale (the "super el nino" coming will likely exacerbate this).
China is currently leading in renewable energy, producing 32% of global renewable electricity. Other notable countries include the United States, Brazil, Canada, and India, but none match China's significant contribution
. Additionally, China has the largest solar energy capacity and is committed to increasing its renewable energy production
Treating China as a leader means admitting that our own net zero strategy has been ill-conceived, because they've done it by not caring about their short-term emissions.
All going a bit Pete Tong for Kenyon. Now The Telegraph is on his back for being a Brexit Betrayer.
Online after the vote, he said Brexit meant Britain had “shot our economy in the foot” and would have “no say whatsoever” on EU rules, adding that the country would have to “pick up the pieces”.
He also said Leave campaigners, who included Nigel Farage, had “peddled the nationalistic pish and got [the] working class vote”, which he described as “a bit silly”.
"When I was up in Makerfield last week I was surprised at the presence the tiny splinter party was generating on the ground. In the wake of the first poll I spoke to a number of sources from different parties who claimed that on the basis of recent canvass returns, they believe it significantly underestimated Restore’s actual support. Then yesterday I spoke to three other sources. They independently told me they believed that on the trends they were seeing, there was a possibility Restore could actually beat Reform in the seat."
All going a bit Pete Tong for Kenyon. Now The Telegraph is on his back for being a Brexit Betrayer.
Online after the vote, he said Brexit meant Britain had “shot our economy in the foot” and would have “no say whatsoever” on EU rules, adding that the country would have to “pick up the pieces”.
He also said Leave campaigners, who included Nigel Farage, had “peddled the nationalistic pish and got [the] working class vote”, which he described as “a bit silly”.
So, he wasn't as stupid as he now appears to be...
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
All going a bit Pete Tong for Kenyon. Now The Telegraph is on his back for being a Brexit Betrayer.
Online after the vote, he said Brexit meant Britain had “shot our economy in the foot” and would have “no say whatsoever” on EU rules, adding that the country would have to “pick up the pieces”.
He also said Leave campaigners, who included Nigel Farage, had “peddled the nationalistic pish and got [the] working class vote”, which he described as “a bit silly”.
So, he wasn't as stupid as he now appears to be...
Where the particular issue of air conditioning is concerned, I at least had no idea there were any such laws until reading about it on here, so it may not be a big issue for voters.
"When I was up in Makerfield last week I was surprised at the presence the tiny splinter party was generating on the ground. In the wake of the first poll I spoke to a number of sources from different parties who claimed that on the basis of recent canvass returns, they believe it significantly underestimated Restore’s actual support. Then yesterday I spoke to three other sources. They independently told me they believed that on the trends they were seeing, there was a possibility Restore could actually beat Reform in the seat."
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
What's more, Burnham could be as unpopular as Starmer is right now when the GE comes around. However it is said that Burnham is in favour of PR and that is what is needed to stop a populist party winning against what most people want.
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
I’ve been talking about this issue for a while.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way.
It insists on natural ventilation and not using air conditioning unless the natural ventilation cannot be provided.
Which makes it very hard to add air con. But not quite impossible.
Note that ultra expensive bocks of flats still have aircon.
Might be worth asking some questions about how that happened.
You can just do what the Italians do in their old buildings, and buy an AC unit, screw it to the wall, and get an electrician to wire it up. I am sitting under one now.
Trump says Iran "thought they were going to out wait me, you know, we'll out wait him, he's got the midterms. I don't care about the midterms, look what happened last night, that was the prelude to the midterms."
This is again part of the mea culpa we never seem to get from Badenoch or from any other senior Conservative. It's almost as though they want us to believe the world began on July 5th 2024 and they (the Conservatives) had never been in Government.
Treating us as if we have the memory capacity and attention span of a forgetful gnat is just insulting.
I've read Blair's "essay", "intervention", whatever you want to call it.
It's not easy to read - yes, it's long on diagnosis and shorter on treatment. I'm a fan of the "Radical Centre" and like to think it's ground I've visited on occasions. If a solution works, who cares if it's "left" or "right"?
On the central tenet (or one of them) technologies come and industries go would be a trite way of describing the past couple of hundred of years. Automaton and the coming of information systems has replaced rows of men with ledgers but the local council of 1926 was about payments - it wasn't about the provision of adult social care and care for vulnerable children but it is now and even if the assessment can be largely automated, the actual care is probably a harder ask.
With an ageing population, you can see a redistribution of work into other areas - how many robots will it take to mend a pothole, you might ask? Trying to imagine 2126 from 2026 is as difficult as it would have been to imagine 2026 from 1926 yet long term strategic thinking is important to prepare for the world as it might be.
On the energy question, Blair rightly mourns the loss of cheap energy - economic growth is often relied on cheap energy or new energy and while renewables have their place, they can't be the be-all and end-all but nor can we ignore the longer term environmental impacts of pushing for cheap energy to achieve short term growth. Britain has less than 1% of global emissions and somehow that means we can't set an example - we can and in my view should be leading on climate change mitigation and the likes of America, China and India are all vulnerable to climate change on a much larger scale (the "super el nino" coming will likely exacerbate this).
China is currently leading in renewable energy, producing 32% of global renewable electricity. Other notable countries include the United States, Brazil, Canada, and India, but none match China's significant contribution
. Additionally, China has the largest solar energy capacity and is committed to increasing its renewable energy production
Treating China as a leader means admitting that our own net zero strategy has been ill-conceived, because they've done it by not caring about their short-term emissions.
China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fell by 1% in the final quarter of 2025, likely securing a decline of 0.3% for the full year as a whole. So emissions have been falling for two and half years.
This is again part of the mea culpa we never seem to get from Badenoch or from any other senior Conservative. It's almost as though they want us to believe the world began on July 5th 2024 and they (the Conservatives) had never been in Government.
Treating us as if we have the memory capacity and attention span of a forgetful gnat is just insulting.
I've read Blair's "essay", "intervention", whatever you want to call it.
It's not easy to read - yes, it's long on diagnosis and shorter on treatment. I'm a fan of the "Radical Centre" and like to think it's ground I've visited on occasions. If a solution works, who cares if it's "left" or "right"?
On the central tenet (or one of them) technologies come and industries go would be a trite way of describing the past couple of hundred of years. Automaton and the coming of information systems has replaced rows of men with ledgers but the local council of 1926 was about payments - it wasn't about the provision of adult social care and care for vulnerable children but it is now and even if the assessment can be largely automated, the actual care is probably a harder ask.
With an ageing population, you can see a redistribution of work into other areas - how many robots will it take to mend a pothole, you might ask? Trying to imagine 2126 from 2026 is as difficult as it would have been to imagine 2026 from 1926 yet long term strategic thinking is important to prepare for the world as it might be.
On the energy question, Blair rightly mourns the loss of cheap energy - economic growth is often relied on cheap energy or new energy and while renewables have their place, they can't be the be-all and end-all but nor can we ignore the longer term environmental impacts of pushing for cheap energy to achieve short term growth. Britain has less than 1% of global emissions and somehow that means we can't set an example - we can and in my view should be leading on climate change mitigation and the likes of America, China and India are all vulnerable to climate change on a much larger scale (the "super el nino" coming will likely exacerbate this).
China is currently leading in renewable energy, producing 32% of global renewable electricity. Other notable countries include the United States, Brazil, Canada, and India, but none match China's significant contribution
. Additionally, China has the largest solar energy capacity and is committed to increasing its renewable energy production
Treating China as a leader means admitting that our own net zero strategy has been ill-conceived, because they've done it by not caring about their short-term emissions.
China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fell by 1% in the final quarter of 2025, likely securing a decline of 0.3% for the full year as a whole. So emissions have been falling for two and half years.
That underlines my point, although you have to take recent figures with a pinch of salt because they've had a construction recession.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
What's more, Burnham could be as unpopular as Starmer is right now when the GE comes around. However it is said that Burnham is in favour of PR and that is what is needed to stop a populist party winning against what most people want.
Isn't that what Labour thought when they made elections to Holyrood PR?
"When I was up in Makerfield last week I was surprised at the presence the tiny splinter party was generating on the ground. In the wake of the first poll I spoke to a number of sources from different parties who claimed that on the basis of recent canvass returns, they believe it significantly underestimated Restore’s actual support. Then yesterday I spoke to three other sources. They independently told me they believed that on the trends they were seeing, there was a possibility Restore could actually beat Reform in the seat."
Second hand, lazy reporting. Reform won't be talking their candidate down, so Mr Hodges "sources" will be from elsewhere. That is from parties which have every interest in seeing a split in the far right vote and which have been doing enough canvassing to be able to claim to be able to give feedback. So almost certainly Labour and probably Restore, because no other parties are doing any campaigning of note, with Mr Hodges obligingly acting as their useful idiot.
That said, Reform's vile candidate is doing himself no favours and word is getting around in the local as well as the national media:
This is again part of the mea culpa we never seem to get from Badenoch or from any other senior Conservative. It's almost as though they want us to believe the world began on July 5th 2024 and they (the Conservatives) had never been in Government.
Treating us as if we have the memory capacity and attention span of a forgetful gnat is just insulting.
I've read Blair's "essay", "intervention", whatever you want to call it.
It's not easy to read - yes, it's long on diagnosis and shorter on treatment. I'm a fan of the "Radical Centre" and like to think it's ground I've visited on occasions. If a solution works, who cares if it's "left" or "right"?
On the central tenet (or one of them) technologies come and industries go would be a trite way of describing the past couple of hundred of years. Automaton and the coming of information systems has replaced rows of men with ledgers but the local council of 1926 was about payments - it wasn't about the provision of adult social care and care for vulnerable children but it is now and even if the assessment can be largely automated, the actual care is probably a harder ask.
With an ageing population, you can see a redistribution of work into other areas - how many robots will it take to mend a pothole, you might ask? Trying to imagine 2126 from 2026 is as difficult as it would have been to imagine 2026 from 1926 yet long term strategic thinking is important to prepare for the world as it might be.
On the energy question, Blair rightly mourns the loss of cheap energy - economic growth is often relied on cheap energy or new energy and while renewables have their place, they can't be the be-all and end-all but nor can we ignore the longer term environmental impacts of pushing for cheap energy to achieve short term growth. Britain has less than 1% of global emissions and somehow that means we can't set an example - we can and in my view should be leading on climate change mitigation and the likes of America, China and India are all vulnerable to climate change on a much larger scale (the "super el nino" coming will likely exacerbate this).
China is currently leading in renewable energy, producing 32% of global renewable electricity. Other notable countries include the United States, Brazil, Canada, and India, but none match China's significant contribution
. Additionally, China has the largest solar energy capacity and is committed to increasing its renewable energy production
Treating China as a leader means admitting that our own net zero strategy has been ill-conceived, because they've done it by not caring about their short-term emissions.
China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fell by 1% in the final quarter of 2025, likely securing a decline of 0.3% for the full year as a whole. So emissions have been falling for two and half years.
That underlines my point, although you have to take recent figures with a pinch of salt because they've had a construction recession.
"When I was up in Makerfield last week I was surprised at the presence the tiny splinter party was generating on the ground. In the wake of the first poll I spoke to a number of sources from different parties who claimed that on the basis of recent canvass returns, they believe it significantly underestimated Restore’s actual support. Then yesterday I spoke to three other sources. They independently told me they believed that on the trends they were seeing, there was a possibility Restore could actually beat Reform in the seat."
Each week The Economist and YouGov ask Americans what they make of their president. The latest survey shows Donald Trump has passed a milestone: he is the most unpopular Oval Office occupant since our poll began in 2009. War in Iran has hurt Mr Trump’s standing, but it is his handling of the economy (which cannot be separated from his foreign policy) that is really dragging him down.
FPT: Off topic but important: Nate Silver's May 5th Silver Bulletin has some numbers that many of you need to know:
1. Of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives, as of the 2024 election, 60, or 14 percent, are held by blacks. (That's slightly more than the percentage of blacks in the US population.) 2. Only 7 of those 60 represent districts that are more than 50 percent black. 3. Nine of the 60 represent districts that are 10 percent, or less, black.
"When I was up in Makerfield last week I was surprised at the presence the tiny splinter party was generating on the ground. In the wake of the first poll I spoke to a number of sources from different parties who claimed that on the basis of recent canvass returns, they believe it significantly underestimated Restore’s actual support. Then yesterday I spoke to three other sources. They independently told me they believed that on the trends they were seeing, there was a possibility Restore could actually beat Reform in the seat."
Second hand, lazy reporting. Reform won't be talking their candidate down, so Mr Hodges "sources" will be from elsewhere. That is from parties which have every interest in seeing a split in the far right vote and which have been doing enough canvassing to be able to claim to be able to give feedback. So almost certainly Labour and probably Restore, because no other parties are doing any campaigning of note, with Mr Hodges obligingly acting as their useful idiot.
That said, Reform's vile candidate is doing himself no favours and word is getting around in the local as well as the national media:
I remember over the weekend saying that the funniest result would be Labour first with Restore second and was shouted down that that was impossible.
Granted we have 3 weeks to go but that doesn’t look impossible given that there are 2 none of the above candidates here and the Reform one is becoming more toxic by the day
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
What's more, Burnham could be as unpopular as Starmer is right now when the GE comes around. However it is said that Burnham is in favour of PR and that is what is needed to stop a populist party winning against what most people want.
Isn't that what Labour thought when they made elections to Holyrood PR?
The level of stupidity here continues to fascinate.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
You don’t live in Makerfield and neither are you a Labour MP. So stop worrying and just fuhgeddaboudit.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
Entirely sympathise with your conflict. One or two thoughts.
Starmer won a landslide, yes, but the vote he got was so small that its moral mandate was very qualified. If he had done as expected - built on his good luck to have such useless opposition, discovered a detailed plan, wavered on impossible promises as circumstances changed, been a leader of the nation, created a narrative, communicated honestly and really well, and been sure footed - he would be secure.
He didn't, he could have, and his moral mandate has vanished. Leading in the polls is an outfit with disgusting qualities and abominable candidates. They are being challenged by others who are worse. Starmer has to go. He is not a future winner.
Finally, Burnham can only be PM if these things are in place: The PM is a busted flush, out of 400 MPs there is no-one good enough, the voters vote for him, the MPs nominate him, and the members vote for him. These are huge hurdles; so great that in the country there appears to be only one person qualified. Burnham.
He would not be my choice, and the chances of him doing badly are under estimated, but them's the breaks.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
What's more, Burnham could be as unpopular as Starmer is right now when the GE comes around. However it is said that Burnham is in favour of PR and that is what is needed to stop a populist party winning against what most people want.
Isn't that what Labour thought when they made elections to Holyrood PR?
PR doesn't stop (nor should it) a popular party winning a majority. What it should stop is an unpopular party doing so.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
The principal critique of Starmer (which Blair's essay completely misses with his "retreating to the soft left comfort zone" schtick) is that he just hasn't got stuff done, or has just been painfully slow in doing stuff. And that's a pretty fair criticism whichever side of the political spectrum you reside.
The push to replace him is all about that (even though it will quite possibly mean a counterproductive hiatus in government).
Burnham, if he is the next PM, will be judged on the same criterion, whether or not he tickles the soft left's fancies.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
You don’t live in Makerfield and neither are you a Labour MP. So stop worrying and just fuhgeddaboudit.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
What's more, Burnham could be as unpopular as Starmer is right now when the GE comes around. However it is said that Burnham is in favour of PR and that is what is needed to stop a populist party winning against what most people want.
Isn't that what Labour thought when they made elections to Holyrood PR?
Elections to Holyrood are not strictly speaking PR. Wales would be a better example.
This is again part of the mea culpa we never seem to get from Badenoch or from any other senior Conservative. It's almost as though they want us to believe the world began on July 5th 2024 and they (the Conservatives) had never been in Government.
Treating us as if we have the memory capacity and attention span of a forgetful gnat is just insulting.
I've read Blair's "essay", "intervention", whatever you want to call it.
It's not easy to read - yes, it's long on diagnosis and shorter on treatment. I'm a fan of the "Radical Centre" and like to think it's ground I've visited on occasions. If a solution works, who cares if it's "left" or "right"?
On the central tenet (or one of them) technologies come and industries go would be a trite way of describing the past couple of hundred of years. Automaton and the coming of information systems has replaced rows of men with ledgers but the local council of 1926 was about payments - it wasn't about the provision of adult social care and care for vulnerable children but it is now and even if the assessment can be largely automated, the actual care is probably a harder ask.
With an ageing population, you can see a redistribution of work into other areas - how many robots will it take to mend a pothole, you might ask? Trying to imagine 2126 from 2026 is as difficult as it would have been to imagine 2026 from 1926 yet long term strategic thinking is important to prepare for the world as it might be.
On the energy question, Blair rightly mourns the loss of cheap energy - economic growth is often relied on cheap energy or new energy and while renewables have their place, they can't be the be-all and end-all but nor can we ignore the longer term environmental impacts of pushing for cheap energy to achieve short term growth. Britain has less than 1% of global emissions and somehow that means we can't set an example - we can and in my view should be leading on climate change mitigation and the likes of America, China and India are all vulnerable to climate change on a much larger scale (the "super el nino" coming will likely exacerbate this).
China is currently leading in renewable energy, producing 32% of global renewable electricity. Other notable countries include the United States, Brazil, Canada, and India, but none match China's significant contribution
. Additionally, China has the largest solar energy capacity and is committed to increasing its renewable energy production
Treating China as a leader means admitting that our own net zero strategy has been ill-conceived, because they've done it by not caring about their short-term emissions.
China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fell by 1% in the final quarter of 2025, likely securing a decline of 0.3% for the full year as a whole. So emissions have been falling for two and half years.
That underlines my point, although you have to take recent figures with a pinch of salt because they've had a construction recession.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
Entirely sympathise with your conflict. One or two thoughts.
Starmer won a landslide, yes, but the vote he got was so small that its moral mandate was very qualified. If he had done as expected - built on his good luck to have such useless opposition, discovered a detailed plan, wavered on impossible promises as circumstances changed, been a leader of the nation, created a narrative, communicated honestly and really well, and been sure footed - he would be secure.
He didn't, he could have, and his moral mandate has vanished. Leading in the polls is an outfit with disgusting qualities and abominable candidates. They are being challenged by others who are worse. Starmer has to go. He is not a future winner.
Finally, Burnham can only be PM if these things are in place: The PM is a busted flush, out of 400 MPs there is no-one good enough, the voters vote for him, the MPs nominate him, and the members vote for him. These are huge hurdles; so great that in the country there appears to be only one person qualified. Burnham.
He would not be my choice, and the chances of him doing badly are under estimated, but them's the breaks.
Yes that's about it. Queasiness aside, he has to go. Who (in Labour) would be your choice as a matter of interest?
The World Cup starts in two weeks. My memories of them go back to the glorious 1966, a moment life was never better than at age 11. Do I detect so far substantially less interest than usual this year, or am I living under a rock, or is the onslaught yet to come?
Trump says Iran "thought they were going to out wait me, you know, we'll out wait him, he's got the midterms. I don't care about the midterms, look what happened last night, that was the prelude to the midterms."
That's some truly dumb shit again.
I take it he's referring to the MAGA faithful voting for the corrupt paedo protector he endorsed in Taxas. The midterms won't stroke his ego in the same way.
Incidentally that 40% rise in the price cap for gas is going to be exceedingly painful for everyone. Politically, it will depend on whether Labour get the blame by virtue of being in power, or they can lump it onto Farage on the grounds he's a supporter of the loon who caused the issue.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
The principal critique of Starmer (which Blair's essay completely misses with his "retreating to the soft left comfort zone" schtick) is that he just hasn't got stuff done, or has just been painfully slow in doing stuff. And that's a pretty fair criticism whichever side of the political spectrum you reside.
The push to replace him is all about that (even though it will quite possibly mean a counterproductive hiatus in government).
Burnham, if he is the next PM, will be judged on the same criterion, whether or not he tickles the soft left's fancies.
That seems fair enough to me.
I think Labour’s media management has been beyond woeful, granted they haven’t done much but they haven’t exactly managed to talk about the things they have achieved.
If Burnham did that (and nothing else) I think things would look better instantly - and Burnham will do more than better story telling
This is again part of the mea culpa we never seem to get from Badenoch or from any other senior Conservative. It's almost as though they want us to believe the world began on July 5th 2024 and they (the Conservatives) had never been in Government.
Treating us as if we have the memory capacity and attention span of a forgetful gnat is just insulting.
I've read Blair's "essay", "intervention", whatever you want to call it.
It's not easy to read - yes, it's long on diagnosis and shorter on treatment. I'm a fan of the "Radical Centre" and like to think it's ground I've visited on occasions. If a solution works, who cares if it's "left" or "right"?
On the central tenet (or one of them) technologies come and industries go would be a trite way of describing the past couple of hundred of years. Automaton and the coming of information systems has replaced rows of men with ledgers but the local council of 1926 was about payments - it wasn't about the provision of adult social care and care for vulnerable children but it is now and even if the assessment can be largely automated, the actual care is probably a harder ask.
With an ageing population, you can see a redistribution of work into other areas - how many robots will it take to mend a pothole, you might ask? Trying to imagine 2126 from 2026 is as difficult as it would have been to imagine 2026 from 1926 yet long term strategic thinking is important to prepare for the world as it might be.
On the energy question, Blair rightly mourns the loss of cheap energy - economic growth is often relied on cheap energy or new energy and while renewables have their place, they can't be the be-all and end-all but nor can we ignore the longer term environmental impacts of pushing for cheap energy to achieve short term growth. Britain has less than 1% of global emissions and somehow that means we can't set an example - we can and in my view should be leading on climate change mitigation and the likes of America, China and India are all vulnerable to climate change on a much larger scale (the "super el nino" coming will likely exacerbate this).
China is currently leading in renewable energy, producing 32% of global renewable electricity. Other notable countries include the United States, Brazil, Canada, and India, but none match China's significant contribution
. Additionally, China has the largest solar energy capacity and is committed to increasing its renewable energy production
Treating China as a leader means admitting that our own net zero strategy has been ill-conceived, because they've done it by not caring about their short-term emissions.
China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fell by 1% in the final quarter of 2025, likely securing a decline of 0.3% for the full year as a whole. So emissions have been falling for two and half years.
That underlines my point, although you have to take recent figures with a pinch of salt because they've had a construction recession.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
What's more, Burnham could be as unpopular as Starmer is right now when the GE comes around. However it is said that Burnham is in favour of PR and that is what is needed to stop a populist party winning against what most people want.
I desperately hope isn't.
Yes, electoral reform is maybe his biggest USP. I also like his talk on council houses.
Re it feeling wrong, for me that would be mitigated somewhat by him being subject to and winning a party leadership contest.
The World Cup starts in two weeks. My memories of them go back to the glorious 1966, a moment life was never better than at age 11. Do I detect so far substantially less interest than usual this year, or am I living under a rock, or is the onslaught yet to come?
I think that the season hasn’t technically finished yet with the two European finals this week and the league finishing last weekend so things will pivot. On my few forays onto channels with ads the terrible World Cup themed ads are already on and it will no doubt not be long until there are barbs traded about football fans flying flags from cars and houses etc.
It won’t really pick up in the UK until England and Scotland are close to playing their first matches and then it will take over.
I was amused reading about a hipster bar in Melbourne which has a strong Scottish theme has announced that it won’t be showing the matches in the pub but playing them on the radio over the speaker to get that old school vibe. Brave.
It won’t be world cupmas though until there is a montage of the England team roaring on the front page of the Sun.
I think this makes sense, air conditioning as temperatures heat in summer will save lives especially in homes of the sick and elderly. Also embarrasses Jenrick as a bonus given he was the minister during the initial ban
I don't think the Tories can brush off responsibility for the updated building regs quite so easily.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
I’ve been talking about this issue for a while.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way.
It insists on natural ventilation and not using air conditioning unless the natural ventilation cannot be provided.
Which makes it very hard to add air con. But not quite impossible.
Note that ultra expensive bocks of flats still have aircon.
Might be worth asking some questions about how that happened.
You can just do what the Italians do in their old buildings, and buy an AC unit, screw it to the wall, and get an electrician to wire it up. I am sitting under one now.
You can’t do that in many flats, in the U.K.
The farce is that you get a VAT rebate for fitting air source heat pumps to a loft conversion in a house. But they are trying to stop air con of all types in new builds.
So the IOWC council meeting is underway and straight off there’s a contest between the current Indy chair of the council and a nominee put forward by Reform. The existing chair seems to have been advised he has an interest and left the meeting - another example of officer overreach on the council (there’s nothing to stop members staying and voting for themselves) - whether or not the Reform nominee does similarly remains to be seen.
Where the particular issue of air conditioning is concerned, I at least had no idea there were any such laws until reading about it on here, so it may not be a big issue for voters.
The detail of most regulation is of no interest at all to the vast majority of voters. But the cumulative effects of bad regulation are of great political significance.
I'm suffering a conflict about Andy Burnham which I hope to feel better for sharing.
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
The principal critique of Starmer (which Blair's essay completely misses with his "retreating to the soft left comfort zone" schtick) is that he just hasn't got stuff done, or has just been painfully slow in doing stuff. And that's a pretty fair criticism whichever side of the political spectrum you reside.
The push to replace him is all about that (even though it will quite possibly mean a counterproductive hiatus in government).
Burnham, if he is the next PM, will be judged on the same criterion, whether or not he tickles the soft left's fancies.
That seems fair enough to me.
It would be and is. However I do think there's a big element of the 'persona' in this. The party have been spooked by the local election results and are (rightly imo) attributing not all but some of that to Starmer's dire connection skills as opposed to policy or delivery failure.
Where the particular issue of air conditioning is concerned, I at least had no idea there were any such laws until reading about it on here, so it may not be a big issue for voters.
The detail of most regulation is of no interest at all to the vast majority of voters. But the cumulative effects of bad regulation are of great political significance.
But how many voters even link the two things ?
Why should they? Most people are not expert in the large subject of governing medium sized countries really well. But it is a reasonable assumption (even if wrong) that those who invite our vote and support to govern the country include 'running stuff competently' as part of their platform, and that between them they know enough and can access enough expertise at our expense to be able to do it.
The Reform nominee for IOWC chair stays and votes for himself; two of his Reform colleagues vote for the wrong guy and have to be put right by their colleagues. Because of the absurd exclusion of the existing chair, it’s a tie, 19:19, and the vice chair, who’s a Tory and lost her seat, so is no longer a councillor, has the casting vote….and goes for the Indy.
So now Reform are nominating the same guy for Vice Chair, and the LibDems are nominating the Green leader. The Tories are abstaining, as is one of the Indies, with some the Indies voting Reform, which will hand the job to Reform.
Where the particular issue of air conditioning is concerned, I at least had no idea there were any such laws until reading about it on here, so it may not be a big issue for voters.
The detail of most regulation is of no interest at all to the vast majority of voters. But the cumulative effects of bad regulation are of great political significance.
But how many voters even link the two things ?
Why should they? Most people are not expert in the large subject of governing medium sized countries really well. But it is a reasonable assumption (even if wrong) that those who invite our vote and support to govern the country include 'running stuff competently' as part of their platform, and that between them they know enough and can access enough expertise at our expense to be able to do it.
I'm not saying they should.
The point is that regulation isn't a big political issue, even when its effects are massive, and that contributes to the election of politicians who don't get it either.
Effective pragmatism is highly underrated politically (except in retrospect). That's a hard problem, and it's not a reasonable assumption that politicians will be effective pragmatists, unless more of us vote for them on that basis.
The Reform nominee for IOWC chair stays and votes for himself; two of his Reform colleagues vote for the wrong guy and have to be put right by their colleagues. Because of the absurd exclusion of the existing chair, it’s a tie, 19:19, and the vice chair, who’s a Tory and lost her seat, so is no longer a councillor, has the casting vote….and goes for the Indy.
How can someone vote if they're no longer a councillor?
Next up, the critical decision to elect a new leader for the IOWC.
One of the Indies nominates one of her colleagues. Reform second the nomination. The LibDems nominate their own leader, and the Green leader seconds. It looks like the Indy will get this…
Next up, the critical decision to elect a new leader for the IOWC.
One of the Indies nominates one of her colleagues. Reform second the nomination. The LibDems nominate their own leader, and the Green leader seconds. It looks like the Indy will get this…although one of the other indies makes a scathing speech opposing the Indy nomination.
My guess is that Reform is going to get the deputy leader role with only the LDs and Greens opposing ….
Now the Tory leader attackers Reform for wanting change but then nominating the Indies to continue running the council.
Not that anything I will say will come as any sort of surprise to anyone since I have now turned into the Scandals Speaking Clock. Whatever time of day or night it is in whatever year, we are never more than a few minutes away from both the last and the next scandal.
To help you out because of the heat since you don't live somewhere sensible like the Lakes.
They work brilliantly to keep the heat out of a house. They work equally well to keep the heat in. Plus effective in deterring burglars. And they also look nice.
And they don't push up your electricity bills or make that awful humming nose so many air con units do.
The World Cup starts in two weeks. My memories of them go back to the glorious 1966, a moment life was never better than at age 11. Do I detect so far substantially less interest than usual this year, or am I living under a rock, or is the onslaught yet to come?
My late father and I went to Goodison for the 1966 Portugal v Brazil match which Portugal won 3 - 1
The great Pele and Eusebio played but Portugal targeted Pele forcing him off with injury
Trump says Iran "thought they were going to out wait me, you know, we'll out wait him, he's got the midterms. I don't care about the midterms, look what happened last night, that was the prelude to the midterms."
The Tory leader says he would have stood himself but knows he wouldn’t win, so he prefers the LibDem. But when it comes to the vote he actually abstains.
Reform gets up to claim they have seen a WhatsApp message between the LDs and Reform plotting to ‘destroy Reform’.
With backing from the large Reform group and most of the Indies, the Indy nominee defeats the LibDem by 28 to 9, with the LD backed Greens, the Labour guy, and one of the indies, the Tories abstaining.
Where the particular issue of air conditioning is concerned, I at least had no idea there were any such laws until reading about it on here, so it may not be a big issue for voters.
The detail of most regulation is of no interest at all to the vast majority of voters. But the cumulative effects of bad regulation are of great political significance.
But how many voters even link the two things ?
Why should they? Most people are not expert in the large subject of governing medium sized countries really well. But it is a reasonable assumption (even if wrong) that those who invite our vote and support to govern the country include 'running stuff competently' as part of their platform, and that between them they know enough and can access enough expertise at our expense to be able to do it.
I'm not saying they should.
The point is that regulation isn't a big political issue, even when its effects are massive, and that contributes to the election of politicians who don't get it either.
Effective pragmatism is highly underrated politically (except in retrospect). That's a hard problem, and it's not a reasonable assumption that politicians will be effective pragmatists, unless more of us vote for them on that basis.
Fair points.
BTW a day or two back you mentioned about the way a 1979 Brahms recording was still the best around. Yes. But there is more, IMHO the Karajan recording of Rosenkavalier, 1956, is still the best, as is the Hollywood 1950 version of Schubert's string quintet.
The Tory leader says he would have stood himself but knows he wouldn’t win, so he prefers the LibDem. But when it comes to the vote he actually abstains.
Reform gets up to claim they have seen a WhatsApp message between the LDs and Reform plotting to ‘destroy Reform’.
With backing from the large Reform group and most of the Indies, the Indy nominee defeats the LibDem by 28 to 9, with the LD backed Greens, the Labour guy, and one of the indies, the Tories abstaining.
I never realised live blogging the Isle of Wight Council could be so exciting...
Comments
"One of the fundamental problems Kemi & The Tories face – politicalbetting.com
TSE"
Which seems like the ultimate humblebrag.
OTOH, I'm all for blaming Jenrick.
He’s a great 2 for 1 deal
Andy Burnham@AndyBurnhamGM
This requires a considered response...
... it's pish.
He neglects to atone for his role in the problems of today.
It’s not a ban as such, by the way.
It insists on natural ventilation and not using air conditioning unless the natural ventilation cannot be provided.
Which makes it very hard to add air con. But not quite impossible.
Note that ultra expensive bocks of flats still have aircon.
Might be worth asking some questions about how that happened.
The flip side is that, historically, the Conservatives have been effective at shedding their old policy positions & adopting new ones & it may be that the electorate will be sufficiently pissed off with the current Labour government that they will forget how many of the problems Labour have been faced with had their origins in the previous Conservative regime.
7 parents, families and friends grieving lost lives
https://news.sky.com/story/body-found-in-search-for-teenager-who-went-missing-in-cheshire-lake-during-hot-weather-13548412
Most mainstream economic analysis says that, in the long run, not pursuing net zero would probably cost the UK more than pursuing it — but there are important caveats about who pays, when, and which policies are used.
Here’s the core debate in simple terms:
Arguments that net zero is ultimately cheaper
The UK’s independent advisers — especially the Climate Change Committee and Office for Budget Responsibility — argue that:
climate damage from unchecked warming will become very expensive,
fossil fuel price shocks (like the 2022 gas crisis) are costly,
renewable electricity and EVs are getting cheaper,
and energy independence reduces long-term risk.
The OBR said in 2025 that the estimated fiscal cost of the transition had fallen significantly compared with earlier forecasts, while the expected economic damage from climate change had risen.
The Climate Change Committee also concluded that reaching net zero is “more cost-effective” than continued fossil-fuel dependence in all the scenarios it tested.
Arguments that net zero is expensive
Critics argue that:
households face high upfront costs (heat pumps, insulation, EVs),
industry can become less competitive if energy prices rise,
government subsidies and infrastructure spending are large,
and some technologies may not deliver as cheaply as forecast.
They also argue official estimates can be optimistic and underestimate real system costs.
The important distinction: short term vs long term
A lot depends on the timeframe.
Short term: net zero policies can absolutely increase costs in some sectors and for some households.
Long term: most official economic modelling says climate damage, energy insecurity, and fossil fuel volatility would cost more overall if the UK did little or nothing.
So the disagreement is often less about whether there are costs — there clearly are — and more about:
whether the benefits justify them,
whether the transition is being managed efficiently,
and how fairly the costs are distributed.
Bottom line
If you ask:
“Does net zero require major spending and economic change?”
then yes.
If you ask:
“Do most economists and official UK institutions think abandoning net zero would be cheaper overall?”
then generally no — the dominant view in UK official analysis is that failing to decarbonise would likely be more expensive over time because of climate damage and fossil-fuel dependence.
Seems fair to me. So are we in favour of short termism and being hostage to Middle East and Russian problems, or are we in favour of Net Zero?
Coping with future heatwaves is going to require aircon to be widely installed but building regulations simply haven’t caught up with this reality, despite being written with the infamous “climate emergency” as a major justification for the current regs. They were completely focused on CO2 reduction, and not on coping with the inevitable heat that’s going to be part of the standard British summer from now on.
In that way, it's characteristic of the regs, which set out to achieve admirable objectives (eg safer buildings) but are so badly drafted that they just prevent an awful lot of building by pricing it out of the market.
They are massively over prescriptive and bear significant responsibility for the failure to build.
And on topic, how is this different to the relaxation in the planning rules introduced (checks notes) last year?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3e5plqke3no
Leaving aside the fact that Kemi can't entirely escape responsibility for the 2019-24 government that she was a minister in, this feeels like it highlights another fundamental problem the Conservatives are facing. Nobody remotely capable seems to be involved in working out and sense-checking policy. It's all reactive nonsense based on whatever they see out of the window.
Anger as Birmingham Reform make 'only English' demand at council meetings after Islamic prayer
In cultural attack, Reform UK criticised the citation of a Qu'ran prayer at Birmingham City Council mayor making ceremony
When the next Grenfell happens, it will probably be because of a fire in a room storing the documents…
Process should follow from requirements. As short and sweet as possible. So that it is easy to check what has been done and what hasn’t.
An example of a process that works, is the health inspections on food places. Which is simple enough that kebab shop owners can understand how to get a 5.
The problem wasn’t so much CO2 emission as getting hung up on “efficiency” as the only way to reduce CO2 emissions.
So the culture of the permanent system of state is that energy usage is bad.
When, in one discussion about a reservoir, the water company in question said that they would run the pumps etc, from 100% green energy and accept intermittent operation, they were told that the energy usage would still be counted at the average national grid emissions rate.
Air conditioning is also heat pumps, of course, but that regulation requires a separate set of hops to be jumped through for a cooling setup.
This is again part of the mea culpa we never seem to get from Badenoch or from any other senior Conservative. It's almost as though they want us to believe the world began on July 5th 2024 and they (the Conservatives) had never been in Government.
Treating us as if we have the memory capacity and attention span of a forgetful gnat is just insulting.
I've read Blair's "essay", "intervention", whatever you want to call it.
It's not easy to read - yes, it's long on diagnosis and shorter on treatment. I'm a fan of the "Radical Centre" and like to think it's ground I've visited on occasions. If a solution works, who cares if it's "left" or "right"?
On the central tenet (or one of them) technologies come and industries go would be a trite way of describing the past couple of hundred of years. Automaton and the coming of information systems has replaced rows of men with ledgers but the local council of 1926 was about payments - it wasn't about the provision of adult social care and care for vulnerable children but it is now and even if the assessment can be largely automated, the actual care is probably a harder ask.
With an ageing population, you can see a redistribution of work into other areas - how many robots will it take to mend a pothole, you might ask? Trying to imagine 2126 from 2026 is as difficult as it would have been to imagine 2026 from 1926 yet long term strategic thinking is important to prepare for the world as it might be.
On the energy question, Blair rightly mourns the loss of cheap energy - economic growth is often relied on cheap energy or new energy and while renewables have their place, they can't be the be-all and end-all but nor can we ignore the longer term environmental impacts of pushing for cheap energy to achieve short term growth. Britain has less than 1% of global emissions and somehow that means we can't set an example - we can and in my view should be leading on climate change mitigation and the likes of America, China and India are all vulnerable to climate change on a much larger scale (the "super el nino" coming will likely exacerbate this).
Like new CO2 emitters that will be offset by CCS for which the emitter gets the engineering done for a feasible concept design that they can show the regulator but don't progress.
In my day, i would have batted all afternoon for that....just aint crrrrricket.
. Additionally, China has the largest solar energy capacity and is committed to increasing its renewable energy production
https://news.sky.com/video/resident-doctors-to-strike-in-june-13548479
All going a bit Pete Tong for Kenyon. Now The Telegraph is on his back for being a Brexit Betrayer.
Online after the vote, he said Brexit meant Britain had “shot our economy in the foot” and would have “no say whatsoever” on EU rules, adding that the country would have to “pick up the pieces”.
He also said Leave campaigners, who included Nigel Farage, had “peddled the nationalistic pish and got [the] working class vote”, which he described as “a bit silly”.
"When I was up in Makerfield last week I was surprised at the presence the tiny splinter party was generating on the ground. In the wake of the first poll I spoke to a number of sources from different parties who claimed that on the basis of recent canvass returns, they believe it significantly underestimated Restore’s actual support. Then yesterday I spoke to three other sources. They independently told me they believed that on the trends they were seeing, there was a possibility Restore could actually beat Reform in the seat."
https://www.dailymail.com/debate/article-15852463/dan-hodges-reform-nigel-farage-restore-rupert-lowe.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFz8czbdPdU
The #1 political priority for me (by miles) is that the Populist Right don't get their hands on national power, ie Reform must not win the next GE. It would be a moral and £££ catastrophe (imo). Whatever is needed to stop it has to happen. Which means, since Keir Starmer can't connect, a new Labour leader is required, specifically one who *can* connect and who polls well. AB is therefore just what the doctor ordered. He's the answer to my prayers and I so so want him to sweep in and take over. Cmon Andy!
OTOH. Less than 2 years ago, a chap named Keir Starmer decisively won a GE. Ok, a churlishly given landslide, and ming vase, no plan etc etc, but so what, all GEs have their features and that was GE24. The fact is after 4 years as LOTO he campaigned to be PM and he won fair and square. Andy Burnham had bugger all to do with it. He was 7 years into being mayor of Manchester. Nobody was even thinking about Andy Burnham when they voted. Yet now, summer 26, a GE still ages away, here he comes barrelling down to London and all of a sudden he's our Prime Minister. I mean, cmon, that's not right.
I feel both these things at the same time and I don't like it. It's causing my temple to throb.
Reform UK's Makerfield candidate described vote to leave EU in 2016 as 'absolutely bonkers', report reveals
https://bsky.app/profile/andrewsparrowgdn.bsky.social/post/3mmtw3h7vrk2x
@MarcJennings90
The only way Peter Murrell could be less popular right now is if he released a song for the World Cup
@GlasgowAlbum
It took Sean Clerkin of all people to bring this pot to a boil. It's as if Pagliacci wandered into Tosca and threw Scarpia off the battlements
Trump says Iran "thought they were going to out wait me, you know, we'll out wait him, he's got the midterms. I don't care about the midterms, look what happened last night, that was the prelude to the midterms."
That said, Reform's vile candidate is doing himself no favours and word is getting around in the local as well as the national media:
"Reform UK has “fully” backed its candidate in the Makerfield by-election amid criticism of his social media posts about Russia’s invasion of Crimea and the Covid pandemic."
https://www.wigantoday.net/news/people/reform-backs-makerfield-candidate-amid-row-over-social-media-posts-8643302
"Makerfield Reform candidate Robert Kenyon hit by fresh accusations over 'vile' social media posts
One post from an X account linked to Robert Kenyon called for the businessman Richard Branson to be 'hanged' while another branded climate change a 'middle class problem'"
https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/makerfield-reform-candidate-robert-kenyon-34013441
Solar power output increased by 43% year-on-year, wind by 14% and nuclear 8%, helping push down coal generation by 1.9%.
Energy storage capacity grew by a record 75 gigawatts (GW), well ahead of the rise in peak demand of 55GW.
1. Of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives, as of the 2024 election, 60, or 14 percent, are held by blacks. (That's slightly more than the percentage of blacks in the US population.)
2. Only 7 of those 60 represent districts that are more than 50 percent black.
3. Nine of the 60 represent districts that are 10 percent, or less, black.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States#Race_and_ethnicity
Granted we have 3 weeks to go but that doesn’t look impossible given that there are 2 none of the above candidates here and the Reform one is becoming more toxic by the day
Starmer won a landslide, yes, but the vote he got was so small that its moral mandate was very qualified. If he had done as expected - built on his good luck to have such useless opposition, discovered a detailed plan, wavered on impossible promises as circumstances changed, been a leader of the nation, created a narrative, communicated honestly and really well, and been sure footed - he would be secure.
He didn't, he could have, and his moral mandate has vanished. Leading in the polls is an outfit with disgusting qualities and abominable candidates. They are being challenged by others who are worse. Starmer has to go. He is not a future winner.
Finally, Burnham can only be PM if these things are in place: The PM is a busted flush, out of 400 MPs there is no-one good enough, the voters vote for him, the MPs nominate him, and the members vote for him. These are huge hurdles; so great that in the country there appears to be only one person qualified. Burnham.
He would not be my choice, and the chances of him doing badly are under estimated, but them's the breaks.
The push to replace him is all about that (even though it will quite possibly mean a counterproductive hiatus in government).
Burnham, if he is the next PM, will be judged on the same criterion, whether or not he tickles the soft left's fancies.
That seems fair enough to me.
I take it he's referring to the MAGA faithful voting for the corrupt paedo protector he endorsed in Taxas.
The midterms won't stroke his ego in the same way.
If Burnham did that (and nothing else) I think things would look better instantly - and Burnham will do more than better story telling
Yes, electoral reform is maybe his biggest USP. I also like his talk on council houses.
Re it feeling wrong, for me that would be mitigated somewhat by him being subject to and winning a party leadership contest.
It won’t really pick up in the UK until England and Scotland are close to playing their first matches and then it will take over.
I was amused reading about a hipster bar in Melbourne which has a strong Scottish theme has announced that it won’t be showing the matches in the pub but playing them on the radio over the speaker to get that old school vibe. Brave.
It won’t be world cupmas though until there is a montage of the England team roaring on the front page of the Sun.
At the opposite end of the list are Major and ... Brown 🤷🏼♂️
The farce is that you get a VAT rebate for fitting air source heat pumps to a loft conversion in a house. But they are trying to stop air con of all types in new builds.
@atrupar
·
44s
Trump: "We're not talking about any easing of sanctions or giving money. No sanctions, no money, no nothing."
===
Yeh, right.
Brown, I guess, is who Labour supporters want to hear from (they only have a choice of two!).
But how many voters even link the two things ?
Burnham is prepared to have a fight and argue his point of view. Labour needs that.
The point is that regulation isn't a big political issue, even when its effects are massive, and that contributes to the election of politicians who don't get it either.
Effective pragmatism is highly underrated politically (except in retrospect).
That's a hard problem, and it's not a reasonable assumption that politicians will be effective pragmatists, unless more of us vote for them on that basis.
One of the Indies nominates one of her colleagues. Reform second the nomination. The LibDems nominate their own leader, and the Green leader seconds. It looks like the Indy will get this…
One of the Indies nominates one of her colleagues. Reform second the nomination. The LibDems nominate their own leader, and the Green leader seconds. It looks like the Indy will get this…although one of the other indies makes a scathing speech opposing the Indy nomination.
My guess is that Reform is going to get the deputy leader role with only the LDs and Greens opposing ….
Now the Tory leader attackers Reform for wanting change but then nominating the Indies to continue running the council.
https://insidetime.org/newsround/andrew-malkinson-has-to-pay-for-the-legal-costs-of-his-appeal/
Not that anything I will say will come as any sort of surprise to anyone since I have now turned into the Scandals Speaking Clock. Whatever time of day or night it is in whatever year, we are never more than a few minutes away from both the last and the next scandal.
To help you out because of the heat since you don't live somewhere sensible like the Lakes.
John Swinney hit out at what he described as the "politicisation" of Peter Murrell's decision to plead guilty to embezzlement.
The former PM’s essay calls on Starmer to rip net zero to pieces
By Andrew Marr"
https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2026/05/tony-blairs-intervention-could-spark-a-labour-civil-war
It’s awful and seems worse this time than normal.
It’s a bit late but we really need education about the risks.
They work brilliantly to keep the heat out of a house. They work equally well to keep the heat in. Plus effective in deterring burglars. And they also look nice.
And they don't push up your electricity bills or make that awful humming nose so many air con units do.
The great Pele and Eusebio played but Portugal targeted Pele forcing him off with injury
https://x.com/DMichaelTripi/status/2059637992478663090
Reform gets up to claim they have seen a WhatsApp message between the LDs and Reform plotting to ‘destroy Reform’.
With backing from the large Reform group and most of the Indies, the Indy nominee defeats the LibDem by 28 to 9, with the LD backed Greens, the Labour guy, and one of the indies, the Tories abstaining.
BTW a day or two back you mentioned about the way a 1979 Brahms recording was still the best around. Yes. But there is more, IMHO the Karajan recording of Rosenkavalier, 1956, is still the best, as is the Hollywood 1950 version of Schubert's string quintet.