Sephiroth

who defines minor? is it you? or is it people who have to make a decision on how to keep traffic in a global city moving? Where, without fines (or other punishment, you can offer your own?) people left to their own devices will just clog up every road? If a box junction suddenly appears - how do you decide it isn't necessary? How is it entrapment? You drive along the road, any road and if you see a box junction you don't enter it unless etc etc - how is that in any way entrapment?

sorry - what's the problem here? You want to enter box junctions, park on double yellow lines?

oh yeah - I forgot to mention the fallout from Scottish Independence - that is going to have quite the bearing on next election - so most of the govt bandwidth will be strategising on how to minimise the blame/fallout by bringing a GE forward

Yep - I'm minded to agree with DR here The reason this is happening now, is because (as we have seen with the queen's speech) the ideas cupboard is bare - apart from "getting brexit done" and getting thru COVID there are no ideas to actually take the country forward But the headwinds of ongoing Brexit-fallout and Austerity 2.0 (much worse than before) mean this government is going to get massively unpopular - so they need to put steps in place to "help" as much as possible

on subject of fishing - the recent Jersey brouhaha summarised well here: https://unherd.com/thepost/ceasefire-declared-in-the-great-jersey-france-whelk-war/

You were the one the brought the fishing dispute into a discussion about how EU citizens are shamefully treated in UK Most nations have trade agreements based on a willingness to give up some sovereignty to gain advantage (with relative power playing a part) UK has spent most of it's time doing the opposite and won't countenance ANY ceding of sovereignty - especially involving EU. SO the problems are not going away any time soon I didn't say the EU is doing the right thing - I said the French were well within their rights

"becuase they want better access for their fisherman to UK waters." and isn't this a misrepresentation of what's happening. Isn't what's happening the French are protesting because the UK broke the terms of the agreement, not because the French don't like the agreement

"I mean, how about the French purposefully holding up the deal that was about to be announced for financial services becuase they want better access for their fisherman to UK waters. If this was the UK doing this, " this would not have been possible with UK as member of EU - but once again, only UK CHOSE THIS PATH! People warned the UK they would be treated as a third country and were dismissed The French are well within their rights to do this - they have not lied about the effects of Brexit to achieve it EU citizens being treated like this in the UK was another worry for Remainers - again, dismissed But both are a consequence of something that only the UK wanted - neither would be happening without Brexit. Brexit enables this

I mean - there is just something fundamentally wrong going on

Global Britain going well I see purely from a self-interested pov, Uk shouldn't be fostering bad-will like this? https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/may/13/eu-citizens-arriving-in-uk-being-locked-up-and-expelled

I would go with "any opposition" rather than Labour specifically, but yes

As I'm not British I don't have quite the same hostility to the concept of ID cards as many British people do When Blair govt was kicking the idea around, I wondered why so many people were QUITE so upset at the idea But to see those opponents now pushing the idea is deeply suss And if any UK govt wants to change such a fundamental part of it's (non)constitution it should campaign on the idea - many Johnson voters will have voted for him with every much the notion that he was dead-set against the idea Mind you, bait and switch seems to be order of the day with this lot

People will already have seen the clip But (apart from gaining power and wanting to keep it) what has changed this mans opinion

Those democracies have safeguards and constitutions to protect against abuse of ID cards This country has nothing People who support any uk party regardless of politics should required proper checks and balances before any introduction into this country (We should also question why they?re being suggested now. By THIS PM. the same guy who swore blind he would swallow any card rather than present one. Was he unaware of any ?issues? then? Fraud and charlatan. And a dangerous one)

2008 eh? Let?s look at all the elections and referendums since then Even if I disagree with every result, voter fraud is not an issue

Of all the things that need doing, this is what they spend time and money on? A solution without a problem

'tis this https://www.itv.com/britaingettalking/

Or you could say a mayor in a second term got returned with a bigger margin than the last double term mayor in his second term. I?ll say again - I don?t rate Khan. And Bailey did do better than expected given his party left him to it compresses with Goldsmith. But he remains an appalling candidate

Ha. Fair play

"Football has felt souless without fans and it would be the same for the Olympics. " This x 100 What would the point be of a zoom Olympics ? A joyless, soulless nothing of an event

Allowing the Olympic to proceed would be madness. The whole point of it is a coming together of all nations, with fans and athletes travelling from everywhere in the world to a concentrated location Complete opposite of what we should be doing Plus I note that Tokyo is close to calling an emergency after and uptick

Ha. Fair point Alan What?s worse is I spent ages trying to see if I had put too many zeroes in. I should have just used a comma and that would have helped. Ah well Main point stands

We might be through the pandemic Or we might not be Remember august last year when many high profile people were saying there wouldn?t be a second wave? And remember when it became obvious the second wave was coming and Starmer was calling for early action and Johnson made exactly same mistakes as March and instead of taking action, stood in parliament doing his jokey schtick calling Starmer ?captain hindsight? And then into November December when it was obvious to everyone things were serious Johnson was still in denial, saying it would be ?inhuman? to cancel Christmas ? Well at that point we had 60000 deaths and subsequently since December we have had more than double that - worse than any other European country and entirely preventable But people like hammer man doff their caps and tug their forelocks once more (If labour had been in charge and took a different course of action and only 20000 people died, he?s be calling them murderers)

Whenever Lou declares something simple...

I suppose the rise in last 20 years of voting as entertainment shows from X factor to apprentice plays a part too I think people on all sides need to worry less about being called stupid (either explicitly or by allusion) and reflect a little on wether they are choosing wisely. It is possible for intelligent people to make very very stupid decisions. And it should be ok for other people (be it friend or foe) to call them on it People in this country find it very easy to call voters in other countries racist or dumb or wrong. Partly because it can often be true, but also the distance allows more objectivity But it is possible for people in this country to take a wrong turn and over-indulge ?an entertainer? because he provokes or indulges less-than-benign impulses And I definitely think this country is going down a dark path. Not because it won?t vote labour. But because after 11 years of this govt it?s very angry and not willing to accept who really might be the root of that anger