HeadNun

I've spent a fair bit of time living in the Nordics and they simply cannot understand why we use carpet in this country - they think it's unhygienic. I agree, I hate the bloody things (and yes, I have carpets). Better to mop three times a day than live with ground in dog / child vomit that, and various other nasty stains that, no matter how many times you scrub them with potions, you know will their remnants will always remain. Having said that, the houses are so well built there, they don't need to worry about drafts. I was living in a two hundred year old apartment block, no central heating - just one storage heater and underfloor in the bathroom, and a wee fire in the sitting room and I was toasty all winter long. Happy days.

No Sue - Sorry, I shouldn't have quoted your whole post. I was just referencing your point that there had been one or two arrests of people who weren't white, right-wingers. And then expanding it out to say that one of them was a Labour councillor. If you watch the video, what he said was appalling and no less toxic that any facist rant https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cz074vyvjzvo My point was that it happens on the right, on the left and from people of all colour. None of is more right than the other. Genuinely, no offence to you was intended.

Ha! All I am saying is racism is racism, no matter what guise it comes in.

You mean who aren't white? Police are also looking for Muslim thugs who went on a pre-emptive rampage in Birmingham. And yesterday Labour fired one of their councillors who, on Wednesday night's anti facist march, called for the throat slitting of fascists, then shouted 'free Palestine'. It's funny how the virtuous left feels justified in using EXACTLY the same rhetoric as the right, like calling for the annihilation of a group of people - be they white facists or Jews........ but it's OK, because they're on the right side of history.

This is my favourite Banksy work

I imagine Banksy is absolutely delighted each time one of his pieces gets nicked. Lots of press exposure and he still makes millions from prints on coasters, t.shirts and all the other tat. Does anyone else think his work is the kind hackneyed dross you'd expect from a first year student, who's just read an idiot's guide to socialism? Always thought it was hype, personally.

Tell us what you witnessed!

Yeah, I was about to suggest Budapest, having spent some time googling it just now. I've never been, people I know who have, raved about it.

I'm not entirely sure that the media and MPs are in disagreement that violence and racism are bad things...

And now I just can't stop thinking about big melons

This is one of the most entertaining threads in quite some time.

I'd try appealing, if I were you. I did (after driving down twice!) and was let off the second PCN. There have been so many PCNs issued there, I suspect they know the placement of the sign isn't clear and I suspect they've cancelled quite a lot issued to drivers for that area.

They are all very clever, I must say. So who's going to email 'Emmaroyds' to see if they get a reply?

Barry's is the best.

Is it possible that No Dishi got the G7 to agree on using 50 billion revenue from seized russian assets, to give to Ukraine, to provoke Putin's retaliation so he'll nuke Starmer, once he's in? 😁

It doesn't really matter anymore how we got here, everyone's far too fixated on blaming one thing / one party / one person. (I notice Mal you haven't mentioned Truss in there). What matters is how the next government is going to get us out. And, as Spartacus says, it's likely that no government can, not in the next term anyway. Labour will win this election and, as they won't be able to make any meaningful dent in the country's problems (which are also about poor infrastructure, outsized by population and slow growth), the Tories will be back in in five years.

Yeah you're right. I realised later that he does flap and is clearly v sensitive to criticism.

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/the-1-disturbing-reason-you-should-befriend-a-crow_uk_66278d68e4b00ea555a4ef21

Surely you'd have to have been living under a rock for the last four years not to know that Starmer's father was a toolmaker. It's so tired and reeks of desperation. If he had any dynamism or big ideas, he wouldn't have to fall back on it time and time again. Having said that, I do completely understand that big ideas are nigh impossible when he's going to be inheriting problems that are, frankly, beyond any government's ability to fix. Or fix any time soon. Also, I don't believe for a second that, if one of Starmer's nearest and dearest was critically ill, they wouldn't go private. Anyone who has the means would, if it were a choice between life and death. The public isn't stupid, I just don't think it buys this kind of nonsense. It wants honesty, surely now more than ever.

It was an absolute shit show. And so much anger coming from both sides, not becoming at all (was surprised how riled cool Rishi was getting). Agree about the format, it was lazy, whatsherchops wasn't asking pertinent questions, she was just going for binary yesses or nos. The producers didn't force either side to drill down on anything, just make commitments so they got good soundbites. If I hear 'my father was a tool maker' / my wife's a nurse / my father was a GP one more time... as if any of those things qualify anyone to fix / understand anything.

I've been in two minds about Gala. While I don't like it much, the noise didn't reach me this year. I'm all for the council generating revenue through events. Or at least I was... I took a look at the field yesterday (I'm in the park three times per day but have been avoiding that area) and the damage is terrible. I'm really not sure that it will recover this year. Destroying `parks for this aim is wrong. Gala was better at lessening the noise this year and moving the entry point. It's a peaceful festival, with what appear to be peaceful people, but Southwark should not have the right to permanently destroy swathes of the park for money. As Angelina said, that particular park - the layout and geography of it - just isn't suited to this type of annual event.

Neither side has clean hands and the same applies historically. That is why I cannot fathom people taking sides, especially people with no connection to, or knowledge of, the region. It's incredibly complicated and, I fear, impossible to resolve.

Thanks for posting the hotline number. It meant I could report the three security guards I clocked sitting on a bench smoking a big fat one. Wouldn't want them in charge of my safety, if I was at a festival.

I'm basing it on 20+ years cycling in London and seeing the absolute biggest rule-breakers being my fellow cyclists. I once stopped at a zebra crossing to let a man cross and a cyclist behind me called me a putain for stopping. I've even witnessed a grown man aggressively ringing his bell and swearing at a four year old child for not getting out of his way.... on a footpath.... in Burgess Park. I genuinely cannot remember the last time a cyclist stopped for me at a pedestrian crossing. They give the rest of us cyclists and bad name and turn the traffic against us.

I am sick to death of cyclists not stopping at pedestrian crossings, thinking they're just too important and in too much of a rush for the rules to apply to them (and I'm a cyclist, have been for 20 years). I see it every day.