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Politics, politics, politics (so long and thanks for all the fish)

Jurgen the German said:
That said, it does often feel like men are under attack and you never hear feminists bring up the fact that a lot of the most dangerous jobs are done mostly by men (which are often low paid jobs also) or that men suffer a lot with depression. .
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Feminists quite like talking about those things, because they can blame the patriarchy.
 
Baleforce said:
Men aren’t under attack, everything has been skewed heavily in our favour forever.

clams are under attack, and it’s about fudging time.
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I don’t disagree and we as men owe women a lot but life is also a complex mix of advantages and disadvantages for men and women. I’m not crying about being a man but there are bad things about being a man too which is highlighted by the statistics and suicide being the biggest killer of men under 50.
 
Jurgen the German said:
I’m only judging by a few of her tweets. One of which she said “I will continue to wear my mask on the tube to protect myself from the most powerful virus of them all: men”. If that was meant as a joke then fair enough (maybe I don’t know her well enough to get when she’s trying to be funny and when she’s not) but there would a fuss if the tweet was the other round and rightly so. Maybe I need to read more about her and not take her tweets at face value.

It’s not a good look for men when people like Laurence Fox say what he said, reminds me of when that BBC rugby presenter made a similar distasteful comment about Marion Bartoli and that she wasn’t much of a looker. That said, it does often feel like men are under attack and you never hear feminists bring up the fact that a lot of the most dangerous jobs are done mostly by men (which are often low paid jobs also) or that men suffer a lot with depression. Maybe I’m being overly sensitive because I have had my own mental struggles.
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You’re not being overly-sensitive. It’s a very deep issue which is still REALLY under-represented, reported and communicated about. Feminists are allies in this and bring it up often as an element of the patriarchy that both men and women are affected.
 
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scaramanga said:
That's an army. Mercenaries are those who fight with the army as a private entity. I'm reasonably sure that's illegal but it's only really illegal if there are consequences (see Wagner Group before they rebelled).
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you do realise Palestine is not allowed to have an army don't you?
 
HS2 is a prime example of the tories inability to think and plan strategically, and hence their inherent unsuitability for national government.

When sunak says the cost benefits for hs2 have completely changed he’s quite right. Inefficient management of the hs2 programme is admittedly a significant contributory factor. But the biggest factor was scrapping of connection to HS1, then scrapping of ph2be, and now scrapping of ph2bw

The northern part of hs2 was the primary driver of the economic benefits built into the business case for the programme as a whole.

Which is why the programme should have started with the northern leg.
 
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Crab.C.Nesbitt said:
HS2 is a prime example of the tories inability to think and plan strategically, and hence their inherent unsuitability for national government.

When sunak says the cost benefits for hs2 have completely changed he’s quite right. Inefficient management of the hs2 programme is admittedly a significant contributory factor. But the biggest factor was scrapping of connection to HS1, then scrapping of ph2be, and now scrapping of ph2bw

The northern part of hs2 was the primary driver of the economic benefits built into the business case for the programme as a whole.

Which is why the programme should have started with the northern leg.
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I think the largest change, by far, is the fact that people and businesses are more comfortable with working from home.

The real planning failure up front was not properly understanding what people want from rail travel when they do need it. If I'm commuting or heading to a meeting, I'd prefer a 2hr journey with a decent data connection the whole way than a 1hr journey with the current network status along railway tracks. A table, power socket, connection, privacy and enough quiet to concentrate are far more valuable than shaving a bit of time.

They also need far more parking at stations to make rail travel usable for many.
 
scaramanga said:
I think the largest change, by far, is the fact that people and businesses are more comfortable with working from home.

The real planning failure up front was not properly understanding what people want from rail travel when they do need it. If I'm commuting or heading to a meeting, I'd prefer a 2hr journey with a decent data connection the whole way than a 1hr journey with the current network status along railway tracks. A table, power socket, connection, privacy and enough quiet to concentrate are far more valuable than shaving a bit of time.

They also need far more parking at stations to make rail travel usable for many.
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A lot of valid points there but i think the impact of home working is significantly overstated.
Anecdotally when I travel to work on local commuter trains they are rammed, and the office I work in which is all hot desking is normally fully booked.
It would be good to see some independent data on rail travel although I’m not sure where to look.
That being said I do work from home quite a lot myself!
I also think in the longer term transport network capacity will remain an issue due to population growth and further change in working practices although that should be caveated by uncertainty around the impact of the rise of ai in the work place.
 
Crab.C.Nesbitt said:
A lot of valid points there but i think the impact of home working is significantly overstated.
Anecdotally when I travel to work on local commuter trains they are rammed, and the office I work in which is all hot desking is normally fully booked.
It would be good to see some independent data on rail travel although I’m not sure where to look.
That being said I do work from home quite a lot myself!
I also think in the longer term transport network capacity will remain an issue due to population growth and further change in working practices although that should be caveated by uncertainty around the impact of the rise of ai in the work place.
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Are there as many trains running as before? I don't use rail travel nearly enough to know, but I'd assume any rail company would want to only run enough trains so that every one was full .
 
I think the bigger issue is that high speed rail should have been built in the 80s like in Japan and France. The technology is getting on for obsolete now - public self driving cars will mean there's no use for rail in 10-15 years (maybe just for freight). Why would anyone need transport hubs anymore, when they'll be able to be chauffeured door-to-door?
 
Crab.C.Nesbitt said:
HS2 is a prime example of the tories inability to think and plan strategically, and hence their inherent unsuitability for national government.

When sunak says the cost benefits for hs2 have completely changed he’s quite right. Inefficient management of the hs2 programme is admittedly a significant contributory factor. But the biggest factor was scrapping of connection to HS1, then scrapping of ph2be, and now scrapping of ph2bw

The northern part of hs2 was the primary driver of the economic benefits built into the business case for the programme as a whole.

Which is why the programme should have started with the northern leg.
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Watch the land get sold off to tory donors for cheap before labour get into power.
 
Rorschach said:
Watch the land get sold off to tory donors for cheap before labour get into power.
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If I was Starmer, next week I would announce that by Easter 2025 Labour will:
- Restart all HS2 work (including the Sheffield and Leeds leg)
- Reinstate the previous ban dates on new petrol and diesel cars and gas boilers
- Withdraw the Rosebank licence

Basically commit to reversing all of Sunak's scorched earth policies. It might be enough to bring down the government a year early.
 
Gutter Boy said:
If I was Starmer, next week I would announce that by Easter 2025 Labour will:
- Restart all HS2 work (including the Sheffield and Leeds leg)
- Reinstate the previous ban dates on new petrol and diesel cars and gas boilers
- Withdraw the Rosebank licence

Basically commit to reversing all of Sunak's scorched earth policies. It might be enough to bring down the government a year early.
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And compulsory purchase of any HS2 land paying a discounted price.
 
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