HeadNun

Half my family are medics, going back generations, and none of them would ever have gone, or would now go, on strike. I know times have changed, but my family knew what they were signing up for, and accepted the detriment to their families and the hours (which, in the junior years, were way longer when they are now)... because it was not only a vocation, but a stable career for life. And they felt a genuine duty of care to their patients, whom they often put before their own children. I can only conclude that entry-level junior doctors are more entitled these days. Plus, it's insensitive to nurses, who really do deserve a lot more money and recognition. There are issues other than pay, like the lack of available posts, and having to move around the country, but they can be improved without a strike. I don't think the right people are being recruited into the profession anymore. We're all on lower wages and paying more tax than we were ten years ago, but many of us just have to suck it up, work our socks off and get on with it.

Blimey, in my head we've gone from Alan Partridge to Borat

I know, back when it was in the news, I read most of it. I said many public schools feature, I didn't say it was exclusively public schools. And Dulwich was one of the schools that stood out to me because I know it, and some of the stories I read stuck in my memory.

This would be fun.

True - many public schools feature regularly. Dulwich does stand out as one of schools that gets frequent mentions and nothing seemed to come of it. I think there was an investigation into a pupil at another London fee paying school, somewhere west, can't recall the name now.

Everyone’s Invited made for shocking reading and, your right, the story never seemed to gain much traction. The whole thing felt very shady.

A lovely bit of writing, which perfectly captures that strange world. I know few men undamaged by public boarding school.

It’s going to happen

Yes and I heard the other day that there is a higher conviction rate with trials heard by only a judge, vs juries, which makes sense when you think about it. Also - call me cynical - I can't help but think that this justice reform story was thrown out to overshadow the Reeves / OBR / Budget story. But I do agree with scrapping juries for fraud cases.

Ah yes, of course, I'd forgotten that the cases will be heard by judges and not Mags. But how does losing juries mean less work for barristers, though? Surely all the other problems (no courtrooms, loos, witnesses etc etc) that stop cases going to trial, or slow trials down - will still exist? Then they'll still be billing the same?

I'm not sure that's true. I don't know how they bill (and I might be wrong) but I doubt they get paid each time they turn up at court and a witness or defendant fails to show, or the printer's broken, or the loos have flooded, or whatever. I think most remaining criminal barristers and solicitors these days (now there's no money in it) genuinely care about the justice system and would like to see trials coming to court quicker, but not like this. Plus, I don't see how these measures will help - they won't suddenly magic up all the courtrooms the system demands (that prev govts shut down), and do we even have enough mags to pick up all the extra non jury cases that will arise? Picking and panelling juries isn't what's causing the delay in trials going to court.

Because this is a really stupid, backwards idea, and you don't need to be a barrister or lawyer to understand why. It's just a token move, to make himself and his department relevant, which will improve precisely nothing.

In an ideal world, yes, more tax would be directed to the justice system. Because a lot of suspects don't get a fair trial and wrongly convicted. Often they'll have a long list of previous, so police are picking the low hanging fruit. And because legal aid solicitors and barristers' pay is now so anaemic, they simply don't have the time to work a case and defend it properly. So you probably see more people behind bars than there should be. It started with Brown and then got way worse with Cameron, when he essentially tried to turn legal aid firms into giant call centres and put the contracts out to tender. Even since then, the system gets squeezed more every year.

I think it's lack of avail courtrooms, poor facilities, equipment not working, defendants not turning up... a whole range of problems caused my chronic underfunding.

Earl Aff-whatever-your-name-is (I'm dyslexic), you do realise that your 'liking' my earlier most, means that you indirectly agree with Rockets on something. Did hell just freeze over?

Yes, I agree with this, it's been very odd indeed. Why did they fly so many kites and brief for so long before the budget? And why was she set on raising income tax, even tho the OBR had upgraded the forecast? And why the speech (which apparently caused gilts to fall), and then the retraction? And then why the business about mansplaining and misogyny in the Treasury? It's been totally baffling, esp when you consider that, in the end, the budget was quite unremarkable. But I do see that, if Reeves had revealed that the forecast wasn't so bad, but that she wanted to keep enough headroom anyway, it would have gone down like a bag of sick with the media. She was damned either way. All this briefing and flip-flopping has just slowed the markets and probably spurred people on to move savings and pensions, hold off on selling their house / buying etc.

I'm pretty sure I saw Meghan's in the Hamlet on Deliveroo the other day - has it become a dark kitchen?

Wasn't it the OBR who leaked that they'd told her the public finances weren't in such dire straits? It's all very weird, was she just afraid of being upfront with the public?

If you have what I and several people I know have / have had, it can make you feel quite blue. It’s common to feel depressed when you’re unwell. This thing takes a good couple of weeks at least before you feel back to normal, so go easy on yourself x

They might not be related. Could your itchy forehead just be from the cold and central heating?

Not if he tells lies to achieve his aims, which he does.

For me, it's not about a twee, rose tinted, yearning for a lost England that never really existed. From an aesthete's point of view, I just prefer the architecture and craftsmanship of yonder years, as well as glass, ceramics, furniture and decoratives. So much now is bland, cookie-cutter and soul-less. It's very sad how, on this forum these days, you can't even comment on liking an old house, without it being somehow sneered upon.

But no one's arguing that pollution is bad and can cause asthma in children.

Yes, you're right. I was conflating Art Deco with 1920s and it does have more Arts and Crafts features. Either way, I think it's a pretty house.