Loz

In 2008 the population rose 408K - that roughly consisted of 240K net natural increase (births v deaths) and 165K net immigration. Birth rates are on the up, partially boosted by new immigrants having a higher average rate of birth (2.5 to 1.84 average per female), though the non-immigrant birth rate is climbing. Births in 2008 were around 700K. So the population rising by 10M over 20 years does not take much of a projection.

The first few episodes were pretty much straight from existing UK scripts. After that, they got their own writers in and it changed for the better. Apparently Steve Carell is leaving, though, so the series may or may not go on.

I always thought it was expensive compared to St Christopher's anyway.

I was looking for slightly more precise directions than 'Lincolnshire'!!

For a kilo or a squirrel?

Having seen something on a TV programme earlier in the year, I quite fancy making my own sloe gin this year. Now that summer is coming to an end (or failed to arrive, even) my research says that the sloes will be ripe for picking after the first frost. So, does anyone know of any wild sloes growing in the ED surrounds? Or anywhere else, for that matter.

Memory is usually the thing. Windows lurrrves it's memory. As stevebailey said, post the details - model number would be good, too (700? 900? 1000?). You night be able to pick up some cheap memory which will help immensely.

Cathedral City "The Nation's Favourite Cheese" for my slot sponsor.

I help run a small sports club. We get a fair number of new joiners - certainly enough to keep the club buoyant - and we have the added disadvantage of being a rather unknown sport. The secret? A good, fresh attractive web site. Get that right and ensure it has a 'public' focus (rather than a members focus) and people will knock on your door. Make sure it has the right keywords on the front page so when people google, say, "dulwich cricket" you are somewhere on the first page. As an addition, advertising in places like Time Out and the Gumtree can pay off, too. There are a number of sparts directory sites popping up (like http://www.totallysporty.com/ and http://www.clubbz.com/. We've not had great success with these, but YMMV. What happens then is up to the club - though the principal of "treat them nicely and get them to the pub ASAP" has always worked for us!

By and large (though not entirely) I disagree. I would argue that everyone in the UK has access to those things you listed. Varying degrees of wealth will buy you better versions/qualities of this, but the basic service is there for all. For instance, I have used both private medical and NHS facilities over the past couple of year. My experience? You would be hard pressed to tell the difference in outpatient services, wait time excepted. (Fortunately I've not needed to stay in a hospital, so I can't comment on that.) Frankly, I would rather be poor in the UK than lower-middle class in some other countries. The one where I would agree is not available to all is not actually on your list - communications. I think internet access is pretty close to being a basic necessity these days. But overall, what is important is to maintain equality of opportunity. There is too much concentration on equality of outcome - that just benefits a few favoured minority groups. So, of your list, education - I think - is the key. Get that right and the rest should follow. And I think the UK is not too far off getting that right.

Greed will always take advantage of poverty. That's not so much economics as human nature. > whether laws should be put in place to ensure fairness But what is fair?? Or, even, which is a better situation to be in if you are poor?: - the poorest have the spending power of ?100 and the richest the spending power of ?500 - the poorest have the spending power of ?200 and the richest the spending power of ?2000 Assuming equal buying power in both options (i.e. prices are the some).

Jah Lush Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Tate Modern Just had a look at the website: a Gauguin exhibition in September - brilliant! Seems a switch for the gallery. Have they decided that current art is, indeed, a pile of doggie doo-doos (sometimes quite literally - or elephant at least) and have gone to the back catalogue?

cate Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Sue Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > > cate Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > > > Vomit has only one m. > > > > xxxxxxxx > > > > Yeh, I think you'll find that most of the > people > > posting above have actually spelled/spelt it > with > > one m :) > > > Well, it is bugging me seeing the heading with two > hence my post. Louisa is usually right about > everything isn't she!;-) The OED just called. They've found Louisa's post and will be adjusting their spelling in the next edition to match.

Me! Me! I want the Cheese Hour. All your favourites songs that you hate to admit you like. It'll be cheesier than a Quattro Formaggio pizza with a stuffed cheese crust. And extra cheese. Topped with Parmesan. Served in the Cheese Block.

I saw at the IMAX last week GG - definitely worth the extra dosh. Still can't work out why gravity only effects one level of dream, though. Did love how the spinning top just wobbled in the last frame or so. It was written by the same bloke that wrote Memento, so not a big surprise it screwed with the head a bit. As for eye-candy for the boys, Ellen Page isn't a classic Hollywood beauty, but she is rather cute And she came in with huge brownie points from her role in the rather fabulous Juno. In fact Page from Juno and Joseph Gordon-Levitt from 500 Day of Summer represent both my favourite films from the last year or so. Best Di Caprio performance since Gilbert Grape, where he was rather brilliant in an otherwise so-so film. He's been a bit meh since. Though if his face gets any fatter they'll only be able to show him on IMAX anyway.

To be fair on the good professor, he has noted himself that he has identified a correlation, but not yet a causation. Does income inequality in a system cause instability, or instability in a system cause income inequality? Or is there a third factor (or even a fourth) that is the causation of both? If you take the current recession and the sub-prime crisis, it was effectively caused by a deregulated system of banks lending to a bunch of people without the means to pay it back. So which caused which there? Or was it a meeting of the two - the banks ran out of good risks and so kept lowering the bar until it all came crashing down, whilst all that time greater income inequality meant that that population was increasing in %age of the total anyway? So, sorry Brendan, I don't think it is quite that simple.

So do you agree that child benefits and tax credits should be limited to one child only?

http://en.wikipedia.org

Cassius Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I don't know if this is true or not but a German > friend told me that when the US were forming their > first constitution there was a vote to see what > language the 'United' states would speak and that > German only lost by a couple of votes. How > different would the history of the last century in > particular be if the US had been a Germanic > orientated country and entered the two WW on the > other side. Urban legend - sorry!

It's been speculated that a derivation of English - dubbed Chinglish - will be the future Lingua Franca, due to the Chinese effect on both the language and world economics.

pk Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Loz Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > how would you dissuade people from having more > than one child, > > pk? > > in the uk at the present time, i wouldn't Why? What is so necessary at the present time to keep birth rates up when it is easily argued that the opposite is true?

If said 'creation of human life' starts to have more of a negative impact than a positive one on an overcrowded planet, then it is definitely a question worth posing. This is the crux of the problem. Being a liberal, I'm not in favour of laws that say "you may have one child only". I would rather encourage people not to have more than one child. Whilst I understand that doing it via tax/benefits does mean that the rich would be relatively unaffected by this law, I'd counter that the higher income earners tend to have less children anyway. And I can't think of a better solution. But, always open to new ideas, how would you dissuade people from having more than one child, pk?

HonaloochieB Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > And before anyone bothers to post about saveloys, > what's wrong with pig lips and bottoms? Well if you are that unfussy, I'm sure you can pick up something matching that description at the Bishop on a Friday night...

I noticed on an episode of "Young, Dumb and Living Off Mum" they filmed in the Blackbird Bakery. Car-crash television, if you've not seen it. Just how stupid and over-pampered can a bunch of 'young adults' be?

expat Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Kids will grow up and pay tax which will pay for > NHS etc. That's a big assumption. 10% of the taxpayers of the UK pay 55% of income tax revenues. 50% of taxpayers contribute just 11% to the income tax pot. Non-taxpaying adults contribute zilch. So there is probably a greater chance that any given child will be a net drain on the country's finances. (Source) > I think it is a myth that flying is so cheap in CO2 - a return trip to spain for a single person is over > 20% of the yearly allowance. That is correct, but I was thinking more in terms of total CO2 output - flying is a small part of the total annual CO2 output (though per person shifted it is quite high). It's become a bit of a way to redirect attention from other issues. "We should reduce carbon output from X" - "Oooh no, a higher tax on flying is what is needed", when actually, both probably need doing.