The Chairman Mao resembling, Monarchy hating, threat to Britain, Labour Party thread

[Chindie]

I believe Labour has decided, on the green front, to turn further into carbon capture recently, which is questionable strategy, unless you've got shares in oil companies, in which case, all for it, yum yum!

[chrisp65]

7 minutes ago, bickster said:

Regardless of any actual opinion of what is currently happening... I'm presuming that is Grenfell Tower on fire in the image?

Grenfell if anything was a failure to enforce current "red tape" so the image use is f***ing stupid on a number of levels

Yes, it was a failure of current legislation with the devil in the detail. It’s very much relevant to the rush to rush planning and building legislation. It’s exactly what you get when you try to game the planning laws and building regs. It’s exactly what you get when you presume a is going to be fine because b was fine and that was fairly similar. I mean, there’s no great difference between a place of assembly and a hotel and student digs, is there? Why not turn a factory in to flats? Why not turn a 32 metres tall office in to apartments? Why test products when we’ve already tested all their components? 
It’s far from **** stupid, in my opinion. 

[sidcow]

3 minutes ago, Chindie said:

I believe Labour has decided, on the green front, to turn further into carbon capture recently, which is questionable strategy, unless you've got shares in oil companies, in which case, all for it, yum yum!

It is absolutely impossible to stop burning fossil fuels for the next few decades.  Well unless you spend hundreds of billions of pounds of public money.

I don't buy the theory that it will keep fossil fuels used for longer than otherwise because I believe economics will drive away fossil fuels at this point. 

However I'm mainly concerned with if this technology actually works. If it can be proved beyond doubt it works, it seems a sensible half way house to me. But that is a big if. 

[sidcow]

1 minute ago, chrisp65 said:

Yes, it was a failure of current legislation with the devil in the detail. It’s very much relevant to the rush to rush planning and building legislation. It’s exactly what you get when you try to game the planning laws and building regs. It’s exactly what you get when you presume a is going to be fine because b was fine and that was fairly similar. I mean, there’s no great difference between a place of assembly and a hotel and student digs, is there? Why not turn a factory in to flats? Why not turn a 32 metres tall office in to apartments? Why test products when we’ve already tested all their components? 
It’s far from **** stupid, in my opinion. 

Have they said they are relaxing building regulations? 

[bickster]

6 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

It’s far from **** stupid, in my opinion. 

Of course its stupid, its saying that if you remove red tape shit burns down but Grenfell shows that you can have all the red tape you want but if it isn't enforced then it still burns down.

 

 

[chrisp65]

1 minute ago, sidcow said:

Have they said they are relaxing building regulations? 

This is going to read a little like a cop out, because it’s genuinely a massive topic. I’ve been on roughly 36 hours of cPD on this stuff and the answer is, nobody will be quite sure until we have a body of case law and precedent.

There are more rules, but there is also a new tier of Building Regs governance, something called a BR Principal Designer. The optimistic will see this as another layer of checking. The cynical will see it as the consultants largely marking their own homework.

But this isn’t purely a Building Regs issue. The actual build reg was always very limited, very brief. Essentially, the regs will say don”t build it from something flammable. The rest, the testing, fire certification, thats all layers of evidence of ways of complying.

Will this all be checked? Yes. But don’t worry, we won’t burden the local authority with this. I’ll check it, on behalf of the builder that’s paying me.

Plus, this isn’t just about building regs.. It’s about green belt, it’s about biodiversity net gain. It’s about the nuisance of listed buildings and tree preservation orders and contaminated ground and a few dozen other things I can’t think of.

Shorter version, we don’t know what it means until he’s more specific about what he considers unnecessary.

 

[Genie]

 Labour are looking to increase employers national insurance after saying national insurance (non specific if it’s employee or employer) would not be increasing.

This feels like winter fuel payment cuts x10 as it’s going to upset a lot more people. 

[chrisp65]

6 minutes ago, bickster said:

Of course its stupid, its saying that if you remove red tape shit burns down but Grenfell shows that you can have all the red tape you want but if it isn't enforced then it still burns down.

 

 

We’re going to have to disagree on this one.

I can see the absolute relevance of unforeseen circumstances. That he didn’t have a more relevant example from the future, I can’t criticise him for that. 

[sidcow]

14 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

This is going to read a little like a cop out, because it’s genuinely a massive topic. I’ve been on roughly 36 hours of cPD on this stuff and the answer is, nobody will be quite sure until we have a body of case law and precedent.

There are more rules, but there is also a new tier of Building Regs governance, something called a BR Principal Designer. The optimistic will see this as another layer of checking. The cynical will see it as the consultants largely marking their own homework.

But this isn’t purely a Building Regs issue. The actual build reg was always very limited, very brief. Essentially, the regs will say don”t build it from something flammable. The rest, the testing, fire certification, thats all layers of evidence of ways of complying.

Will this all be checked? Yes. But don’t worry, we won’t burden the local authority with this. I’ll check it, on behalf of the builder that’s paying me.

Plus, this isn’t just about building regs.. It’s about green belt, it’s about biodiversity net gain. It’s about the nuisance of listed buildings and tree preservation orders and contaminated ground and a few dozen other things I can’t think of.

Shorter version, we don’t know what it means until he’s more specific about what he considers unnecessary.

 

I know what you mean. 

After Grenfell construction companies Professional Indemnity insurance went through the roof cost wise (easily 10 times what they paid before), with many exclusions and masses and masses of extra underwriting questions. 

Plenty of cover cancelled for past activities too (due to the way PI is arranged this is possible to implement) 

I remember asking a client  (a very substantial construction firm who you will see building large apartment blocks around Birmingham and The Midlands) off the record that they are obviously ensuring that they are meeting all building requirements NOW. This was a good year after Grenfell. 

He responded that no, he could no guarantee that at all because it's impossible to know what the regulations actually are. 

Edited Monday at 21:24 by sidcow

[Davkaus]

2 hours ago, Genie said:

 Labour are looking to increase employers national insurance after saying national insurance (non specific if it’s employee or employer) would not be increasing.

This feels like winter fuel payment cuts x10 as it’s going to upset a lot more people. 

The bit in bold is kind of true, but not really.

Anyone that's surprised by this simply wasn't paying attention, they basically confirmed it by omission when they were pressed on 'so you're not raising NI?' and repeatedly answered that question with 'we won't be raising taxes on working people'.

They were asked a straight question, and dodged it repeatedly, which quite clearly answered the question that they planned to raise employer's NI all along.

100 odd days in, I've seen enough from this lot to be pretty confident they won't be in government by 2030.

[OutByEaster?]

18 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

100 odd days in, I've seen enough from this lot to be pretty confident they won't be in government by 2030.

Hmmm. I suspect that the cycle when you have a massive majority is to do the unpopular stuff in your first two years then start buttering up the voters, Labour have a hostile press to deal with, but the Tory Party are still a complete s***show with years before they're viable again, the Lib Dems are pointless, Farage isn't going to get any more traction than he already has and the Greens are unlikely to see a sudden swell of support. I'd imagine the Labour Party are still feeling very confident, I mean they're unpleasant, but I can see why they;d be confident in it.

[sidcow]

6 hours ago, Davkaus said:

100 odd days in, I've seen enough from this lot to be pretty confident they won't be in government by 2030.

Really? You think people are thinking those Tories weren't so bad after all? 

[sidcow]

I reckon in a few months time once we've seen all the furore of the bad news die down we'll start to see some of the improvements coming through. 

There have been rafts of announcements about projects and policy that sounds good already. 

Edited Tuesday at 06:13 by sidcow

[tinker]

We can't complain about poor public services and then moan when the government starts to find the money to improve them. The NHS is on its knees, the police have no money and the very departments that are supposed to enforce building regs, planning laws and environmental laws haven't got the money to do there jobs. We haven't even got the prison space to lock criminals up.

Public services cost money

[delboy54]

Reported in the media that "unemployed obese people are to be given weight loss jabs to help get them back to work".

If this was announced by a Tory government, I wonder what the reaction would be?........different I suspect.

[Seat68]

15 minutes ago, delboy54 said:

Reported in the media that "unemployed obese people are to be given weight loss jabs to help get them back to work".

If this was announced by a Tory government, I wonder what the reaction would be?........different I suspect.

Quote

Wes Streeting suggested the latest generation of medicines including Ozempic and Mounjaro could be "lifechanging" for individuals and would ease pressure on the NHS. 

"Our widening waistbands are also placing significant burden on our health service," he said in an opinion piece for the Telegraph, external.

"The long-term benefits of these drugs could be monumental in our approach to tackling obesity."

Illnesses relating to obesity cost the NHS £11bn a year, Streeting said.

 

Quote

The health secretary added the weight-loss injections could benefit the economy too, reducing the number of sick days caused by obesity.

"Illness caused by obesity causes people to take an extra four sick days a year on average, while many others are forced out of work altogether," he said.

 

 

 

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cjd54zd0ezjo

[DCJonah]

21 minutes ago, delboy54 said:

Reported in the media that "unemployed obese people are to be given weight loss jabs to help get them back to work".

If this was announced by a Tory government, I wonder what the reaction would be?........different I suspect.

Well I guess it's how it's reported. You've done a daily mail summary of the story.

[ml1dch]

56 minutes ago, delboy54 said:

Reported in the media that "unemployed obese people are to be given weight loss jabs to help get them back to work".

If this was announced by a Tory government, I wonder what the reaction would be?........different I suspect.

What was the reaction when it was licensed for prescription as a treatment for Type 2 Diabetes years ago?

My recollection is that the reaction was...nothing. 

[omariqy]

The budget on the 30th October will give a really good indication on what type of Labour Party we will be governed by. My clients are really nervous and all sorts of rumours are flying around re capital gains tax, IHT, pensions etc. Reality is that Labour can afford to be political with this budget and recover. I don’t think it will be Liz Truss esque but I expect a couple of big changes if they are to fill this ‘hole’.

[Wainy316]

Don't know how it would translate to seats but I can see the next election having 4 parties on roughly 25% of the vote each.