Oh dear. A comparison that says far more abut your state of mind than it does about Farage. I mean I don't want him anywhere near power but that is because he is bloody useless. But Hitler comparisons are very childish.
The clue is in the title. Very few saw it coming, even as late as 1932.
Like I said, Very childish. If I were to compare Burnham to Stalin that would be equally stupid. However I clearly have far more common sense than you do and don't go for these simplistic, pointless comparisons.
Would you accept there’s any validity to the comparison between the Nazis and Restore Britain? Or with Trump and MAGA?
Well, there goes the pound. If it sinks to £1=$1.20 I can sell my dollar reserve at a profit. Everybody else will be buggered but I'll make about a hundred quid. So there's...that? Yay me.
Reeves has been disastrous politically. Political suicide after political suicide followed by U turn after U turn.
Why are we expecting Burnham to go all Liz Truss on us?
Oh dear. A comparison that says far more abut your state of mind than it does about Farage. I mean I don't want him anywhere near power but that is because he is bloody useless. But Hitler comparisons are very childish.
The clue is in the title. Very few saw it coming, even as late as 1932.
Like I said, Very childish. If I were to compare Burnham to Stalin that would be equally stupid. However I clearly have far more common sense than you do and don't go for these simplistic, pointless comparisons.
Would you accept there’s any validity to the comparison between the Nazis and Restore Britain? Or with Trump and MAGA?
I think it's a bit harsh to compare Trump to Hitler.
I mean, I know about his sexual depravity, but so far as I know Hitler was never accused of raping twelve year old girls.
It is difficult to see how any other challenger gets 81 nominations. Streeting won't. Rayner or Miliband might but will probably be happy with senior cabinet roles (and in Rayner's case, another chance later). So if Starmer elects not to contest an election then I'd be very surprised if Burnham is opposed.
First leader of the Labour Party to be forced out against his will since 1935. Quite an achievement, but not in a good way.
Blair was forced out against his will by Brown. Blair had wanted to serve out a full term.
So in each of the last two parliaments in which Labour had a majority, the PM will have been forced to resign by the party.
Elect right. Replace left.
So is Burnham going to hit the ground running with fully evaluated policies like Starmer? He's had at least a few weeks to think some up.
These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade. This is done on the basis of no discernible platform or policy difference but simply the belief that one is capable of speaking to and relating to people and the other is not. It is an incredible gamble, not just for the Labour party but for the country.
I think all sensible people can only hope this works for the sake of the country but I am not sure reckless really covers it.
I would say desperate, rather than reckless.
Reckless implies that there's a better option that is being passed over, but there isn't, really. For whatever reason the Cabinet is incredibly weak. There are no major political divides, because none of them have a clue.
And so, with such a complete lack of leadership they turn in desperation to the one person exhibits some motive force.
"These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade."
The reason this has happened is
a) Starmer is not a politician and has no idea why this has happened and the whole thing is bewildering to him. He never had a 'story' or narrative to tell the voters. He never had one or two guiding star ideas as to what should be done for Britain.
b) Labour under McSweeney spent so much time eradicating Corbynista and campaigning to win via a 'time for change' strategy that was actually a ming vase walk* that they did not think to actually have a serious plan for governing
c) the problems facing any PM are bordering on insurmountable.
* Contrast with Blair/Brown - ming vase with an actual up their sleeve plan from day one - e.g bank of england.
What's Burnham's plan? Free buses for WASPI women or something equally ridiculous.
1, Remove red lines on CU and SM 2. Go for PR 3. Devolve more authority to local authorities and promote more social housing 4. Bring Thames Water into public ownership
All popular, big, and easy to describe.
He has said no PR this side of a GE.
How much will no 4 cost? Not just the nationalisation but all the remedial work needed. How is it going to be paid for?
About a third of Thames Water's income goes to paying interest on its debt. Incredible. Remove the debt (because it's bankrupt) and suddenly it's profitable and cash generating. Its investors will argue that makes it a valuable company and they should receive massive compensation.
But because the company's debts far exceed its assets, existing shareholders cannot "walk away" from the debt while keeping the underlying value of the pipes and treatment plants.
If Thames Water goes bankrupt and enters the government's Special Administration Regime (SAR), its existing equity is legally wiped out and treated as completely worthless.
So there is the plan. Do SAR and its cash generation can finance better environmental protection, mend leaks, perhaps a reservoir, and hopefully a reduction in consumer prices.
Just ignore the special pleading from the Private Equity vultures which Starmer seems unwilling to do.
Nationalising Thames Water would be utterly moronic*.
They have borrowed too much money. Their owners therefore should be left with nothing, and, congratulations to their creditors, you now own a water company. This is standard practice for debt laden businesses going bump, there is nothing particularly special about this one.
The only reason for the government to get involved in the long term would be if the core business can't wash its face, even absent the debt.
There might be a role for government to play in ensuring suppliers get paid on time through the restructuring (and thus don't have the potential to cause water supplies to be interrupted), but that's about all that is necessary.
Capitalism works, boys and girls. All that is required is usually to keep the government out of the way of it, and this case is no different.
* Labour being the party for morons, they'll therefore probably rush off and do it.
This sounds simplistic. OK, the creditors now own a debt free water company they didn't ask for. And they decide the best thing to do with their new found zero debt company shell is to sell candy floss at fairgrounds rather than the tricky matter of providing water for 12 million voters. Government cannot keep out of the matter of water. If no-one else runs it, they do.
Capitalism allied to natural monopolies is not a natural state of affairs.
It is difficult to see how any other challenger gets 81 nominations. Streeting won't. Rayner or Miliband might but will probably be happy with senior cabinet roles (and in Rayner's case, another chance later). So if Starmer elects not to contest an election then I'd be very surprised if Burnham is opposed.
First leader of the Labour Party to be forced out against his will since 1935. Quite an achievement, but not in a good way.
Blair was forced out against his will by Brown. Blair had wanted to serve out a full term.
So in each of the last two parliaments in which Labour had a majority, the PM will have been forced to resign by the party.
Elect right. Replace left.
So is Burnham going to hit the ground running with fully evaluated policies like Starmer? He's had at least a few weeks to think some up.
He's probably spent the past two years in a state of increasing frustration over what SKS hasn't been doing. That will have crystallised at least some policies he'd like to see implemented.
(My second attempt at entering this comment, the first was just swallowed, apparently.)
These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade. This is done on the basis of no discernible platform or policy difference but simply the belief that one is capable of speaking to and relating to people and the other is not. It is an incredible gamble, not just for the Labour party but for the country.
I think all sensible people can only hope this works for the sake of the country but I am not sure reckless really covers it.
I would say desperate, rather than reckless.
Reckless implies that there's a better option that is being passed over, but there isn't, really. For whatever reason the Cabinet is incredibly weak. There are no major political divides, because none of them have a clue.
And so, with such a complete lack of leadership they turn in desperation to the one person exhibits some motive force.
"These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade."
The reason this has happened is
a) Starmer is not a politician and has no idea why this has happened and the whole thing is bewildering to him. He never had a 'story' or narrative to tell the voters. He never had one or two guiding star ideas as to what should be done for Britain.
b) Labour under McSweeney spent so much time eradicating Corbynista and campaigning to win via a 'time for change' strategy that was actually a ming vase walk* that they did not think to actually have a serious plan for governing
c) the problems facing any PM are bordering on insurmountable.
* Contrast with Blair/Brown - ming vase with an actual up their sleeve plan from day one - e.g bank of england.
What's Burnham's plan? Free buses for WASPI women or something equally ridiculous.
1, Remove red lines on CU and SM 2. Go for PR 3. Devolve more authority to local authorities and promote more social housing 4. Bring Thames Water into public ownership
All popular, big, and easy to describe.
He has said no PR this side of a GE.
How much will no 4 cost? Not just the nationalisation but all the remedial work needed. How is it going to be paid for?
About a third of Thames Water's income goes to paying interest on its debt. Incredible. Remove the debt (because it's bankrupt) and suddenly it's profitable and cash generating. Its investors will argue that makes it a valuable company and they should receive massive compensation.
But because the company's debts far exceed its assets, existing shareholders cannot "walk away" from the debt while keeping the underlying value of the pipes and treatment plants.
If Thames Water goes bankrupt and enters the government's Special Administration Regime (SAR), its existing equity is legally wiped out and treated as completely worthless.
So there is the plan. Do SAR and its cash generation can finance better environmental protection, mend leaks, perhaps a reservoir, and hopefully a reduction in consumer prices.
Just ignore the special pleading from the Private Equity vultures which Starmer seems unwilling to do.
Nationalising Thames Water would be utterly moronic*.
They have borrowed too much money. Their owners therefore should be left with nothing, and, congratulations to their creditors, you now own a water company. This is standard practice for debt laden businesses going bump, there is nothing particularly special about this one.
The only reason for the government to get involved in the long term would be if the core business can't wash its face, even absent the debt.
There might be a role for government to play in ensuring suppliers get paid on time through the restructuring (and thus don't have the potential to cause water supplies to be interrupted), but that's about all that is necessary.
Capitalism works, boys and girls.
You just failed to observe that in this case it worked against the public interest. Capitalism does indeed work, for the holders of capital, but that's meaningless as far as the operation of an essential monopoly public utility is concerned.
Competition tends to mitigate the malign effects of capitalism, and drive its beneficial effects, but there is no such thing as competition here.
Met Office is saying 39 here next week. I wonder if there’s a chance we break the 40 degree record of 2022
Met saying 38 and 37 here on Tuesday and Wednesday, but Beeb saying 34 and 35 for the same days.
Matthew Todd 🌏🔥 @MrMatthewTodd · 54m This would obliterate the UK temperature record for the month of June which currently stands at 35.6C set in 1976.
No, they aren't. For their official forecasts they use a combination of various models including the Met Office and ECMWF.
Their app on the other hand might well be automated from the GFS model and therefore a bit rubbish. The BBC app has always been rubbish whether Met Office or not.
Most models are now going for 38C+ in the south for Tues-Thurs, and some truly horrible nights with Cornwall registering a 29C overnight minimum on one run.
I expect the weather warning will be upgraded to Red unless those forecasts change.
Remember, the June record is "only" 35.6C. The UK statistical max is in mid July.
The government is going to have to rethink its stance on air conditioning (and other adaptations) fast, as this has ceased to be funny and/or within any sort of expected deviation from the norm.
Yes, this could be accelerating quite a bit faster than expected. Obviously it could still just be “weather”, just some statistical noise, but the chance of that in successive years in diminishing fast.
When we talk about climate change we should be talking about the balance of mitigation (reducing emissions), adaptation, and residual damage. We spend far too much time on the first of the three, important as it is.
Simple stuff like street trees, gardens, shutters etc are going to more and more important too - we need to learn from the continent.
If Starmer resigns tomorrow then what’s the point of hanging around . I don’t think it’s conceivable that he attends 3 important events when he’s effectively powerless . NATO , G20 and the UK EU summit should be attended by Burnham although the latter should really be postponed as he’ll have to decide on some key issues that have so far not found agreement like the youth mobility scheme and would need more time to decide on the way forward..
Why waste time footling around with the youth mobility scheme ?
Oh and Germany did have a written constitution. Indeed it was because they had a written constitution that Hitler was able to gain power. He was able to exploit the German Constitution to make sure he could say, quite truthfully, that he had taken power legitimately,
Key to it was control of the judiciary, where they had a head start since many of the senior judges were already Nazi sympathetic. Once it became almost impossible to challenge the actions of the paramilitaries and other thugs in dragging elected mayors out of council meetings and beating them up in the street, and the like, taking control of the rest of the state became relatively easy.
They also had direct control of the Prussian police force.
Indeed. When I was reading Evans's tome about how the Nazis destroyed democracy, the stories of the way social democrat and other centrist mayors and councillors were treated naturally got me thinking about how I'd react if I were dragged out of a council meeting and beaten up . My recourse would be to go to the police and then rely on the legal system, and if neither of those were prepared to do anything, I'd really have nowhere else to go. It's no surprise that most of them gave up politics and then saw some Nazi dropped in as mayor in their place. It would be nice to think that in the same circumstances we'd make some sort of heroic stand, but I suspect that I and most of us would give up and try and keep our heads down, once the institutions of the state had so obviously been captured.
I detest Burnham and fear him far more than Starmer in terms of the damage he could do to the country.
But, if there is not going to be a contest and Burnham is the new leader to be, then Starmer should resign on 22nd July, the day Parliament rises for the summer recess. I say this for the good of the country. Burnham will need time to get his house in order before he has to face Parliament. He will then have time to get his head round the financial sitation and the issues with various departments - especially defence - before he comes back with a programme in the Autumn. He shoudl reshuffle his cabinet as much as he sees necessary as soon as possible and then cancel holidays for his Ministers and get them working on his programme through the summer.
Like I say I detest him but right now I want him to do well as the country needs proper leadership and a proper, thought out programme for Government.
Oh and he should sack Miliband (although of course he won't)
He could make Milliband Foreign Secretary. Lots of private jet travel (a personal fave pastime) and signing things in gilded halls, and in theory a more senior job. And gets him the fuck away from DESNZ. If he refuses, he can be safely packed off to the back benches.
That would be a clever move. Putting Ed in a position where he can't avoid taking a lot of flights, lol.
He wouldn't want to avoid it. His carbon footprint as Energy and Net Zero Secretary is the size of Wales.
Oh dear. A comparison that says far more abut your state of mind than it does about Farage. I mean I don't want him anywhere near power but that is because he is bloody useless. But Hitler comparisons are very childish.
The clue is in the title. Very few saw it coming, even as late as 1932.
Like I said, Very childish. If I were to compare Burnham to Stalin that would be equally stupid. However I clearly have far more common sense than you do and don't go for these simplistic, pointless comparisons.
Would you accept there’s any validity to the comparison between the Nazis and Restore Britain? Or with Trump and MAGA?
I think it's a bit harsh to compare Trump to Hitler.
I mean, I know about his sexual depravity, but so far as I know Hitler was never accused of raping twelve year old girls.
Lol
The comparison one might make, from the US rather than anything happening in the UK, would be with the way that the politicisation of the supreme court(s) coupled with the misuse of presidential immunity, some of the electoral malpractice, and the politically motivated legal cases taken out against perceived enemies at home and abroad, does allow a malign president like Trump to protect both himself and supporters right down to some of the January 6 thugs from what are supposed to be their legal/political system's constraints and balances, and abuse his position to try and silence or neuter his opponents.
Starmer spent more than 4 years as leader of the opposition, wins a huge majority, and then resigns after less than 2 years as PM. Mindboggling.
4 years during which they supposedly had a plan for what they wanted to do in power. Then Rishi called an election early and SKS arrived in No 10 as a startled bunny with no plans
If Starmer resigns tomorrow then what’s the point of hanging around . I don’t think it’s conceivable that he attends 3 important events when he’s effectively powerless . NATO , G20 and the UK EU summit should be attended by Burnham although the latter should really be postponed as he’ll have to decide on some key issues that have so far not found agreement like the youth mobility scheme and would need more time to decide on the way forward..
Why waste time footling around with the youth mobility scheme ?
These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade. This is done on the basis of no discernible platform or policy difference but simply the belief that one is capable of speaking to and relating to people and the other is not. It is an incredible gamble, not just for the Labour party but for the country.
I think all sensible people can only hope this works for the sake of the country but I am not sure reckless really covers it.
I would say desperate, rather than reckless.
Reckless implies that there's a better option that is being passed over, but there isn't, really. For whatever reason the Cabinet is incredibly weak. There are no major political divides, because none of them have a clue.
And so, with such a complete lack of leadership they turn in desperation to the one person exhibits some motive force.
"These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade."
The reason this has happened is
a) Starmer is not a politician and has no idea why this has happened and the whole thing is bewildering to him. He never had a 'story' or narrative to tell the voters. He never had one or two guiding star ideas as to what should be done for Britain.
b) Labour under McSweeney spent so much time eradicating Corbynista and campaigning to win via a 'time for change' strategy that was actually a ming vase walk* that they did not think to actually have a serious plan for governing
c) the problems facing any PM are bordering on insurmountable.
* Contrast with Blair/Brown - ming vase with an actual up their sleeve plan from day one - e.g bank of england.
What's Burnham's plan? Free buses for WASPI women or something equally ridiculous.
1, Remove red lines on CU and SM 2. Go for PR 3. Devolve more authority to local authorities and promote more social housing 4. Bring Thames Water into public ownership
All popular, big, and easy to describe.
He has said no PR this side of a GE.
How much will no 4 cost? Not just the nationalisation but all the remedial work needed. How is it going to be paid for?
About a third of Thames Water's income goes to paying interest on its debt. Incredible. Remove the debt (because it's bankrupt) and suddenly it's profitable and cash generating. Its investors will argue that makes it a valuable company and they should receive massive compensation.
But because the company's debts far exceed its assets, existing shareholders cannot "walk away" from the debt while keeping the underlying value of the pipes and treatment plants.
If Thames Water goes bankrupt and enters the government's Special Administration Regime (SAR), its existing equity is legally wiped out and treated as completely worthless.
So there is the plan. Do SAR and its cash generation can finance better environmental protection, mend leaks, perhaps a reservoir, and hopefully a reduction in consumer prices.
Just ignore the special pleading from the Private Equity vultures which Starmer seems unwilling to do.
Nationalising Thames Water would be utterly moronic*.
They have borrowed too much money. Their owners therefore should be left with nothing, and, congratulations to their creditors, you now own a water company. This is standard practice for debt laden businesses going bump, there is nothing particularly special about this one.
The only reason for the government to get involved in the long term would be if the core business can't wash its face, even absent the debt.
There might be a role for government to play in ensuring suppliers get paid on time through the restructuring (and thus don't have the potential to cause water supplies to be interrupted), but that's about all that is necessary.
Capitalism works, boys and girls. All that is required is usually to keep the government out of the way of it, and this case is no different.
* Labour being the party for morons, they'll therefore probably rush off and do it.
This sounds simplistic. OK, the creditors now own a debt free water company they didn't ask for. And they decide the best thing to do with their new found zero debt company shell is to sell candy floss at fairgrounds rather than the tricky matter of providing water for 12 million voters. Government cannot keep out of the matter of water. If no-one else runs it, they do.
Capitalism allied to natural monopolies is not a natural state of affairs.
Sadly, it is, which is why careful regulation is needed. Sadly, SW1 is peopled by naive free market zealots.
Oh dear. A comparison that says far more abut your state of mind than it does about Farage. I mean I don't want him anywhere near power but that is because he is bloody useless. But Hitler comparisons are very childish.
The clue is in the title. Very few saw it coming, even as late as 1932.
Like I said, Very childish. If I were to compare Burnham to Stalin that would be equally stupid. However I clearly have far more common sense than you do and don't go for these simplistic, pointless comparisons.
Would you accept there’s any validity to the comparison between the Nazis and Restore Britain? Or with Trump and MAGA?
I think it's a bit harsh to compare Trump to Hitler.
I mean, I know about his sexual depravity, but so far as I know Hitler was never accused of raping twelve year old girls.
Hitler's 6 year relationship with his half-neice that ended in her suicide at age 23 was more than a little dodgy:
Oh dear. A comparison that says far more abut your state of mind than it does about Farage. I mean I don't want him anywhere near power but that is because he is bloody useless. But Hitler comparisons are very childish.
The clue is in the title. Very few saw it coming, even as late as 1932.
Like I said, Very childish. If I were to compare Burnham to Stalin that would be equally stupid. However I clearly have far more common sense than you do and don't go for these simplistic, pointless comparisons.
Would you accept there’s any validity to the comparison between the Nazis and Restore Britain? Or with Trump and MAGA?
I think it's a bit harsh to compare Trump to Hitler.
I mean, I know about his sexual depravity, but so far as I know Hitler was never accused of raping twelve year old girls.
Hitler's 6 year relationship with his half-neice that ended in her suicide at age 23 was more than a little dodgy:
These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade. This is done on the basis of no discernible platform or policy difference but simply the belief that one is capable of speaking to and relating to people and the other is not. It is an incredible gamble, not just for the Labour party but for the country.
I think all sensible people can only hope this works for the sake of the country but I am not sure reckless really covers it.
I would say desperate, rather than reckless.
Reckless implies that there's a better option that is being passed over, but there isn't, really. For whatever reason the Cabinet is incredibly weak. There are no major political divides, because none of them have a clue.
And so, with such a complete lack of leadership they turn in desperation to the one person exhibits some motive force.
"These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade."
The reason this has happened is
a) Starmer is not a politician and has no idea why this has happened and the whole thing is bewildering to him. He never had a 'story' or narrative to tell the voters. He never had one or two guiding star ideas as to what should be done for Britain.
b) Labour under McSweeney spent so much time eradicating Corbynista and campaigning to win via a 'time for change' strategy that was actually a ming vase walk* that they did not think to actually have a serious plan for governing
c) the problems facing any PM are bordering on insurmountable.
* Contrast with Blair/Brown - ming vase with an actual up their sleeve plan from day one - e.g bank of england.
What's Burnham's plan? Free buses for WASPI women or something equally ridiculous.
1, Remove red lines on CU and SM 2. Go for PR 3. Devolve more authority to local authorities and promote more social housing 4. Bring Thames Water into public ownership
All popular, big, and easy to describe.
He has said no PR this side of a GE.
How much will no 4 cost? Not just the nationalisation but all the remedial work needed. How is it going to be paid for?
About a third of Thames Water's income goes to paying interest on its debt. Incredible. Remove the debt (because it's bankrupt) and suddenly it's profitable and cash generating. Its investors will argue that makes it a valuable company and they should receive massive compensation.
But because the company's debts far exceed its assets, existing shareholders cannot "walk away" from the debt while keeping the underlying value of the pipes and treatment plants.
If Thames Water goes bankrupt and enters the government's Special Administration Regime (SAR), its existing equity is legally wiped out and treated as completely worthless.
So there is the plan. Do SAR and its cash generation can finance better environmental protection, mend leaks, perhaps a reservoir, and hopefully a reduction in consumer prices.
Just ignore the special pleading from the Private Equity vultures which Starmer seems unwilling to do.
Nationalising Thames Water would be utterly moronic*.
They have borrowed too much money. Their owners therefore should be left with nothing, and, congratulations to their creditors, you now own a water company. This is standard practice for debt laden businesses going bump, there is nothing particularly special about this one.
The only reason for the government to get involved in the long term would be if the core business can't wash its face, even absent the debt.
There might be a role for government to play in ensuring suppliers get paid on time through the restructuring (and thus don't have the potential to cause water supplies to be interrupted), but that's about all that is necessary.
Capitalism works, boys and girls. All that is required is usually to keep the government out of the way of it, and this case is no different.
* Labour being the party for morons, they'll therefore probably rush off and do it.
This sounds simplistic. OK, the creditors now own a debt free water company they didn't ask for. And they decide the best thing to do with their new found zero debt company shell is to sell candy floss at fairgrounds rather than the tricky matter of providing water for 12 million voters. Government cannot keep out of the matter of water. If no-one else runs it, they do.
Capitalism allied to natural monopolies is not a natural state of affairs.
Yes and no.
If for some reason the new owners of Thames Water were to decide to use it for selling candyfloss at fairgrounds rather than supplying water, then the government (via the water regulator) would need to step in.
However, it's vanishingly unlikely that the government would need to do this, as they have a business that is currently making loads of money supplying water. If the owners fancy trying their hand at the candyfloss trade, they'd be very unlikely to abandon supplying water at a profit in order to focus their energies on the candyfloss.
The only problem with the Thames Water business is the debt with which it's been loaded. A conventional going bust and selling off the viable business underneath, minus it's unplayable debt doesn't require the government to get involved.
Met Office is saying 39 here next week. I wonder if there’s a chance we break the 40 degree record of 2022
Met saying 38 and 37 here on Tuesday and Wednesday, but Beeb saying 34 and 35 for the same days.
Matthew Todd 🌏🔥 @MrMatthewTodd · 54m This would obliterate the UK temperature record for the month of June which currently stands at 35.6C set in 1976.
No, they aren't. For their official forecasts they use a combination of various models including the Met Office and ECMWF.
Their app on the other hand might well be automated from the GFS model and therefore a bit rubbish. The BBC app has always been rubbish whether Met Office or not.
Most models are now going for 38C+ in the south for Tues-Thurs, and some truly horrible nights with Cornwall registering a 29C overnight minimum on one run.
I expect the weather warning will be upgraded to Red unless those forecasts change.
Remember, the June record is "only" 35.6C. The UK statistical max is in mid July.
The government is going to have to rethink its stance on air conditioning (and other adaptations) fast, as this has ceased to be funny and/or within any sort of expected deviation from the norm.
Yes, this could be accelerating quite a bit faster than expected. Obviously it could still just be “weather”, just some statistical noise, but the chance of that in successive years in diminishing fast.
When we talk about climate change we should be talking about the balance of mitigation (reducing emissions), adaptation, and residual damage. We spend far too much time on the first of the three, important as it is.
Simple stuff like street trees, gardens, shutters etc are going to more and more important too - we need to learn from the continent.
Yep, the British instinct to throw open all the windows on a hot sunny day needs to be replaced with the Italians' habitual closing of curtains and shutters and keeping their homes in darkness during the day, so they can sleep at night.
The latest temperature forecast for London appears to peak on Wednesday afternoon at 36C+, whereas here on the south coast it looks like Thursday late afternoon will be the hottest at 26C; living by the sea does have some compensation to offset the occasional fog and frequent wind (- that said, I see the 1976 June record we're batting at was set in Southampton!). I'm surprised the Cornwall forecasts are as high as that, when even London is forecast to drop down to no more than 24C by dawn?
If Starmer resigns tomorrow then what’s the point of hanging around . I don’t think it’s conceivable that he attends 3 important events when he’s effectively powerless . NATO , G20 and the UK EU summit should be attended by Burnham although the latter should really be postponed as he’ll have to decide on some key issues that have so far not found agreement like the youth mobility scheme and would need more time to decide on the way forward .
It’s still hard to believe that just two years into his premiership Starmer is going .
Why? Starmer follows a recent run of 2- or 3-year Prime Ministers.
Gordon Brown: 3 years David Cameron: 6 but only 1 year outside the coalition Theresa May: 3 years Boris Johnson: 3 years Liz Truss: 7 weeks Rishi Sunak: 2 years
Starmer spent more than 4 years as leader of the opposition, wins a huge majority, and then resigns after less than 2 years as PM. Mindboggling.
There are good reasons for that. (Narrator: he was crap at the job. Like, really, really crap.)
No where near as bad as Truss, May, Boris in that order.
Foreign policy good with the exception of his failure to hammer Israel hard
It's a dismal game, but going poor to catastrophic, I'd go
May, Starmer, Sunak, (big gap) Johnson, (huge gap) Truss.
Johnson brought disgrace on the office and Truss was mad. The other three just weren't up to it.
(The interesting one is Cameron- he wasn't stupid, but he shared some properties of the stupid-diligent corner of the military officer classification. He calmly and effectively did a lot of things that have turned out to be disastrous.)
As for Burnham, one of his bits of people-pleasing has been to implicitly promise to depose Starmer right now- even though he's absurdly underprepared for the role he's about to take on. Health Sec and Manchester Mayor is an incredibly thin CV for the job he's up for, and none of us have a damn clue what he's going to do, except please everyone.
I’m interested by the near absence of reply to my incessant sous vide posts
Has no one else here cooked fish sous vide before?
Am I the first?
Who will be next to douse their fish in really quite warm water?
I suspect the absence of @Leon_VotedForStarmer has meant your post did not get turned into the entire thread. Pretty sure he would have had the world's finest 'sous vide' etc etc
Leon was a fan of Masterchef so would be familiar with sous vide. Here's the answer. Yes, fish can be cooked sous vide. Here's the other answer – instructions for everything are on YouTube. So buy yourself proper sous vide and vacuum bag machines and head over to YouTube before Keir Starmer bans it.
Have you ever eaten anything really yummy that was cooked sous vide though? Bland...
If Starmer resigns tomorrow then what’s the point of hanging around . I don’t think it’s conceivable that he attends 3 important events when he’s effectively powerless . NATO , G20 and the UK EU summit should be attended by Burnham although the latter should really be postponed as he’ll have to decide on some key issues that have so far not found agreement like the youth mobility scheme and would need more time to decide on the way forward..
Why waste time footling around with the youth mobility scheme ?
Some people on Twitter seem to be genuinely upset that Starmer might be about to step down in favour of Burnham. They must be True Believers in the type of bureaucratic proceduralism that Starmer represents.
I was at a wedding yesterday, with a reasonably politically engaged group of centre left on my table. Unanimously they said they didn't understand why Starmer was resigning, or how Burnham would be any better.
I'll admit to a small amount of blind optimism that the change allows a reset and more of a long-term plan. Call it hopium if you're that way inclined. The problem with change, though, is it can make things worse rather than better, and I see zero evidence that Burnham has a long term plan that will navigate the choppy waters of our economy with anything like the nuance required.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade. This is done on the basis of no discernible platform or policy difference but simply the belief that one is capable of speaking to and relating to people and the other is not. It is an incredible gamble, not just for the Labour party but for the country.
I think all sensible people can only hope this works for the sake of the country but I am not sure reckless really covers it.
I would say desperate, rather than reckless.
Reckless implies that there's a better option that is being passed over, but there isn't, really. For whatever reason the Cabinet is incredibly weak. There are no major political divides, because none of them have a clue.
And so, with such a complete lack of leadership they turn in desperation to the one person exhibits some motive force.
"These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade."
The reason this has happened is
a) Starmer is not a politician and has no idea why this has happened and the whole thing is bewildering to him. He never had a 'story' or narrative to tell the voters. He never had one or two guiding star ideas as to what should be done for Britain.
b) Labour under McSweeney spent so much time eradicating Corbynista and campaigning to win via a 'time for change' strategy that was actually a ming vase walk* that they did not think to actually have a serious plan for governing
c) the problems facing any PM are bordering on insurmountable.
* Contrast with Blair/Brown - ming vase with an actual up their sleeve plan from day one - e.g bank of england.
What's Burnham's plan? Free buses for WASPI women or something equally ridiculous.
1, Remove red lines on CU and SM 2. Go for PR 3. Devolve more authority to local authorities and promote more social housing 4. Bring Thames Water into public ownership
All popular, big, and easy to describe.
He has said no PR this side of a GE.
How much will no 4 cost? Not just the nationalisation but all the remedial work needed. How is it going to be paid for?
About a third of Thames Water's income goes to paying interest on its debt. Incredible. Remove the debt (because it's bankrupt) and suddenly it's profitable and cash generating. Its investors will argue that makes it a valuable company and they should receive massive compensation.
But because the company's debts far exceed its assets, existing shareholders cannot "walk away" from the debt while keeping the underlying value of the pipes and treatment plants.
If Thames Water goes bankrupt and enters the government's Special Administration Regime (SAR), its existing equity is legally wiped out and treated as completely worthless.
So there is the plan. Do SAR and its cash generation can finance better environmental protection, mend leaks, perhaps a reservoir, and hopefully a reduction in consumer prices.
Just ignore the special pleading from the Private Equity vultures which Starmer seems unwilling to do.
Nationalising Thames Water would be utterly moronic*.
They have borrowed too much money. Their owners therefore should be left with nothing, and, congratulations to their creditors, you now own a water company. This is standard practice for debt laden businesses going bump, there is nothing particularly special about this one.
The only reason for the government to get involved in the long term would be if the core business can't wash its face, even absent the debt.
There might be a role for government to play in ensuring suppliers get paid on time through the restructuring (and thus don't have the potential to cause water supplies to be interrupted), but that's about all that is necessary.
Capitalism works, boys and girls. All that is required is usually to keep the government out of the way of it, and this case is no different.
* Labour being the party for morons, they'll therefore probably rush off and do it.
This sounds simplistic. OK, the creditors now own a debt free water company they didn't ask for. And they decide the best thing to do with their new found zero debt company shell is to sell candy floss at fairgrounds rather than the tricky matter of providing water for 12 million voters. Government cannot keep out of the matter of water. If no-one else runs it, they do.
Capitalism allied to natural monopolies is not a natural state of affairs.
Yes and no.
If for some reason the new owners of Thames Water were to decide to use it for selling candyfloss at fairgrounds rather than supplying water, then the government (via the water regulator) would need to step in.
However, it's vanishingly unlikely that the government would need to do this, as they have a business that is currently making loads of money supplying water. If the owners fancy trying their hand at the candyfloss trade, they'd be very unlikely to abandon supplying water at a profit in order to focus their energies on the candyfloss.
The only problem with the Thames Water business is the debt with which it's been loaded. A conventional going bust and selling off the viable business underneath, minus it's unplayable debt doesn't require the government to get involved.
It does require it a bit according to my research, because in a conventional liquidation, the creditors own the assets (land, pipes etc.) and can sell them off to offset their losses, but in this case those assets must be passed on whole to the next buyer. So whilst in theory you're correct, and this is broadly what should happen, the Government must intervene in the transition to ensure continuity of water supply.
These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade. This is done on the basis of no discernible platform or policy difference but simply the belief that one is capable of speaking to and relating to people and the other is not. It is an incredible gamble, not just for the Labour party but for the country.
I think all sensible people can only hope this works for the sake of the country but I am not sure reckless really covers it.
I would say desperate, rather than reckless.
Reckless implies that there's a better option that is being passed over, but there isn't, really. For whatever reason the Cabinet is incredibly weak. There are no major political divides, because none of them have a clue.
And so, with such a complete lack of leadership they turn in desperation to the one person exhibits some motive force.
"These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade."
The reason this has happened is
a) Starmer is not a politician and has no idea why this has happened and the whole thing is bewildering to him. He never had a 'story' or narrative to tell the voters. He never had one or two guiding star ideas as to what should be done for Britain.
b) Labour under McSweeney spent so much time eradicating Corbynista and campaigning to win via a 'time for change' strategy that was actually a ming vase walk* that they did not think to actually have a serious plan for governing
c) the problems facing any PM are bordering on insurmountable.
* Contrast with Blair/Brown - ming vase with an actual up their sleeve plan from day one - e.g bank of england.
What's Burnham's plan? Free buses for WASPI women or something equally ridiculous.
1, Remove red lines on CU and SM 2. Go for PR 3. Devolve more authority to local authorities and promote more social housing 4. Bring Thames Water into public ownership
All popular, big, and easy to describe.
He has said no PR this side of a GE.
How much will no 4 cost? Not just the nationalisation but all the remedial work needed. How is it going to be paid for?
About a third of Thames Water's income goes to paying interest on its debt. Incredible. Remove the debt (because it's bankrupt) and suddenly it's profitable and cash generating. Its investors will argue that makes it a valuable company and they should receive massive compensation.
But because the company's debts far exceed its assets, existing shareholders cannot "walk away" from the debt while keeping the underlying value of the pipes and treatment plants.
If Thames Water goes bankrupt and enters the government's Special Administration Regime (SAR), its existing equity is legally wiped out and treated as completely worthless.
So there is the plan. Do SAR and its cash generation can finance better environmental protection, mend leaks, perhaps a reservoir, and hopefully a reduction in consumer prices.
Just ignore the special pleading from the Private Equity vultures which Starmer seems unwilling to do.
Nationalising Thames Water would be utterly moronic*.
They have borrowed too much money. Their owners therefore should be left with nothing, and, congratulations to their creditors, you now own a water company. This is standard practice for debt laden businesses going bump, there is nothing particularly special about this one.
The only reason for the government to get involved in the long term would be if the core business can't wash its face, even absent the debt.
There might be a role for government to play in ensuring suppliers get paid on time through the restructuring (and thus don't have the potential to cause water supplies to be interrupted), but that's about all that is necessary.
Capitalism works, boys and girls. All that is required is usually to keep the government out of the way of it, and this case is no different.
* Labour being the party for morons, they'll therefore probably rush off and do it.
This sounds simplistic. OK, the creditors now own a debt free water company they didn't ask for. And they decide the best thing to do with their new found zero debt company shell is to sell candy floss at fairgrounds rather than the tricky matter of providing water for 12 million voters. Government cannot keep out of the matter of water. If no-one else runs it, they do.
Capitalism allied to natural monopolies is not a natural state of affairs.
Yes and no.
If for some reason the new owners of Thames Water were to decide to use it for selling candyfloss at fairgrounds rather than supplying water, then the government (via the water regulator) would need to step in.
However, it's vanishingly unlikely that the government would need to do this, as they have a business that is currently making loads of money supplying water. If the owners fancy trying their hand at the candyfloss trade, they'd be very unlikely to abandon supplying water at a profit in order to focus their energies on the candyfloss.
The only problem with the Thames Water business is the debt with which it's been loaded. A conventional going bust and selling off the viable business underneath, minus it's unplayable debt doesn't require the government to get involved.
What would stop the new owners mortgaging it to the hilt and taking all the money out again? PE have found their way to maximise their take, they're not going to give up on it.
If Starmer resigns tomorrow then what’s the point of hanging around . I don’t think it’s conceivable that he attends 3 important events when he’s effectively powerless . NATO , G20 and the UK EU summit should be attended by Burnham although the latter should really be postponed as he’ll have to decide on some key issues that have so far not found agreement like the youth mobility scheme and would need more time to decide on the way forward..
Why waste time footling around with the youth mobility scheme ?
These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade. This is done on the basis of no discernible platform or policy difference but simply the belief that one is capable of speaking to and relating to people and the other is not. It is an incredible gamble, not just for the Labour party but for the country.
I think all sensible people can only hope this works for the sake of the country but I am not sure reckless really covers it.
I would say desperate, rather than reckless.
Reckless implies that there's a better option that is being passed over, but there isn't, really. For whatever reason the Cabinet is incredibly weak. There are no major political divides, because none of them have a clue.
And so, with such a complete lack of leadership they turn in desperation to the one person exhibits some motive force.
"These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade."
The reason this has happened is
a) Starmer is not a politician and has no idea why this has happened and the whole thing is bewildering to him. He never had a 'story' or narrative to tell the voters. He never had one or two guiding star ideas as to what should be done for Britain.
b) Labour under McSweeney spent so much time eradicating Corbynista and campaigning to win via a 'time for change' strategy that was actually a ming vase walk* that they did not think to actually have a serious plan for governing
c) the problems facing any PM are bordering on insurmountable.
* Contrast with Blair/Brown - ming vase with an actual up their sleeve plan from day one - e.g bank of england.
What's Burnham's plan? Free buses for WASPI women or something equally ridiculous.
1, Remove red lines on CU and SM 2. Go for PR 3. Devolve more authority to local authorities and promote more social housing 4. Bring Thames Water into public ownership
All popular, big, and easy to describe.
He has said no PR this side of a GE.
How much will no 4 cost? Not just the nationalisation but all the remedial work needed. How is it going to be paid for?
About a third of Thames Water's income goes to paying interest on its debt. Incredible. Remove the debt (because it's bankrupt) and suddenly it's profitable and cash generating. Its investors will argue that makes it a valuable company and they should receive massive compensation.
But because the company's debts far exceed its assets, existing shareholders cannot "walk away" from the debt while keeping the underlying value of the pipes and treatment plants.
If Thames Water goes bankrupt and enters the government's Special Administration Regime (SAR), its existing equity is legally wiped out and treated as completely worthless.
So there is the plan. Do SAR and its cash generation can finance better environmental protection, mend leaks, perhaps a reservoir, and hopefully a reduction in consumer prices.
Just ignore the special pleading from the Private Equity vultures which Starmer seems unwilling to do.
Nationalising Thames Water would be utterly moronic*.
They have borrowed too much money. Their owners therefore should be left with nothing, and, congratulations to their creditors, you now own a water company. This is standard practice for debt laden businesses going bump, there is nothing particularly special about this one.
The only reason for the government to get involved in the long term would be if the core business can't wash its face, even absent the debt.
There might be a role for government to play in ensuring suppliers get paid on time through the restructuring (and thus don't have the potential to cause water supplies to be interrupted), but that's about all that is necessary.
Capitalism works, boys and girls. All that is required is usually to keep the government out of the way of it, and this case is no different.
* Labour being the party for morons, they'll therefore probably rush off and do it.
This sounds simplistic. OK, the creditors now own a debt free water company they didn't ask for. And they decide the best thing to do with their new found zero debt company shell is to sell candy floss at fairgrounds rather than the tricky matter of providing water for 12 million voters. Government cannot keep out of the matter of water. If no-one else runs it, they do.
Capitalism allied to natural monopolies is not a natural state of affairs.
Yes and no.
If for some reason the new owners of Thames Water were to decide to use it for selling candyfloss at fairgrounds rather than supplying water, then the government (via the water regulator) would need to step in.
However, it's vanishingly unlikely that the government would need to do this, as they have a business that is currently making loads of money supplying water. If the owners fancy trying their hand at the candyfloss trade, they'd be very unlikely to abandon supplying water at a profit in order to focus their energies on the candyfloss.
The only problem with the Thames Water business is the debt with which it's been loaded. A conventional going bust and selling off the viable business underneath, minus it's unplayable debt doesn't require the government to get involved.
Thanks. You may be right. But a monopoly 'making loads of money' and is a viable business which also has 'unpayable debt' suggests that something about capitalism and something about the regulator didn't quite work. I am sure 'lessons will be learned' but why should I believe that either regulators or monopoly capitalism will change their spots?
Starmer spent more than 4 years as leader of the opposition, wins a huge majority, and then resigns after less than 2 years as PM. Mindboggling.
4 years during which they supposedly had a plan for what they wanted to do in power. Then Rishi called an election early and SKS arrived in No 10 as a startled bunny with no plans
I think it is slightly worse than that. As a naive technocrat, Starmer assumed there was a correct answer to each question, and that the Civil Service already had a roadmap to the sunlit uplands but had been prevented from following it by successive malign Conservative Prime Ministers. This later evolved into his warm bath speech – it was now Civil Servants' fault for not following the right course which surely they all knew about. Nowhere is the sense that these are political questions, both destination and route.
Starmer spent more than 4 years as leader of the opposition, wins a huge majority, and then resigns after less than 2 years as PM. Mindboggling.
4 years during which they supposedly had a plan for what they wanted to do in power. Then Rishi called an election early and SKS arrived in No 10 as a startled bunny with no plans
I think it is slightly worse than that. As a naive technocrat, Starmer assumed there was a correct answer to each question, and that the Civil Service already had a roadmap to the sunlit uplands but had been prevented from following it by successive malign Conservative Prime Ministers. This later evolved into his warm bath speech – it was now Civil Servants' fault for not following the right course which surely they all knew about. Nowhere is the sense that these are political questions, both destination and route.
I’m interested by the near absence of reply to my incessant sous vide posts
Has no one else here cooked fish sous vide before?
Am I the first?
Who will be next to douse their fish in really quite warm water?
I suspect the absence of @Leon_VotedForStarmer has meant your post did not get turned into the entire thread. Pretty sure he would have had the world's finest 'sous vide' etc etc
Leon was a fan of Masterchef so would be familiar with sous vide. Here's the answer. Yes, fish can be cooked sous vide. Here's the other answer – instructions for everything are on YouTube. So buy yourself proper sous vide and vacuum bag machines and head over to YouTube before Keir Starmer bans it.
Have you ever eaten anything really yummy that was cooked sous vide though? Bland...
Bland often means under-seasoned, and often sous vide meat will then be flash-fried to enhance flavour and texture.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Two-tier reporting. There's no doubt that if this had been a knife-wielding Muslim attacking random innocent white Scots it would have been as prominent in the news as Starmer's woes and the Bedford train crash.
Starmer spent more than 4 years as leader of the opposition, wins a huge majority, and then resigns after less than 2 years as PM. Mindboggling.
4 years during which they supposedly had a plan for what they wanted to do in power. Then Rishi called an election early and SKS arrived in No 10 as a startled bunny with no plans
I think it is slightly worse than that. As a naive technocrat, Starmer assumed there was a correct answer to each question, and that the Civil Service already had a roadmap to the sunlit uplands but had been prevented from following it by successive malign Conservative Prime Ministers. This later evolved into his warm bath speech – it was now Civil Servants' fault for not following the right course which surely they all knew about. Nowhere is the sense that these are political questions, both destination and route.
That explains why he thought that appointing Sue Gray was a sufficient plan for entering Number 10.
Some people on Twitter seem to be genuinely upset that Starmer might be about to step down in favour of Burnham. They must be True Believers in the type of bureaucratic proceduralism that Starmer represents.
I was at a wedding yesterday, with a reasonably politically engaged group of centre left on my table. Unanimously they said they didn't understand why Starmer was resigning, or how Burnham would be any better.
I'll admit to a small amount of blind optimism that the change allows a reset and more of a long-term plan. Call it hopium if you're that way inclined. The problem with change, though, is it can make things worse rather than better, and I see zero evidence that Burnham has a long term plan that will navigate the choppy waters of our economy with anything like the nuance required.
Interesting. Surely the politically engaged centre left know that Starmer is under pressure because 400 MPs are thinking they could lose their seats and that if enough of them lose confidence in him he will go.
As to anyone else being better.......
The debate generally says: Starmer is useless in that the public won't vote Labour under him. There is no reason to think Burnham would be better.
The only people with both power over the matter and personal careers at stake are 400 Labour MPs. They want to keep their seat, and to win the next election. Have they, between them come up with a better idea than Burnham, and if so, what?
Some people on Twitter seem to be genuinely upset that Starmer might be about to step down in favour of Burnham. They must be True Believers in the type of bureaucratic proceduralism that Starmer represents.
I was at a wedding yesterday, with a reasonably politically engaged group of centre left on my table. Unanimously they said they didn't understand why Starmer was resigning, or how Burnham would be any better.
I'll admit to a small amount of blind optimism that the change allows a reset and more of a long-term plan. Call it hopium if you're that way inclined. The problem with change, though, is it can make things worse rather than better, and I see zero evidence that Burnham has a long term plan that will navigate the choppy waters of our economy with anything like the nuance required.
Let’s not overthink this. The reason for Starmer resigning is his appalling personal ratings and nothing else. If they were simply “bad”, like Farage’s, he wouldn’t be in this position. People loathe SKS. I don’t, I think he’s been a huge disappointment, but I don’t get the visceral hatred. Nevertheless it’s a reality.
Burnham is, by comparison, untainted. Absolutely he has no long term plan, but look at his ratings in Manchester. Makerfield should not have been winnable given the locals a month before. That popularity may not translate nationally, or may go south (pun intended) rapidly, but they are, in context, currently remarkable for any politician. That’s all there is to it. No one sees him as “the Holy Grail” but they do see someone whose brand is not a net negative, and did not serve in the Starmer cabinet, so to that extent they are correct.
These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade. This is done on the basis of no discernible platform or policy difference but simply the belief that one is capable of speaking to and relating to people and the other is not. It is an incredible gamble, not just for the Labour party but for the country.
I think all sensible people can only hope this works for the sake of the country but I am not sure reckless really covers it.
I would say desperate, rather than reckless.
Reckless implies that there's a better option that is being passed over, but there isn't, really. For whatever reason the Cabinet is incredibly weak. There are no major political divides, because none of them have a clue.
And so, with such a complete lack of leadership they turn in desperation to the one person exhibits some motive force.
"These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade."
The reason this has happened is
a) Starmer is not a politician and has no idea why this has happened and the whole thing is bewildering to him. He never had a 'story' or narrative to tell the voters. He never had one or two guiding star ideas as to what should be done for Britain.
b) Labour under McSweeney spent so much time eradicating Corbynista and campaigning to win via a 'time for change' strategy that was actually a ming vase walk* that they did not think to actually have a serious plan for governing
c) the problems facing any PM are bordering on insurmountable.
* Contrast with Blair/Brown - ming vase with an actual up their sleeve plan from day one - e.g bank of england.
What's Burnham's plan? Free buses for WASPI women or something equally ridiculous.
1, Remove red lines on CU and SM 2. Go for PR 3. Devolve more authority to local authorities and promote more social housing 4. Bring Thames Water into public ownership
All popular, big, and easy to describe.
He has said no PR this side of a GE.
How much will no 4 cost? Not just the nationalisation but all the remedial work needed. How is it going to be paid for?
Maternity scandals are the rule rather than the exception in the UK.
I understand that the annual cost of litigation over maternity exceeds the annual cost of all maternity units. In part this is because of the lifetime cost of disability, but even so an astonishing figure.
Not unique to the UK, indeed the US figures are pretty appalling too, so to a degree Obstetrics is intrinsically high risk.
But there is an underlying issue between midwives and obstetricians in the UK over responsibility that goes back further than Wendy Savage in the Eighties. I think there is fault on both sides but a fundamental difference in culture.
There also has been neglect of services because there are few government targets apart from pressure to reduce section rates.
I find it shocking that something so fundamentally important as the start of new life is treated so neglectfully.
One of our children is in a special school. I think about 20% of the pupils are there because of accidents at birth or very preterm deliveries. If half of these could be avoided then that would save 10% of the special education budget. But it doesn't stop there. Lack of early diagnosis and treatment is another major problem. Like many children our child was diagnosed with "autism" which is no more useful than when they used to diagnose children as "spastic" or "morons". Today we got a proper diagnosis privately .He has a treatable condition but it is probably too late. The treatment cost is a few thousand pounds. If we had got that four years ago then that would have saved the taxpayer £5 million in lost tax revenue and care fees.
For all its faults this is indeed one of the priorities of this government, with ambition to halve the rate of still birth and neonalal death, with these as markers of overall quality of care. For everyone of these there are several survivors with permenant lifelong damage. We should be able to achieve levels comparable to Scandinavia, though we are way ahead of the USA.
The issues are complex. The highest risk factor for neonatal death is prematurity with 77% of infants born before 24 weeks dying, but the other major risk factors are ethnicity, social deprivation and mothers under 20 or over 40.
My own Trust is one of the 14 in the national enquiry, selected as the rate in Leicester is the second highest in the country, after Birmingham.
However, when you look a little closer there is something striking. The rate for the County of Leics is bang on the national average. Both City and County are served by the same two maternity units, with the same staff, same leadership and same intensity of work. So why the difference?
To get back to the thread topic, one of the things Starmer has not done well is to flag up efforts to improve standards of services and reduce . These are genuine, and well under way and could go a long way to improve lives in the neglected parts of the country. Real levelling up.
Burnham has shown in Manchester that he gets this, and part of getting a country to feel good about itself again, and to feel united is about these things, not just NHS, but also education, public spaces, public transport, policing. Lets see how he does.
Starmer spent more than 4 years as leader of the opposition, wins a huge majority, and then resigns after less than 2 years as PM. Mindboggling.
4 years during which they supposedly had a plan for what they wanted to do in power. Then Rishi called an election early and SKS arrived in No 10 as a startled bunny with no plans
I think it is slightly worse than that. As a naive technocrat, Starmer assumed there was a correct answer to each question, and that the Civil Service already had a roadmap to the sunlit uplands but had been prevented from following it by successive malign Conservative Prime Ministers. This later evolved into his warm bath speech – it was now Civil Servants' fault for not following the right course which surely they all knew about. Nowhere is the sense that these are political questions, both destination and route.
That explains why he thought that appointing Sue Gray was a sufficient plan for entering Number 10.
Yes. I have always been of the opinion that Starmer did have an agenda entering No. 10, but that it was one that had to be concealed, because the public would never have voted for it. But the theory that (a few personal hobby horses like Chagos aside) actually he just wanted to set the amazing agenda of the British civil service FREE at last is a very neat one.
I’m interested by the near absence of reply to my incessant sous vide posts
Has no one else here cooked fish sous vide before?
Am I the first?
Who will be next to douse their fish in really quite warm water?
I suspect the absence of @Leon_VotedForStarmer has meant your post did not get turned into the entire thread. Pretty sure he would have had the world's finest 'sous vide' etc etc
Leon was a fan of Masterchef so would be familiar with sous vide. Here's the answer. Yes, fish can be cooked sous vide. Here's the other answer – instructions for everything are on YouTube. So buy yourself proper sous vide and vacuum bag machines and head over to YouTube before Keir Starmer bans it.
Have you ever eaten anything really yummy that was cooked sous vide though? Bland...
poncy rubbish Mark, done by clowns trying to feel important and smug.
Met Office is saying 39 here next week. I wonder if there’s a chance we break the 40 degree record of 2022
Met saying 38 and 37 here on Tuesday and Wednesday, but Beeb saying 34 and 35 for the same days.
Matthew Todd 🌏🔥 @MrMatthewTodd · 54m This would obliterate the UK temperature record for the month of June which currently stands at 35.6C set in 1976.
No, they aren't. For their official forecasts they use a combination of various models including the Met Office and ECMWF.
Their app on the other hand might well be automated from the GFS model and therefore a bit rubbish. The BBC app has always been rubbish whether Met Office or not.
Most models are now going for 38C+ in the south for Tues-Thurs, and some truly horrible nights with Cornwall registering a 29C overnight minimum on one run.
I expect the weather warning will be upgraded to Red unless those forecasts change.
Remember, the June record is "only" 35.6C. The UK statistical max is in mid July.
The government is going to have to rethink its stance on air conditioning (and other adaptations) fast, as this has ceased to be funny and/or within any sort of expected deviation from the norm.
Yes, this could be accelerating quite a bit faster than expected. Obviously it could still just be “weather”, just some statistical noise, but the chance of that in successive years in diminishing fast.
When we talk about climate change we should be talking about the balance of mitigation (reducing emissions), adaptation, and residual damage. We spend far too much time on the first of the three, important as it is.
Simple stuff like street trees, gardens, shutters etc are going to more and more important too - we need to learn from the continent.
Yep, the British instinct to throw open all the windows on a hot sunny day needs to be replaced with the Italians' habitual closing of curtains and shutters and keeping their homes in darkness during the day, so they can sleep at night.
The latest temperature forecast for London appears to peak on Wednesday afternoon at 36C+, whereas here on the south coast it looks like Thursday late afternoon will be the hottest at 26C; living by the sea does have some compensation to offset the occasional fog and frequent wind (- that said, I see the 1976 June record we're batting at was set in Southampton!). I'm surprised the Cornwall forecasts are as high as that, when even London is forecast to drop down to no more than 24C by dawn?
The latest forecast I saw has the plume of hot air more to the west, so the airmass temperature at 850hPa is ten degrees warmer over southern Ireland than SE England. I think cloud will keep temperatures down over Ireland, but presumably Cornwall will be sunny.
Some people on Twitter seem to be genuinely upset that Starmer might be about to step down in favour of Burnham. They must be True Believers in the type of bureaucratic proceduralism that Starmer represents.
I was at a wedding yesterday, with a reasonably politically engaged group of centre left on my table. Unanimously they said they didn't understand why Starmer was resigning, or how Burnham would be any better.
I'll admit to a small amount of blind optimism that the change allows a reset and more of a long-term plan. Call it hopium if you're that way inclined. The problem with change, though, is it can make things worse rather than better, and I see zero evidence that Burnham has a long term plan that will navigate the choppy waters of our economy with anything like the nuance required.
Let’s not overthink this. The reason for Starmer resigning is his appalling personal ratings and nothing else. If they were simply “bad”, like Farage’s, he wouldn’t be in this position. People loathe SKS. I don’t, I think he’s been a huge disappointment, but I don’t get the visceral hatred. Nevertheless it’s a reality.
Burnham is, by comparison, untainted. Absolutely he has no long term plan, but look at his ratings in Manchester. Makerfield should not have been winnable given the locals a month before. That popularity may not translate nationally, or may go south (pun intended) rapidly, but they are, in context, currently remarkable for any politician. That’s all there is to it. No one sees him as “the Holy Grail” but they do see someone whose brand is not a net negative, and did not serve in the Starmer cabinet, so to that extent they are correct.
I’m interested by the near absence of reply to my incessant sous vide posts
Has no one else here cooked fish sous vide before?
Am I the first?
Who will be next to douse their fish in really quite warm water?
I suspect the absence of @Leon_VotedForStarmer has meant your post did not get turned into the entire thread. Pretty sure he would have had the world's finest 'sous vide' etc etc
Leon was a fan of Masterchef so would be familiar with sous vide. Here's the answer. Yes, fish can be cooked sous vide. Here's the other answer – instructions for everything are on YouTube. So buy yourself proper sous vide and vacuum bag machines and head over to YouTube before Keir Starmer bans it.
Have you ever eaten anything really yummy that was cooked sous vide though? Bland...
Bland often means under-seasoned, and often sous vide meat will then be flash-fried to enhance flavour and texture.
So just pan-fry it in the first place. Especially fish.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Starmer spent more than 4 years as leader of the opposition, wins a huge majority, and then resigns after less than 2 years as PM. Mindboggling.
4 years during which they supposedly had a plan for what they wanted to do in power. Then Rishi called an election early and SKS arrived in No 10 as a startled bunny with no plans
I think it is slightly worse than that. As a naive technocrat, Starmer assumed there was a correct answer to each question, and that the Civil Service already had a roadmap to the sunlit uplands but had been prevented from following it by successive malign Conservative Prime Ministers. This later evolved into his warm bath speech – it was now Civil Servants' fault for not following the right course which surely they all knew about. Nowhere is the sense that these are political questions, both destination and route.
That explains why he thought that appointing Sue Gray was a sufficient plan for entering Number 10.
Starmer seems particularly and perhaps even uniquely bad at picking his top team and back office staff. The lack of lead from the top brings a toxic atmosphere of court politics, perhaps best shown in the Mandelson debacle, drift combined with regular punishment beatings
Sure, money is tight and always will be in government hemmed in by demographics, legacy institutions and shibboliths like the Triple lock, but a lot can be done in low cost areas by showing a clear sense of direction backed by genuine concern to improve lives.
Will Burnham be better at this? Almost certainly, and he is far and away the best of the candidates to attempt a turnaround.
I don't think I will be voting Labour, but I do wish him the best of luck. He will need it.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Two-tier reporting. There's no doubt that if this had been a knife-wielding Muslim attacking random innocent white Scots it would have been as prominent in the news as Starmer's woes and the Bedford train crash.
Perhaps. Hapappily no one died. If they had it would have led the news. It’s also in Scotland, so blame the Anglo centric media.
Starmer spent more than 4 years as leader of the opposition, wins a huge majority, and then resigns after less than 2 years as PM. Mindboggling.
4 years during which they supposedly had a plan for what they wanted to do in power. Then Rishi called an election early and SKS arrived in No 10 as a startled bunny with no plans
Not to quibble with the substance but ... not 4 years more like 2. Until the 2022 Tory implosion the mission was rebuilding Labour from the ashes of the 2019 defeat. Government looked a vanishingly remote prospect and preparing for it was accordingly not a big priority.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Starmer spent more than 4 years as leader of the opposition, wins a huge majority, and then resigns after less than 2 years as PM. Mindboggling.
4 years during which they supposedly had a plan for what they wanted to do in power. Then Rishi called an election early and SKS arrived in No 10 as a startled bunny with no plans
Not to quibble with the substance but ... not 4 years more like 2. Until the 2022 Tory implosion the mission was rebuilding Labour from the ashes of the 2019 defeat. Government looked a vanishingly remote prospect and preparing for it was accordingly not a big priority.
And any plans for government made before 2022 (I doubt there were many, too) would have had to be binned, given the economic effects of Vlad and Liz.
And then there's all the unexploded bombs Rishi left round the place. Which is why he's bottom of my ordering May, Starmer and Sunak.
I’m interested by the near absence of reply to my incessant sous vide posts
Has no one else here cooked fish sous vide before?
Am I the first?
Who will be next to douse their fish in really quite warm water?
I suspect the absence of @Leon_VotedForStarmer has meant your post did not get turned into the entire thread. Pretty sure he would have had the world's finest 'sous vide' etc etc
Leon was a fan of Masterchef so would be familiar with sous vide. Here's the answer. Yes, fish can be cooked sous vide. Here's the other answer – instructions for everything are on YouTube. So buy yourself proper sous vide and vacuum bag machines and head over to YouTube before Keir Starmer bans it.
Have you ever eaten anything really yummy that was cooked sous vide though? Bland...
Bland often means under-seasoned, and often sous vide meat will then be flash-fried to enhance flavour and texture.
While I'm reluctant to make predictions, future historians may well decide that Starmer was a better PM than Burnham, but despite this Burnham was a much more popular PM than Starmer.
These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade. This is done on the basis of no discernible platform or policy difference but simply the belief that one is capable of speaking to and relating to people and the other is not. It is an incredible gamble, not just for the Labour party but for the country.
I think all sensible people can only hope this works for the sake of the country but I am not sure reckless really covers it.
I would say desperate, rather than reckless.
Reckless implies that there's a better option that is being passed over, but there isn't, really. For whatever reason the Cabinet is incredibly weak. There are no major political divides, because none of them have a clue.
And so, with such a complete lack of leadership they turn in desperation to the one person exhibits some motive force.
"These are really astonishing times. Starmer wins a huge majority and, within 2 years, is forced to resign by his own party on behalf of someone who has not even been an MP for more than a decade."
The reason this has happened is
a) Starmer is not a politician and has no idea why this has happened and the whole thing is bewildering to him. He never had a 'story' or narrative to tell the voters. He never had one or two guiding star ideas as to what should be done for Britain.
b) Labour under McSweeney spent so much time eradicating Corbynista and campaigning to win via a 'time for change' strategy that was actually a ming vase walk* that they did not think to actually have a serious plan for governing
c) the problems facing any PM are bordering on insurmountable.
* Contrast with Blair/Brown - ming vase with an actual up their sleeve plan from day one - e.g bank of england.
What's Burnham's plan? Free buses for WASPI women or something equally ridiculous.
1, Remove red lines on CU and SM 2. Go for PR 3. Devolve more authority to local authorities and promote more social housing 4. Bring Thames Water into public ownership
All popular, big, and easy to describe.
He has said no PR this side of a GE.
How much will no 4 cost? Not just the nationalisation but all the remedial work needed. How is it going to be paid for?
About a third of Thames Water's income goes to paying interest on its debt. Incredible. Remove the debt (because it's bankrupt) and suddenly it's profitable and cash generating. Its investors will argue that makes it a valuable company and they should receive massive compensation.
But because the company's debts far exceed its assets, existing shareholders cannot "walk away" from the debt while keeping the underlying value of the pipes and treatment plants.
If Thames Water goes bankrupt and enters the government's Special Administration Regime (SAR), its existing equity is legally wiped out and treated as completely worthless.
So there is the plan. Do SAR and its cash generation can finance better environmental protection, mend leaks, perhaps a reservoir, and hopefully a reduction in consumer prices.
Just ignore the special pleading from the Private Equity vultures which Starmer seems unwilling to do.
Nationalising Thames Water would be utterly moronic*.
They have borrowed too much money. Their owners therefore should be left with nothing, and, congratulations to their creditors, you now own a water company. This is standard practice for debt laden businesses going bump, there is nothing particularly special about this one.
The only reason for the government to get involved in the long term would be if the core business can't wash its face, even absent the debt.
There might be a role for government to play in ensuring suppliers get paid on time through the restructuring (and thus don't have the potential to cause water supplies to be interrupted), but that's about all that is necessary.
Capitalism works, boys and girls. All that is required is usually to keep the government out of the way of it, and this case is no different.
* Labour being the party for morons, they'll therefore probably rush off and do it.
This sounds simplistic. OK, the creditors now own a debt free water company they didn't ask for. And they decide the best thing to do with their new found zero debt company shell is to sell candy floss at fairgrounds rather than the tricky matter of providing water for 12 million voters. Government cannot keep out of the matter of water. If no-one else runs it, they do.
Capitalism allied to natural monopolies is not a natural state of affairs.
Yes and no.
If for some reason the new owners of Thames Water were to decide to use it for selling candyfloss at fairgrounds rather than supplying water, then the government (via the water regulator) would need to step in.
However, it's vanishingly unlikely that the government would need to do this, as they have a business that is currently making loads of money supplying water. If the owners fancy trying their hand at the candyfloss trade, they'd be very unlikely to abandon supplying water at a profit in order to focus their energies on the candyfloss.
The only problem with the Thames Water business is the debt with which it's been loaded. A conventional going bust and selling off the viable business underneath, minus it's unplayable debt doesn't require the government to get involved.
What would stop the new owners mortgaging it to the hilt and taking all the money out again? PE have found their way to maximise their take, they're not going to give up on it.
What's the current overlap between the equity and debt holders ? Certainly in the past they've been one and the same entities.
Met Office is saying 39 here next week. I wonder if there’s a chance we break the 40 degree record of 2022
Met saying 38 and 37 here on Tuesday and Wednesday, but Beeb saying 34 and 35 for the same days.
Matthew Todd 🌏🔥 @MrMatthewTodd · 54m This would obliterate the UK temperature record for the month of June which currently stands at 35.6C set in 1976.
No, they aren't. For their official forecasts they use a combination of various models including the Met Office and ECMWF.
Their app on the other hand might well be automated from the GFS model and therefore a bit rubbish. The BBC app has always been rubbish whether Met Office or not.
Most models are now going for 38C+ in the south for Tues-Thurs, and some truly horrible nights with Cornwall registering a 29C overnight minimum on one run.
I expect the weather warning will be upgraded to Red unless those forecasts change.
Remember, the June record is "only" 35.6C. The UK statistical max is in mid July.
The government is going to have to rethink its stance on air conditioning (and other adaptations) fast, as this has ceased to be funny and/or within any sort of expected deviation from the norm.
Yes, this could be accelerating quite a bit faster than expected. Obviously it could still just be “weather”, just some statistical noise, but the chance of that in successive years in diminishing fast.
When we talk about climate change we should be talking about the balance of mitigation (reducing emissions), adaptation, and residual damage. We spend far too much time on the first of the three, important as it is.
Simple stuff like street trees, gardens, shutters etc are going to more and more important too - we need to learn from the continent.
I think it's a false dichotomy. You can mitigate and adapt. Doing one does not prevent the other.
There is a reason to concentrate on mitigation, though. In order to adapt to global warming it helps to know what you are adapting to. One of the main sources of uncertainty is how much fossil fuels are burned. So it makes a lot of sense to resolve that uncertainty as much in our favour as possible.
Of course Starmers genuinely laudible achievements are lost in the usual vaccum of right wing lies, tropes and disinformation. The scripts written in advance bearing no basis on fact.
The LOWEST Tariffs on the Planet granted by Trump, NOT getting involved in Trump wars which Farage and Badenoch would now have us in the midst of!
The RETURN of the UK as a trusted and serious player on the GLOBAL Stage (after the trashing of Brexit and Boris Johnson) The opportunity to resume serious relations with Europe, talking yo them rather than shouting insults at them
An INCREASE in defence spending back to Pre Tory slashing and gutting
Domestically
The creation of a coherent path to Net Zero and dramatic increase in Renewable Energy provision Billions in green energy commitments (25+% of homes worth so far - biggest push ever) towards energy independence and emissions reductions. • 8.3B for gb energy, nuclear commitments, 12 mill + homes of off shore wind. Millions of homes in solar energy. • 3 new national forests in development (first for 30 years). • 15 billion in grants for UK homes to improve energy efficiency and generation Cracking down on No Fault Evition via Renters Right Act Cutting NHS Waiting lists to lowest levels in a decade and re-investment in furture medicines and development of cures The reduction in Illegal MIgration starting to take place after a number of new initiatives Slow but necessary revision of Planning laws Significant expansion of free school meals/breakfasts. • Investment focused on infrastructure and growth industries, large public sector pay rises. • significant external revenue generated for tech, fintech, other growth industries. • 104 billion of private investment secured for water infrastructure, 9 new reservoirs currently planned/under construction. • £38 bill for school and hospital repairs. Sunak approved a quarter of what was requested, this is comprehensive. • ban ticket resales above face value. • knocked £100+ off average energy bill (2025 budget) • 38 bill for nuclear energy. More for small reactors. • LDES battery technology research push, huge capacity increase. -hereditary peers bill • priority access for UK medical graduates.
A case of a PM who should be measured in 5 years time.
On the face of it this is extraordinary. A man who won a landslide duresctly from opposition, with a huge majority still is going to resign to let in someone who twice failed to be elected leader who has succeeded in a role that is essentially just spending money. And yet it’s happening.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Was he upset at the spelling mistake?
It’s the Italian. I can’t imagine you making that joke if it was an Islamist attack on white people.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Was he upset at the spelling mistake?
It’s the Italian. I can’t imagine you making that joke if it was an Islamist attack on white people.
I’m just worried about reprisals against the Scottish native community
While I'm reluctant to make predictions, future historians may well decide that Starmer was a better PM than Burnham, but despite this Burnham was a much more popular PM than Starmer.
It all depends what happens once Burnham has to disappoint some of his supporters.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Was he upset at the spelling mistake?
It’s the Italian. I can’t imagine you making that joke if it was an Islamist attack on white people.
I’m just worried about reprisals against the Scottish native community
You did ask for regular updates on it yesterday. On the assumption that you were serious rather than taking the piss out of a terrorist attack, I’ll make sure to keep you informed.
Of course Starmers genuinely laudible achievements are lost in the usual vaccum of right wing lies, tropes and disinformation. The scripts written in advance bearing no basis on fact.
The LOWEST Tariffs on the Planet granted by Trump, NOT getting involved in Trump wars which Farage and Badenoch would now have us in the midst of!
The RETURN of the UK as a trusted and serious player on the GLOBAL Stage (after the trashing of Brexit and Boris Johnson) The opportunity to resume serious relations with Europe, talking yo them rather than shouting insults at them
An INCREASE in defence spending back to Pre Tory slashing and gutting
Domestically
The creation of a coherent path to Net Zero and dramatic increase in Renewable Energy provision Billions in green energy commitments (25+% of homes worth so far - biggest push ever) towards energy independence and emissions reductions. • 8.3B for gb energy, nuclear commitments, 12 mill + homes of off shore wind. Millions of homes in solar energy. • 3 new national forests in development (first for 30 years). • 15 billion in grants for UK homes to improve energy efficiency and generation Cracking down on No Fault Evition via Renters Right Act Cutting NHS Waiting lists to lowest levels in a decade and re-investment in furture medicines and development of cures The reduction in Illegal MIgration starting to take place after a number of new initiatives Slow but necessary revision of Planning laws Significant expansion of free school meals/breakfasts. • Investment focused on infrastructure and growth industries, large public sector pay rises. • significant external revenue generated for tech, fintech, other growth industries. • 104 billion of private investment secured for water infrastructure, 9 new reservoirs currently planned/under construction. • £38 bill for school and hospital repairs. Sunak approved a quarter of what was requested, this is comprehensive. • ban ticket resales above face value. • knocked £100+ off average energy bill (2025 budget) • 38 bill for nuclear energy. More for small reactors. • LDES battery technology research push, huge capacity increase. -hereditary peers bill • priority access for UK medical graduates.
A case of a PM who should be measured in 5 years time.
Politically nieve Communications CRAP
If any of that was true Starmer would not be about to resign alongside the recent resignations of his health and defence secretaries
It sounds like the last pleading of a failed political career
On the face of it this is extraordinary. A man who won a landslide duresctly from opposition, with a huge majority still is going to resign to let in someone who twice failed to be elected leader who has succeeded in a role that is essentially just spending money. And yet it’s happening.
Alan Clark's Diaries, from November 1990. His emphasis.
Maddeningly, I had to return to the Department. Meetings, and an official lunch. Scandinavians. ‘I assume that there is no likelihood of Mrs Thatcher being defeated for the position of Prime Minister?’ ‘Oh no. None whatsoever. It’s just one of these quaint traditions we have in the Conservative Party.' But the encounter made me realise the enormity of what we’re doing- changing the Prime Minister- but without any electoral authority to do so.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Was he upset at the spelling mistake?
It’s the Italian. I can’t imagine you making that joke if it was an Islamist attack on white people.
I’m just worried about reprisals against the Scottish native community
You did ask for regular updates on it yesterday. On the assumption that you were serious rather than taking the piss out of a terrorist attack, I’ll make sure to keep you informed.
Please do. I’m sure it wasn’t the spelling. Was it the good ?
I got on at 42 so considering whether I should trade out
You’ve got to be tempted. I put a tenner on last night at 13 so I can get a quick payout today or gamble on the whole thing. I fear there is a sweet spot between now and when Starmer crashes it by announcing he will stay until x in July or similar.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Was he upset at the spelling mistake?
It’s the Italian. I can’t imagine you making that joke if it was an Islamist attack on white people.
I’m just worried about reprisals against the Scottish native community
You did ask for regular updates on it yesterday. On the assumption that you were serious rather than taking the piss out of a terrorist attack, I’ll make sure to keep you informed.
I would just say it has been featured on Sky together with Starmer's comment it appears to have been motivated by anti Muslim hatred
It was a horrible and an unacceptable attack on innocent Muslims
Oh dear. A comparison that says far more abut your state of mind than it does about Farage. I mean I don't want him anywhere near power but that is because he is bloody useless. But Hitler comparisons are very childish.
The clue is in the title. Very few saw it coming, even as late as 1932.
Like I said, Very childish. If I were to compare Burnham to Stalin that would be equally stupid. However I clearly have far more common sense than you do and don't go for these simplistic, pointless comparisons.
Would you accept there’s any validity to the comparison between the Nazis and Restore Britain? Or with Trump and MAGA?
I think it's a bit harsh to compare Trump to Hitler.
I mean, I know about his sexual depravity, but so far as I know Hitler was never accused of raping twelve year old girls.
Hitler's 6 year relationship with his half-neice that ended in her suicide at age 23 was more than a little dodgy:
But if we want a really sexually depraved dictator to compare Trump to, Stalin would be better.
Stalin was depraved in several aspects but was sex one of them? I guess allowing and encouraging the likes of Beria to indulge their sexual depravity to its utmost indicates a certain lack of moral compass but that pretty much covers everything to do with Joseph Vissarionovich.
On the face of it this is extraordinary. A man who won a landslide duresctly from opposition, with a huge majority still is going to resign to let in someone who twice failed to be elected leader who has succeeded in a role that is essentially just spending money. And yet it’s happening.
Alan Clark's Diaries, from November 1990. His emphasis.
Maddeningly, I had to return to the Department. Meetings, and an official lunch. Scandinavians. ‘I assume that there is no likelihood of Mrs Thatcher being defeated for the position of Prime Minister?’ ‘Oh no. None whatsoever. It’s just one of these quaint traditions we have in the Conservative Party.' But the encounter made me realise the enormity of what we’re doing- changing the Prime Minister- but without any electoral authority to do so.
+1 for correct use of "enormity", but it was more than a generation ago
Of course Starmers genuinely laudible achievements are lost in the usual vaccum of right wing lies, tropes and disinformation. The scripts written in advance bearing no basis on fact.
The LOWEST Tariffs on the Planet granted by Trump, NOT getting involved in Trump wars which Farage and Badenoch would now have us in the midst of!
The RETURN of the UK as a trusted and serious player on the GLOBAL Stage (after the trashing of Brexit and Boris Johnson) The opportunity to resume serious relations with Europe, talking yo them rather than shouting insults at them
An INCREASE in defence spending back to Pre Tory slashing and gutting
Domestically
The creation of a coherent path to Net Zero and dramatic increase in Renewable Energy provision Billions in green energy commitments (25+% of homes worth so far - biggest push ever) towards energy independence and emissions reductions. • 8.3B for gb energy, nuclear commitments, 12 mill + homes of off shore wind. Millions of homes in solar energy. • 3 new national forests in development (first for 30 years). • 15 billion in grants for UK homes to improve energy efficiency and generation Cracking down on No Fault Evition via Renters Right Act Cutting NHS Waiting lists to lowest levels in a decade and re-investment in furture medicines and development of cures The reduction in Illegal MIgration starting to take place after a number of new initiatives Slow but necessary revision of Planning laws Significant expansion of free school meals/breakfasts. • Investment focused on infrastructure and growth industries, large public sector pay rises. • significant external revenue generated for tech, fintech, other growth industries. • 104 billion of private investment secured for water infrastructure, 9 new reservoirs currently planned/under construction. • £38 bill for school and hospital repairs. Sunak approved a quarter of what was requested, this is comprehensive. • ban ticket resales above face value. • knocked £100+ off average energy bill (2025 budget) • 38 bill for nuclear energy. More for small reactors. • LDES battery technology research push, huge capacity increase. -hereditary peers bill • priority access for UK medical graduates.
A case of a PM who should be measured in 5 years time.
Politically nieve Communications CRAP
If any of that was true Starmer would not be about to resign alongside the recent resignations of his health and defence secretaries
It sounds like the last pleading of a failed political career
Two flawed assumptions there, Big G.
One is that politicians do well by doing the right thing for the future of the country. All the evidence is that that's not the case. On your calculus, Thatcher should have been a footnote, forced out in 1981.
The other is that you know enough of other avatars' inner lives and motivations to tell them why they think what they do. You don't, none of us do. I'm not trying to censor you, but I'd hope you're a better man than that.
The only vehicular route in and out of Crimea is now the Kerch Bridge, which has for some time been closed to heavy traffic. They’ve stopped private fuel sales on the island, and across Russia in general fuel logistics is showing signs of breaking down completely.
Another good day for Ukraine, at the end of a very good week.
I’m interested by the near absence of reply to my incessant sous vide posts
Has no one else here cooked fish sous vide before?
Am I the first?
Who will be next to douse their fish in really quite warm water?
I suspect the absence of @Leon_VotedForStarmer has meant your post did not get turned into the entire thread. Pretty sure he would have had the world's finest 'sous vide' etc etc
Leon was a fan of Masterchef so would be familiar with sous vide. Here's the answer. Yes, fish can be cooked sous vide. Here's the other answer – instructions for everything are on YouTube. So buy yourself proper sous vide and vacuum bag machines and head over to YouTube before Keir Starmer bans it.
Have you ever eaten anything really yummy that was cooked sous vide though? Bland...
Bland often means under-seasoned, and often sous vide meat will then be flash-fried to enhance flavour and texture.
So just pan-fry it in the first place. Especially fish.
It is perfectly possible to sous vide with flavour. For instance, carrots cooked sous vide in a bag full of butter and aromats (at 80C) are delicious.
I used to sous vide fish but results of pan frying are usually just better. That said, the Fat Duck sous vide liquorice salmon was delicious and looked beautiful, and I do sometimes sous vide cod fillets.
I also cook the insides of an individual venison suet pudding sous vide because that's how it was done by the person who gave me the recipe; not entirely necessary for "at home" but...
And it's great for tougher steak cuts to deliver *more* flavour.
ETA: and infusing things sous vide adds bags of flavour (hoho) e.g. alcohol into fruit, herb oils, and it is *the best* way to cook rhubarb.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Two-tier reporting. There's no doubt that if this had been a knife-wielding Muslim attacking random innocent white Scots it would have been as prominent in the news as Starmer's woes and the Bedford train crash.
Perhaps. Hapappily no one died. If they had it would have led the news. It’s also in Scotland, so blame the Anglo centric media.
No one died in the Golders Green stabbings but they most certainly led the news (and a COBRA meeting ensued).
On the face of it this is extraordinary. A man who won a landslide duresctly from opposition, with a huge majority still is going to resign to let in someone who twice failed to be elected leader who has succeeded in a role that is essentially just spending money. And yet it’s happening.
Alan Clark's Diaries, from November 1990. His emphasis.
Maddeningly, I had to return to the Department. Meetings, and an official lunch. Scandinavians. ‘I assume that there is no likelihood of Mrs Thatcher being defeated for the position of Prime Minister?’ ‘Oh no. None whatsoever. It’s just one of these quaint traditions we have in the Conservative Party.' But the encounter made me realise the enormity of what we’re doing- changing the Prime Minister- but without any electoral authority to do so.
+1 for correct use of "enormity", but it was more than a generation ago
If you're a conservative, let alone a Conservative, that's no time at all.
Of course Starmers genuinely laudible achievements are lost in the usual vaccum of right wing lies, tropes and disinformation. The scripts written in advance bearing no basis on fact.
The LOWEST Tariffs on the Planet granted by Trump, NOT getting involved in Trump wars which Farage and Badenoch would now have us in the midst of!
The RETURN of the UK as a trusted and serious player on the GLOBAL Stage (after the trashing of Brexit and Boris Johnson) The opportunity to resume serious relations with Europe, talking yo them rather than shouting insults at them
An INCREASE in defence spending back to Pre Tory slashing and gutting
Domestically
The creation of a coherent path to Net Zero and dramatic increase in Renewable Energy provision Billions in green energy commitments (25+% of homes worth so far - biggest push ever) towards energy independence and emissions reductions. • 8.3B for gb energy, nuclear commitments, 12 mill + homes of off shore wind. Millions of homes in solar energy. • 3 new national forests in development (first for 30 years). • 15 billion in grants for UK homes to improve energy efficiency and generation Cracking down on No Fault Evition via Renters Right Act Cutting NHS Waiting lists to lowest levels in a decade and re-investment in furture medicines and development of cures The reduction in Illegal MIgration starting to take place after a number of new initiatives Slow but necessary revision of Planning laws Significant expansion of free school meals/breakfasts. • Investment focused on infrastructure and growth industries, large public sector pay rises. • significant external revenue generated for tech, fintech, other growth industries. • 104 billion of private investment secured for water infrastructure, 9 new reservoirs currently planned/under construction. • £38 bill for school and hospital repairs. Sunak approved a quarter of what was requested, this is comprehensive. • ban ticket resales above face value. • knocked £100+ off average energy bill (2025 budget) • 38 bill for nuclear energy. More for small reactors. • LDES battery technology research push, huge capacity increase. -hereditary peers bill • priority access for UK medical graduates.
A case of a PM who should be measured in 5 years time.
Politically nieve Communications CRAP
If any of that was true Starmer would not be about to resign alongside the recent resignations of his health and defence secretaries
It sounds like the last pleading of a failed political career
Two flawed assumptions there, Big G.
One is that politicians do well by doing the right thing for the future of the country. All the evidence is that that's not the case. On your calculus, Thatcher should have been a footnote, forced out in 1981.
The other is that you know enough of other avatars' inner lives and motivations to tell them why they think what they do. You don't, none of us do. I'm not trying to censor you, but I'd hope you're a better man than that.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Was he upset at the spelling mistake?
It’s the Italian. I can’t imagine you making that joke if it was an Islamist attack on white people.
Why not? I joke about all kinds of shit. I’m the son of a policeman, after all. If you want to call me a racist have the balls to do it.
Met Office is saying 39 here next week. I wonder if there’s a chance we break the 40 degree record of 2022
Met saying 38 and 37 here on Tuesday and Wednesday, but Beeb saying 34 and 35 for the same days.
Matthew Todd 🌏🔥 @MrMatthewTodd · 54m This would obliterate the UK temperature record for the month of June which currently stands at 35.6C set in 1976.
No, they aren't. For their official forecasts they use a combination of various models including the Met Office and ECMWF.
Their app on the other hand might well be automated from the GFS model and therefore a bit rubbish. The BBC app has always been rubbish whether Met Office or not.
Most models are now going for 38C+ in the south for Tues-Thurs, and some truly horrible nights with Cornwall registering a 29C overnight minimum on one run.
I expect the weather warning will be upgraded to Red unless those forecasts change.
Remember, the June record is "only" 35.6C. The UK statistical max is in mid July.
The government is going to have to rethink its stance on air conditioning (and other adaptations) fast, as this has ceased to be funny and/or within any sort of expected deviation from the norm.
Yes, this could be accelerating quite a bit faster than expected. Obviously it could still just be “weather”, just some statistical noise, but the chance of that in successive years in diminishing fast.
When we talk about climate change we should be talking about the balance of mitigation (reducing emissions), adaptation, and residual damage. We spend far too much time on the first of the three, important as it is.
Simple stuff like street trees, gardens, shutters etc are going to more and more important too - we need to learn from the continent.
I think it's a false dichotomy. You can mitigate and adapt. Doing one does not prevent the other.
There is a reason to concentrate on mitigation, though. In order to adapt to global warming it helps to know what you are adapting to. One of the main sources of uncertainty is how much fossil fuels are burned. So it makes a lot of sense to resolve that uncertainty as much in our favour as possible.
That’s true - you’re trying to identify the optimal balance between the three and then the optimal amount to intervene.
Mitigation is by far the most efficient way to do it but a lot of it is already baked in and we’re struggling to persuade other countries to take it seriously - hence my cold calculation that we need to think more about adaptation. This is where the discount rates used by the Treasury start to cause serious harm - they place very little value on costs in 50 years time, even though someone like me will be living through that.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Was he upset at the spelling mistake?
It’s the Italian. I can’t imagine you making that joke if it was an Islamist attack on white people.
I’m just worried about reprisals against the Scottish native community
I’m disappointed that the change of PM won’t be to Angela Rayner.
If Josh Simon’s hadn’t of stood down then it’s possible that she would have been the first woman Labour PM . I expect she’ll get a good role in the new cabinet and you never know with our current churn of PMs might still end up getting the top job !
I’m disappointed that the change of PM won’t be to Angela Rayner.
If Josh Simon’s hadn’t of stood down then it’s possible that she would have been the first woman Labour PM . I expect she’ll get a good role in the new cabinet and you never know with our current churn of PMs might still end up getting the top job !
Of course Starmers genuinely laudible achievements are lost in the usual vaccum of right wing lies, tropes and disinformation. The scripts written in advance bearing no basis on fact.
The LOWEST Tariffs on the Planet granted by Trump, NOT getting involved in Trump wars which Farage and Badenoch would now have us in the midst of!
The RETURN of the UK as a trusted and serious player on the GLOBAL Stage (after the trashing of Brexit and Boris Johnson) The opportunity to resume serious relations with Europe, talking yo them rather than shouting insults at them
An INCREASE in defence spending back to Pre Tory slashing and gutting
Domestically
The creation of a coherent path to Net Zero and dramatic increase in Renewable Energy provision Billions in green energy commitments (25+% of homes worth so far - biggest push ever) towards energy independence and emissions reductions. • 8.3B for gb energy, nuclear commitments, 12 mill + homes of off shore wind. Millions of homes in solar energy. • 3 new national forests in development (first for 30 years). • 15 billion in grants for UK homes to improve energy efficiency and generation Cracking down on No Fault Evition via Renters Right Act Cutting NHS Waiting lists to lowest levels in a decade and re-investment in furture medicines and development of cures The reduction in Illegal MIgration starting to take place after a number of new initiatives Slow but necessary revision of Planning laws Significant expansion of free school meals/breakfasts. • Investment focused on infrastructure and growth industries, large public sector pay rises. • significant external revenue generated for tech, fintech, other growth industries. • 104 billion of private investment secured for water infrastructure, 9 new reservoirs currently planned/under construction. • £38 bill for school and hospital repairs. Sunak approved a quarter of what was requested, this is comprehensive. • ban ticket resales above face value. • knocked £100+ off average energy bill (2025 budget) • 38 bill for nuclear energy. More for small reactors. • LDES battery technology research push, huge capacity increase. -hereditary peers bill • priority access for UK medical graduates.
A case of a PM who should be measured in 5 years time.
Politically nieve Communications CRAP
If any of that was true Starmer would not be about to resign alongside the recent resignations of his health and defence secretaries
It sounds like the last pleading of a failed political career
I don't normally pay too much attention to his posts, but on this occasion he's right.
I really fear what a Burnham government is going to look like. He's totally vapid and appears to have done no thinking about the hard choices that will need to be made. I hope I'm wrong and that, to coin a phrase, Burnham surprises on the upside.
It has to be the absolute peak of Trump Derangement Syndrome, that people are now vandalising national monuments in Washington because they don’t like the man in the big White House who’s trying to clean up the city for the 250th celebrations, egged on by a mainstream media who think that it’s the biggest news story in the world this week.
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Was he upset at the spelling mistake?
It’s the Italian. I can’t imagine you making that joke if it was an Islamist attack on white people.
Why not? I joke about all kinds of shit. I’m the son of a policeman, after all. If you want to call me a racist have the balls to do it.
How many jokes did you make about the Golders Green attack?
Of course Starmers genuinely laudible achievements are lost in the usual vaccum of right wing lies, tropes and disinformation. The scripts written in advance bearing no basis on fact.
The LOWEST Tariffs on the Planet granted by Trump, NOT getting involved in Trump wars which Farage and Badenoch would now have us in the midst of!
The RETURN of the UK as a trusted and serious player on the GLOBAL Stage (after the trashing of Brexit and Boris Johnson) The opportunity to resume serious relations with Europe, talking yo them rather than shouting insults at them
An INCREASE in defence spending back to Pre Tory slashing and gutting
Domestically
The creation of a coherent path to Net Zero and dramatic increase in Renewable Energy provision Billions in green energy commitments (25+% of homes worth so far - biggest push ever) towards energy independence and emissions reductions. • 8.3B for gb energy, nuclear commitments, 12 mill + homes of off shore wind. Millions of homes in solar energy. • 3 new national forests in development (first for 30 years). • 15 billion in grants for UK homes to improve energy efficiency and generation Cracking down on No Fault Evition via Renters Right Act Cutting NHS Waiting lists to lowest levels in a decade and re-investment in furture medicines and development of cures The reduction in Illegal MIgration starting to take place after a number of new initiatives Slow but necessary revision of Planning laws Significant expansion of free school meals/breakfasts. • Investment focused on infrastructure and growth industries, large public sector pay rises. • significant external revenue generated for tech, fintech, other growth industries. • 104 billion of private investment secured for water infrastructure, 9 new reservoirs currently planned/under construction. • £38 bill for school and hospital repairs. Sunak approved a quarter of what was requested, this is comprehensive. • ban ticket resales above face value. • knocked £100+ off average energy bill (2025 budget) • 38 bill for nuclear energy. More for small reactors. • LDES battery technology research push, huge capacity increase. -hereditary peers bill • priority access for UK medical graduates.
A case of a PM who should be measured in 5 years time.
Politically nieve Communications CRAP
If any of that was true Starmer would not be about to resign alongside the recent resignations of his health and defence secretaries
It sounds like the last pleading of a failed political career
I don't normally pay too much attention to his posts, but on this occasion he's right.
I really fear what a Burnham government is going to look like. He's totally vapid and appears to have done no thinking about the hard choices that will need to be made. I hope I'm wrong and that, to coin a phrase, Burnham surprises on the upside.
it doesn't look good that his number 1 cheerleader appears to be the cabinet minister who was given the heave-ho for hiding the fact she had a conviction for expense fraud
Feels very odd that there was a rampaging terror attack less than a mile away from me and life just sort of trundles along, barely troubling the news. He tried to murder the folk working at Origano (fantastic pizza, strongly recommend).
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
Was he upset at the spelling mistake?
It’s the Italian. I can’t imagine you making that joke if it was an Islamist attack on white people.
They wouldn't have made the joke, and that they did does illustrate the point you are making about different standards of victims.
It has to be the absolute peak of Trump Derangement Syndrome, that people are now vandalising national monuments in Washington because they don’t like the man in the big White House, egged on by a mainstream media who think that it’s the biggest news story in the world this week.
I think the vandalism was done by Trump tbh. Not really a reflecting pool anymore, more a swamp.
Of course Starmers genuinely laudible achievements are lost in the usual vaccum of right wing lies, tropes and disinformation. The scripts written in advance bearing no basis on fact.
The LOWEST Tariffs on the Planet granted by Trump, NOT getting involved in Trump wars which Farage and Badenoch would now have us in the midst of!
The RETURN of the UK as a trusted and serious player on the GLOBAL Stage (after the trashing of Brexit and Boris Johnson) The opportunity to resume serious relations with Europe, talking yo them rather than shouting insults at them
An INCREASE in defence spending back to Pre Tory slashing and gutting
Domestically
The creation of a coherent path to Net Zero and dramatic increase in Renewable Energy provision Billions in green energy commitments (25+% of homes worth so far - biggest push ever) towards energy independence and emissions reductions. • 8.3B for gb energy, nuclear commitments, 12 mill + homes of off shore wind. Millions of homes in solar energy. • 3 new national forests in development (first for 30 years). • 15 billion in grants for UK homes to improve energy efficiency and generation Cracking down on No Fault Evition via Renters Right Act Cutting NHS Waiting lists to lowest levels in a decade and re-investment in furture medicines and development of cures The reduction in Illegal MIgration starting to take place after a number of new initiatives Slow but necessary revision of Planning laws Significant expansion of free school meals/breakfasts. • Investment focused on infrastructure and growth industries, large public sector pay rises. • significant external revenue generated for tech, fintech, other growth industries. • 104 billion of private investment secured for water infrastructure, 9 new reservoirs currently planned/under construction. • £38 bill for school and hospital repairs. Sunak approved a quarter of what was requested, this is comprehensive. • ban ticket resales above face value. • knocked £100+ off average energy bill (2025 budget) • 38 bill for nuclear energy. More for small reactors. • LDES battery technology research push, huge capacity increase. -hereditary peers bill • priority access for UK medical graduates.
A case of a PM who should be measured in 5 years time.
Politically nieve Communications CRAP
If any of that was true Starmer would not be about to resign alongside the recent resignations of his health and defence secretaries
It sounds like the last pleading of a failed political career
I don't normally pay too much attention to his posts, but on this occasion he's right.
I really fear what a Burnham government is going to look like. He's totally vapid and appears to have done no thinking about the hard choices that will need to be made. I hope I'm wrong and that, to coin a phrase, Burnham surprises on the upside.
It has to be the absolute peak of Trump Derangement Syndrome, that people are now vandalising national monuments in Washington because they don’t like the man in the big White House, egged on by a mainstream media who think that it’s the biggest news story in the world this week.
The person who vandalised the relecting pool was Trumps mate who was given the contract.
The only vehicular route in and out of Crimea is now the Kerch Bridge, which has for some time been closed to heavy traffic. They’ve stopped private fuel sales on the island, and across Russia in general fuel logistics is showing signs of breaking down completely.
Another good day for Ukraine, at the end of a very good week.
They are massacred and you don't even see a Ukrainian defender in any of the images. Warfare has really changed out of all recognition and the way the Russians are still trying to fight is doomed.
Of course Starmers genuinely laudible achievements are lost in the usual vaccum of right wing lies, tropes and disinformation. The scripts written in advance bearing no basis on fact.
The LOWEST Tariffs on the Planet granted by Trump, NOT getting involved in Trump wars which Farage and Badenoch would now have us in the midst of!
The RETURN of the UK as a trusted and serious player on the GLOBAL Stage (after the trashing of Brexit and Boris Johnson) The opportunity to resume serious relations with Europe, talking yo them rather than shouting insults at them
An INCREASE in defence spending back to Pre Tory slashing and gutting
Domestically
The creation of a coherent path to Net Zero and dramatic increase in Renewable Energy provision Billions in green energy commitments (25+% of homes worth so far - biggest push ever) towards energy independence and emissions reductions. • 8.3B for gb energy, nuclear commitments, 12 mill + homes of off shore wind. Millions of homes in solar energy. • 3 new national forests in development (first for 30 years). • 15 billion in grants for UK homes to improve energy efficiency and generation Cracking down on No Fault Evition via Renters Right Act Cutting NHS Waiting lists to lowest levels in a decade and re-investment in furture medicines and development of cures The reduction in Illegal MIgration starting to take place after a number of new initiatives Slow but necessary revision of Planning laws Significant expansion of free school meals/breakfasts. • Investment focused on infrastructure and growth industries, large public sector pay rises. • significant external revenue generated for tech, fintech, other growth industries. • 104 billion of private investment secured for water infrastructure, 9 new reservoirs currently planned/under construction. • £38 bill for school and hospital repairs. Sunak approved a quarter of what was requested, this is comprehensive. • ban ticket resales above face value. • knocked £100+ off average energy bill (2025 budget) • 38 bill for nuclear energy. More for small reactors. • LDES battery technology research push, huge capacity increase. -hereditary peers bill • priority access for UK medical graduates.
A case of a PM who should be measured in 5 years time.
Politically nieve Communications CRAP
While this may be true and most of it was good. The problem was the tone. The triangulation towards the racists. The support for a genocide, the disregard for justice.
Nevertheless I feel the approach SKS has taken has not gelled. The Environment Agency has been unsupported. Privatisation of water is clearly required. National Parks 11% funding cut fixed for five years.
Local Councils are seeing more cuts. And LGR is led by the urge to control from the centre. Local Mayors? Like why?
The planning and infrastructure bill seriously undermines local democratic oversight of development. The rules include being able to build anywhere including ancient woodland for a fee. Newts are not our enemy. That may have been mainly A Rayner, but still…
The blocking of the introduction of Swift Bricks showed utter disregard for small towns and a 60 million year old presence in our skies.
These things matter to middle Britain and Starmer in all his arrogance has not listened. The feeling the Mc Sweeny was shitting on our environment to teach us a lesson. . .
Comments
Why are we expecting Burnham to go all Liz Truss on us?
I mean, I know about his sexual depravity, but so far as I know Hitler was never accused of raping twelve year old girls.
So is Burnham going to hit the ground running with fully evaluated policies like Starmer? He's had at least a few weeks to think some up.
Capitalism allied to natural monopolies is not a natural state of affairs.
(My second attempt at entering this comment, the first was just swallowed, apparently.)
Capitalism does indeed work, for the holders of capital, but that's meaningless as far as the operation of an essential monopoly public utility is concerned.
Competition tends to mitigate the malign effects of capitalism, and drive its beneficial effects, but there is no such thing as competition here.
When we talk about climate change we should be talking about the balance of mitigation (reducing emissions), adaptation, and residual damage. We spend far too much time on the first of the three, important as it is.
Simple stuff like street trees, gardens, shutters etc are going to more and more important too - we need to learn from the continent.
Two-thirds of EU citizens back UK rejoining bloc, survey finds
Even voters for far-right and Eurosceptic parties back closer relations, polling says
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/jun/21/two-thirds-eu-citizens-back-uk-rejoining-bloc-brexit-survey
The comparison one might make, from the US rather than anything happening in the UK, would be with the way that the politicisation of the supreme court(s) coupled with the misuse of presidential immunity, some of the electoral malpractice, and the politically motivated legal cases taken out against perceived enemies at home and abroad, does allow a malign president like Trump to protect both himself and supporters right down to some of the January 6 thugs from what are supposed to be their legal/political system's constraints and balances, and abuse his position to try and silence or neuter his opponents.
Then Rishi called an election early and SKS arrived in No 10 as a startled bunny with no plans
Personally, I'm more concerned with him throwing the technologically deficient authoritarianism in the bin.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geli_Raubal#:~:text=He departed for a meeting,She was 23.
But if we want a really sexually depraved dictator to compare Trump to, Stalin would be better.
If for some reason the new owners of Thames Water were to decide to use it for selling candyfloss at fairgrounds rather than supplying water, then the government (via the water regulator) would need to step in.
However, it's vanishingly unlikely that the government would need to do this, as they have a business that is currently making loads of money supplying water. If the owners fancy trying their hand at the candyfloss trade, they'd be very unlikely to abandon supplying water at a profit in order to focus their energies on the candyfloss.
The only problem with the Thames Water business is the debt with which it's been loaded. A conventional going bust and selling off the viable business underneath, minus it's unplayable debt doesn't require the government to get involved.
The latest temperature forecast for London appears to peak on Wednesday afternoon at 36C+, whereas here on the south coast it looks like Thursday late afternoon will be the hottest at 26C; living by the sea does have some compensation to offset the occasional fog and frequent wind (- that said, I see the 1976 June record we're batting at was set in Southampton!). I'm surprised the Cornwall forecasts are as high as that, when even London is forecast to drop down to no more than 24C by dawn?
Gordon Brown: 3 years
David Cameron: 6 but only 1 year outside the coalition
Theresa May: 3 years
Boris Johnson: 3 years
Liz Truss: 7 weeks
Rishi Sunak: 2 years
May, Starmer, Sunak, (big gap) Johnson, (huge gap) Truss.
Johnson brought disgrace on the office and Truss was mad. The other three just weren't up to it.
(The interesting one is Cameron- he wasn't stupid, but he shared some properties of the stupid-diligent corner of the military officer classification. He calmly and effectively did a lot of things that have turned out to be disastrous.)
As for Burnham, one of his bits of people-pleasing has been to implicitly promise to depose Starmer right now- even though he's absurdly underprepared for the role he's about to take on. Health Sec and Manchester Mayor is an incredibly thin CV for the job he's up for, and none of us have a damn clue what he's going to do, except please everyone.
Unanimously they said they didn't understand why Starmer was resigning, or how Burnham would be any better.
I'll admit to a small amount of blind optimism that the change allows a reset and more of a long-term plan. Call it hopium if you're that way inclined. The problem with change, though, is it can make things worse rather than better, and I see zero evidence that Burnham has a long term plan that will navigate the choppy waters of our economy with anything like the nuance required.
I’m just glad he didn’t do something really dreadful like put a t-shirt on, or block a street off for an hour or two.
PE have found their way to maximise their take, they're not going to give up on it.
As to anyone else being better.......
The debate generally says: Starmer is useless in that the public won't vote Labour under him.
There is no reason to think Burnham would be better.
The only people with both power over the matter and personal careers at stake are 400 Labour MPs. They want to keep their seat, and to win the next election. Have they, between them come up with a better idea than Burnham, and if so, what?
All politics is relative.
Who to belive?
Burnham is, by comparison, untainted. Absolutely he has no long term plan, but look at his ratings in Manchester. Makerfield should not have been winnable given the locals a month before. That popularity may not translate nationally, or may go south (pun intended) rapidly, but they are, in context, currently remarkable for any politician. That’s all there is to it. No one sees him as “the Holy Grail” but they do see someone whose brand is not a net negative, and did not serve in the Starmer cabinet, so to that extent they are correct.
The issues are complex. The highest risk factor for neonatal death is prematurity with 77% of infants born before 24 weeks dying, but the other major risk factors are ethnicity, social deprivation and mothers under 20 or over 40.
My own Trust is one of the 14 in the national enquiry, selected as the rate in Leicester is the second highest in the country, after Birmingham.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/14-nhs-trusts-the-focus-of-national-maternity-investigation
However, when you look a little closer there is something striking. The rate for the County of Leics is bang on the national average. Both City and County are served by the same two maternity units, with the same staff, same leadership and same intensity of work. So why the difference?
https://cabinet.leicester.gov.uk/documents/s171009/Scrutiny Report IM April 2026 v3.pdf
To get back to the thread topic, one of the things Starmer has not done well is to flag up efforts to improve standards of services and reduce . These are genuine, and well under way and could go a long way to improve lives in the neglected parts of the country. Real levelling up.
Burnham has shown in Manchester that he gets this, and part of getting a country to feel good about itself again, and to feel united is about these things, not just NHS, but also education, public spaces, public transport, policing. Lets see how he does.
Sure, money is tight and always will be in government hemmed in by demographics, legacy institutions and shibboliths like the Triple lock, but a lot can be done in low cost areas by showing a clear sense of direction backed by genuine concern to improve lives.
Will Burnham be better at this? Almost certainly, and he is far and away the best of the candidates to attempt a turnaround.
I don't think I will be voting Labour, but I do wish him the best of luck. He will need it.
And then there's all the unexploded bombs Rishi left round the place. Which is why he's bottom of my ordering May, Starmer and Sunak.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-uEx_hEXAM
I got on at 42 so considering whether I should trade out
There is a reason to concentrate on mitigation, though. In order to adapt to global warming it helps to know what you are adapting to. One of the main sources of uncertainty is how much fossil fuels are burned. So it makes a lot of sense to resolve that uncertainty as much in our favour as possible.
The LOWEST Tariffs on the Planet granted by Trump, NOT getting involved in Trump wars which Farage and Badenoch would now have us in the midst of!
The RETURN of the UK as a trusted and serious player on the GLOBAL Stage (after the trashing of Brexit and Boris Johnson)
The opportunity to resume serious relations with Europe, talking yo them rather than shouting insults at them
An INCREASE in defence spending back to Pre Tory slashing and gutting
Domestically
The creation of a coherent path to Net Zero and dramatic increase in Renewable Energy provision
Billions in green energy commitments (25+% of homes worth so far - biggest push ever) towards energy independence and emissions reductions. • 8.3B for gb energy, nuclear commitments, 12 mill + homes of off shore wind. Millions of homes in solar energy. • 3 new national forests in development (first for 30 years). • 15 billion in grants for UK homes to improve energy efficiency and generation
Cracking down on No Fault Evition via Renters Right Act
Cutting NHS Waiting lists to lowest levels in a decade and re-investment in furture medicines and development of cures
The reduction in Illegal MIgration starting to take place after a number of new initiatives
Slow but necessary revision of Planning laws
Significant expansion of free school meals/breakfasts. • Investment focused on infrastructure and growth industries, large public sector pay rises. • significant external revenue generated for tech, fintech, other growth industries. • 104 billion of private investment secured for water infrastructure, 9 new reservoirs currently planned/under construction. • £38 bill for school and hospital repairs. Sunak approved a quarter of what was requested, this is comprehensive. • ban ticket resales above face value. • knocked £100+ off average energy bill (2025 budget) • 38 bill for nuclear energy. More for small reactors. • LDES battery technology research push, huge capacity increase. -hereditary peers bill • priority access for UK medical graduates.
A case of a PM who should be measured in 5 years time.
Politically nieve
Communications CRAP
It sounds like the last pleading of a failed political career
Maddeningly, I had to return to the Department. Meetings, and an official lunch. Scandinavians.
‘I assume that there is no likelihood of Mrs Thatcher being defeated for the position of Prime Minister?’
‘Oh no. None whatsoever. It’s just one of these quaint traditions we have in the Conservative Party.'
But the encounter made me realise the enormity of what we’re doing- changing the Prime Minister- but without any electoral authority to do so.
https://x.com/SethAbramson/status/2068498088038109366
More terrorism
https://x.com/yoursouthend/status/2068333714719817865?s=46&t=d8CnRhyZJ-m4vy0k55W8XQ
It was a horrible and an unacceptable attack on innocent Muslims
https://news.sky.com/story/counter-terror-police-investigating-violent-attacks-in-edinburgh-13556144
One is that politicians do well by doing the right thing for the future of the country. All the evidence is that that's not the case. On your calculus, Thatcher should have been a footnote, forced out in 1981.
The other is that you know enough of other avatars' inner lives and motivations to tell them why they think what they do. You don't, none of us do. I'm not trying to censor you, but I'd hope you're a better man than that.
https://x.com/wartranslated/status/2068592267858706891
The only vehicular route in and out of Crimea is now the Kerch Bridge, which has for some time been closed to heavy traffic. They’ve stopped private fuel sales on the island, and across Russia in general fuel logistics is showing signs of breaking down completely.
Another good day for Ukraine, at the end of a very good week.
I used to sous vide fish but results of pan frying are usually just better. That said, the Fat Duck sous vide liquorice salmon was delicious and looked beautiful, and I do sometimes sous vide cod fillets.
I also cook the insides of an individual venison suet pudding sous vide because that's how it was done by the person who gave me the recipe; not entirely necessary for "at home" but...
And it's great for tougher steak cuts to deliver *more* flavour.
ETA: and infusing things sous vide adds bags of flavour (hoho) e.g. alcohol into fruit, herb oils, and it is *the best* way to cook rhubarb.
It is what it is
Mitigation is by far the most efficient way to do it but a lot of it is already baked in and we’re struggling to persuade other countries to take it seriously - hence my cold calculation that we need to think more about adaptation. This is where the discount rates used by the Treasury start to cause serious harm - they place very little value on costs in 50 years time, even though someone like me will be living through that.
"Who became PM after the 2024 general election?"
"Andy Burnham"
"Wrong, it was Keir Starmer".
I think that says a lot about why he failed.
he bought a pool full of magic blue water
If Josh Simon’s hadn’t of stood down then it’s possible that she would have been the first woman Labour PM . I expect she’ll get a good role in the new cabinet and you never know with our current churn of PMs might still end up getting the top job !
If Josh Simon’s hadn’t of stood down then it’s possible that she would have been the first woman Labour PM . I expect she’ll get a good role in the new cabinet and you never know with our current churn of PMs might still end up getting the top job !
I really fear what a Burnham government is going to look like. He's totally vapid and appears to have done no thinking about the hard choices that will need to be made. I hope I'm wrong and that, to coin a phrase, Burnham surprises on the upside.
However origano is the correct Italian spelling.
Team Algae are just taking the Mickey.
https://bsky.app/profile/iwillnotbesilenced.bsky.social/post/3mopjywyhf226
They are massacred and you don't even see a Ukrainian defender in any of the images. Warfare has really changed out of all recognition and the way the Russians are still trying to fight is doomed.
Nevertheless I feel the approach SKS has taken has not gelled. The Environment Agency has been unsupported. Privatisation of water is clearly required. National Parks 11% funding cut fixed for five years.
Local Councils are seeing more cuts. And LGR is led by the urge to control from the centre. Local Mayors? Like why?
The planning and infrastructure bill seriously undermines local democratic oversight of development. The rules include being able to build anywhere including ancient woodland for a fee. Newts are not our enemy. That may have been mainly A Rayner, but still…
The blocking of the introduction of Swift Bricks showed utter disregard for small towns and a 60 million year old presence in our skies.
These things matter to middle Britain and Starmer in all his arrogance has not listened. The feeling the Mc Sweeny was shitting on our environment to teach us a lesson. . .
I mean. Starmer was there at the centre of this.
Good fucking riddance.