UK General Discussion: The Toolmaker's Son.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The Employment Rights Bill has been published today. It amounts to an extremely significant package, some of which will be phased in via secondary legislation after consultation over details. This TUC press release includes a summary of some of the changes and you can read the whole thing here.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Meanwhile the private schools lobby are trying a new tactic: circulating actual creepshots of Bridget Phillipson* to friendly newspapers. Really winning friends and influencing people there, chaps!

_{*Who plays hockey competitively to a pretty high standard, which means that her team often ends up playing away matches against teams who use pitches owned by private schools.}

[CumbrianLefty]

Starmer Says No

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DA3D3DasKcw/

Glad he told her to shut up.

Starmer is the lunatic who is funding the genocidal assault on the Middle East.

What, he is actually funding it personally??

The sort of stunning revelation I would expect from someone with your sig.

[Cassius]

They circulated that photo because Phillipson had tweeted days earlier that “our students need careers advice more than private schools need AstroTurf pitches”. Whilst that sort of comment is of a piece with the neuroses of many in the Great Movement of Theirs about public schools and people who went to them, it’s a strange thing to say when you yourself are making use of those same facilities, which are of course frequently made available for hire to the public (it’s also strange to imply that AstroTurf pitches are some kind of gilded luxury, as opposed to a facility that many, many state schools also have).

[Silent Hunter]

They circulated that photo because Phillipson had tweeted days earlier that “our students need careers advice more than private schools need AstroTurf pitches”. Whilst that sort of comment is of a piece with the neuroses of many in the Great Movement of Theirs about public schools and people who went to them, it’s a strange thing to say when you yourself are making use of those same facilities, which are of course frequently made available for hire to the public (it’s also strange to imply that AstroTurf pitches are some kind of gilded luxury, as opposed to a facility that many, many state schools also have).

My school had a grass pitch, not an astroturf one. Also, haven't a lot been sold off in recent decades?

[Silent Hunter]

In other news, we've got a new version of the Coat of Arms.

[Cassius]

They circulated that photo because Phillipson had tweeted days earlier that “our students need careers advice more than private schools need AstroTurf pitches”. Whilst that sort of comment is of a piece with the neuroses of many in the Great Movement of Theirs about public schools and people who went to them, it’s a strange thing to say when you yourself are making use of those same facilities, which are of course frequently made available for hire to the public (it’s also strange to imply that AstroTurf pitches are some kind of gilded luxury, as opposed to a facility that many, many state schools also have).

My school had a grass pitch, not an astroturf one. Also, haven't a lot been sold off in recent decades?

So when I was at school (a bog standard middle-of-the-road comp) just over a decade ago, we had an AstroTurf (which I actually thought was rather pointless given that the school owned a couple of grass pitches as well, which they never let anyone use apart from the 1st (and only) XV) and I was aware of at least a couple of other comps in the vicinity having them. Whilst anecdote seems to point to them not being uncommon (although certainly not universal), you may be right though on a lot of them being sold off, especially as there aren’t any stats on how many comps actually have them.

[Torrain]

Alex Salmond has died, after taking ill during a speech in North Macedonia.

[afleitch]

Shocking news. Quite a titan. Gone.

[Boobs]

He’s gone off to the great drunken invective in the sky

[Silent Hunter]

Yes, a massive political figure, even if he had lost much of his relevance in recent years.

[#UnbanTender]

I thought at first someone had mistaken North Berwick for North Macedonia but no, it really was North Macedonia

[MABA 2020]

Alex Salmond has died, after taking ill during a speech in North Macedonia.

Wow this is a shocking one

[インターネット掲示板ユーザー Punxsutawney Phil]

I thought at first someone had mistaken North Berwick for North Macedonia but no, it really was North Macedonia

Reality is stranger than fiction.
RIP.

[Estrella]

I was just wondering about something and thought to check it out. And indeed:

https://twitter.com/perearagones/status/1845167166569562315

https://twitter.com/PaulPlamondon/status/1845160334358696320

https://twitter.com/ArnaldoOtegi/status/1845180532742815763

[morgieb]

Jesus. Really no age at all, also no real health issues discussed before. RIP.

[CumbrianLefty]

Jesus. Really no age at all, also no real health issues discussed before. RIP.

Even these days, it is a fair age albeit now clearly below the average lifespan. And he clearly liked his food and drink even if he didn't have major health problems as such.

Like many, I had a grudging admiration for him despite not liking his personality or politics overmuch. Though having said that, I wonder if more (ahem) "stuff" will now emerge after his passing.

[Zinneke]

I was just wondering about something and thought to check it out. And indeed:

https://twitter.com/perearagones/status/1845167166569562315

https://twitter.com/PaulPlamondon/status/1845160334358696320

https://twitter.com/ArnaldoOtegi/status/1845180532742815763

What's your problem Estrella Galicia? That the chief Hungarian separatist in Slovakia didn't join in the tributes?

[Estrella]

What's your problem Estrella Galicia? That the chief Hungarian separatist in Slovakia didn't join in the tributes?

What problem lol. It would be hilarious though if De Wever or Van Grieken joined, but alas they were busy. As for Hungarian separatists ‘round here, I’d be curious if you can tell me more because that’s the first time I’m hearing of those people existing after 1945.

[Zinneke]

What's your problem Estrella Galicia? That the chief Hungarian separatist in Slovakia didn't join in the tributes?

What problem lol. It would be hilarious though if De Wever or Van Grieken joined, but alas they were busy. As for Hungarian separatists ‘round here, I’d be curious if you can tell me more because that’s the first time I’m hearing of those people existing after 1945.

What are you doing up at 4 am mate usually Ive got time to delete my drunken posts in the morning

All these political leaders paid tribute to Salmond because he managed to obtain a legal referendum from his host state, it's an impressive political achievement.

[Meclazine for Israel]

R.I.P. Alex Salmond who died after repeatedly collapsing whilst giving a speech.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-10-13/alex-salmond-former-scottish-first-minister-dies/104466470


Alex Salmond was first minister of Scotland until 2014. (AP: Jane Barlow/PA)

[CumbrianLefty]

What's your problem Estrella Galicia? That the chief Hungarian separatist in Slovakia didn't join in the tributes?

What problem lol. It would be hilarious though if De Wever or Van Grieken joined, but alas they were busy. As for Hungarian separatists ‘round here, I’d be curious if you can tell me more because that’s the first time I’m hearing of those people existing after 1945.

What are you doing up at 4 am mate usually Ive got time to delete my drunken posts in the morning

All these political leaders paid tribute to Salmond because he managed to obtain a legal referendum from his host state, it's an impressive political achievement.

He was a very significant political figure, beyond doubt. But in large part he only "obtained" that due to the sitting Tory PM seeing possible political advantage in doing so. And the almost symbiotic state of affairs between the Tories and SNP has often been clear in the subsequent decade. To the Nats, England *has* to mean Tory - we see this again just this week with Sturgeon saying "Boris" would have won again had he lasted as PM until this year. 

[25 Abril/Aprile Sempre!]

Alex Salmond died at an event called the Ohrid Cultural Diplomacy Forum, organized primarily by something called the Institute (or Academy) for Cultural Diplomacy. The Macedonian lakes are quietly very inclined to these cultural events - see also Struga Poetry Evenings - and Salmond was exactly the sort of semi-retired politician you can find at all such conferences, therefore the circumstances of his death are not that shocking on reflection; nonetheless still pretty shocking. I have been to Ohrid myself (but never to Scotland ironically), which I imagine is true of very few people here, so I was particularly struck by that.

It has not been mentioned in the thread yet, but Salmond is also survived by his wife seventeen years his senior, to add to the unusual circumstances.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Half genius and half charlatan, with the two sides always existing alongside each other in an uneasy and complex embrace until, in the aftermath of his very public fall from grace, the latter won out decisively. I suspect that time will not be very kind to large elements of his reputation, but we should not allow for that to be used to minimize his importance to shaping, for better or worse, both the country (by which I mean both Scotland and Britain) in the twenty first century.

[oldtimer]

Half genius and half charlatan, with the two sides always existing alongside each other in an uneasy and complex embrace until, in the aftermath of his very public fall from grace, the latter won out decisively. I suspect that time will not be very kind to large elements of his reputation, but we should not allow for that to be used to minimize his importance to shaping, for better or worse, both the country (by which I mean both Scotland and Britain) in the twenty first century.

A more serious and formidable person than most in politics.

I imagine if he had decided to become PM of Britain rather than narrow his ambition to just FM of Scotland, perhaps he would have become a more cheerfull version of Gordon Brown.