Blah Blah

I had no idea wood burners were so popular and have learned something there. I wonder as well how far advanced filter technology is, or could be, to deal with the problem. Filters on cars don't work very effectively, do I don't know.

UKIP is now surely finished? Once they no longer have those MEPs they will have no legitimate claim to media attention either. Hopefully they will fade into obscurity. Even Farage thinks the party has served its purpose. I found Question Time painful. The rent a mob audience seems to be a typical part of the show now. Is it just me or do the brexit voters on there always seem to be aggressive towards and intolerant of any kind of debate? I noted the young guy who couldn't understand why we can't just leave. Does he read nothing, watch nothing, listen to nothing, understand nothing? And then the other guy who wouldn't let Ayesha Harazika answer, and had to be put in his place when she called him a bully. Peter Hitchens is a curious one, because he seems to be far more reasonable these days and talks a lot of sense. Basically he is speaking for the middle ground, which neither the Tories nor Labour are representing right now. What interested me though is how he seems more angry at the Tory party for their failings.

It is important to understand that a bad cold or chest infection, is not the flu and a flu jab won't prevent catching those. Influenza is a different kind of virus and anyone who is at risk should have the vaccine. It is the progression to pnuemonia that makes it fatal in some people, hence why anyone over 65 and those with respiratory conditions are offered the vaccine. We've not seen a global pandemic for a long time, and vaccinations are part of preventing that too. There are a lot of things we can do though to make sure our immune systems are as strong as they can be as well. Diet is very important - don't allow yourself to get run down and where possible, avoid people who already have colds. The reason why these viruses are more prolific in winter is because they live longer in cold temperatures. A flu virus remains infectious for around one week at human body temperature, but can last for thirty day at zero degrees, and longer at lower temperatures than that. Most disinfectants will kill viruses on hard surfaces.

I think the issue with gentrification is not so much the ebb, flow and evolution of an area, but the speed with which the change is happening at the moment. I was trying to think of when there was last anything on this scale of change. The mass building programmes of the late 60's early 70's perhaps?

New vehicles automatically cut out the engine when stationary and restart it when the brake comes off. In the future, all vehicles will do this. The law does not seem to be clear from Edhistory's post but it is always a good idea to count to ten when frustrated, and then be calm when asking for something. It tends to bring the helpful side out of a person more often than not. At least we are no longer burning coal fires and having to battle with smog every other day. The technology to get rid of vehicle pollution is already there. It will just take time for it to work through new vehicle sales.

This highlights perfectly the complexity of global trade. It only takes one element of the chain to be adversely affected and the whole thing falls. The single market, for all the faults of the EU, is the only large market in the world which offers seemless free trade between a sizeable group of nations. We pay around ?12bn a year to be part of it. If our exporters had to pay WTO tariffs on the things they export to the EU, it would add around ?40bn a year to their costs. And yes, as a body, the EU has clout because of the size of the market it protects. The UK on its own is a tiny market. There is no way we can expect to get favourable deals with markets much bigger than our own. 37% of our exports to the EU are in cars, pharmaceuticals, raw materials and nuclear parts - all things that the US produces themselves. There is no way that the US is going to open themselves up to imports of things that compete directly wwith their home grown businesses doing the same thing.

It is not against EU rules to nationalise anything (another myth spread the left this time). The issue is one of monopolies and competition. So under EU rules, you can nationalise a railway, as long as there is competition. That might be tricky with a railway (assuming you want to nationalise every line) but with other things like an energy company for example, you could have a state owned provider competing alongside other providers. The consumer then has the choice. For me, putting all that trade at risk for the folly of nationalising a railway is wreckless. And listening to the speeches yesterday, it is becoming very clear that a Corbyn and McDonnell government will either have to borrow heavily to deliver all of these promises, or not deliver them at all.

Black cabs have always complained about competition of any kind. They don't like Addison Lee either. But they are just too expensive for a lot of people, up to three times the cost of the average mini cab fare.

But the EU federal thing is a red herring anyway. If nothing else, Maastricht showed that the UK have always had a position from which to negotiate exemptions. And TTIP was brought down by public lobbying so that just enough of the 27 member states said no. Indeed the UK and Cameron had to agree to exempt the NHS from any TTIP deal (due to public concern) something it was perfectly possible to do. This is another huge area of lack of knowledge about EU processes for legislation. Even on immigration, we have always had the power to deport any EU national who has not found a job after three months (other EU countries do it). This idea that free movement means anyone can come and we have no way of sending them away is just not correct.

Yes, Sturgeon might be the voice of reason in that coalition. But the price might be another referendum on independence for Scotland, although I don't think there is appetite for that in Scotland. Some think that part of the swing away from the SNP has been because of the obsession with independence. I also think the Tories and esp the brexiteers, are terrified of a Labour SNP coalition, and also now see that as a real posibility. The two year transition deal is designed to make sure that the Tories, if parliament goes the full term, will have had complete control of Brexit and made sure we are fully out just by election time, without the impacts of a cliff having hit yet, to affect their electoral chances. It's a plan based purely on political expediency, not what is best for the country. Lots can go very wrong in the meantime and force an early election of course.

I don't diagree with you there Loz, but I also think that we are in for a run of hung and coalition government, before the centre ground splits away and forms a new party. A Labour SNP coalition is less likely to remove us from the SM and CU than a Tory/ DUP one. But you are right in that Corbyn's eurosceptic position is a minority one amongst labour MPs. And I don't expect that to change as the hard left has had very little success in changing the shape of local constituency parties.

I think it is reality check time for leavers. Most people who voted leave have no understanding of how business, trade and exports work, none whatsoever. The politicians driving the leave campaign deliberately didn't educate them on any of that (and nor did the remain side either to be fair). Experts tried to warn about all of this but people with simplistic world views don't ever listen to experts. There was a flurry of leave voters who claimed they had done their research, but then couldn't hold an informed conversation about any of it. In a nutshell, they voted leave for reasons around immigration and who makes the rules, over the really important issue of economics and trade. Even if we decided to not leave the EU, the damage is now done. Business is relocating (as we were warmed it would), skilled people are leaving the country, as we were warned they would, prices and inflation are up, the pound is down and the economy is slowing to a rate taking us closer to recession, just as it was warned it would. Slowly we are going to conceed to every EU demand in order to get a deal. I would still put money on us ending up staying in the SM and CU. The Tory Party will rip itself apart in the process.

I see the Black Cab complaints as those of luddites. The technology is there, it is already being used and the caariage office refuses to modernise with it. There is only ever one outcome to business models that don;t move with the times. As someone has pointed out, the carriage office wants a monopoly only to keep prices as high as possible. Even before Uber, black cabs complained about private mini cab companies. The Last time I took a Black Cab (years ago) it was at night from Lewisham Stn (off the last train) to Nunhead, and it cost ?17 - completely ridiculous. They charge for time and distance, and no of people, and pieces of luggage and there is a standing charge before the cab even moves anywhere too. All ways of racking up the fare. A mini cab would have cost ?6. That is why there is so little sympathy for the carriage office.

Thank you Jerry for clarifying this. So Meadow Property should have applied for a TEN and didn't. We can absolve DHFC from any blame here. They have the correct licence in place for the events they run at the club, and yes there have been problems in the past, but things seem to have sorted themselves out. We should continue to support both the football club and the volunteers that have kept the club going through bad times and good. So can James Barber look into this? Why did Meadow Property not apply for a TEN and what can Southwark licensing do to admonish this behaviour so this does not happen in future.

Apparently she is going to quote Machiavelli. The mind boggles.

Teresa May gave a speech to the UN a couple of days ago. The room was pretty much empty. Says it all really.

Uber have had plenty of time to stop breaching the licensing regulations and have only themselves to blame. Hopefully, during the appeal, they will make the necessary changes to get their licence back. 30,000 driver jobs are at risk if they don't.

Just what to DHFC own here. If they own the astroturf, they are responsible. If they don't, then the company that owns it are responsible. DHFC licence applies to music indoors. To have an outdoor public event with music would require a TEN. This is what the southwark website says; 'If your event includes entertainment (music, singing, dancing, drama, films or spectator sports) and / or the sale of alcohol, it will need to be licensed by the council under the Licensing Act 2003. This applies to indoor venues (e.g. a school hall or theatre) and outdoor locations (e.g. public parks, town squares and streets). In some situations, the venue you are using will already hold a Premises Licence to allow these activities to take place. You will need to check this with the venue manager. If the venue does not hold a suitable licence you will either need to submit a Temporary Event Notice or a full premises licence application. As of 1 October 2012 the Live Music Act 2012 came into effect. This means that some live music is now deregulated. Please visit the Licensing News pages for details.' From what I can see, the DHFC licence would not extend to using the astroturf for these events. So why did the owners agent not apply for a TEN then?

There are lots of worrying aspects to this. You have astroturfs, designed for sports use, being hired out for noisy music events, that surely need licensing (as the club premises licence is solely for the club and its bar) - so someone is responsible for allowing these unlicensed events. Had a temporary licence been applied for, the council would then have been able to decide whether the event was appropriate use of the astroturf in advance, or not, and set conditions on noise and hours. But then, also having allowed the event, when the noise became excessive, the council noise team, and the club manager, seemed to be too intimidated to exercise the powers they had to close the event down. This can not be ok. Wasn't it DHFC that had a teenage shooting or stabbing or something whilst breaching their licence a few years ago?

The thing is, that most people (including children) know the difference between a poster advertising fiction, and real life. This argument about movies, and advertising and so on has been going on for years.

DulwichFox Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I have not suggested any deliberate acts of > Cruelty by Zippo and the horses look fine. > > Don't put your words into my mouth. > > I just think with all the other brilliant acts > animal acts are not needed. If Humans want to > endanger their > lives, then that is fine. Then why post something that says this? 'We believe that the use of animals in circus performances is not only damaging to the welfare of those individuals involved....' if you acknowledge the horses at Zippos are fine and there is no damage to their welfare (or injury to them)? You can't have it both ways. Zippos show that horses can be used and kept in a way that is not detrimental to their welfare clearly.

XIX, as I mentioned, I am from a family that have always kept horses. I grew up on a farm. I know a lot about horses. There are many things you can tell about the welfare of a horse merely from the condition and gait of it. And yes, I have seen the horses up close on the Rye. I always take an interest where I see horses. This is no different to someone who has spent all their life around dogs having knowledge that a non dog owner would not have. DF's post was C&P of opinion - go read it again - there is no evidence or data there, just opinion. If you want me to dig up vetinary evidence of my points, I can quite easily do so. As someone has said, the horses are regularly inspected by bodies qualified to do so. A circus has to satisfy certain standards to keep its licence to trade, of which animal welfare is one standard. The horses at Zippos, are left to graze most of the day, and are stabled at night, just like most horses anywhere are. They train and work for a small part of the day, also like any working horse, from Police horses to horses that pull funeral carriages. And cantering in a circle btw, is how all horses are trained. It is the simplest thing for a horse to learn. Zippos only travel in the Southeast with a few hours of travel on average once a week. Race horses travel more than that. Police horses travel more than that. And no, there is no difference to a horse between a travelling stable and a permanent stable block. Zipoos do not keep their horses in the travelling horsebox overnight. They build a temporary stable, and yes I have seen those too. The horses have more than adaquate space. What I am trying to challenge is the idea that any use of horses in a circus is animal cruelty. DF's post projected that view. But it is not born out by fact.

Exactly that binky. No-one would deny that animal cruelty exists. Mostly it occurs at the hands of an individual, but mass meat production, can be seen as a system with cruelty designed into it. That is very different from what we are talking about here. I see nothing but happy and healthy horses at Zippos. They are not shut up in stables all day. They are well groomed and clearly well looked after.

Most horse injuries happen in Equestrian events and most injuries happen because the riders are beginners or inexperienced. As you can imagine, cross country eventing has all kinds of hazards, and it takes very little for a horse to stumble or fall if a rider does not know what they are doing. And I would absolutely agree with the link between suspensory ligament injuries and competitive sports - there is much to criticise there (because just like with humans, competing animals, that are repeatedly jumping and doing dressage, can suffer injuries that are everything from tears to repetitive strain). But this is very far removed from the canter of a horse in a circus ring, a non competitive scenario. Horses rarely suffer injury in circus use, especially circus use where there is no rearing on hind legs. And in fact, it is the rider who is most likely to suffer injury, not the horse. The evidence for all of this is overwhelming.