UK General Discussion: 2017 and onwards, Mayhem

[EPG]

It wasn't coincidental that the West Midlands voted super-strongly for Brexit, nor that BREAKING POINT was targeted as being racist rather than a falsehood. Most Neo-Nazis don't gun down politicians over phytosanitary rules.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Well Brexit was always rather silly. That said, cheese should always be treated with respect.

https://youtu.be/B3KBuQHHKx0

[Antonio the Sixth]

Tbh I kind of want Prime Minister Rees-Mogg to happen, though hopefully just for a few months. It would be an experience.

[Tintrlvr]

Tbh I kind of want Prime Minister Rees-Mogg to happen, though hopefully just for a few months. It would be an experience.

Or you could just watch V for Vendetta.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

Tbh I kind of want Prime Minister Rees-Mogg to happen, though hopefully just for a few months. It would be an experience.

Or you could just watch V for Vendetta.

HA!

[Antonio the Sixth]

Tbh I kind of want Prime Minister Rees-Mogg to happen, though hopefully just for a few months. It would be an experience.

Or you could just watch V for Vendetta.

Adam Sutler is to Jacob Rees-Mogg what the John Simm master is to the Roger Delgado Master. They do have a vague resemblance but distinctly different styles.

[Silent Hunter]

Brexit happened because of PR; UKIP would never have gained the prominence they did without the European Parliament elections.

[EPG]

Important: Labour against fake jerk chicken dishes
Important: Labour against former Lehman workers marking the 10th anniversary
Not important: A Labour leader who doesn't promulgate images of big-nosed rich Jews sitting on the backs of humanity

[Silent Hunter]

A "no-deal", if as bad as people think it might be, would probably very swiftly lead to a deal. It's not exactly something the French would want as it would be massively disruptive for the Pas de Calais region at least.

[Ethelberth]

No written constitution, no written deal, business as usual.

[cp]

A "no-deal", if as bad as people think it might be, would probably very swiftly lead to a deal. It's not exactly something the French would want as it would be massively disruptive for the Pas de Calais region at least.

True, but if/since 'no deal' *would* be as bad as people think it might be, it follows that the UK/EU would have done everything in their power to avoid it in the first place. If they nevertheless fail, there's no obvious reason to believe they would be able to conclude something suddenly, especially considering the spiraling economic and political crises that could accompany it.*

Also, I think it rises to the level of a category error to compare the effects of a 'no deal' exit on the UK with its effects on the EU, even if limited to northern France. The EU would have all 27 of its remaining member states to draw upon to alleviate the crisis - financially, diplomatically, etc. - while the UK would be alone. Added to that, the UK would feel added pressure from shortages on simple supplies (fresh produce, medicines, radiological therapy isotopes) that the EU would not suffer to anywhere near the same extent. 'No deal' is a blow for the EU, but it's a mortal threat for the UK.


*Worth noting: if there's no deal then that means the UK would have reneged on its promises from December 2017 (Irish border backstop, paying £40 billion for existing commitments). That will be highly corrosive to any effort to negotiate another deal.

[Antonio the Sixth]

It's not often that I 100% agree with FBM, but good on him here.

[Silent Hunter]

Alex Salmond has resigned from the SNP over sexual harassment allegations.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

It's not often that I 100% agree with FBM, but good on him here.

Even if Theresa May had a twin sister who was President of France, she'd probably be telling Theresa May to pound sand as well.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

I hope balloon protests become an omnipresent feature in London; if the next G20 hosted in London isn't accompanied by helium caricatures of all the national leaders I will be bitterly disappointed (although I hope the people who fund these things realise they are basically wasting their money, lmao).

[Silent Hunter]

More of London news, but TfL have announced the opening of the 'central core' of the new Elizabeth Line will be delayed from December 2018 to autumn 2019, basically due to the need to make sure it's reliable and safe first...

[DaWN]

More of London news, but TfL have announced the opening of the 'central core' of the new Elizabeth Line will be delayed from December 2018 to autumn 2019, basically due to the need to make sure it's reliable and safe first...

 Something to bear in mind with British rail projects is that they are always late and always over budget without exception.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

More of London news, but TfL have announced the opening of the 'central core' of the new Elizabeth Line will be delayed from December 2018 to autumn 2019, basically due to the need to make sure it's reliable and safe first...

 Something to bear in mind with British rail projects is that they are always late and always over budget without exception.

Not unique to Britain or the rail industry. It's just a fact of life that big projects that involve multiple organisations and subcontractors, specialised skills and often have politicians muddying the waters by trying to make premature  and optimistic announcements will almost certainly break the budget and the timeframe.

[IceAgeComing]

There's also the fact that when it comes to projects like this it really is better to be safe than sorry - you don't want to launch your fancy new trains on your fancy new line only for you to get technical issues that could easily have been resolved with a few more months of testing.  Especially with something like Crossrail which is a flagship scheme and something which needs to run effectively when it launches.

Part of the reason why these things can also happen is that the way that these things are tendered out often contractors are chosen based on how little they cost and how quickly they can do things.  If a contractor makes assumptions that turn out to be wrong in order to produce a cheaper bid and then they find out that they have to do things a more expensive and lengthy way, that can lead to delays on the whole project especially since these things tend to be linked together with work reliant on the completion of something else having to wait for that to be completed increasing costs even more since those people probably are being paid for waiting around for a while.

The main train lines in Central Scotland (Edinburgh-Glasgow Queen Street via Falkirk High; and Glasgow/Edinburgh to Dunblane/Alloa) are currently being electrified and the actual electrification work is actually going mostly to schedule and to budget - at least based on the last that I looked.  They've already finished electrifying Edinburgh-Glasgow and work on the bits to the north seem to be going relatively well - its a big job; involving replacing lots of infrastructure including a road bridge across a really quite important road right in the centre of Stirling and theoretically any delay on that bridge would cause a knock back on the whole project since it'd delay the installation of the electric lines and that would delay them started route learning with the new trains, etc etc.  The problem that we do have is that although the electric line is ready the vast majority of the new trains that are meant to run them aren't ready yet: meaning that they're having to run all sorts of random trains (the two new electric sets they have, some old electric ones that they've pulled from other lines and the last of the diesels they have) which isn't very good since it means they can't change the schedule yet to offer the better schedule they should be able to.  But its another example of how one delay can affect a lot more things: the old diesels that currently run those lines are meant to be being sent to the North of England over the next few weeks to begin a refit before replacing some incredibly old, crap trains (called Pacers; based on a Bus design that was ancient for the 80s and then not really changed that much to use as a train so shockingly its crap to ride on and built because it was cheap and the people of the North of England apparently don't deserve proper trains: being replaced because they aren't disabled accessible) and because of this train delay plus the delay in them getting some of their 'new' trains (they've gotten some of the old High Speed Trains from the South West to run Express lines from Glasgow and Edinburgh to the North on unelectrified lines - unlike the above trains the HST are very good especially considering they were built in the 70s so I don't mind this) they are actually going to start running short on the amount of rolling stock they have which isn't a great position to be in if you are a passenger rail company.

In some ways this shows the rather comical differences between the way these things work in London compared to outside London - we celebrate getting 40 year old trains that are legitimate improvements on what we have now and see them as a long term solution: while I'm pretty sure that there isn't a train left running in London that's anything like that old which aren't already being considered for replacement.  Although I get the reasons why you spend all of that money in London: as someone who's used public transport in London before it can get incredibly crowded and something to relieve the pressure from what they have now (and hopefully take some cars off of the road) would be incredibly helpful for those who live, work or visit London.  Although it would be nice to see some of that money spent on things that would also be of clear economic benefits: like the electrification schemes that were cancelled by the government rather conveniently after the last election: all of which linked key cities on key routes and would benefit from that level of investment.  I think that this is where I'm meant to say that nationalisation is the answer but I don't think it is when it comes to this: pretty much all rail improvement schemes right now are decided by the government anyway so little will change: plus weirdly its probably more likely that governments of all parties will invest in the railways when they are privately owned rather than in public ownership.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

https://twitter.com/islingtonclown/status/1035284352542928897

Of course they want to deselect Corbyn for not being a warmonger.

[MAINEiac4434]

"Successful Blair/Brown government"

this is what red tories actually believe

[Silent Hunter]

A Broadchurch coalition? Which one is Jodie Whittaker then?

[DC Al Fine]

It's weird to see the Tories hold onto Scottish seats even with over 65's are banned from voting. That's very different from the stereotype of Scottish Tories from a few years ago.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It's just a crass uniform swing or some similar model. Not worth taking seriously...

[Statilius the Epicurean]

I would imagine that's a comforting narrative to a Tory broadcaster, but May's job is 'impossible' because of her own decisions and botching an easy snap election, while I don't think it's fair to call Corbyn's job easy when he's under constant attack from parts of his parliamentary party, the majority of which opposed his election to the leadership.

Corbyn appears to be doing badly because he has poor media management.
May is doing badly because the actual policies she is implementing are either fundamentally unworkable or disastrous.