My main concern - alarm bells are ringing - is that we’re hearing the same things from Burnham’s team that we heard from Starmer’s in 2024.
“The plan will come”.
I won’t be lied to twice.
Are you not including Corbyn too? Or did you not regard him as lying. more deluded?
Corbyn lied about anti-Semitism. But that wasn’t not having a plan per se.
I think his lies were more about the extent of the things he was going to provide - free wifi for all etc.
I didn't doubt there was a plan to do those things, though. It wouldn’t have been delivered but I think they did have a plan.
Burnham doesn’t seem to have a plan. Better comms will start him off well but it will only take him so far. Get Blair back in.
If Blair was PM we would have troops in Iran and be in Trump’s pocket. Is that what you want?
Yes, and hell no.
You want our troops in Iran - what would they be doing
Regime change.
Support a new leader, eg Pahlavi, to take over the powers of the state and get their own army running things in Tehran and the oil fields etc (to control money) not the entire mountainous country, then let that leader take it from there.
Um you clearly haven’t the first clue as how big and geographically awkward Iran is.
I do, which is why I literally said do not take the entire country.
Try reading what you respond to next time.
Can you highlight an example where regime changew imposed by the West has worked out well in the long term? I don't say there won't be an example, I just can't think of any, whereas I can think of lots where it's gone badly.
England 1688.
Regime change imposed by the West?
1688 was regime change driven from within, which is a completely different beast.
1688 was regime change from the East, as Holland is to the East of the UK.
Nicola Sturgeon has said she was "deceived, betrayed and lied to" by her estranged husband Peter Murrell as he embezzled hundreds of thousands of pounds from the SNP.
Sturgeon appeared at a writers' event in Listowel, County Kerry, in conversation with author Andrew O'Hagan to promote her memoir, Frankly.
Will the paperaback be called "Frankly...I didnt have a clue" ?
Sadly Google is not finding for me the picture of the bookseller's sign attached to John Major's autobiography in the wake of the Currie scandal: "Half Price - not the full story."
Nicola Sturgeon has said she was "deceived, betrayed and lied to" by her estranged husband Peter Murrell as he embezzled hundreds of thousands of pounds from the SNP.
Sturgeon appeared at a writers' event in Listowel, County Kerry, in conversation with author Andrew O'Hagan to promote her memoir, Frankly.
Will the paperaback be called "Frankly...I didnt have a clue" ?
Sadly Google is not finding for me the picture of the bookseller's sign attached to John Major's autobiography in the wake of the Currie scandal: "Half Price - not the full story."
In that instance I'd pay double not to read the full story.
Never realised employer NIC was higher than corporation tax take. That to my mind is very very worrying
It's a really informative way of displaying tax distribution. Most people don't have a good sense of the relative magnitudes of the major (and minor) taxes - in the same way we're often very bad at estimating how our taxes are spent.
Residential Stamp Duty raises so little for all the damage it does to the economy.
Yes, it's an obvious winner for Burnham. Many undecided voters may well take the view that it would benefit Makerfield to have the PM as their MP, and they're probably right. If, of course, he makes it to PM.
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
He's a bloke in a sweatshirt that can't be bothered to explain why he's (with a full-on-insane bunch of friends) proposing that he should be PM. I find it pathetic and I hope that we find a law somewhere to stick him in a dungeon for about a million years.
Another good header from Cyclefree, which along with the majority of PBers (and probably the rest of the public, too) I'm in sympathy with.
Two comments here - while she is right to condemn the "cheeseparing' when it comes to compensation, the figures government pays out in compensation every year are quite significant. It's difficult to get a total figure, as government doesn't publish one, but it's likely well over £5bn excluding exceptional cases like the blood, and Post Office scandals. I'm not sure what conclusion to draw from that, other than just doing stuff better would save us an awful lot of money.
Secondly, it seems to me that there's little reason we shouldn't pick out the most senior figures in the PO scandal who are most clearly likely to have been in breach of the law, and save years of investigation by concentrating on investigating and prosecuting them first. That ought to be doable with existing resources.
When government fucks up, the money should be there to right that (invariably) egregious wrong.
No ifs, no buts. Imagine you or a loved one on the end of that "cheeseparing". Yep, we'd both be incandescent.
Worth remembering that in 2003 Alan Bates wrote a letter to the then Chief Executive, Allan Leighton, which set out concisely the 2 key problems with Horizon which it later took a judge over 500 pages to explain in 2019. Had his complaints - and he was in effect a whistleblower - been looked into properly, had they had a Cyclefree Investigations Team, much agony and eye watering cost would have been avoided. The PO's investigations team was nothing of the kind. A decade was lost because so-called managers did not know how to deal with a complaint. This is - to me - a level of incompetence which should never be tolerated, let alone rewarded in the way that it has been. Leighton should be in the stocks quite as much as Vennells.
A decade was lost in the case of Malkinson too.
The blood contamination case is even worse. I've read the report. It makes you weep. I and my brother have a rare blood condition and we were treated for it at the Royal Free's haemophilia unit run by Dr Kernoff. He was one of the doctors who warned government about the problem with infected blood products. It was our sheer good fortune that we did not get treated with any of the infected blood. I have lost all trust in the authorities to behave with any sense of decency towards me should something dreadful be done to me by those authorities. Such good behaviour as there is comes from individuals trying to behave professionally within a system which either makes this harder than it need be or does not reward or value it. And it is incidentally one reason why I am against AD - give the state the power to suggest suicide to those people who will cost it a lot to treat or help (like me, now) and that power will, without question, be abused - no matter what any procedure says.
I think you’re mixing up the two versions of Horizon there. The earlier EPOSS version - generally called legacy horizon, would be the version that was being written about in 2003. Everybody in the business knew back then that it didn’t work; I remember sitting down to lunch in the canteen with people working on it, who were in despair at all its bugs. So if Bates wrote about it, he wasn’t telling the business anything it didn’t already know. The later Fujitsu Horizon was a different beast entirely.
You are missing the point. Prosecutions happened under both systems. It was well known that both were not fit for purpose and had loads of bugs. The evidence at the inquiry shows this and that there was a policy of denial about this. The point is that Bates pointed out to Leighton in 2003 the two issues which were at the heart of the 2019 judgment. Had his concerns been taken seriously it is likely that the whole ghastly mess could have been avoided.
Re header: @Cyclefree, it seems that many of your concerns are how the rest of us victimise others. How society is unfair. We do, and it is. We try not to and want to avoid such a thing.
Reality needs to give you a gentle knock on the door, and when you open it you'll find many thousands of innocents enquiring what you're on about.
You think I've been inured from reality, both professionally and personally?
That's his mugshot. How seriously do we take this story?
He loves that mugshot though.
He does. Thinks it shows the toughest handsomest son of a gun there's ever been.
I have used my photo of the day, so you will need to click the link to see the albino buffalo spared slaughter in Bangladesh because it looks like Trump:
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
Re header: @Cyclefree, it seems that many of your concerns are how the rest of us victimise others. How society is unfair. We do, and it is. We try not to and want to avoid such a thing.
Reality needs to give you a gentle knock on the door, and when you open it you'll find many thousands of innocents enquiring what you're on about.
You think I've been inured from reality, both professionally and personally?
I've no idea, but you suggest not. It's the healthy branches, not the ill ones, or the malevolent ones, that are surely central.
That's his mugshot. How seriously do we take this story?
He loves that mugshot though.
He does. Thinks it shows the toughest handsomest son of a gun there's ever been.
I have used my photo of the day, so you will need to click the link to see the albino buffalo spared slaughter in Bangladesh because it looks like Trump:
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
Re header: @Cyclefree, it seems that many of your concerns are how the rest of us victimise others. How society is unfair. We do, and it is. We try not to and want to avoid such a thing.
Reality needs to give you a gentle knock on the door, and when you open it you'll find many thousands of innocents enquiring what you're on about.
You think I've been inured from reality, both professionally and personally?
I've no idea, but you suggest not. It's the healthy branches, not the ill ones, or the malevolent ones, that are surely central.
WTF are you on about?
The state clearly prefers to protect itself rather than its citizens in many many cases.
I know PBers have recently been much concerned with displaying their level of Scotch legal expertise but there seems strangely little discussion of the trial of the ex leader of the DUP accused of what seems to me a more serious crime. According to C4 the complainant who cannot be identified has a letter from ‘Sir’ Jeffrey apologising for his past actions against her. Unless this refers to docking their pocket money, this seems less than optimal for his defence.
How do people describe main party leaders in their own words. The world clouds below give you a flavour of what the public say. For Starmer biggest word is weak, For Farage racist, For Badenoch OK For Davey don’t know
Re header: @Cyclefree, it seems that many of your concerns are how the rest of us victimise others. How society is unfair. We do, and it is. We try not to and want to avoid such a thing.
Reality needs to give you a gentle knock on the door, and when you open it you'll find many thousands of innocents enquiring what you're on about.
You think I've been inured from reality, both professionally and personally?
I've no idea, but you suggest not. It's the healthy branches, not the ill ones, or the malevolent ones, that are surely central.
WTF are you on about?
The state clearly prefers to protect itself rather than its citizens in many many cases.
I know PBers have recently been much concerned with displaying their level of Scotch legal expertise but there seems strangely little discussion of the trial of the ex leader of the DUP accused of what seems to me a more serious crime. According to C4 the complainant who cannot be identified has a letter from ‘Sir’ Jeffrey apologising for his past actions against her. Unless this refers to docking their pocket money, this seems less than optimal for his defence.
The reason for the lack of discussion is because of the contempt of court laws.
Sky News came to Ireland in an attempt to question Nicola Sturgeon about claims she shut down scrutiny of SNP finances at the same time her ex-husband Peter Murrell stole £400k from party. She entered the kitchen to avoid questions with security pushing me away.
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
A Restore Britain Government will ban the Kirpan in public spaces.
One rule for all.
Will they ban sgian dubhs as well?
They're generally plastic. Don't think there are many Scots attending weddings with offensive weapons these days.
Plenty are not plastic. Will they get banned too? It's a simple question, I'd be interested in the answer, as a Scot I don't like to see my culture coming under attack like this.
I know PBers have recently been much concerned with displaying their level of Scotch legal expertise but there seems strangely little discussion of the trial of the ex leader of the DUP accused of what seems to me a more serious crime. According to C4 the complainant who cannot be identified has a letter from ‘Sir’ Jeffrey apologising for his past actions against her. Unless this refers to docking their pocket money, this seems less than optimal for his defence.
Ultimately, although more serious in its impact on the possible victims, Donaldson's alleged crimes relate to the former leader of an increasingly irrelevant party and have few obvious political implications.
Keir Starmer meets apprentices at a train engineering workshop. The PM says ‘we can’t afford a lost generation’ as he vows to tackle youth unemployment after Alan Milburn’s ‘sobering’ report
Being PM is really bad for aging. I nearly didn't recognise him. He looks more like the old bloke you get in a B&Q (or for our American friends the Walmart) that is there to help.
I know PBers have recently been much concerned with displaying their level of Scotch legal expertise but there seems strangely little discussion of the trial of the ex leader of the DUP accused of what seems to me a more serious crime. According to C4 the complainant who cannot be identified has a letter from ‘Sir’ Jeffrey apologising for his past actions against her. Unless this refers to docking their pocket money, this seems less than optimal for his defence.
The reason for the lack of discussion is because of the contempt of court laws.
You’d better send a stiff letter to C4 news then, they had a long discussion of the evidence given today. You’re right to worry about gormless speculation on PB though.
I know PBers have recently been much concerned with displaying their level of Scotch legal expertise but there seems strangely little discussion of the trial of the ex leader of the DUP accused of what seems to me a more serious crime. According to C4 the complainant who cannot be identified has a letter from ‘Sir’ Jeffrey apologising for his past actions against her. Unless this refers to docking their pocket money, this seems less than optimal for his defence.
I didn't think we were allowed to talk about such alleged crimes?
Sky News came to Ireland in an attempt to question Nicola Sturgeon about claims she shut down scrutiny of SNP finances at the same time her ex-husband Peter Murrell stole £400k from party. She entered the kitchen to avoid questions with security pushing me away.
Sky News came to Ireland in an attempt to question Nicola Sturgeon about claims she shut down scrutiny of SNP finances at the same time her ex-husband Peter Murrell stole £400k from party. She entered the kitchen to avoid questions with security pushing me away.
Son moving from Tottenham to LAFC, resulting in Korean men getting to watch their hero scores a ton of goals last summer, and resulting in an uptick in their mood?
In the US, most wives as unhappy with their husbands as Nicola says she is would "file for divorce". Is there some reason she can't do that in Scotland?
Or is there some practical reason for her not doing so. (For example: Commonly in the US a wife can not be forced to testify against her husband (and vice versa). Is the same true in Scotland?)
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
A Restore Britain Government will ban the Kirpan in public spaces.
One rule for all.
Will they ban sgian dubhs as well?
They're generally plastic. Don't think there are many Scots attending weddings with offensive weapons these days.
Plenty are not plastic. Will they get banned too? It's a simple question, I'd be interested in the answer, as a Scot I don't like to see my culture coming under attack like this.
If they are seriously stabby, I would suggest a ban wouldn't be an extraordinary step. Highland dress is frequently worn to occasions with a lot of alcohol being consumed. As UD suggests, I think it's very rare to see one that would be more dangerous than a table knife.
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
A Restore Britain Government will ban the Kirpan in public spaces.
One rule for all.
Will they ban sgian dubhs as well?
They're generally plastic. Don't think there are many Scots attending weddings with offensive weapons these days.
Plenty are not plastic. Will they get banned too? It's a simple question, I'd be interested in the answer, as a Scot I don't like to see my culture coming under attack like this.
Are the English who can prove Saxon lineage allowed to carry Seaxes in public as they are a historic part of their culture, even giving the culture its name?
Sky News came to Ireland in an attempt to question Nicola Sturgeon about claims she shut down scrutiny of SNP finances at the same time her ex-husband Peter Murrell stole £400k from party. She entered the kitchen to avoid questions with security pushing me away.
I know PBers have recently been much concerned with displaying their level of Scotch legal expertise but there seems strangely little discussion of the trial of the ex leader of the DUP accused of what seems to me a more serious crime. According to C4 the complainant who cannot be identified has a letter from ‘Sir’ Jeffrey apologising for his past actions against her. Unless this refers to docking their pocket money, this seems less than optimal for his defence.
You are trying WhatAboutery, using an example from… Northern Ireland?
In the US, most wives as unhappy with their husbands as Nicola says she is would "file for divorce". Is there some reason she can't do that in Scotland?
Or is there some practical reason for her not doing so. (For example: Commonly in the US a wife can not be forced to testify against her husband (and vice versa). Is the same true in Scotland?)
In Scotland, unlike in England, you still need to prove that a marriage has irretrievably broken down before a divorce can be granted. There's a list of ways to prove it, the most common being separation of two years with the consent of the other party, or five years without consent. I'm not sure if they have been separated for two years, and if Murrell is refusing divorce I'm fairly sure they have not been separated for five years.
Interestingly another ground is behaviour so that it would be unreasonable to expect the spouse to live with the other. I would imagine this would qualify.
Labour is poised for a fresh attempt at changing the welfare system after a major government-backed report said youth unemployment was costing Britain more than £125bn a year.
My piece on a very interesting show of hands at a [real estate investment] conference in Leeds last week …. Should Starmer stay or go? It was 85-15 stay!
Never realised employer NIC was higher than corporation tax take. That to my mind is very very worrying
It's a really informative way of displaying tax distribution. Most people don't have a good sense of the relative magnitudes of the major (and minor) taxes - in the same way we're often very bad at estimating how our taxes are spent.
Residential Stamp Duty raises so little for all the damage it does to the economy.
Stamp duty in general, I think ? There must be a better efficient maximising way of raising the same amount of money without anyone noticing the pain.
Stats wise he is already, and without doubt, the greatest T20 batsman so far. And he is only 15.
To give a crazy comparison of both how good he is and how much the game has changed since the early days:
Kevin Pietersen, not a bad limited overs player, averaged 34 at a strike rate of 137 in T20s. He hit 17% of balls, about one an over for boundaries. About 5% of balls faced went for six.
This guy, at 15 playing adults, mostly in the IPL which is the equivalent of Champions League in football, averages 43 but at a strike rate of 222, so scoring more than 50% per ball than Pietersen did. And he hits 20% of the balls he faces for six, more than Pietersen managed to hit combined 4s and 6s.
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
A Restore Britain Government will ban the Kirpan in public spaces.
One rule for all.
Will they ban sgian dubhs as well?
They're generally plastic. Don't think there are many Scots attending weddings with offensive weapons these days.
Plenty are not plastic. Will they get banned too? It's a simple question, I'd be interested in the answer, as a Scot I don't like to see my culture coming under attack like this.
In the Scots part of my family, they are always dress items that don’t actually have a blade and can’t be drawn.
Stats wise he is already, and without doubt, the greatest T20 batsman so far. And he is only 15.
To give a crazy comparison of both how good he is and how much the game has changed since the early days:
Kevin Pietersen, not a bad limited overs player, averaged 34 at a strike rate of 137 in T20s. He hit 17% of balls, about one an over for boundaries. About 5% of balls faced went for six.
This guy, at 15 playing adults, mostly in the IPL which is the equivalent of Champions League in football, averages 43 but at a strike rate of 222, so scoring more than 50% per ball than Pietersen did. And he hits 20% of the balls he faces for six, more than Pietersen managed to hit combined 4s and 6s.
His numbers are freakish outliers.
Another way of looking at it, if you had a team full of batsman at his strike rate, their average T20 score would be 266.
Stats wise he is already, and without doubt, the greatest T20 batsman so far. And he is only 15.
To give a crazy comparison of both how good he is and how much the game has changed since the early days:
Kevin Pietersen, not a bad limited overs player, averaged 34 at a strike rate of 137 in T20s. He hit 17% of balls, about one an over for boundaries. About 5% of balls faced went for six.
This guy, at 15 playing adults, mostly in the IPL which is the equivalent of Champions League in football, averages 43 but at a strike rate of 222, so scoring more than 50% per ball than Pietersen did. And he hits 20% of the balls he faces for six, more than Pietersen managed to hit combined 4s and 6s.
His numbers are freakish outliers.
Yep - he's not one for the future, he's here already.
Labour is poised for a fresh attempt at changing the welfare system after a major government-backed report said youth unemployment was costing Britain more than £125bn a year.
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
The six hitting is the craziest thing about Sooryavanshi.
Tendulker for instance was in pro / international cricket at a very young age (I know a different era), but if you have the technique that extra pace of adult cricket is actually helpful if you a kid as you don't need to force it to get the ball off the square and to the boundary. But that is totally different to consistently taking bowlers downtown.
I got into semi-pro cricket at a reasonably young age and I much prefered having a ~70-75 mph bowler compared to going back to youth cricket on a Sunday and having to generate the pace on the ball. I faced a couple of international spinners and again the turn they get it absolute bastard, but even those guys because most push it through faster than your average 13-14 year old bowling of any varierty, again you could use that pace.
Sky News came to Ireland in an attempt to question Nicola Sturgeon about claims she shut down scrutiny of SNP finances at the same time her ex-husband Peter Murrell stole £400k from party. She entered the kitchen to avoid questions with security pushing me away.
Yes, it's an obvious winner for Burnham. Many undecided voters may well take the view that it would benefit Makerfield to have the PM as their MP, and they're probably right. If, of course, he makes it to PM.
Tbf Leigh did pretty well out of Burnham's time as MP. Leigh Sports Village and three new roads to it.
My piece on a very interesting show of hands at a [real estate investment] conference in Leeds last week …. Should Starmer stay or go? It was 85-15 stay!
When worn as part of the national dress of Scotland, the sgian-dubh is legal in Scotland, England, and Wales: in Scotland under the Criminal Law (Consolidation) (Scotland) Act 1995 s. 49(5)(c); in England and Wales under the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (s. 139) and the Offensive Weapons Act 1996 (s. 4). However, the wearing of the sgian-dubh is sometimes banned in Britain in areas with zero tolerance weapons policies or heightened security concerns. For example, they were banned from a school dance in Scotland, and initially banned for the June 2014 celebration of the Battle of Bannockburn.
Sky News came to Ireland in an attempt to question Nicola Sturgeon about claims she shut down scrutiny of SNP finances at the same time her ex-husband Peter Murrell stole £400k from party. She entered the kitchen to avoid questions with security pushing me away.
I hope the kitchen was well stocked with 7 kettles and 3 coffee machines so she felt at home.
Sky could spend one tenth of the effort questioning Nigel Farage about his £5 million bribe. Yes I understand bribery is a different thing from theft but (a) he actually did it unlike Sturgeon; (b) he is still party leader liable to become Prime Minister; and (c) it's a lot more money.
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
A Restore Britain Government will ban the Kirpan in public spaces.
One rule for all.
Will they ban sgian dubhs as well?
They're generally plastic. Don't think there are many Scots attending weddings with offensive weapons these days.
Plenty are not plastic. Will they get banned too? It's a simple question, I'd be interested in the answer, as a Scot I don't like to see my culture coming under attack like this.
In the Scots part of my family, they are always dress items that don’t actually have a blade and can’t be drawn.
I’ve never seen a dummy sgian dubh in my puff, never knew there was such a thing; every day’s a school day. From the cheesier highland outfitters I imagine.
I know PBers have recently been much concerned with displaying their level of Scotch legal expertise but there seems strangely little discussion of the trial of the ex leader of the DUP accused of what seems to me a more serious crime. According to C4 the complainant who cannot be identified has a letter from ‘Sir’ Jeffrey apologising for his past actions against her. Unless this refers to docking their pocket money, this seems less than optimal for his defence.
If the English don't understand the Scots, we really, really don't understand the Northern Irish.
"Police treated stab victim as a racist while he lay dying Officers handcuffed teenager as he bled to death after they fell for attacker’s ‘wicked’ lies" (£)
A Restore Britain Government will ban the Kirpan in public spaces.
One rule for all.
Will they ban sgian dubhs as well?
They're generally plastic. Don't think there are many Scots attending weddings with offensive weapons these days.
Plenty are not plastic. Will they get banned too? It's a simple question, I'd be interested in the answer, as a Scot I don't like to see my culture coming under attack like this.
In the Scots part of my family, they are always dress items that don’t actually have a blade and can’t be drawn.
I’ve never seen a dummy sgian dubh in my puff, never knew there was such a thing; every day’s a school day. From the cheesier highland outfitters I imagine.
Think it was as a result of anti-knife campaign, way back. One of the great-aunts was from Glasgow and it was a cause of hers for years.
Enfield council now Conservative led after the Greens abstain on both leadership votes. What a turnaround in two cycles after hitting an all time low of just 17 out if 63 councillors.
Hopefully they can undo a lot of the damage Labour have done over the last decade and bin the ridiculous developments that are completely overcrowding the area. I hope they tell the mayor to go fuck himself, paving over every bit of green space in outer London with unwanted flats and high rises needs to stop. Enfield is functionally full much like the rest of London and it's time for councils to take a stand.
Apologies for being so English and all, but. Wtf is a sgian dubh?
Literal translation black knife, worn in the sock of highland dress. It resembles a small hunting knife, though tending to be ornate and useless nowadays.
Massively. The people involved (from Starmer backwards) should have their arses smacked. I know I bang on about this, but the (for want of a better word) elites in all parties find it difficult to envisage things like an enemy army who wish to mutilate you and your family and the need to maintain sufficient armed forces to prevent that. It's chock full of people who think food comes from the shop, violence to be met by calling the police, and it is only necessary in politics to "call for" things. It's not even a factor in ths Makerfield by-election when it should be front-and-centre.
I know PBers have recently been much concerned with displaying their level of Scotch legal expertise but there seems strangely little discussion of the trial of the ex leader of the DUP accused of what seems to me a more serious crime. According to C4 the complainant who cannot be identified has a letter from ‘Sir’ Jeffrey apologising for his past actions against her. Unless this refers to docking their pocket money, this seems less than optimal for his defence.
Ultimately, although more serious in its impact on the possible victims, Donaldson's alleged crimes relate to the former leader of an increasingly irrelevant party and have few obvious political implications.
The Murrell saga, however...
How is the DUP increasingly irrelevant? They remain the largest Unionist party and second largest party in NI.
Today’s decision on prostate cancer screening will be hugely disappointing to the thousands of brave men who have campaigned for a targeted screening programme to prevent more families from losing a father, a son or a brother before their time. For just 0.01% of the NHS budget, we could've had a targeted screening programme that would have saved lives.
Enfield council now Conservative led after the Greens abstain on both leadership votes. What a turnaround in two cycles after hitting an all time low of just 17 out if 63 councillors.
Hopefully they can undo a lot of the damage Labour have done over the last decade and bin the ridiculous developments that are completely overcrowding the area. I hope they tell the mayor to go fuck himself, paving over every bit of green space in outer London with unwanted flats and high rises needs to stop. Enfield is functionally full much like the rest of London and it's time for councils to take a stand.
Thanks for proving (not that it was needed) that once people get a bit of money they become NIMBYs...
Apologies for being so English and all, but. Wtf is a sgian dubh?
Ceremonial knife to be worn in the sock whilst wearing formal Highland dress. Comes in handy when fighting the enemy of the Scots, to wit the Other Scots.
The reason why it's being discussed now is as a compare-and-contrast where a Sikh man stabbed another man to death and then claimed he had been racially abused by his victim. Sikh males also carry a ceremonial knife - the kirpan - as part of their religion and he used that as the murder weapon.
I know PBers have recently been much concerned with displaying their level of Scotch legal expertise but there seems strangely little discussion of the trial of the ex leader of the DUP accused of what seems to me a more serious crime. According to C4 the complainant who cannot be identified has a letter from ‘Sir’ Jeffrey apologising for his past actions against her. Unless this refers to docking their pocket money, this seems less than optimal for his defence.
I didn't think we were allowed to talk about such alleged crimes?
You are mistaken. AIUI, we’re not to talk about grooming gangs.
Today’s decision on prostate cancer screening will be hugely disappointing to the thousands of brave men who have campaigned for a targeted screening programme to prevent more families from losing a father, a son or a brother before their time. For just 0.01% of the NHS budget, we could've had a targeted screening programme that would have saved lives.
Enfield council now Conservative led after the Greens abstain on both leadership votes. What a turnaround in two cycles after hitting an all time low of just 17 out if 63 councillors.
Hopefully they can undo a lot of the damage Labour have done over the last decade and bin the ridiculous developments that are completely overcrowding the area. I hope they tell the mayor to go fuck himself, paving over every bit of green space in outer London with unwanted flats and high rises needs to stop. Enfield is functionally full much like the rest of London and it's time for councils to take a stand.
Thanks for proving (not that it was needed) that once people get a bit of money they become NIMBYs...
I've been saying for the last three years the housing crisis should be solved by reducing the population, not by concreting over green spaces. If only the Tories had been paying attention to the insane population growth under Boris then they might still be in power.
Today’s decision on prostate cancer screening will be hugely disappointing to the thousands of brave men who have campaigned for a targeted screening programme to prevent more families from losing a father, a son or a brother before their time. For just 0.01% of the NHS budget, we could've had a targeted screening programme that would have saved lives.
Enfield council now Conservative led after the Greens abstain on both leadership votes. What a turnaround in two cycles after hitting an all time low of just 17 out if 63 councillors.
Hopefully they can undo a lot of the damage Labour have done over the last decade and bin the ridiculous developments that are completely overcrowding the area. I hope they tell the mayor to go fuck himself, paving over every bit of green space in outer London with unwanted flats and high rises needs to stop. Enfield is functionally full much like the rest of London and it's time for councils to take a stand.
I see...
Not so long ago, it was "build, build, build" and scrap planning legislation because we need houses (or indeed flats).
Now, Enfield is apparently "full" - well, if it is, Newham must be full as well so presuambly our Council should join the anti-development Conservatives and block new developments.
Yet Sadiq is criticised for the low number of houses being built in London....
Today’s decision on prostate cancer screening will be hugely disappointing to the thousands of brave men who have campaigned for a targeted screening programme to prevent more families from losing a father, a son or a brother before their time. For just 0.01% of the NHS budget, we could've had a targeted screening programme that would have saved lives.
It is not as straightforward as that. As presented, the options seem to be for every 2 lives saved you overtreat around 12 patients creating incontinence and impotence for their last 3 decades. A bigger group then also have psychological stress of cancer diagnosis and managing that pathway even if they are surveilled rather than treated.
Not sure whether I prefer the small chance of death or the 6x chance of incontinence and impotence. Glad I don't have to make that call for millions of others though. Hopefully tech leads swiftly to both better diagnosis and treatment.
There hasn't been a major sea battle since WW2. We've had Nuclear hunter killers since the sixties and only fired once, and that was sinking the Begrano. Include Trident and we spend more on the Navy than any other service yet the other services are used more often and the Army, which gets least, the most.
We talk about our global role but apart from a cluster of small colonial left overs we have no real important assets.
The Telegraph fumes about Diego Garcia but without the Americans we couldn't aafford to keep it open. What we we do if we could, threaten India? Realistically beyond our own teritorial waters almost everything we have costs more to defend than it's worth or is in no real danger.
We aren't masters of our destiny, we are prisoners of our past. We portray ourselves as a trading nation but we trade more by keyboard than sea, we send most of our exports to a continent we can see on a clear day.
The basic premise of his criticisms are sound but they miss the point.
Even if we did have sixteen frigates, which we won't, at best we would be able to put two in each of the North and South Atlantic ,the Indian and perhaps three in the Pacific, or we could send out two small Taskforces around each of our two Carriers. What could they do. Possibly see off Argentina again but what else. There are over 5Ok sea going merchant vessels in the world, even with ten Frigates at seas they have to protect 5,000 ships each.
Even if the UK was to rebuild the Navy it wouldn't be able to come anywhere near being able to play a decisive role in any major conflict let alone take on a major adversary on it's own.
Now two points here!
First as an SNP member I know that my Party has the silly idea that we will build and operate Frigates too, but seriously we can do pretty much anything we need to do with UAV's far more cheaply than with frigates as we have nothing to protect beyond 200 miles and the bit that far out beyond Rockall is too deep for oil and like UK overseas territories would cost more to patrol to protect fish than the fish are worth.
That policy has nothing to do with how best to protect Scottland and everything to do with protecting shipbuilding jobs.
Secondly, I think you can sum up much of UK post war defence and foreign policy as "The Importance of Being Important!"
Advocates of a large Navy talk about British Interest and the Important role we play, but is that because it's true or because they need it to be. Are they focusing on what they want to believe we should be doing and want to believe we coudld do, rather than being realistic about what even a bigger Navy would be capable of?
Enfield council now Conservative led after the Greens abstain on both leadership votes. What a turnaround in two cycles after hitting an all time low of just 17 out if 63 councillors.
Hopefully they can undo a lot of the damage Labour have done over the last decade and bin the ridiculous developments that are completely overcrowding the area. I hope they tell the mayor to go fuck himself, paving over every bit of green space in outer London with unwanted flats and high rises needs to stop. Enfield is functionally full much like the rest of London and it's time for councils to take a stand.
I see...
Not so long ago, it was "build, build, build" and scrap planning legislation because we need houses (or indeed flats).
Now, Enfield is apparently "full" - well, if it is, Newham must be full as well so presuambly our Council should join the anti-development Conservatives and block new developments.
Yet Sadiq is criticised for the low number of houses being built in London....
I'd start with net emigration for 5 years, halting all the fake student visas and expiring all visas for workers (plus dependents) who don't meet a £60k salary threshold in London. Reduce the non-citizen population before concreting over our green spaces.
Today’s decision on prostate cancer screening will be hugely disappointing to the thousands of brave men who have campaigned for a targeted screening programme to prevent more families from losing a father, a son or a brother before their time. For just 0.01% of the NHS budget, we could've had a targeted screening programme that would have saved lives.
Today’s decision on prostate cancer screening will be hugely disappointing to the thousands of brave men who have campaigned for a targeted screening programme to prevent more families from losing a father, a son or a brother before their time. For just 0.01% of the NHS budget, we could've had a targeted screening programme that would have saved lives.
Sunak is wrong. It’s not about money. It’s about effectiveness. If you screen, you get large numbers of false positives.
True. It's also true that for many people ongoing monitoring is the best option, as many people with prostate cancer will not die of prostate cancer - something else kills you first. Problem is, once you tell them they have cancer all they hear is the word "cancer" and get very worried, demand resection, or both, resulting in unnecessary ops and concern.
I know the NHS is trialling studies that are trying (a) less intrusive treatment modality(s) that aren't so drastic, rationalising that the lower effectiveness is justified by the fewer side-effects. But they're not due to report for several years.
Apologies for being so English and all, but. Wtf is a sgian dubh?
Ceremonial knife to be worn in the sock whilst wearing formal Highland dress. Comes in handy when fighting the enemy of the Scots, to wit the Other Scots.
The reason why it's being discussed now is as a compare-and-contrast where a Sikh man stabbed another man to death and then claimed he had been racially abused by his victim. Sikh males also carry a ceremonial knife - the kirpan - as part of their religion and he used that as the murder weapon.
Nicholas Lobbenberg KC, for the prosecution, dismissed the racism allegation as a “wicked lie”. He told the jury Digwa was wearing a small kirpan (a ceremonial sword or dagger worn by initiated Sikhs) under his clothing around his neck – which the barrister said satisfied his religious obligation – but chose also to carry the much larger blade.
In the US, most wives as unhappy with their husbands as Nicola says she is would "file for divorce". Is there some reason she can't do that in Scotland?
Or is there some practical reason for her not doing so. (For example: Commonly in the US a wife can not be forced to testify against her husband (and vice versa). Is the same true in Scotland?)
In Scotland, unlike in England, you still need to prove that a marriage has irretrievably broken down before a divorce can be granted. There's a list of ways to prove it, the most common being separation of two years with the consent of the other party, or five years without consent. I'm not sure if they have been separated for two years, and if Murrell is refusing divorce I'm fairly sure they have not been separated for five years.
Interestingly another ground is behaviour so that it would be unreasonable to expect the spouse to live with the other. I would imagine this would qualify.
Yes, but if they're both SNP members that's a much harder case to make.
Comments
😬
"Elect me and Makerfield will be the most powerful constituency in the land."
That is good. Very very good.
https://x.com/AndyBurnhamGM/status/2060037975417749576
The state clearly prefers to protect itself rather than its citizens in many many cases.
You should try dealing with the care system...
How do people describe main party leaders in their own words. The world clouds below give you a flavour of what the public say.
For Starmer biggest word is weak,
For Farage racist,
For Badenoch OK
For Davey don’t know
https://x.com/ConnorGillies/status/2060051358074487201?s=20
I hope the kitchen was well stocked with 7 kettles and 3 coffee machines so she felt at home.
The Murrell saga, however...
https://x.com/sophie_wing8/status/2060009531162112125?s=20
Being PM is really bad for aging. I nearly didn't recognise him. He looks more like the old bloke you get in a B&Q (or for our American friends the Walmart) that is there to help.
One day I might get some free time to play it. Looks good and start of a new franchise.
Or is there some practical reason for her not doing so. (For example: Commonly in the US a wife can not be forced to testify against her husband (and vice versa). Is the same true in Scotland?)
https://bsky.app/profile/phillewis.bsky.social/post/3mmwnrylnrc2h
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaibhav_Sooryavanshi
Away with your Cultural Appropriation.
Good night.
Interestingly another ground is behaviour so that it would be unreasonable to expect the spouse to live with the other. I would imagine this would qualify.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/may/28/uk-risks-125bn-hit-youth-unemployment-landmark-report-alan-milburn-neets
Good luck getting that through the PLP.
https://x.com/HarrietHarman/status/2060070055602184225
Show of hands called by @BethRigby at Hay Festival should Starmer stay or go. Same % as Leeds.
https://x.com/campbellclaret/status/2059988316657733896
My piece on a very interesting show of hands at a [real estate investment] conference in Leeds last week …. Should Starmer stay or go? It was 85-15 stay!
There must be a better efficient maximising way of raising the same amount of money without anyone noticing the pain.
To give a crazy comparison of both how good he is and how much the game has changed since the early days:
Kevin Pietersen, not a bad limited overs player, averaged 34 at a strike rate of 137 in T20s. He hit 17% of balls, about one an over for boundaries. About 5% of balls faced went for six.
This guy, at 15 playing adults, mostly in the IPL which is the equivalent of Champions League in football, averages 43 but at a strike rate of 222, so scoring more than 50% per ball than Pietersen did. And he hits 20% of the balls he faces for six, more than Pietersen managed to hit combined 4s and 6s.
His numbers are freakish outliers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBe_36XfZb4
Tendulker for instance was in pro / international cricket at a very young age (I know a different era), but if you have the technique that extra pace of adult cricket is actually helpful if you a kid as you don't need to force it to get the ball off the square and to the boundary. But that is totally different to consistently taking bowlers downtown.
I got into semi-pro cricket at a reasonably young age and I much prefered having a ~70-75 mph bowler compared to going back to youth cricket on a Sunday and having to generate the pace on the ball. I faced a couple of international spinners and again the turn they get it absolute bastard, but even those guys because most push it through faster than your average 13-14 year old bowling of any varierty, again you could use that pace.
"Good news, boss: the dodgy money stories aren't cutting through!"
https://bsky.app/profile/roberthutton.co.uk/post/3mmwrjzrb2c23
Leigh Sports Village and three new roads to it.
When worn as part of the national dress of Scotland, the sgian-dubh is legal in Scotland, England, and Wales: in Scotland under the Criminal Law (Consolidation) (Scotland) Act 1995 s. 49(5)(c); in England and Wales under the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (s. 139) and the Offensive Weapons Act 1996 (s. 4). However, the wearing of the sgian-dubh is sometimes banned in Britain in areas with zero tolerance weapons policies or heightened security concerns. For example, they were banned from a school dance in Scotland, and initially banned for the June 2014 celebration of the Battle of Bannockburn.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/28/netanyahu-orders-israeli-army-seize-70-gaza-strip-violating-ceasefire-deal
Wtf is a sgian dubh?
Hopefully they can undo a lot of the damage Labour have done over the last decade and bin the ridiculous developments that are completely overcrowding the area. I hope they tell the mayor to go fuck himself, paving over every bit of green space in outer London with unwanted flats and high rises needs to stop. Enfield is functionally full much like the rest of London and it's time for councils to take a stand.
https://x.com/RishiSunak/status/2059987692356591962?s=20
The reason why it's being discussed now is as a compare-and-contrast where a Sikh man stabbed another man to death and then claimed he had been racially abused by his victim. Sikh males also carry a ceremonial knife - the kirpan - as part of their religion and he used that as the murder weapon.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sgian-dubh
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirpan
Not so long ago, it was "build, build, build" and scrap planning legislation because we need houses (or indeed flats).
Now, Enfield is apparently "full" - well, if it is, Newham must be full as well so presuambly our Council should join the anti-development Conservatives and block new developments.
Yet Sadiq is criticised for the low number of houses being built in London....
Not sure whether I prefer the small chance of death or the 6x chance of incontinence and impotence. Glad I don't have to make that call for millions of others though. Hopefully tech leads swiftly to both better diagnosis and treatment.
There hasn't been a major sea battle since WW2. We've had Nuclear hunter killers since the sixties and only fired once, and that was sinking the Begrano. Include Trident and we spend more on the Navy than any other service yet the other services are used more often and the Army, which gets least, the most.
We talk about our global role but apart from a cluster of small colonial left overs we have no real important assets.
The Telegraph fumes about Diego Garcia but without the Americans we couldn't aafford to keep it open. What we we do if we could, threaten India? Realistically beyond our own teritorial waters almost everything we have costs more to defend than it's worth or is in no real danger.
We aren't masters of our destiny, we are prisoners of our past. We portray ourselves as a trading nation but we trade more by keyboard than sea, we send most of our exports to a continent we can see on a clear day.
The basic premise of his criticisms are sound but they miss the point.
Even if we did have sixteen frigates, which we won't, at best we would be able to put two in each of the North and South Atlantic ,the Indian and perhaps three in the Pacific, or we could send out two small Taskforces around each of our two Carriers. What could they do. Possibly see off Argentina again but what else. There are over 5Ok sea going merchant vessels in the world, even with ten Frigates at seas they have to protect 5,000 ships each.
Even if the UK was to rebuild the Navy it wouldn't be able to come anywhere near being able to play a decisive role in any major conflict let alone take on a major adversary on it's own.
Now two points here!
First as an SNP member I know that my Party has the silly idea that we will build and operate Frigates too, but seriously we can do pretty much anything we need to do with UAV's far more cheaply than with frigates as we have nothing to protect beyond 200 miles and the bit that far out beyond Rockall is too deep for oil and like UK overseas territories would cost more to patrol to protect fish than the fish are worth.
That policy has nothing to do with how best to protect Scottland and everything to do with protecting shipbuilding jobs.
Secondly, I think you can sum up much of UK post war defence and foreign policy as "The Importance of Being Important!"
Advocates of a large Navy talk about British Interest and the Important role we play, but is that because it's true or because they need it to be. Are they focusing on what they want to believe we should be doing and want to believe we coudld do, rather than being realistic about what even a bigger Navy would be capable of?
Peter.
I know the NHS is trialling studies that are trying (a) less intrusive treatment modality(s) that aren't so drastic, rationalising that the lower effectiveness is justified by the fewer side-effects. But they're not due to report for several years.
Nicholas Lobbenberg KC, for the prosecution, dismissed the racism allegation as a “wicked lie”. He told the jury Digwa was wearing a small kirpan (a ceremonial sword or dagger worn by initiated Sikhs) under his clothing around his neck – which the barrister said satisfied his religious obligation – but chose also to carry the much larger blade.
Green/LD/Ind coalition:
29 for, 37 against
Reform:
29 for, 35 against, 2 abstentions
The blockage is the 9 member Conservative group being unwilling to back Reform and prevented from backing the coalition if they so wished.
Leadership to be back on the agenda of 15th July meeting.
Committee chairs filled, except for those that are reserved for the opposition, Conservatives split their votes between coalition and Reform nominees.
I skipped a lot of the live feed, but Cllr "I don't know the rules" Wood, Reform group leader, did seem to keep digging in the places I did alight.