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Reply | BBC charging to read the news section. I'm off
at 00:57 6 Jul 2025
It is a bit boring I know, but some of us used to get our football via moveable motorised dishes - quite a bit bigger than the Sky dishes. I still have one in the back garden. As you say, in the UK it is easier to stream via IPTV these days, and VM and increasingly Sky have turned to cable to distribute the digital signals.. However, the raw feeds from football grounds are still often beamed back to the broadcasting centre by satellite for rebroadcasting, which is also done by satellite as well as cable still. Stevethejack was particularly knowledgeable about tapping in to feeds. Around the world many still do get their TV from satellite. In the country where I am now, lots of people still have the large C-Band dishes, as well as the smaller Ku band dishes that Sky still use to some extent. |
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Reply | All this Budget Speculation
at 16:17 5 Jul 2025
What I am struggling to understand is what different path you see ahead for bond yields. What argument can one advance to explain how a big rise in US borrowing does anything other then increase bond yields globally? As far as I can see, there is nothing the UK government can then do to stop the cost of state borrowing rising. If more governments increase their borrowing by selling bonds on the international markets then the result will be that the interest demanded by the investors will rise. It is rather like the law of gravity. |
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Reply | BBC charging to read the news section. I'm off
at 02:19 4 Jul 2025
Pay attention, I did say satellite. You don't seem familiar with the technology. It might seem retro but it still works as an alternative broadcast medium. I suppose a VPN might do the trick for Martyn if he just relies on streaming.
Here is what is still available on satellites around the world for those who have suitable equipment. Internet is not reliable everywhere.
https://www.lyngsat.com/ [Post edited 4 Jul 2:26]
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Reply | All this Budget Speculation
at 10:56 3 Jul 2025
I'm 5000+ miles away and had let my attention stray away from the UK news. So this morning I was disconcerted to see reports of Rachel crying in the HoC. It looks like the bond market is getting more skittish than at any time since the Liz Truss fiasco and the GBP fell over 1% against the USD. I noticed the exchange rate fall here. Worrying times. Let us hope that Starmer can hold firm with so many Labour back benchers lacking any grasp of basic economics. |
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Reply | Livestock ban
at 07:32 3 Jul 2025
That quote does illustrate the problem. |
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Reply | Bob Vylan
at 01:59 2 Jul 2025
Re Rod Stewart, I only saw a brief snippet, but have noticed a few FB posts saying he did well. On the other hand, several said he shouldn't have been there because of his politics. It looks as though inclusiveness only goes so far for many who shout loudly about it in other contexts. [Post edited 2 Jul 7:43]
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Reply | Pro-Palestine group damage aircraft
at 06:16 28 Jun 2025
I suppose the question raised by on-base action would be: If you were an armed guard and saw a figure wielding a crowbar near the engine casing of an RAF jet, would you pull the trigger rather than shouting a warning and tolerating the chance of damage? I think I might. |
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Reply | Best pub in Wales
at 06:05 28 Jun 2025
Tricky driving home along those lanes. Back in the day (when many of us lacked our present moral compass re drink driving), I often attended the mid-week folk club in the upstairs bar in the Brit. One night after closing time a friend and I found ourselves facing a car coming the other way along a narrow stretch of lane. I couldn't reverse because there was already another vehicle behind me. The other driver, who appeared to be inebriated, refused point blank to back up. He said he was a GP on his way to an urgent call; we should all reverse. It took the arrival of another couple of cars heading back to Swansea for him to relent and finally reverse unsteadily to a passing point. It was some years later that the folk club moved to the Greyhound. I'd say the old Tuesday nights at the Brit were one of the highlights of the local music scene. [Post edited 28 Jun 19:02]
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Reply | Uganda
at 05:47 28 Jun 2025
As I said last year when we were debating Rwanda, it was (and is) the WHO's poster child when it comes to a healthcare system that covers the whole population.
https://www.afro.who.int/news/rwanda-beacon-universal-health-coverage-africa
But while one UN body (WHO) lauded Rwanda, it suited another - UNHCR - to give our Supreme Court a highly negative assessment, despite sending some of its own refugees there and publishing an in-country situation report that was much more positive about the services available there. It is true that tension between Rwanda and Congo is a negative, but according to TV News today a new treaty has smoothed that over. The truth is probably that UNHCR would oppose transfers of asylum seekers from Europe or the USA to any African country. It wouldn't surprise me to see another developed country take advantage of our Rwanda investment. I still think dropping that plan was one of Labour's big mistakes. |
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Reply | Pro-Palestine group damage aircraft
at 13:49 27 Jun 2025
The investigation needs to widen to encompass the network behind the attacks. PA runs direct action training events, and has done for some time.
https://www.palestineaction.org/
It is reported that one recent workshop identified three other airfields for PA attacks - two in Lincolnshire and RAF Valley. The authorities have let things get completely out of hand.
There is now a determined campaign to portray PA as a non-violent peace movement, but no nation can tolerate sabotage of its military assets, especially in the present "pre-war" climate. The latest statement from PA says they will set out to radicalise other prisoners by creating an "intifada" if they find themselves in jail. What with the recent attacks on prison staff by Islamist prisoners, I wonder if we are reaching the stage where we need a special supermax facility. |
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Reply | Starmer's welfare cuts
at 07:43 27 Jun 2025
The Labour rebels seem to think the UK has money for everything - the mushrooming disability support bill, the NHS, welfare benefits in general, public-sector pay, ODA, migrant support - although perhaps not defence. They seem unaware that much of current spending is going straight on to the national debt, or how difficult debt servicing becomes when borrowing is over 100% of GDP. Their solution is increase taxes on the rich and big companies, when rates are already high. As we know, many of the rich are now highly mobile, and as we've seen with the non-doms policy and VAT on private education, the hoped for increases in tax revenue are not really materialising. We're going to reach a tipping point soon when things get really uncomfortable. |
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Reply | Assisted dying in Wales
at 14:08 26 Jun 2025
My point was simply that the advocates of this policy keep saying that persons considering AD should not be pushed towards a decision based on what is better for their carers. However, that is the argument you ended up making, and you now add that it will also cost less. If you cannot see that this stands in tension with the "its all about personal choice" line then there is nothing more I can really say. You will see as the debate moves to the Lords that I am not the only one concerned that tacit pressures may affect a decision to opt for AD.. As I said, I think the policy should be allowed to go ahead given the HoC vote, but there are going to be more practical complications than many suppose. |
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Reply | Assisted dying in Wales
at 03:16 26 Jun 2025
I think Wes Streeting may be right to say the AD policy is more likely to have significant costs rather than cost savings.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14835865/Wes-Streeting-money-NHS-assist
My own view is that we must respect the democratic vote, but that the pace of implementation would depend on identifying the necessary resources, and weighing the priority of the new policy against other priorities. When a government bill is enacted the financial aspect will have already have been factored in, but this does not apply in the same way with a private member's bill.
The thing that worries me with the "it will save money" aspect, is that a perception that this is so amounts to another subtle pressure on persons who might see themselves as a burden. The central argument of the pro-AD camp has always been that this is about individual choice, but there tends to be a slippage between talking about the viewpoint of the suffering person and wider considerations. For example, when I mentioned deep palliative sedation in an earlier discussion, Cat's response was to say that this extended the misery for the relatives or carers. If the policy is about individual choice then surely the person considering AD needs to be protected from these pressures.
Since Streeting's statement Starmer had stepped in to say that the NHS will find the money for AD, but I think it will be difficult. I'm still worried that already under-funded palliative care services will lose out further if and when funds are transferred to AD, and that before that happened it would have been logical to make sure there was a good palliative care service in all areas, which there isn't at present.
In many areas of public policy there is a tension between arguments about rights and the associated resource implications. In a series of classic judicial review cases from the 1980s and 90s representatives of patients who had been unable to get the treatments they needed argued that this was unlawful because the Secretary of State for Health had a duty under the primary NHS legislation to provide comprehensive health services (the so-called Birmingham heart babies were among the cases). In all cases the courts found that there was no absolute right to treatment and that decisions had to be made in the light of available resources as determined by the government of the time (which today would include devolved governments). The courts seem more interventionist these days, so we shall have to see whether the likely tension between AD and the resources needed leads some people to go to court when they don't get what they want. [Post edited 26 Jun 5:07]
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Reply | The Improved A465
at 10:13 25 Jun 2025
You would have thought that one of the most obvious factors correlated with rising emissions would be rising population, and that population control should feature somewhere in the WG's plan. Actually however, some WG policies seem to actively promote increased population, for example the "Nation of sanctuary" plan.
Here is the blurb from co-pilot: "The Welsh Government declared in 2019 that Wales would become the world’s first ‘Nation of Sanctuary’. The ‘Nation of Sanctuary’ plan aims to help all people seeking sanctuary to integrate well with communities in Wales. The plan outlines the breadth of work which the Welsh Government is undertaking across Wales to ensure inequalities experienced by these communities are reduced, access to opportunities increased, and relations between these communities and wider society improved. The Nation of Sanctuary vision is about making Wales not just welcoming to migrants, but also harnessing the opportunities which migration brings to help the economy and communities to thrive."
See also: https://www.gov.wales/sites/default/files/publications/2019-03/nation-of-sanctua
It seems to me that the bit they never told us is that the future is no (or at best highly-restricted) private car ownership in a very different society from the one we have now, and this is a big step on that road. |
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Reply | Starmer's welfare cuts
at 07:53 25 Jun 2025
I thought Paul Johnson, a generally neutral voice from the IFS, had it right when he said a few days ago that what people are complaining about is a modest slowing of the huge increase in disability expenditure that has occurred in recent years rather than cuts. I can't find the exact quote, but among other things he said: ""This isn't [austerity], (...) As Rachel Reeves points out repeatedly — but it is true — spending will be rising, and there were increases this year... In the last parliament, we saw some quite big rises, and average spending overall will be increasing rather than falling." Here is the Government's explanation of why something has to be done to cut spending in this area.
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/pathways-to-work-reforming-benefits- |
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Reply | Pro-Palestine group damage aircraft
at 11:04 23 Jun 2025
Another prominent member of Palestine Action is Saeed Taji Farouky, a documentary film maker. His father is Palestinian, while his mother is Egyptian, but he has UK citizenship. I think several of the people near the top of Palestine Action illustrate what Henry Kissinger meant when he said that mass immigration into European countries creates new interest groups that may not share the values of the majority populations. |
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