NPR

Hal Jordan wrote: Tue Apr 15, 2025 9:30 am Coal? The 20th Century has been over for a quarter of a century now, coal is thankfully dead in the UK.

Coal for steel, not energy .

Jo Maugham loses yet again and declares himself shocked as he found another barrister who thought he had a good case. What a grifter

Paddington Bear wrote: Wed Apr 16, 2025 3:52 pm Jo Maugham loses yet again and declares himself shocked as he found another barrister who thought he had a good case. What a grifter

I hope he doesn't come across a fox on his way home.

Begbie wrote: Wed Apr 16, 2025 4:37 pm

Paddington Bear wrote: Wed Apr 16, 2025 3:52 pm Jo Maugham loses yet again and declares himself shocked as he found another barrister who thought he had a good case. What a grifter

I hope he doesn't come across a fox on his way home.

Given his record it is a minor miracle that he hit the last fox

Paddington Bear wrote: Wed Apr 16, 2025 4:42 pm

Begbie wrote: Wed Apr 16, 2025 4:37 pm

Paddington Bear wrote: Wed Apr 16, 2025 3:52 pm Jo Maugham loses yet again and declares himself shocked as he found another barrister who thought he had a good case. What a grifter

I hope he doesn't come across a fox on his way home.

Given his record it is a minor miracle that he hit the last fox

Paddington Bear wrote: Wed Apr 16, 2025 3:52 pm Jo Maugham loses yet again and declares himself shocked as he found another barrister who thought he had a good case. What a grifter

I know Guido likes to mock Jolyon Maugham at every possible opportunity, but Maugham wasn't really involved in this case. The case was between For Women Scotland (FWS) and the Scottish Government. A couple of trans lawyers tried to intervene in the case with the backing of Maugham but their application was very quickly rejected in October last year.

In this particular case Maugham's only recent involvement was commenting from the side lines and declaring before the judgement was announced that he was confident that FWS's case would be rejected, only to find that he was completely wrong. You can mock his failure to predict the outcome of this case, but as he wasn't involved, he hasn't actually lost this case.

Lobby wrote: Thu Apr 17, 2025 1:40 pm

Paddington Bear wrote: Wed Apr 16, 2025 3:52 pm Jo Maugham loses yet again and declares himself shocked as he found another barrister who thought he had a good case. What a grifter

I know Guido likes to mock Jolyon Maugham at every possible opportunity, but Maugham wasn't really involved in this case. The case was between For Women Scotland (FWS) and the Scottish Government. A couple of trans lawyers tried to intervene in the case with the backing of Maugham but their application was very quickly rejected in October last year.

In this particular case Maugham's only recent involvement was commenting from the side lines and declaring before the judgement was announced that he was confident that FWS's case would be rejected, only to find that he was completely wrong. You can mock his failure to predict the outcome of this case, but as he wasn't involved, he hasn't actually lost this case.

Fair enough - I’m on holiday and only saw brief bits on twitter (not from Guido), and would be loath to miss an opportunity to take the piss out of a man who sorely deserves it

Pmsl PB

Labour’s great nature sellout is the worst attack on England’s ecosystems I’ve seen in my lifetime
George Monbiot

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ir-starmer

Tichtheid wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 12:49 pm Labour’s great nature sellout is the worst attack on England’s ecosystems I’ve seen in my lifetime
George Monbiot

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ir-starmer

Damn, that's a very poor piece of legislation.

Sandstorm wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 1:17 pm

Tichtheid wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 12:49 pm Labour’s great nature sellout is the worst attack on England’s ecosystems I’ve seen in my lifetime
George Monbiot

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ir-starmer

Damn, that's a very poor piece of legislation.

Std Politics really. Will we win more voters with increased house building, than we lose by pissing off Environmentalists & NIMBYs

Meanwhile the Lib Dems are proposing a fine of £1000 for playing music out loud on public transport, has my vote

Paddington Bear wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 4:28 pm Meanwhile the Lib Dems are proposing a fine of £1000 for playing music out loud on public transport, has my vote

We were in a pub in Berwick recently and a guy was watching some video or other on his phone, sitting at a table immediately behind my wife. The sound was full blast and it was either a saw mill, an angle grinder or a Stihl Saw, that kind of noise.
To be fair he turned it right down when we asked him to, but ffs, why would you play that out loud in public, or music?

Are people becoming more selfish?

Paddington Bear wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 4:28 pm Meanwhile the Lib Dems are proposing a fine of £1000 for playing music out loud on public transport, has my vote

Me too. I'm always surprised that the twats listening to their Youtube videos at maximum volume on their phone seem so completely oblivious to everyone around them. At the very least they could use headphones, rather than simply having the rubbish blasting out of the phone's tinny speakers.

Tichtheid wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 5:06 pm

Paddington Bear wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 4:28 pm Meanwhile the Lib Dems are proposing a fine of £1000 for playing music out loud on public transport, has my vote

We were in a pub in Berwick recently and a guy was watching some video or other on his phone, sitting at a table immediately behind my wife. The sound was full blast and it was either a saw mill, an angle grinder or a Stihl Saw, that kind of noise.
To be fair he turned it right down when we asked him to, but ffs, why would you play that out loud in public, or music?

Are people becoming more selfish?

That’s my experience as well - if someone is told they pretty much always turn it off straight away. The question I can’t work out is why they felt it was acceptable in the first place, definitely a post-covid thing. Silly as it sounds it turns my OK commute into something hellish if I have 40 minutes of people’s tik toks to listen to.

£1,000 probably a little high but I have a suspicion that a month of people picking up a fine for it would cut it right down to the truly obnoxious

Mentioned it in one of the other threads, but a couple of weeks back I had to tell a teenage lad off for vaping in the train carriage while I was travelling up to London for a gig. He was apologetic enough when I called it out, but it blows my mind that he even did it in the first place. He was also watching stuff on his phone with his mate and not a pair of headphones between them of course.

I was listening to music via my own noise cancelling headphones, so I hadn't noticed until I pulled one out to have a word.

The behaviour is 90% selfishness or being completely myopic and not thinking about having an impact on others' lives, but is it also subtle things like phones no longer having a headphone jack or coming with a free pair of in ear headphones? Possibly a stretch, but I feel like that sort of thing emphasised that your audio was meant to be for you and only you.

Having mentioned vaping, anyone who puts forward updating the existing smoking ban legislation to include vaping too would certainly get an interested look from me. Most places exercise their right to tell punters its not welcome in their establishment, but anywhere that's not the case, like music venues, is becoming grim with clouds of chemical raspberry smoke or something similarly vile constantly appearing. I'm convinced there's going to be some horrendous stuff to come out about how bad it is for us and I'm antsy about even the second hand impact.

Tichtheid wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 12:49 pm Labour’s great nature sellout is the worst attack on England’s ecosystems I’ve seen in my lifetime
George Monbiot

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ir-starmer

Wasn't exepcting much from Labour on this front and they've still managed to be grossly disappointing.

Not that manifestos mean much, but this is completely counter to theirs.

They really do seem to be going out of their way to piss off the broadest range of people possible with their decisions.

sockwithaticket wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 6:33 pm Mentioned it in one of the other threads, but a couple of weeks back I had to tell a teenage lad off for vaping in the train carriage while I was travelling up to London for a gig. He was apologetic enough when I called it out, but it blows my mind that he even did it in the first place. He was also watching stuff on his phone with his mate and not a pair of headphones between them of course.

I was listening to music via my own noise cancelling headphones, so I hadn't noticed until I pulled one out to have a word.

The behaviour is 90% selfishness or being completely myopic and not thinking about having an impact on others' lives, but is it also subtle things like phones no longer having a headphone jack or coming with a free pair of in ear headphones? Possibly a stretch, but I feel like that sort of thing emphasised that your audio was meant to be for you and only you.

Having mentioned vaping, anyone who puts forward updating the existing smoking ban legislation to include vaping too would certainly get an interested look from me. Most places exercise their right to tell punters its not welcome in their establishment, but anywhere that's not the case, like music venues, is becoming grim with clouds of chemical raspberry smoke or something similarly vile constantly appearing. I'm convinced there's going to be some horrendous stuff to come out about how bad it is for us and I'm antsy about even the second hand impact.

I think I can pretty much guarantee that in a decades time we're going to discover that 99.99% of them contain carcinogens, because it seems to be the wild west, with no-one really giving a fuck what's actually happening in the factory in Vietnam, or China or where ever that makes this shit.

Paddington Bear wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 5:48 pm

Tichtheid wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 5:06 pm

Paddington Bear wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 4:28 pm Meanwhile the Lib Dems are proposing a fine of £1000 for playing music out loud on public transport, has my vote

We were in a pub in Berwick recently and a guy was watching some video or other on his phone, sitting at a table immediately behind my wife. The sound was full blast and it was either a saw mill, an angle grinder or a Stihl Saw, that kind of noise.
To be fair he turned it right down when we asked him to, but ffs, why would you play that out loud in public, or music?

Are people becoming more selfish?

That’s my experience as well - if someone is told they pretty much always turn it off straight away. The question I can’t work out is why they felt it was acceptable in the first place, definitely a post-covid thing. Silly as it sounds it turns my OK commute into something hellish if I have 40 minutes of people’s tik toks to listen to.

£1,000 probably a little high but I have a suspicion that a month of people picking up a fine for it would cut it right down to the truly obnoxious

I think a lot of the kids just genuinely don’t realise, it’s how they do it at school and with their mates. A lot are just knobs though.

One of the greatest pleasures I had when I used to get the bus to work from Shepherds Bush to town was an old fella who, when kids would start playing music loud on their phones, would turn up his to full volume with opera. It was fucking magnificent and often got a round of applause that embarrassed the kids into turning it down. I’ve tried it myself twice and it also worked

sockwithaticket wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 6:38 pm

Tichtheid wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 12:49 pm Labour’s great nature sellout is the worst attack on England’s ecosystems I’ve seen in my lifetime
George Monbiot

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ir-starmer

Wasn't exepcting much from Labour on this front and they've still managed to be grossly disappointing.

Not that manifestos mean much, but this is completely counter to theirs.

They really do seem to be going out of their way to piss off the broadest range of people possible with their decisions.

When you are elected on the basis of "You are not the previous arseholes who we are sick of", you get very little benefit of the doubt, and even then Labour have been spectacular in their stupidity at every turn.

Attempting to pander to Reform voters who will never vote for them, sucking up to tech bro billionaires with promises of AI hokey and, more importantly, big tax cuts, shitting on the disabled, culture war shittery on trans issues (ignore the SC ruling, they're just aping the cretinous "What is a woman?" cuntery), rowing back on every front in an attempt to look tough, crapp9ng on the environment, shitting themselves over the EV mandate etc. etc.

If they get wiped out in the local elections, they will draw the wrong conclusion - not hard enough on the people Reform hate, must beat harder.

If they do OK, keep up the cuntery, it's working!

fishfoodie wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 3:22 pm

Sandstorm wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 1:17 pm

Tichtheid wrote: Thu Apr 24, 2025 12:49 pm Labour’s great nature sellout is the worst attack on England’s ecosystems I’ve seen in my lifetime
George Monbiot

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ir-starmer

Damn, that's a very poor piece of legislation.

Std Politics really. Will we win more voters with increased house building, than we lose by pissing off Environmentalists & NIMBYs

Yes fuck NIMBYS and honestly fuck the bizare legislation thats stopped us building anything. Fuck the endless post 2008 cycle of anemic <2% growth and rising inflation.

The current system will eventually create enough people who cant get a house or anything like their parents levels of affleunce and then you will get something far more radical than Labours reforms.

Labour look like having a very poor time at the local council elections, but the Tories will hardly fare any better. Not much doubt that Reform will benefit greatly in many areas and make a huge number of gains, while Greens will benefit in other areas. Wonder if the new Reform councillors might perform better than the one representative in our council who has attended < 50% of meeting and never voted!

tabascoboy wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 2:51 pm Labour look like having a very poor time at the local council elections, but the Tories will hardly fare any better. Not much doubt that Reform will benefit greatly in many areas and make a huge number of gains, while Greens will benefit in other areas. Wonder if the new Reform councillors might perform better than the one representative in our council who has attended < 50% of meeting and never voted!

Were they unavoidable detained at HMs pleasure for their term ?

I mean it's highly likely given the non-existent vetting of their candidates, & how they're almost universally scum, & the UK voters seeming ambivalence towards this.

Tories will take a particular shoeing as these elections are heavily in rural areas and were last contested during Boris’ vaccine bounce. Suspect Reform will fall short in Runcorn despite all the briefings

Reform taking power in a few councils will be something to watch. A shower of incompetents who’ll rip apart the entire thing and burn it all down while people suffer.

Biffer wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:16 pm Reform taking power in a few councils will be something to watch. A shower of incompetents who’ll rip apart the entire thing and burn it all down while people suffer.

It’s local councils , hardly anyone will notice any difference whatsoever

Yeeb wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:31 pm

Biffer wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:16 pm Reform taking power in a few councils will be something to watch. A shower of incompetents who’ll rip apart the entire thing and burn it all down while people suffer.

It’s local councils , hardly anyone will notice any difference whatsoever

Turnout will be abysmal even though it's a nice day.

No one noticed the bin strikes in Birmingham right enough.

Biffer wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:16 pm Reform taking power in a few councils will be something to watch. A shower of incompetents who’ll rip apart the entire thing and burn it all down while people suffer.

Was reading today that they are looking at getting well into double figures at the Holyrood elections next year.

That “anti far right” meeting was predictably counter productive

Slick wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 6:23 pm

Biffer wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:16 pm Reform taking power in a few councils will be something to watch. A shower of incompetents who’ll rip apart the entire thing and burn it all down while people suffer.

Was reading today that they are looking at getting well into double figures at the Holyrood elections next year.

That “anti far right” meeting was predictably counter productive

Not for the main people who organised it

Dogbert wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 8:28 pm

Slick wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 6:23 pm

Biffer wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:16 pm Reform taking power in a few councils will be something to watch. A shower of incompetents who’ll rip apart the entire thing and burn it all down while people suffer.

Was reading today that they are looking at getting well into double figures at the Holyrood elections next year.

That “anti far right” meeting was predictably counter productive

Not for the main people who organised it

Are we seriously describing Reform as far right? For the police to be involved is breathtakingly inept

Slick wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 9:03 pm

Dogbert wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 8:28 pm

Slick wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 6:23 pm

Was reading today that they are looking at getting well into double figures at the Holyrood elections next year.

That “anti far right” meeting was predictably counter productive

Not for the main people who organised it

Are we seriously describing Reform as far right? For the police to be involved is breathtakingly inept

It was never about 'anti far right'really , although some members of reform are exactly that.

This was about how to further split the Unionist ( or anti SNP ) vote, Reform vastly hinders both the Conservative and Labour vote, compared to the SNP / Greens.

Yeeb wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:31 pm

Biffer wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:16 pm Reform taking power in a few councils will be something to watch. A shower of incompetents who’ll rip apart the entire thing and burn it all down while people suffer.

It’s local councils , hardly anyone will notice any difference whatsoever

Also increasingly their budgets are completely consumed by their statutory requirements around social care, there’s very limited scope for any regime to be notably different to any other

Paddington Bear wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 10:24 pm

Yeeb wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:31 pm

Biffer wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 4:16 pm Reform taking power in a few councils will be something to watch. A shower of incompetents who’ll rip apart the entire thing and burn it all down while people suffer.

It’s local councils , hardly anyone will notice any difference whatsoever

Also increasingly their budgets are completely consumed by their statutory requirements around social care, there’s very limited scope for any regime to be notably different to any other

Don't forget the varying degrees of extreme NIMBYness.

Dogbert wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 9:58 pm

Slick wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 9:03 pm

Dogbert wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 8:28 pm

Not for the main people who organised it

Are we seriously describing Reform as far right? For the police to be involved is breathtakingly inept

It was never about 'anti far right'really , although some members of reform are exactly that.

This was about how to further split the Unionist ( or anti SNP ) vote, Reform vastly hinders both the Conservative and Labour vote, compared to the SNP / Greens.

Was it not? John Swinney, who convened the meeting said it was to discuss how to "lock out the far right from Scottish politics". You'd think he's know what his meeting was about.

Reform win Runcorn, one of Labour's safest seats, by just 6 votes, making it one of the closest elections in British history.

Having overturned a Labour heartland in the north west, on the other coast they’ve smashed the Tories in Lincolshire. Fallen very narrowly short in the Tyneside and Doncaster mayoral elections and not a million miles away in Bristol, somewhere its often assumed is immune to their message. Both parties under threat, expect panic buttons to be hit

Slick wrote: Fri May 02, 2025 7:57 am

Dogbert wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 9:58 pm

Slick wrote: Thu May 01, 2025 9:03 pm

Are we seriously describing Reform as far right? For the police to be involved is breathtakingly inept

It was never about 'anti far right'really , although some members of reform are exactly that.

This was about how to further split the Unionist ( or anti SNP ) vote, Reform vastly hinders both the Conservative and Labour vote, compared to the SNP / Greens.

Was it not? John Swinney, who convened the meeting said it was to discuss how to "lock out the far right from Scottish politics". You'd think he's know what his meeting was about.

Believing Politicians tell the truth

I'm sure Starmer will learn all the right lessons:-

Be tougher on immigrants to try and win over Regorm voters who will never vote for you.

Be tougher on benefits to try and appease right wing media interests who will never support you.

Continue to kowtow to multinationals who will tolerate you until you cease to be a supplicant.

Indulge in culture war shit you will never win no matter how much you punch down.

Abandon any pretence of progressive policies to ensure that section of the Party and the public looks elsewhere for leadership.

Hal Jordan wrote: Fri May 02, 2025 8:29 am I'm sure Starmer will learn all the right lessons:-

Be tougher on immigrants to try and win over Regorm voters who will never vote for you.

Be tougher on benefits to try and appease right wing media interests who will never support you.

Continue to kowtow to multinationals who will tolerate you until you cease to be a supplicant.

Indulge in culture war shit you will never win no matter how much you punch down.

Abandon any pretence of progressive policies to ensure that section of the Party and the public looks elsewhere for leadership.

How does ‘they’ll never vote Labour’ square with a result where reasonably clearly a chunk of the electorate voted Reform having voted Labour as recently as last year? Don’t get me wrong there’s clearly a risk of peeling off voters to the Greens, but this idea that Labour can just ignore Reform is mad, they’re actively targeting traditional Labour voters, successfully

Hal Jordan wrote: Fri May 02, 2025 8:29 am I'm sure Starmer will learn all the right lessons:-

Be tougher on immigrants to try and win over Regorm voters who will never vote for you.

Be tougher on benefits to try and appease right wing media interests who will never support you.

Continue to kowtow to multinationals who will tolerate you until you cease to be a supplicant.

Indulge in culture war shit you will never win no matter how much you punch down.

Abandon any pretence of progressive policies to ensure that section of the Party and the public looks elsewhere for leadership.

I knew having a lawyer as PM was a bad idea.