Stop voting for fucking Tories

[Insane_Homer]

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... rland-race?

At least 57 people fell ill with sickness and diarrhoea after competing in sea swimming events at the World Triathlon Championship Series in Sunderland, health officials confirmed this weekend.

About 2,000 people participated in the events last weekend, which included a swim off Sunderland’s blue flag Roker beach. The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said it would be testing samples from those who were ill to establish the cause of the illness and any common pathogens.

[tabascoboy]

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... rland-race?

At least 57 people fell ill with sickness and diarrhoea after competing in sea swimming events at the World Triathlon Championship Series in Sunderland, health officials confirmed this weekend.

About 2,000 people participated in the events last weekend, which included a swim off Sunderland’s blue flag Roker beach. The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said it would be testing samples from those who were ill to establish the cause of the illness and any common pathogens.

Snowflakes!

[Rhubarb & Custard]

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... rland-race?

At least 57 people fell ill with sickness and diarrhoea after competing in sea swimming events at the World Triathlon Championship Series in Sunderland, health officials confirmed this weekend.

About 2,000 people participated in the events last weekend, which included a swim off Sunderland’s blue flag Roker beach. The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said it would be testing samples from those who were ill to establish the cause of the illness and any common pathogens.

Snowflakes!

And to add to that if one goes back to 60s just how many people were complaining about domestic violence and racism. These problems aren't worse now, it's just more people complain about them!

I would observe again they promised better standards post Brexit, but there's little point, they've no shame and less mental acuity

[Insane_Homer]

I approve of this message

Screenshot_20230806-102556.png (587.45 KiB) Viewed 1501 times

[Flockwitt]

I see the UK has had to effectively drop it's own standards mark the UKCA and accept European standards, the CE mark.

(another shower of posturing shite that's simply cause a bucket load of expenses which is now cash flushed down the dunny)

[Line6 HXFX]

You know in 5 years the tories will be back in, after Labour has failed miserably to unscramble the egg of fuck the tories have left them with..
The tories are desperate to go into opposition, and they and their media are ready to hit the ground running, and bombard the airwaves with every miserable conspiracy, and anti woke bullshit they can generate.
There is a very successful well worn route back into power...and it involves British Glenn Becks, of which there are many.
I remember when Obama got in and it was startling just the sheer amount of crazy shit the right was ready to go with, and came out with.

Brexit voters will lap it up.

[Insane_Homer]

Snowflakes!

Hazzar! Let's go back to the 60s and 70s, wholesale. when the top tax rates for the rich were over 83%

And rail, mail, water, utilities were publicly owned.

Selective memory cunts

[Rhubarb & Custard]

Hazzar! Let's go back to the 60s and 70s, wholesale. when the top tax rates for the rich were over 83%

And rail, mail, water, utilities were publicly owned.

Selective memory cunts

In his defence he's not that interested in most of the policies, he only joined the Tories on hearing they wanted to pawn off the country and everything else has flowed from that initial misunderstanding

[dpedin]

Snowflakes!

Hazzar! Let's go back to the 60s and 70s, wholesale. when the top tax rates for the rich were over 83%

And rail, mail, water, utilities were publicly owned.

Selective memory cunts

I thought he was just after the free internet to connect to porn sites and free House of Commons paper hankies?

[tabascoboy]

Snowflakes!

Hazzar! Let's go back to the 60s and 70s, wholesale. when the top tax rates for the rich were over 83%

And rail, mail, water, utilities were publicly owned.

Selective memory cunts

They'll be campaigning for an overturn on the ban on lead water pipes and in fuel next

[Insane_Homer]

They'll be campaigning for an overturn on the ban on lead water pipes and in fuel next

Nadine Dorries used to suck on the tailpipes of leaded petrol cars when she was young and she turned out just fine

[SaintK]

They only appoint morons to the Home Office
Never heard of this one before but she appears to have caused a bit of havoc on the interview round this morning!!!

[tabascoboy]

All the rush and publicity to get Voter ID in place, meanwhile nearly 2 years ago and taken 9 months to be made public... not specifically a Tory fail but still happened on their watch

Cyber-attack on UK's electoral registers revealed

The UK's elections watchdog has revealed it has been the victim of a "complex cyber-attack" potentially affecting millions of voters. The Electoral Commission said unspecified "hostile actors" had managed to gain access to copies of the electoral registers, from August 2021. Hackers also broke into its emails and "control systems" but the attack was not discovered until October last year.

The watchdog has warned people to watch out for unauthorised use of their data.

In a public notice, the commission said hackers accessed copies of the registers it was holding for research purposes, and for conducting checks on political donors. Chief executive officer Shaun McNally said the commission knew which of its systems were accessible to the hackers, but could not "conclusively" identify which files may have been accessed. The watchdog said the information it held at the time of the attack included the names and addresses of people in the UK who registered to vote between 2014 and 2022.

This includes those who opted to keep their details off the open register - which is not accessible to the public but can be purchased, for example by credit reference agencies.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-66441010

[_Os_]

Change the names and this story about Tory corruption could be from South Africa.

In SA the word for this is "tenderpreneur". A tenderpreneur is someone that secures a lucrative government contract (usually at local/provincial level), using their connections to avoid audit processes (everyone involved is ANC), the contract is often wildly inflated in value. The tenderpreneur then takes all the money and uses it to fund their lifestyle. If the residents are lucky the tenderpreneur may subcontract the work they should be doing at market rate (usually to a white owned company that other than the corruption, couldn't even bid on the contract because they're white). Because ANC heartlands vote for these guys, they don't get new houses for the poor or new power/water infrastructure, instead someone owns a supercar.

Now over to the Tory heartland of Essex, and Thurrock:
https://metro.co.uk/2023/08/01/thurrock ... -19226332/

Thurrock's Tory controlled council gives someone described as a "tycoon" £655m, in the hope a complex financial structure (alarm bells should be going off) would yield Thurrock Council interest payments from the "tycoon's" solar farm. The "tycoon" uses it to buy a £12m private jet, £2m Bugatti supercar, £16m yacht, £1m diamond-encrusted watch. £40m went into a bank account called "other". The "tycoon's" solar farm company turns out to have an inflated value, it gets wound up and Thurrock Council loses everything. The "tycoon" states in one leaked email "These funds… will be used to create a new family investment office and to create wealth for years to come. This has always been my plan". The "tycoon" now no longer lives in the UK (of course). Combined with other "failed investments" Thurrock rate payers are now left paying off Thurrock Council's £1.3b debt, about £6500 per man/woman/child, and Thurrock Council is bankrupt.

In the May council elections, the Tory seat count in Thurrock went down by 2 overall, they won 4 seats and were a close second in about 6 more. The Tories maintained control of the council, still run it now with an absolute majority.

[Lobby]

They'll be campaigning for an overturn on the ban on lead water pipes and in fuel next

Nadine Dorries used to suck on the tailpipes of leaded petrol cars when she was young and she turned out just fine

Now she just sucks on the pipe of ex prime ministers

[sockwithaticket]

Change the names and this story about Tory corruption could be from South Africa.

In SA the word for this is "tenderpreneur". A tenderpreneur is someone that secures a lucrative government contract (usually at local/provincial level), using their connections to avoid audit processes (everyone involved is ANC), the contract is often wildly inflated in value. The tenderpreneur then takes all the money and uses it to fund their lifestyle. If the residents are lucky the tenderpreneur may subcontract the work they should be doing at market rate (usually to a white owned company that other than the corruption, couldn't even bid on the contract because they're white). Because ANC heartlands vote for these guys, they don't get new houses for the poor or new power/water infrastructure, instead someone owns a supercar.

Now over to the Tory heartland of Essex, and Thurrock:
https://metro.co.uk/2023/08/01/thurrock ... -19226332/

Thurrock's Tory controlled council gives someone described as a "tycoon" £655m, in the hope a complex financial structure (alarm bells should be going off) would yield Thurrock Council interest payments from the "tycoon's" solar farm. The "tycoon" uses it to buy a £12m private jet, £2m Bugatti supercar, £16m yacht, £1m diamond-encrusted watch. £40m went into a bank account called "other". The "tycoon's" solar farm company turns out to have an inflated value, it gets wound up and Thurrock Council loses everything. The "tycoon" states in one leaked email "These funds… will be used to create a new family investment office and to create wealth for years to come. This has always been my plan". The "tycoon" now no longer lives in the UK (of course). Combined with other "failed investments" Thurrock rate payers are now left paying off Thurrock Council's £1.3b debt, about £6500 per man/woman/child, and Thurrock Council is bankrupt.

In the May council elections, the Tory seat count in Thurrock went down by 2 overall, they won 4 seats and were a close second in about 6 more. The Tories maintained control of the council, still run it now with an absolute majority.

Woking had about the same amount of debt exposed back in June, the vast majority of it run up by the Tory council ousted in last year's elections via commercial investments.

Perhaps I'm ignorant of the role of councils, but what right is it of theirs to be investing council funds in business ventures rather than services? At a time when funding has been slashed and services their communities need are on their knees the money needs to be directed at keeping them afloat, not siphoned off for speculative ventures.

[Insane_Homer]

Zac Goldsmith - who quit the government over its alleged climate change "apathy" - has said he is "very tempted" to back Labour.

The Conservative peer criticised his own party for not having "a clear answer" to what he called the "biggest challenge we've ever faced".

He told the BBC's HARDtalk he was "desperately hoping the Conservative Party comes to its senses."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-66449347

[Dinsdale Piranha]

Change the names and this story about Tory corruption could be from South Africa.

In SA the word for this is "tenderpreneur". A tenderpreneur is someone that secures a lucrative government contract (usually at local/provincial level), using their connections to avoid audit processes (everyone involved is ANC), the contract is often wildly inflated in value. The tenderpreneur then takes all the money and uses it to fund their lifestyle. If the residents are lucky the tenderpreneur may subcontract the work they should be doing at market rate (usually to a white owned company that other than the corruption, couldn't even bid on the contract because they're white). Because ANC heartlands vote for these guys, they don't get new houses for the poor or new power/water infrastructure, instead someone owns a supercar.

Now over to the Tory heartland of Essex, and Thurrock:
https://metro.co.uk/2023/08/01/thurrock ... -19226332/

Thurrock's Tory controlled council gives someone described as a "tycoon" £655m, in the hope a complex financial structure (alarm bells should be going off) would yield Thurrock Council interest payments from the "tycoon's" solar farm. The "tycoon" uses it to buy a £12m private jet, £2m Bugatti supercar, £16m yacht, £1m diamond-encrusted watch. £40m went into a bank account called "other". The "tycoon's" solar farm company turns out to have an inflated value, it gets wound up and Thurrock Council loses everything. The "tycoon" states in one leaked email "These funds… will be used to create a new family investment office and to create wealth for years to come. This has always been my plan". The "tycoon" now no longer lives in the UK (of course). Combined with other "failed investments" Thurrock rate payers are now left paying off Thurrock Council's £1.3b debt, about £6500 per man/woman/child, and Thurrock Council is bankrupt.

In the May council elections, the Tory seat count in Thurrock went down by 2 overall, they won 4 seats and were a close second in about 6 more. The Tories maintained control of the council, still run it now with an absolute majority.

Woking had about the same amount of debt exposed back in June, the vast majority of it run up by the Tory council ousted in last year's elections via commercial investments.

Perhaps I'm ignorant of the role of councils, but what right is it of theirs to be investing council funds in business ventures rather than services? At a time when funding has been slashed and services their communities need are on their knees the money needs to be directed at keeping them afloat, not siphoned off for speculative ventures.

The rules preventing councils investing directly were relaxed a few years ago.

This is a similar issue to what caused the S&L crisis in the USA 30 years ago. Letting people who don't know how to invest do just that.

[Biffer]

Change the names and this story about Tory corruption could be from South Africa.

In SA the word for this is "tenderpreneur". A tenderpreneur is someone that secures a lucrative government contract (usually at local/provincial level), using their connections to avoid audit processes (everyone involved is ANC), the contract is often wildly inflated in value. The tenderpreneur then takes all the money and uses it to fund their lifestyle. If the residents are lucky the tenderpreneur may subcontract the work they should be doing at market rate (usually to a white owned company that other than the corruption, couldn't even bid on the contract because they're white). Because ANC heartlands vote for these guys, they don't get new houses for the poor or new power/water infrastructure, instead someone owns a supercar.

Now over to the Tory heartland of Essex, and Thurrock:
https://metro.co.uk/2023/08/01/thurrock ... -19226332/

Thurrock's Tory controlled council gives someone described as a "tycoon" £655m, in the hope a complex financial structure (alarm bells should be going off) would yield Thurrock Council interest payments from the "tycoon's" solar farm. The "tycoon" uses it to buy a £12m private jet, £2m Bugatti supercar, £16m yacht, £1m diamond-encrusted watch. £40m went into a bank account called "other". The "tycoon's" solar farm company turns out to have an inflated value, it gets wound up and Thurrock Council loses everything. The "tycoon" states in one leaked email "These funds… will be used to create a new family investment office and to create wealth for years to come. This has always been my plan". The "tycoon" now no longer lives in the UK (of course). Combined with other "failed investments" Thurrock rate payers are now left paying off Thurrock Council's £1.3b debt, about £6500 per man/woman/child, and Thurrock Council is bankrupt.

In the May council elections, the Tory seat count in Thurrock went down by 2 overall, they won 4 seats and were a close second in about 6 more. The Tories maintained control of the council, still run it now with an absolute majority.

Woking had about the same amount of debt exposed back in June, the vast majority of it run up by the Tory council ousted in last year's elections via commercial investments.

Perhaps I'm ignorant of the role of councils, but what right is it of theirs to be investing council funds in business ventures rather than services? At a time when funding has been slashed and services their communities need are on their knees the money needs to be directed at keeping them afloat, not siphoned off for speculative ventures.

The rules preventing councils investing directly were relaxed a few years ago.

This is a similar issue to what caused the S&L crisis in the USA 30 years ago. Letting people who don't know how to invest do just that.

And a lot of them are vaguely successful local businessmen who are dyed in the wool tories nd as such think they're business geniuses. Recipe for disaster.

[_Os_]

Woking had about the same amount of debt exposed back in June, the vast majority of it run up by the Tory council ousted in last year's elections via commercial investments.

Perhaps I'm ignorant of the role of councils, but what right is it of theirs to be investing council funds in business ventures rather than services? At a time when funding has been slashed and services their communities need are on their knees the money needs to be directed at keeping them afloat, not siphoned off for speculative ventures.

One of the reasons for including the SA example, was so further comment is legally safer.

In SA corruption at local/provincial level happens through the collusion of ANC politicians and the "businessman", often they're all ANC members and/or they have a social connection, they're related in some way or friends or went to the same school. If there isn't people overriding audit procedures, then large scale corruption becomes very difficult or impossible. There's always an insider in on it, corruption doesn't happen otherwise. Even in a developing country like SA, when the rules are followed considerably less corruption happens. The ANC constantly wages war against their own government's oversight institutions including the judiciary itself, if there's no audit process at all then looting becomes easier. None of this description is particularly controversial, there's countless examples of all of it.

Back to Thurrock, which is definitely nothing like the worst governed parts of SA (for any lawyers, this is meant literally). This from the Metro article I linked:

"Essex County Council issued a report last month which blasted Thurrock Council for its risky investments and inadequate checks.
It also criticised the council’s then chief financial officer – Sean Clark – who also invested council cash in other companies which went bust.
The current Thurrock Council leader, Andrew Jeffries, apologised for ‘the shocking and unacceptable failures’."

The Tories abolished local government's Audit Commission in 2015 as part of austerity. Its functions were transferred variously to the voluntary sector/non-profit sector/private sector. In other words the UK's local government spending oversight institution was killed, so upstanding people like Sean Clark could be empowered. Eric Pickles decided money needed to be saved so got his axe swinging, the Tories thought it would be far better to have a mess of private accounting firms (it's not entirely convincing money is being saved on auditing) than a national state run auditing institution with a pool of expert experience. The Tories were warned by the ACCA (Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) that the private sector couldn't replicate this experience and proficiency, the Tories decided to kill the Audit Commission anyway.

A list of Tory run councils which accumulated £500m+ of debt with little to show for it would be interesting. £1b+ of debt loaded onto some random council with fuck all new infrastructure and no one in jail, is insane.

[Hal Jordan]

Another white turd left by Cameron and Osborne.

[shaggy]

It's was specially Shapps who made it a condition of the post COVID bailout that Boris' ULEZ be expanded

https://t.co/KOwjrAFQbS

As above, you can read those conditions in different ways. If it was clear cut why has this not ever been mentioned by Khan, someone who loves blaming someone else for his decisions.

https://fullfact.org/online/ulez-expansion-letter/

[Insane_Homer]

... and urgently bring forward proposals to widen the scope and levels of these charges, in accordance with the relevant legal powers and decision-making processes.”

Sure reads like Michael Green, aka honest Bob, was dead keen on expansion at the time (probably because they knew it would be unpopular with voters and blame Khan for the implementation). His dept arguing posthumously that greater London was not the entire scope is weak shit.

The point was that Shapps was dead keen on expansion until it became a voting issue a few weeks ago and it was time to anger the hornets to distract from another woeful performance at the ballot box.

[Insane_Homer]

whoopsies

Theresa Villiers: MP failed to declare she owned Shell shares worth £70,000 while working as environment secretary
Theresa Villiers served in Boris Johnson's cabinet as environment secretary from July 2019 until February 2020.

[Biffer]

Yet another good analysis on regional variation.

Taking the GDP per capita for all the regions, nations and largest cities in the UK (19 used, I think Scotland Wales NI London, Southeast, South southwest, East mids, West mids, East, Northeast, Northwest, Birmingham, Manchester Liverpool Leeds, Bristol, Glasgow Edinburgh) only three areas have a gdp per head above the UK average - London, the south east and Edinburgh. If you take out London, GDP per capita falls from about $45k to about $38k. A bigger fall than any comparitor country except France, which is roughly the same if you take out Paris.

A demonstration of just how much our wealth is concentrated in one area. Whether you think that's a bad thing or not probably depends on your politics.

Analysis done by that terrible lefty rag, The Financial Times.

[SaintK]

Haven't seen or heard from this turd of a secretary of state for weeks.

[fishfoodie]

The previous witch in residence in the HO apparently (a) Did such a half-arsed job there, that she didn't notice that a location close to her Constituency, was planned to be used to house asylum seekers, & (b) is now a massive fucking hypocrite for being happy to dump these unfortunate people on barges in Liverpool, but doesn't want them anywhere that might cost her votes !

Wethersfield: Priti Patel accuses government of being 'secretive' over asylum housing plan

Former Home Secretary Dame Priti Patel has accused the government of being "secretive" about plans to house asylum seekers at an ex-RAF base.

The Daily Telegraph has reported there are plans to use the Wethersfield site in Essex for as long as five years.

The MP for nearby Witham said she had repeatedly asked for a timeframe but the Home Office had been "evasive".

The Home Office said military sites provided cheaper and more orderly accommodation than hotels.

However, the plans for the Wethersfield site have been criticised by charities and the local council as inappropriate.

The first group of migrants moved on to the disused RAF base in July.

The Home Office eventually wants to place 1,700 people at the site, which would make it the UK's largest asylum accommodation centre.

In a letter to Home Secretary Suella Braverman and Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick, Dame Priti said no clarity had been provided to her or local partners on how long the Home Office expected to use the site to house asylum seekers.

"Clear answers now need to be provided by the Home Office and the government must be transparent rather than evasive," she wrote. "The lack of clarity has been alarming and staggering."
...

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-66502375

Isn't she MP ?

Would it be wrong of me to hope this site is right on his doorstep ?

[Biffer]

Gillian Keegan, education secretary, when asked to reassure students disappointed with their results, said that no one would care about their results in ten years time.

[petej]

Gillian Keegan, education secretary, when asked to reassure students disappointed with their results, said that no one would care about their results in ten years time.

That is kind of true to be fair.

[Sandstorm]

Gillian Keegan, education secretary, when asked to reassure students disappointed with their results, said that no one would care about their results in ten years time.

That is kind of true to be fair.

True, but he can't say it today in his official capacity.

[David in Gwent]

I like it when people speak the truth, such a rare commodity these days.

[robmatic]

Gillian Keegan, education secretary, when asked to reassure students disappointed with their results, said that no one would care about their results in ten years time.

That is kind of true to be fair.

It's not wrong but the education secretary should probably express it in a different way.

[sockwithaticket]

Grades are mostly falling back to pre-covid levels, which isn't a surprise. I was working at one of the exam boards during the summers of teacher assessed grades in lieu of exams and the amount of inflation that process enabled was absurd. The correction that they attempted to apply was blunt and cackhanded, but it was necessary given how severely schools were boosting grades. However, a fuss was kicked up by some of those caught out and any meaningful attempt to counter grade inflation was abandoned due to the negative press.

[Hal Jordan]

Gillian Keegan, education secretary, when asked to reassure students disappointed with their results, said that no one would care about their results in ten years time.

That is kind of true to be fair.

Except in the context of the immediate action that the students can take, which is the issue at stake.

No, no one is going to care in 10 years time. But UCAS do right now, and so do employers, and that's what the issue is.

[Paddington Bear]

Gillian Keegan, education secretary, when asked to reassure students disappointed with their results, said that no one would care about their results in ten years time.

That is kind of true to be fair.

It's not wrong but the education secretary should probably express it in a different way.

The absolute best thing we could do for most kids is make that clear from about year 9 and massively reduce their stress levels. Probably not as you say the way to do it on results day having hyped up exams for years

[Paddington Bear]

Yet another good analysis on regional variation.

Taking the GDP per capita for all the regions, nations and largest cities in the UK (19 used, I think Scotland Wales NI London, Southeast, South southwest, East mids, West mids, East, Northeast, Northwest, Birmingham, Manchester Liverpool Leeds, Bristol, Glasgow Edinburgh) only three areas have a gdp per head above the UK average - London, the south east and Edinburgh. If you take out London, GDP per capita falls from about $45k to about $38k. A bigger fall than any comparitor country except France, which is roughly the same if you take out Paris.

A demonstration of just how much our wealth is concentrated in one area. Whether you think that's a bad thing or not probably depends on your politics.

Analysis done by that terrible lefty rag, The Financial Times.

Not sure how useful a graph this is. London, SE and Edinburgh combined probably make up over 30% of the population for a start

[Sandstorm]

The absolute best thing we could do for most kids is make that clear from about year 9 and massively reduce their stress levels.

Life is hard until you're 30, kids need to learn that and experience it first hand.

[Paddington Bear]

The absolute best thing we could do for most kids is make that clear from about year 9 and massively reduce their stress levels.

Life is hard until you're 30, kids need to learn that and experience it first hand.

Not sure how relevant this is to my point

[Rhubarb & Custard]

Gillian Keegan, education secretary, when asked to reassure students disappointed with their results, said that no one would care about their results in ten years time.

That is kind of true to be fair.

True, but he can't say it today in his official capacity.

nor she in her. and actually for her it's something she's rather lived

[fishfoodie]

That is kind of true to be fair.

It's not wrong but the education secretary should probably express it in a different way.

The absolute best thing we could do for most kids is make that clear from about year 9 and massively reduce their stress levels. Probably not as you say the way to do it on results day having hyped up exams for years

The obvious response to this from students & parents is;

"if it's irrelevant, then WTF do you put us thru it ?"

To which the only honest answer is that it's the best solution society has found for whittling down the number of people who have an aptitude for study & academic success, & thus who have the best chance of being successful in 3rd level academic education.

Of course once these students graduate 3rd level, they shortly discover that if you want to stay relevant, learning is continuous.