kevinjohnsonmbe

Only by degrees..... ??

I can agree with that..... seems eminently "fair." I will have to try and grab / post the news clip that I watched this morning if it's on iplayer or youtube. That wasn't the impression I took from the slightly confused and poorly thought out message that chummy was attempting to relay - which I interpreted as, business uses park, business pays for park upkeep. There didn't appear to be any relation between impact of the use and the cost of the licence, rather just a fairly clumsy reference to "we're too skint to look after the trees, who can we fleece...." That was just my interpretation - I may have been pre-caffeine, pre-breakfast grumpy old bastard mind....

I'm more inclined to think they all do rather than restricting my contempt only to those that hold an opposing political ideology..... Maybe's we're better off restricting ourselves to topics that we can agree on...?

Or, grass cutting and leaf collection are out dated, unnecessary, costly and potentially inappropriate actions which, by their very nature, incur (financial and environmental) "costs" which are poorly considered.....?

Interesting, was it exclusive to Tory councils?

Yes, quite so! I remember the news, don't know how it panned out though... I'll have a look at that. Good call!

Will be tuned in and watching Ti

That's exactly what I was wondering....!

I can relate to that.... and whilst not in favour of over-regulation, I guess by-laws could be an appropriate means to enforce - "no balls games, no skating" etc are not uncommon signs. Similar to Mark, I've got some reading regarding Commons to do. We have registered common land in the parish which has historic grazing rights and a Commoners Association, but due to a bit of awkwardness dealing with the land owner and the demise of free range grazing by those with the rights, the areas are suffering* / benefitting* from a degree of re-wilding with a dominance of Gorse. * depending upon your view of such situations.....?

It's boring.... But some of the potential issues are expanded in this vid:

Agree with both of you! Of a fashion (no buts!!!!) Regarding the gig economy, and I know you'll appreciate this Mr E, I regard the biggest 'pain' from lower tax receipts into the exchequer to be generated from big industry (BBC, Google, Uber, UPS, Amazon etc) rather than SMEs who I think of as industrious, minor entrepreneurs who, even combined, would come nowhere near the negative impact on tax revenue as the big hitters. A quick diversion - even the MoD is in on the scam arriving late to the party in typical civil service fashion. Mrs J having resigned, is now recruited back as a consultant under, wait for it, IR35 Off-payroll working through an intermediary scheme. That's right! It's a recognised and endorsed HMRC method of outsourcing workers to self employed status so as to reduce capitation rates for the employer and simultaneously reduce tax take to the exchequer. Who'd have thunk it? Appreciated the opportunity to rage at HMRC last night by the way Pot and window scenario.... Yeah, they keep saying it whilst constantly p*ssing what they do get up the wall (local, regional and national level.) I'll have to listen to the Ward councillor dribbling on about Cornwall council's financial woes on Wednesday night. He can stand-by, got a few left hooks lined up for him! I can't digest sob stories whilst I'm seeing unrestricted waste and incompetence. The NHS is another case in point, we have a constant tirade of sob stories and blaming the lack of money but some of the stories of financial mismanagement and misappropriation are truly staggering. Regardless of the individual ideological stand (some may think Trident inappropriate, just as others might think foreign aid inappropriate - equal measure to all for purpose of this anti tax rant) Stop the waste before trying to dig in my pocket. Government funding for parks, agree Mark. That's where it all seems to be going wrong, there should be government funding for so many things - libraries, schools, police, NHS, social care. The list is almost endless, the available funds (within budget) however are not. Tories bad for attempting to stay within budget Labour good for spending beyond budget How do we sort that out? I'm part way through trying to digest the latest 25 year environmental plan: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/25-year-environment-plan Will be interesting to see what (if anything) that changes. As you mention, 'policing' the licensing of business use of parks - really difficult which is why I'm sceptical that any net £ gain would be achieved. If we're to believe that LAs have had staff cut to the bone, it would be reasonable to assume that this function could not be added to an already overstretched staff terms of reference - so there must be a new staff role. If there's a new staff role there'll be costs attached. Will that cost be exceeded by at least double, gusting treble, the cost of doing it? If not, it makes little business sense to do it and will be interpreted (certainly by me) as just another admin / finance burden being placed upon those that are at least 'having a go' at making a crust. Nothing to desperately disagree with in either of your posts

Liverpool City Council propose charging for Park use, not recreational use, but where a business (apparently this has exploded with the growth of the gig economy) utilises the public open green spaces for business purposes eg. contract dog walking, personal/group trainer, artist classes, professional photography to name but a few...... (Coincidentally there there are some youtube vids I watched recently of this process in effect in the States, it didn't really go that smoothly....) Chummy from LCC (Steve Mundy) on the news this morning actually said "...we'll have to suck it and see..." [if it is workable / viable......] Hardly instils the highest level of confidence in the financial and strategic management of a 2016/17 audited revenue budget of £417m, and oddly, the term "suck it and see" doesn't appear to feature anywhere in the Statement of Accounts 2016/17? There's lots of high sounding management speak but no reference to "suck it and see." Odd? Interested in people's thoughts on this. Should those that make a profit or deliver a business function by utilising public parks be expected to contribute to their upkeep? A couple of quick calc's and thoughts which follow on from Mr Mundy's rather poor performance on national TV this morning: He suggested something like, maybe £150/pa licence for a small operation (maybe like a dog walker / personal trainer) £300 to land a helicopter, and much more for a concert. It was all a bit sketchy which is probably where the suck it and see strategy(?) came from.... Run those possibilities through the 'reality check calculator'.... Assume, in order to administer licensing, police and enforce the requirement, there would be the equivalent of 1 person's work per year. Assume, that person would have a salary of £25k and a public sector capitation rate +/- £33.3k Assume it was only SME/ sole traders that were operating in the park (the number of helicopter landings and large concerts would be easy to calculate from record after all since I would imagine they are not every day occurrences) they would need to "sell" 220 SME/Sole Trader licences a year just to break even! Call me Mr Picky, but I would have hoped that before such a scheme was considered there would have been some data to support the supposition that they even have 220 businesses operating in the park in the first place. If not, then this is just a blatant example of the "system" creating a "requirement" for no other reason than a lame attempt to justify it's own existence - the classic self licking lollipop! If he'd fronted up and said "...we can generate X amount of net income from this (and it will be ring-fenced into this cost-centre) because there are Y number of operators and our cost to deliver would be Z..." I could possibly see the potential to generate funds which could contribute to the management, maintenance and progressive development costs for valuable public resource (the parks)..." Although, fundamentally, why 'business' should be shouldered with the burden of another tax I would probably struggle to reconcile.....

Love it!! My next letter to them will be along the lines of: You have had X period of time to resolve the discrepancies I have highlighted to you, on the basis that you are unable / unwilling to do so, I shall make my own calculations for 18/19 (and any subsequent years) and set aside anything that I think due which you may request on supply of satisfactory resolution of the outstanding discrepancies. Until then, I will not subscribe to your services.... F*ckyou very much, yours, blah, blah.....

You're conflating 2 separate issues Mucker.... Imposed "diversity" has occurred as a consequence of poorly conceived strategic policy and can be shown, empirically, to be a failed concept at the level and intensity that has been endured. Home grown terrorism could, perhaps, be argued to be a consequence of parts of that failed strategy of uncontrolled immigration - whilst recognising that there are examples of what might be described as less disastrous outcomes. Some degree of 'movement of people' can be shown to be beneficial economically, socially and morally. The argument for economic need is predicated upon the blind obsession with 'growth' - which will be our ultimate demise. Social and moral justifications must be balanced by the acknowledgement that the absence of such balance will be disastrous since it will lead to the type of upheaval that benefits no-one. It cannot be denied that enclaves already exist, and are expanding, within the UK. This is NOT diversity, it is ethnic stove piping. Lessons need to be learnt from past successes and failures which have brought us to the situation we currently see. The obsessive refusal to acknowledge and discuss the disastrous implications of unmanaged migration by labelling it as "racism", has had it's day.... It won't wash anymore and we see the evidence of that throughout Europe. PS - Those ex-Brit ISIS characters, they shite all over the very values that the whiners now seek to bestow upon them and that they themselves will seek to claim as universal human rights... Doubtless calling in 100's of thousands of £'s worth of legal aid whilst pensioners die of the cold and decent people are eeking out an existence on the streets.... There would be very limited public sympathy for the likes of Brady or Bulger, personally, I place these characters in a similar category.

Barter is better than cash Mr E! Although covered in tax law under: As Viscount Simon noted, in Gold Coast Selection Trust Ltd v Humphrey [1948] 30TC209, at page 240: ‘..In my view the principle to be applied is the following. In cases such as this, when a trader in the course of his trade receives a new and valuable asset, not being money, as the result of sale or exchange, that asset, for the purpose of computing the annual profits or gains arising or accruing to him from his trade, should be valued as at the end of the accounting period in which it was received, even though it is neither realised nor realisable till later...’ Yeah, good luck with that Hector! PS.... All those examples you mention, and many more, are legitimate business expenses.... And THAT my friends, is why it is SO expensive to hire a pro....

Did you mean ‘last’ or ‘least’. ?? ?

Nooooooo....... Let it Diiiiiieeeeeeeee

If it's EN 397: 2012, it's allowed.....

Agreed! I can often spend almost as long watching the videos of a task as I do 'doing' the task. Incredibly useful for self analysis. It was a bit worrying (for your safety and financial well being) to see so many 'little' mistakes even over a fairly long time frame. What percentage, as a rough guestimate, would you say were afternoon as opposed to AM? I'm of the view that my little errors are more prevalent around the 14:00 mark, I'll allow myself 1, if a second one occurs I draw stumps and come out of the tree - come back another day.

Pair of muppets! I missed QT, and hadn’t had any wine (it was cider!) ?

It’s an unfortunate, but inevitable, acknowledgement that blunt, consistent, logical and honest delivery of uncomfortable truth is deeply upsetting for the strangely contradictory, apparently delicate, disposition of the loony Left who seem to want shout the loudest but feel mortally offended if anyone dares to shout back. ?

Waiting for Ticketmaster to list the event!!

More likely that you'd have 10,000 empty beer tins, human body parts and waste far and wide, a judicial inquiry on behalf of the HSE, an ASBO instigated by neighbour complaints, a couple of dozen missing persons reports and a set of traumatic experiences that would frighten Kim Jong-un.... But (there it is again!) it might be worth a punt....

Brilliant that you came back with a comprehensive reposte Martin As ever, here comes the “but”... But, I’m confused..... You say you’ve been through the mill with various trades, and, as a consequence, had a go at some things yourself (tree felling included - which ended badly), and you’ve been generally unhappy with some elements, and gone so far as court action..... And I can relate to all of that having also renovated an 1830s farmhouse from near dereliction. I feel you Bro! But the but is.... The biggest lesson from my journey was CHOOSE THE SERVICE PROVIDER WISELY! Sometimes £50, £100, £150/day cash for a casual labour type scenario is entirely appropriate, sometimes is just isn’t. The “I wouldn’t get out of bed for less than £100/day” quote seems to have made quite an impact upon you. But frankly, the ‘cost’ to an employer of providing a man (or woman) @ £100/day is close to 1 ½ times that so why would anyone bother to get out of bed, to get someone out of bed, to work for £100/day? That just leaves the option of ‘the man from the pub’ who will do it for £50-100 cash to top up thier Social (whilst undermining the very principles of the Welfare State so as to have more disposable cash to throw ale down their Gregory.) Take the cheap option and shoulder the responsibility of what happens if things go bad.... or Outsource the job AND the responsibility to someone that you can hold to account if things go bad.... Rarely is it possible to have both!